Follow us on social media:
Rhode Island
Rhode Island will be the winner if Justice Dept. drops its AI suit | Opinion
New study shows how Gen Z, millennial leaders use AI in the workplace
A new study shows that rising Gen Z and millennial workplace leaders are embracing artificial intelligence tools in their industries.
It is no secret that artificial intelligence ‒ technology that is streamlining everyday tasks to make them faster, safer and more efficient ‒ is the future. From detecting fraud in banking to personalizing recommendations on Netflix, to improving medical diagnoses, this tech is popping up everywhere. Between 2020 and 2024, AI models created by OpenAI ‒ the company that develops much of today’s AI technology ‒ were able to improve their score from 0% to 5% on a benchmark test that compares AI intelligence to human intelligence. Going from 5% to 76% took just a few months. With additional computational resources, that same model (OpenAI’s o3) scored an 88%. Whether the AI industry can keep up this breakneck pace of innovation is unclear, but even if all AI research stopped tomorrow, they are already powerful enough to transform the global economy.Rhode Island’s leaders have positioned our state well to reap its share of this global windfall. In May 2023, the state House of Representatives passed a resolution requesting that the Department of Administration and the Office of Information Technology evaluate the current use of AI and provide recommendations on expanding AI usage.
Nine months later, Gov. Dan McKee issued an executive order establishing an AI task force to assess AI’s risks and opportunities across various sectors, including business, education, health care and government.
The state Senate even created a new Committee on Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technology, which has championed a proactive approach to AI adoption as well as close collaboration with multi-state working groups to share best practices.
It’s difficult to overstate the impact AI will have in the coming years. How much more productive could we become? Estimates vary, but the consulting firm McKinsey suggests AI could add over $4 trillion to the world economy every year ‒ the equivalent of Japan’s entire GDP.
Unfortunately, over the last four years, the federal government seemed more interested in containing AI than unleashing it. Its actions have hurt Rhode Island tremendously. Then-President Joe Biden’s 2023 executive order on AI emphasized caution over innovation, and his fellow Democrats in Congress introduced a bill to ban AI-powered pricing algorithms that help landlords set rents. Biden’s Department of Justice also pursued prosecutions that seemed designed to have a chilling effect on AI adoption. For example, the DOJ is suing software company RealPage ‒ whose technology is popular in Rhode Island ‒ for selling rental pricing software to property managers. They’ve also targeted several hotels that use similar tools to price their rooms. Federal prosecutors claim that these AI systems enable price fixing and drive up costs for renters, but all they really do is analyze existing market conditions. In the case of the rental and hotel algorithm example, if the prices are high, it’s because the housing supply is too low. There’s nothing AI can do about that, and using the technology as a scapegoat won’t solve the problem.
While President Trump rescinded Biden’s AI executive order, all these AI cases remain on the Department of Justice’s docket and are discouraging innovators in the state from helping to advance the AI revolution that their state representatives have worked so hard to foster.
With the new president portraying himself as a champion of AI innovation, here’s hoping his new Justice Department will drop its campaign against pricing algorithms once the full leadership team ‒ including recently confirmed antitrust czar Gail Slater ‒ is fully operating.
Rhode Island is ready to embrace the AI revolution. As soon as the DOJ take its thumb off the scale, we’ll be free to do just that ‒ and to enjoy all the benefits it brings.
Glenn Loury is the Merton P. Stoltz Professor of the Social Sciences, professor of economics, and professor of public and international affairs at Brown University.
New East Bay Bike Path bridges are open and ready for bikes
What’s it like to ride over the new East Bay Bike Path bridges? We sent a reporter to try them out.
I’ve long thought bike paths are among Rhode Island’s premier attractions, up there with the beaches, the mansions and the bay.
We like to knock government, but credit where it’s due, the state has done an amazing job building out an incredible pedaling network.
It’s clearly a priority.
At least I thought it was.
But they’ve just dropped the ball on what should have been a beautiful new stretch.
The plan was to finish a mile-long connector from the East Providence end of the Henderson Bridge all the way to the East Bay Bike Path.
There was even $25 million set aside to get it done.
Except WPRI recently reported that it’s now been canceled.
The main fault lies with the Trump administration, which is no friend of bike paths, and moved to kill that $25 million.
But it gets complicated, as government funding always does.
To try to rescue that money, the state DOT reportedly worked with the administration to refunnel it into a road project. Specifically, the $25 million will now be spent helping upgrade the mile-long highway between the Henderson Bridge and North Broadway in East Providence, turning it into a more pleasant boulevard.
That totally sounds worthy.
But it’s insane to throw away the bike path plan.
Especially for a particular reason in this case.
They’d already put a ton of money into starting it.
When state planners designed the new Henderson Bridge between the East Side and East Providence, they included a bike path.
It’s a beauty – well protected from traffic by a barrier, a great asset for safely riding over the Seekonk River.
The plan was to continue it another mile or so along East Providence’s Waterfront Drive, ultimately connecting with the East Bay Bike Path, which runs all the way to Bristol. Which, by the way, is one of the nicest bike paths you’ll find anywhere.
But alas, that connector plan has been canceled.
So the expensive stretch over the Henderson Bridge to East Providence is now a bike path to nowhere. Once the bridge ends, the path on it continues a few hundred yards or so and then, just … ends.
Too bad.
We were so close.
Most of the stories on the issue have been about the complex negotiation to rescue the $25 million by rerouting it to that nearby highway-to-boulevard project. But I don’t want to get lost in the weeds of that bureaucratic process here because it loses sight of the heart of this story.
Which is that an amazing new addition to one of the nation’s best state bike path systems has just been scrapped.
You can knock the Rhode Island government for blowing a lot of things.
The PawSox.
The Washington Bridge.
But they’ve done great with bike paths.
And especially, linking many of them together.
Example: not too many years ago, Providence bikers had to risk dicey traffic on the East Side to get to the more pleasant paths in India Point Park and on the 195 bridge to the East Bay Path.
But the state fixed that by adding an amazing connector that starts behind the Salvation Army building and beautifully winds along the water of the Seekonk River for a mile or so.
That makes a huge difference – and no doubt has avoided some bike-car accidents.
We were close to a comparable stretch on the other side of the river – that’s what the $25 million would have done.
But it’s now apparently dead.
Online commenters aren’t happy about it.
On a Reddit string, “Toadscoper” accused the state of being “complicit” with the feds in rerouting the money from bikes to cars.
And there was this fascinating post from FineLobster 5322, who apparently is a disappointed planner who worked on the project: “Mind you money has already been spent on phase one so rejecting it at this point is wasting money and also against the public interest … but what do I know? I only worked on the project as an engineer … I didn’t get into this to build more highways. I do it … to give back to communities and give them more access to their environment.”
Wow. One can imagine the state planning team is devastated. That’s not a small consideration. Good people go into government to make life better in Rhode Island, and it’s a bad play to take the spirit out of the job by first assigning a great human-scale project and then, after a ton of work, trashing it.
A poster named Homosapiens simply said, “We just accept this?”
Hopefully not.
The first stretch of the path over the Henderson Bridge is done, money already sunk.
What a shame to leave that as a path to nowhere.
It doesn’t have to happen.
Between Governor McKee and our Washington delegation, there’s got to be a way to get this done.
There’s got to be.
mpatinki@providencejournal.com
WARWICK, R.I. (WPRI) — Two people are dead and another person seriously hurt after a crash involving two vehicles on the highway in Warwick Saturday.
Rhode Island State Police said the crash happened around 1:34 p.m. on the ramp from Route 113 West to I-95 South.
According to police, a Hyundai SUV that was driving in the middle lane of the highway started to drift to the right, crossed the first lane, and then crossed onto the on-ramp lane. The car struck the guardrail twice before driving through the grass median.
The Hyundai then struck the driver’s side of a Mercedes SUV that was on the ramp, causing the Mercedes to roll over and come to a rest. The impact sent the Hyundai over the guardrail and down an embankment.
The driver of the Hyundai, a 73-year-old man, and his passenger, a 69-year-old woman, were both pronounced dead at the hospital.
A woman who was in the Mercedes was rushed to Rhode Island Hospital in critical condition.
State police said all lanes of traffic were reopened by 4:30 p.m.
The investigation remains ongoing.
Download the WPRI 12 and Pinpoint Weather 12 apps to get breaking news and weather alerts.
Watch 12 News Now on WPRI.com or with the free WPRI 12+ TV app.
A federal judge on Friday tossed the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) lawsuit aiming to force Rhode Island to hand over its voter information as part of the Trump administration’s push to acquire voter data from several states.
Rhode Island U.S. District Court Judge Mary McElroy wrote that federal law does not allow the DOJ “to conduct the kind of fishing expedition it seeks here,” siding with Rhode Island election officials. She added that the DOJ did not provide evidence to suggest that Rhode Island violated election law.
McElroy, a Trump appointee, wrote that she sided with the similar decision in Oregon. That decision ruled that the DOJ was not entitled to unredacted voter registration lists.
“Absent from the demand are any factual allegations suggesting that Rhode Island may be violating the list maintenance requirements,” she said in her ruling.
Rhode Island Secretary of State Gregg Amore (D) praised McElroy’s decision. He said in a statement that the Trump administration “seems to have no problem taking actions that are clear Constitutional overreaches, regularly meddling in responsibilities that are the rights of the states.”
“Today’s decision affirms our position: the United States Department of Justice has no legal right to – or need for – the personally-identifiable information in our voter file,” he said. “Voter list maintenance is a responsibility entrusted to the states, and I remain confident in the steps we take here in Rhode Island to keep our list as accurate as possible.”
The Hill reached out to the DOJ for comment.
The DOJ called for the voter lists as it investigated Rhode Island’s compliance with the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which allowed Americans to register to vote when they apply for a driver’s license.
The DOJ sued at least 30 states, as well as Washington, D.C., in December demanding their respective voter data. This data includes birth dates, names and partial Social Security numbers.
At least 12 states have given or said they will give the DOJ their voter registration lists, according to a tracker operated by the Brennan Center for Justice.
The department stated after it lost a similar suit against Massachusetts earlier this month that it had “sweeping powers” to access the voter data and that, if states fail to comply, courts have a “limited, albeit vital, role” in directing election officers on behalf of the administration to produce the records. The DOJ cited the Civil Rights Act as being intended to unearth alleged election law violations.
Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
-
Lifestyle3 minutes agoPhotos: How overfishing in Southeast Asia is an ecological and human crisis
-
Technology15 minutes agoBlue Origin successfully reused its New Glenn rocket
-
World21 minutes agoDistress call captures tanker under fire, Iran shuts Hormuz trapping thousands of sailors
-
Politics27 minutes agoTrump ally diGenova tapped to lead DOJ probe into Brennan over Russia probe origins
-
Health33 minutes agoExperts reveal why ‘nonnamaxxing’ trend may improve mental, physical health
-
Sports39 minutes ago‘Demon’ Finn Balor settles score with Dominik Mysterio at WrestleMania 42
-
Technology45 minutes agoiPhone and Samsung flashlight tricks you should know
-
Business51 minutes agoDavid Ellison hits CinemaCon, vowing to make more movies with Paramount-Warner Bros.