John Chu
295.6K posts
@john_chu
The writer who won the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Awards. Not the movie director. (He/him/his) Mastodon: @[email protected] Bluesky: @johnchu.bsky.social
It is totally dumbfounding that Bezos and co. managed to botch up a news company in THIS news climate.
BREAKING NEWS: Trump Family Took Secret Hundreds of Millions From UAE as U.S. Approved Banned AI Tech New reporting confirms a staggering corruption scandal at the highest level of the U.S. government. Just days before Donald Trump’s 2025 inauguration, a firm backed by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed, a UAE royal and national security chief, secretly paid at least $187 million to Trump family entities and $31 million to the family of Trump’s top Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, through a private cryptocurrency deal that was never disclosed to the public. Within months, the Trump administration reversed U.S. national security policy and approved the export of billions of dollars’ worth of advanced AI chips to the UAE—technology the Biden administration had explicitly blocked over fears it could be diverted to China. The sequence is now clear and documented: * January 2025: UAE-backed firm signs a $500 million deal for a 49% stake in Trump-linked crypto company World Liberty Financial. * Immediate payouts: $187M to Trump family, $31M to Witkoff family. * Spring–Fall 2025: Trump White House greenlights massive AI chip sales to the UAE after years of refusal by prior administrations. * Experts respond: Ethics lawyers call it a likely violation of the Constitution’s Foreign Emoluments Clause and warn it “looks like a bribe.” No Republican lawmaker has called for an investigation. The Justice Department has announced no enforcement action. The White House denies any conflict, despite the money flowing first and the national security concessions following. Democratic senators are calling it “mind-blowing corruption” and an unprecedented case of a sitting president’s family profiting directly from a foreign government while shaping U.S. policy in that government’s favor. The bottom line is brutal and unavoidable: A foreign government secretly paid Trump’s family hundreds of millions of dollars, and then received national-security-sensitive technology it had previously been denied. That is not normal politics. That is not “America First.” That is corruption in plain sight. Sources: [1] CNN, Feb. 1, 2026. Trump family crypto firm received secret UAE investment tied to Sheikh Tahnoon. cnn.com/2026/02/01/pol… [2] Wall Street Journal, Jan. 31, 2026. UAE spy chief quietly took stake in Trump-linked crypto firm days before inauguration. wsj.com/politics/polic… [3] Yahoo News, Feb. 1, 2026. Trump sold stake in crypto company to UAE-backed firm in private deal. yahoo.com/news/articles/… [4] CNBC, Feb. 1, 2026. U.S. approved advanced AI chip sales to UAE after Trump took office. cnbc.com/2026/02/01/spy… [5] Reuters, May 16, 2025. U.S., UAE agree path for Abu Dhabi to buy most advanced AI chips. reuters.com/world/china/ua… [6] Reuters, Oct. 9, 2025. U.S. approves billions in Nvidia AI chip exports to UAE. reuters.com/technology/us-… [7] New York Times, Feb. 1, 2026. Trump family’s crypto venture deepens foreign entanglements. nytimes.com/2026/02/01/us/… [8] The Nation, Feb. 2026. Trump’s UAE crypto deal looks like an emoluments violation, experts say. thenation.com/article/politi… [9] Japan Times, Feb. 2, 2026. Senators call Trump-UAE crypto deal “corruption, plain and simple.” japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/02/0… [10] Bloomberg, Oct. 9, 2025. U.S. greenlights Nvidia AI chip sales to UAE despite security concerns. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
Waking up without power, heat, or running water. (Again.) But the work here in Kyiv continues. Warming up in the car, writing in pencil — pen ink freezes — by headlamp. Despite how difficult this job can be, I am proud to be a foreign correspondent at The Washington Post.
BREAKING Star Tribune: Eight additional federal prosecutors are in the process of leaving the Minnesota U.S. Attorney's Office, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the situation. The departures follow the mass exit of six veteran prosecutors who left the office last month. startribune.com/ice-raids-minn…
Difficult to overstate the gravity of the Mandelson affair. A cabinet minister, during a financial crisis, allegedly leaking highly-confidential and market-sensitive information to a mega-rich financier (and convicted paedophile) who had been personally bankrolling him, while also privately suggesting the CEO of a top investment bank 'threaten' his own chancellor in an effort to force a change of policy. Potentially one of the most serious scandals in British political history, surely?
BREAKING: The two federal immigration agents who fired on Minneapolis protester Alex Pretti are identified in government records as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez. propublica.org/article/alex-p…
DEI causes me to feel fatigue. "Diversity," "equity," and "inclusion" aren't inherently bad; it's the distortion of the concepts in implementation that fatigues. Christopher Nolan casting a black woman as Helen of Troy in The Odyssey causes me to feel hostility. It is a deliberate assault on a treasure of Western Civilization. But the same thing applies on a lesser scale to the casting in Bridgerton. It's a distortion of a historical setting in the service of an ideology, and I find it offensive. OTOH, I'm old and grumpy.
#TomasLlorencGuarinoSabate is one of the skaters affected the additions copyright issues with the Olympic Games. His Short Program (The Minions) is no longer cleared.
The Justice Department is investigating Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey over alleged obstruction of law enforcement, a source told CNN. cnn.it/3LR4xFU
Trump: "I had a great meeting by a person who I have a lot of respect for. She has respect obviously for me and our country. And she gave me her Nobel Prize, but I'll tell you what -- I got to know her. I never met her before. And I was very very impressed. This is a fine woman."
