Trump Team Pauses New Student Visa Interviews as It Weighs Expanding Social Media Vetting

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A transgender TikToker, dressed in a blue leotard and pink Minnie Mouse ears, went on an angry rant after a waiter at a Disney World restaurant referred to him as “sir.” In response, the individual, who presents as a teenage girl, claimed the experience made him feel unsafe at Disney, a place often described as “the happiest place on Earth.”

“It makes me want to immediately, like, leave, because I no longer feel, like, safe here,” trans TikToker Lilly Contino said in a video posted to social media.

Contino was dining at Tiffins Restaurant in Disney’s Animal Kingdom Park when the waiter, while explaining the first course, addressed him as “sir.”

“Coconut bread from Thailand?” Contino asked, to which the server replied, “Yes, sir.”

(Read more from “Trump Team Pauses New Student Visa Interviews as It Weighs Expanding Social Media Vetting” HERE)

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New Student Visa Interviews on Hold as Trump’s Team Considers Broader Social Media Investigation

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The Trump administration is weighing requiring all foreign students applying to study in the United States to undergo social media vetting — a significant expansion of previous such efforts, according to a cable obtained by POLITICO.

In preparation for such required vetting, the administration is ordering U.S. Embassies and consular sections to pause scheduling new interviews for such student visa applicants, according to the cable, dated Tuesday and signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

If the administration carries out the plan, it could severely slow down student visa processing. It also could hurt many universities who rely heavily on foreign students to boost their financial coffers.

“Effective immediately, in preparation for an expansion of required social media screening and vetting, consular sections should not add any additional student or exchange visitor (F, M, and J) visa appointment capacity until further guidance is issued septel, which we anticipate in the coming days,” the cable states. (“Septel” is State Department shorthand for “separate telegram.”) (Read more from “New Student Visa Interviews on Hold as Trump’s Team Considers Broader Social Media Investigation” HERE)

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OpenAI CEO Whines to Congress About Pesky Regulations, Once More Insists the Tech’s Impact Will Be ‘As Big as the Internet, Maybe Bigger’

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OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman told senators that the artificial intelligence (AI) boom “will be at least as big as the internet, maybe bigger,” pressing Congress to clear bottlenecks in energy, chips, and regulation as the United States jockeys for global dominance in the technology race.

The testimony was extensive, but there was a consistent theme: AI is incredibly advanced, helping hundreds of millions, and it’s vital that America leads the AI race. “ChatGPT is used by more than 500 million people a week,” Altman said. He continued, “It’s now the fifth biggest website on the internet globally growing very quickly.” Given the sweeping and global nature of OpenAI’s products, it’s more than clear he is on to something with his bold prediction.

According to Altman, America is leading the AI race and he is proud of how his country is supporting those efforts. But in order for America to stay ahead, “investment in infrastructure is critical. I believe the next decade will be about abundant intelligence and abundant energy.”

At a three‑hour Senate Commerce Committee hearing on May 8, Altman appeared alongside Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) CEO Lisa Su, Microsoft (MSFT) vice‑chair Brad Smith, and CoreWeave (CRWV) co‑founder Michael Intrator. All four executives urged lawmakers to craft a single, “light‑touch” federal rulebook and accelerate permitting for power‑hungry data‑center projects.

Altman highlighted OpenAI’s Stargate super‑computing campus rising outside Abilene, Texas — a joint venture with Oracle (ORCL) expected to house 64,000 Nvidia (NVDA) GB200 GPUs by 2026 and draw roughly 200 megawatts in its first phase. But financing for the wider $100 billion national build‑out has slowed after fresh Trump‑era tariffs threatened to lift steel and server costs by up to 15%, according to investors briefed on the deal. (Read more from “OpenAI CEO Whines to Congress About Pesky Regulations, Once More Insists the Tech’s Impact Will Be ‘As Big as the Internet, Maybe Bigger’” HERE)

Disney’s ‘Star Wars’ Star Mark Hamill Calls Trump ‘Dictator, Presi-Dementia’ in Unhinged Bluesky Screed

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Disney’s Star Wars star Mark Hamill has had enough of President Donald Trump and let fly Sunday with a string of epithets on social media to signal his displeasure.

Taking to his Bluesky account, Hamill laid out the following (all in capitals, as you would expect) veering from calling Trump a “dictator” through to describing him as “presi-dementia.”

PRESI-DEMENTIA/CON-MANDER-IN-CHIEF/FATTY SHACK/AYATOLLAH COMPLAINI/TANNIBAL LECTER/SCAMMY DAVIS JR./RICH LITTLE HANDS/HIPPOPOTUS/OUR FONDLING FARTER/TRUMPELSTILTSKIN/HUNGRY HUNGRY HYPOCRITE/DICTATOR TOT/UNCLE SCAM/QUID PRO COMBOVER/MANGO MUSSOLINI/FRANCIS FORD GROPE-ALA/ALEXANDER SCAMILTON <the end>

[image or embed]

— Mark Hamill (@markhamillofficial.bsky.social) May 25, 2025 at 12:08 PM

Sneering and scorning Trump is nothing new for Hamill.

Last month he took it upon himself to apologize to Canada just as that country’s election saw Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberal Party claim a massive federal election victory, as Breitbart News reported.

“Dear Canada. Please accept our deepest apologies from all decent Americans embarrassed by the obnoxious trolling from our man-baby-in-chief who is lacking in both intelligence & any impulse-control whatsoever,” Hamill wrote on Bluesky. (Read more from “Disney’s ‘Star Wars’ Star Mark Hamill Calls Trump ‘Dictator, Presi-Dementia’ in Unhinged Bluesky Screed” HERE)

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‘How Does This Happen?’: Power Outages Hit Blue City On Holiday Weekend After Months Of Warnings

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New Orleans was plunged into darkness on Sunday afternoon when the region’s grid operator cut off power to reduce usage, a “last resort” measure to prevent a large-scale blackout, according to Nola.com, a local news outlet.

The Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), a major electrical grid operator, directed the energy company Entergy to reduce power with only three minutes’ notice to prevent a blackout, affecting nearly 100,000 customers, according to Nola.com. Power was fully restored after several hours, though concerns about the power grid’s reliability remain as President Donald Trump’s administration, energy policy experts and multiple North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) reports have signaled that MISO is at an elevated risk for blackouts due in part to phasing out coal-fired power plants.

“The forced outages were directed by MISO as a last resort, and done in order to prevent a more extensive, prolonged power outage that could severely affect the reliability of the power grid,” Entergy said in a Sunday statement.

“How does this happen?” New Orleans City Council member Joe Giarrusso told Nola.com. “There are lots of questions that need answering.”

Giarrusso and fellow New Orleans City Council member Helena Moreno said MISO warned Entergy of the outage just three minutes before turning off the power, though the reason for the short notice was unclear, according to Nola.com. The blackouts affected approximately 100,000 customers in and around New Orleans, according to 4WWL, a local CBS affiliate. (Read more from “‘How Does This Happen?’: Power Outages Hit Blue City On Holiday Weekend After Months Of Warnings” HERE)

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Turns Out There’s A Catch To California’s Rosy Population Stats

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California’s population is growing again, but not because Americans are moving in, according to The Wall Street Journal.

In 2024, nearly 240,000 Californians packed up and left the state, WSJ reported. The state’s population still rose by 0.6% overall because more than 361,000 immigrants arrived to take their place.

The exodus from the state is not a new phenomenon, as around 344,000 Californians left in 2023, while 292,000 international migrants arrived, the outlet reported.

About 56% of Californians have considered leaving the state due to the exorbitant cost of living, a 2024 Emerson College poll found. California’s median home price topped $900,000 in 2024 — well over double the national average — while utility and gas prices remain among the country’s highest.

The state’s population decreased for the first time in history in 2020, when over 477,000 Californians left, leading to the state losing a congressional seat. The population continued to decline until 2023, buoyed by an influx of international immigrants. (Read more from “Turns Out There’s A Catch To California’s Rosy Population Stats” HERE)

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Church Plans Homeless Shelter, so Government Responds With Plan to Confiscate the Property

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A church in Toms River, New Jersey, with plenty of space as it owns 10 acres of land, proposed building a 17-bed overnight shelter as a way to reach out to the needy and help the community.

So officials in the town retaliated with their own plan to confiscate the land and turn it into pickleball courts.

“It is clear that this is being done in retaliation for the church making an application for a homeless shelter,” Harvey York, the church’s lawyer, told Fox News.

Citing the constitutional standards regarding protections for freedom religion as well as the federal Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, he said, “I don’t know that you’ll find a lawyer who will say, ‘Oh, yeah, they have every right to do this; they’re going to win.'”

It is the Christ Episcopal Church that has found itself in the middle of the city’s bull’s-eye.

And York said while some residents are happy with the idea, “the majority” is shocked and dismayed.

(Read more from “Church Plans Homeless Shelter, so Government Responds With Plan to Confiscate the Property” HERE)

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GOP-Appointed University of Florida Trustees Vote on DEI Booster for President Today

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Trustees of Florida’s flagship public university vote today on whether to reverse their institution’s nascent success by selecting an identity-politics booster to replace former University of Florida President Ben Sasse.

Sasse’s UF presidency was key to the Florida legislature and Gov. Ron DeSantis’ efforts at reforming higher education away from leftist indoctrination and towards an academics-focused core curriculum. States including Utah, Texas, and Oklahoma have used Florida’s education reforms as a model for their own.

Yet UF trustees will vote Tuesday on a candidate to replace Sasse likely to undo all he and state lawmakers have accomplished to increase the university’s profile, improve its stewardship of public resources, lead the nation in education reform, and remove identity politics corruption. Although the university search committee promised it would “recommend a small number of highly qualified candidates to the UF Board of Trustees,” it ultimately only recommended one finalist, Santa Ono, whose professional record teems with identity politics activism.

On Saturday, journalist Chris Rufo posted a supercut of Ono’s public pledges of allegiance to race and sex discrimination throughout his career.

The Canadian-born Ono was president of the University of Cincinnati from 2012 to 2016, president of the University of British Columbia from 2016 to 2022, and then president of the University of Michigan from 2022 to May 2025. (Read more from “GOP-Appointed University of Florida Trustees Vote on DEI Booster for President Today” HERE)

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Star Business Professor Stripped of Tenure, Fired for Manipulating Data in Studies on Dishonesty

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A renowned Harvard University professor was stripped of her tenure and fired after an investigation found she fabricated data on multiple studies focused on dishonesty.

Francesca Gino, a celebrated behavioral scientist at Harvard Business School, was let go after the school’s top governing board determined she tweaked observations in four studies so that their findings boosted her hypotheses, GHB reported.

Harvard administrators notified business faculty that Gino was out of a job in a closed-door meeting this past week, the outlet reported.

Harvard did not detail the professor’s firing or tenure being stripped — citing it as a personnel matter — but told GHB that the school had not revoked a professor’s tenure in decades.

No professors have had their tenure revoked at Harvard since the 1940s, when the American Association of University Professors formalized termination rules, according to The Harvard Crimson. (Read more from “Star Business Professor Stripped of Tenure, Fired for Manipulating Data in Studies on Dishonesty” HERE)

Trump to Yank All Remaining Federal Funds to Harvard in Latest Blow to ‘Very Antisemitic’ Ivy League School

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The Trump administration is planning to cancel all remaining federal contracts with Harvard University — a day after the president said he was pulling $3 billion in grants from the “very antisemitic” Ivy League school.

The fresh cuts — worth roughly $100 million — are detailed in a memo that will be fired off to all federal agencies early Tuesday, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Post.

The letter, signed by the US General Services Administration, orders the agencies to start providing a list of contracts that will need to be canned.

It also instructs the agencies to “seek alternative vendors for future services where you had previously considered Harvard.”

The letter, in part, blames the move on Harvard’s inaction to crackdown on antisemitism on campus, as well as alleged “race discrimination” in its admission process. (Read more from “Trump to Yank All Remaining Federal Funds to Harvard in Latest Blow to ‘Very Antisemitic’ Ivy League School” HERE)

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