Calls for Nvidia probes, new chip export limits intensify

WASHINGTON — The resignation of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang on Thursday did little to quell bipartisan demands from Congress for an accounting of potential national security fallout from his affair with an alleged Chinese spy and talk of adding tougher chip export controls to the annual defense authorization bill.

Huang admitted on Sunday to having an affair, and reports say that it was with Alice Huang, an executive at Singaporean tech company and Nvidia customer Megaspeed, whom the U.S. government believes spied for China, according to recent reports. The New York Times and Reuters reported he also had affairs with two Nvidia employees.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., told reporters Thursday that he supports the Senate investigating Huang’s potential influence on U.S. artificial intelligence and chip policy.

“I think that it would make sense because of the… nature of the association… and the governments and the national security interests we were talking about here,” Thune said, though he said he thought it would be “wrong” to make assumptions about how close Huang’s relationship with President Donald Trump has been.

—CQ-Roll Call

NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani declines to back Schumer leadership bid amid Van Hollen challenge

NEW YORK — New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani declined to back Sen. Chuck Schumer’s bid for majority leader on Friday — coming after Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen announced a progressive challenge to the New York senator.

Van Hollen, a progressive Democrat, announced his challenge on Thursday, saying he was motivated by the results of the midterm elections: “The call was really to reject the status quo and to reject business as usual,” he said on MS NOW.

Mamdani and Schumer have many ideological differences, and the mayor has frequently spoken about a need to elevate populist, left-wing politics that prioritize “material improvements for the working class.”

“I care less about who it is, and I care more about what they do with that power,” Mamdani said at a Friday press conference in response to a question on whether Schumer and his more centrist politics were a fit for the leadership position.

—New York Daily News

Plastic waste in the Great Lakes could be coming from as far as 120 miles away, study shows

CHICAGO — For scientists working to keep plastic litter out of the environment, the idea might seem counterintuitive. Looking to follow the movement of water bottles and other floating throwaways, they tossed dozens of plastic smoothie shakers into rivers across the United States and Canada, including stretches of the Chicago River.

The researchers equipped each of the shakers with a small GPS device to track where they ended up. Computer modeling of the results suggests half of the plastic bottles washing into the Great Lakes and oceans every year come from at least 10 miles and up to 120 miles away, the scientists reported. In other words, far away from shoreline trash traps and volunteer beach cleanups that tend to be the focus of efforts to combat plastic pollution.

The study shows cities and towns upstream also have a role to play. “It shows a community’s actions can have a distant impact, even in places like the Midwest where we often consider ourselves landlocked,” said Tim Hoellein, a Loyola University biologist and one of the study’s authors.

Hoellein’s contribution included deploying smoothie shakers at several points in northern reaches of the Chicago River system, including the Middle Fork Savanna in Lake Forest, Glenview Woods and the Skokie River.

—Chicago Tribune

Pope Leo XIV's return to Peru thrills those who recall 'Padre Robert'

MEXICO CITY — While delivering his first speech as pope last year from the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica, Leo XIV paused, and then briefly switched from Italian to Spanish.

"A greeting to all," he said, smiling. "And in particular to my dear Diocese of Chiclayo, in Peru."

Before he was elevated to the highest earthly authority in the Catholic Church, Robert Francis Prevost, a 71-year-old Chicago native, spent two decades as a priest and bishop in Peru, where he mastered Spanish and became a naturalized citizen. He served from 2015 until 2023 as diocesan bishop of Chiclayo, a small city near the Pacific coast.

The pontiff returned to Peru this week for the final leg of a celebratory but politically charged Latin America tour, where Catholicism is in decline, eclipsed by the rise of evangelical Christian churches, and a new wave of right-wing politicians have come to power on platforms that often clash with Leo's teachings.

—Los Angeles Times