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Silicon Valley aghast at the Musk-Trump divorce

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Silicon Valley aghast at the Musk-Trump divorce

As Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s “bromance” broke apart on Thursday, tech industry figures who had backed both men raced to contain the fallout.

“Elon isn’t taking calls from anyone,” complained one Silicon Valley financier and major donor to Republican candidates. “Not from people who have billions invested in his companies . . . The Valley is losing their shit.”

At stake was an alliance between the tech world and the populist right that not only helped return Trump to office but also one that founders and investors had hoped would herald an era of tax cuts and deregulation, as well as an open door to crypto and artificial intelligence.

Musk’s role in the Trump administration had also paved the way for several Silicon Valley figures to take prominent positions in government — roles that could now be in peril. 

The sudden deselection of Jared Isaacman, a Musk ally and tech founder who had been nominated to lead Nasa, was just the start of an expected “purge”, one person close to the administration said, threatening tech’s hard-won influence in Washington.

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Jared Isaacman alongside the recovered first stage of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket © Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images

Some of those considered to be at risk were crypto and AI tsar David Sacks, policy adviser Sriram Krishnan, and Michael Grimes, Musk’s former banker at Morgan Stanley, now an official at the Department of Commerce.

As Musk’s relationship with the White House worsened, key figures on the tech right tried to play down the permanence of the rift. 

“USA is VERY lucky to have both E and Pres Trump,” Joe Lonsdale, a co-founder of Palantir and investor in Musk’s companies wrote on X. 

Hedge fund manager Bill Ackman urged the duo to “make peace for the benefit of our great country”, pleading: “We are much stronger together than apart.”

David Friedberg, a co-host of the All-In podcast that often features Musk and that has become a sounding board for the Trump-aligned tech world, suggested there was a broader cost to America from the spat between the US president and the Tesla boss. “China just won,” he posted.

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Behind the scenes, prominent Silicon Valley figures were desperately trying to prevent Musk from appearing on an emergency episode of the podcast, according to two people familiar with the matter, out of concern that the billionaire would make the dispute even worse and poison the relationship with tech’s most powerful ally in Washington, vice-president JD Vance.

“It’s going to be a disaster with Musk in this frame of mind,” one of the people warned. 

One of the podcast co-hosts, David Sacks, was “shell-shocked”, the second person added, and needed to be protected from public scrutiny until things calmed down. Sacks, usually a frequent poster on social media, has remained silent since the Musk-Trump relationship imploded. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

David Sacks
David Sacks is said to be ‘shell-shocked’ by the rift © Ian Maule/AFP/Getty Images

Elsewhere, other prominent tech figures debated whether reconciliation was possible and, if not, what life beyond the break-up would look like.   

Ryan Selkis, founder of a crypto platform who became a prominent Trump backer, told the Financial Times: “Elon will be back in the fold in a matter of weeks, but it will be a chastened Elon.”

Delian Asparouhov, a space tech founder who co-runs the Hill & Valley Forum, which links Silicon Valley and Washington, said: “I don’t think there is going to be a de-escalation here.” He expressed concern to tech news site TBPN that smaller space companies that work with Musk’s SpaceX could encounter “more resistance” from the White House.

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Others bemoaned the souring of the tech community’s Trump bet. “Maybe Silicon Valley got played by Trump. He got what he wanted,” said one West Coast venture capital founder, citing Musk’s $250mn donation to Trump’s campaign. 

The person lamented the ongoing economic volatility — caused by tariffs and Trump’s unpredictability — during a presidency that they had been promised would be a boon to business. “We’re all experiencing a liquidity crunch,” they said. “We need public markets to open.” 

Cracks in Silicon Valley and Washington’s marriage of convenience had been appearing for weeks, particularly over the Trump tax bill that so irked Musk. Deficit hawks balked at the legislation adding trillions to the US debt pile, while more socially progressive tech figures bridled at proposed cuts to entitlement programmes like Medicaid.

“I am fully for pursuing the elimination of waste and fraud,” said Jon McNeill, a former Tesla president who worked alongside Musk and now runs start-up incubator DVx Ventures. “But at the same time, I don’t want a tax break so badly as to make the most vulnerable suffer. And from what I’m hearing, a lot of my peers feel the same way.”

The public bust-up could now open the door for others in Silicon Valley to replace Musk as tech’s de facto ambassadors in Washington, especially his arch-rival, OpenAI’s Sam Altman. 

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“Tech is not represented by one person,” an investor in Musk’s companies said. “Engagement between tech and government is not because JD is a tech guy or because Trump is, it’s because tech is so important,” they added. “This doesn’t end because of one person, even if he’s the most prominent person in the world.”

Additional reporting by Alex Rogers in Washington

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Manhattan Building’s Columns Buckled Beneath New Addition, Images Show

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Manhattan Building’s Columns Buckled Beneath New Addition, Images Show

At least two structural columns buckled and failed in a 37-story office tower in Midtown Manhattan on Tuesday, prompting evacuations of nearby streets and buildings. While city officials asserted that the tower was in no danger of collapsing completely, outside engineers said further failures in the structure could not be ruled out.

A pair of columns that failed completely were part of the tower’s existing structure. A New York Times review of images and videos from inside the building has found that several floors were added atop these columns.

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City officials said in a news conference on Tuesday that the building was continuing to move, while they simultaneously assured the city that the building would not suffer “total collapse.” “The way this building is constructed, it’s a steel-frame building,” John Esposito, a chief in the Fire Department in New York, said at the afternoon news conference. “So, it would not be a total collapse. It would be more of a localized collapse.” Still, he said, “that remains our concern, that it’s moved.”

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Engineers said that the movement itself was cause for concern. In a properly designed steel building, they said, loads should redistribute quickly to surviving structural supports if columns failed.

Joe DiPompeo, a former president of the Structural Engineering Institute at the American Society of Civil Engineers, said that if the structure had been overloaded, he would expect any movement “to happen very quickly,” rather than gradually.

“Generally when a column buckles, it’s a sudden failure,” Mr. DiPompeo said. He said that a full collapse remained unlikely given the redundancies built into the building codes.

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Engineers often refer to the most dangerous possibility as a progressive collapse, a process in which structures near the initial failure become overstressed and also fail, potentially bringing down the building if the sequence continues. While unlikely, it cannot be ruled out, Mr. DiPompeo said.

Footage recorded from inside the building shows at least two structural columns appear to have failed completely, Mr. DiPompeo said. Other nonstructural, interior walls — or at least the metal “studs” that were in place to hold them up — also appear to have deformed.

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“The only way that really happens is if the floor above them dropped. It looks like the floor above could have dropped a foot or two, which is obviously not a good situation,” Mr. DiPompeo said.

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Image from @fernando40tiktok.commarc via Storyful

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Image from @Bogs4NY via X

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The 37-story building is in the process of being converted from office space into residential units. Four new floors and a large vertical portion were added onto the existing building in recent months. The vertical portion consists of a stack of over a dozen new floors cantilevered out over the existing building below.

Engineers said that there was nothing inherently wrong with adding residential floors or the cantilevered section above the columns that failed, as long as the original structure and the modifications had properly accounted for the added weight and wind loads.

“The cantilever alone doesn’t change anything,” Mr. DiPompeo said, but it does put additional load on the columns underneath — a factor that should have been reflected in the design.

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Nathan Berman, managing principal and founder of MetroLoft, the developer overseeing the conversion, said on Tuesday that “this incident is nothing more than a typical construction mishap.”

He said two columns near the northwest corner of the tower had bent under the weight of additions to the building above, most likely because those columns had not been properly reinforced, though he said an investigation would determine the cause. The rest of the columns, he said, “picked up the weight.” He estimated the affected floors above the failed columns had sagged by a maximum of four inches.

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Mr. Berman said that he expected the problems to be fixed and the project to be completed with, at most, a slight delay.

On Tuesday evening, installation of temporary shoring was set to begin shortly, in order to help stabilize the 20th and 21st floors of the building.

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DOJ warns of criminal charges for state election officials if noncitizens vote

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DOJ warns of criminal charges for state election officials if noncitizens vote

The Justice Department sent letters warning election officials in all 50 states and the District of Columbia that they could face criminal prosecution over noncitizen voting, a spokesperson for the Justice Department confirmed Tuesday.

The letters, signed by Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who heads up the department’s Civil Rights Division, give states five days to explain how they will comply with federal voter eligibility laws and how they will maintain “clean voter lists.”

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“The Department sent these letters to all 50 states and the District of Columbia, asking for voluntary compliance in a timely manner with their obligations under federal law to ensure only citizens vote in federal elections,” a Justice Department spokesperson said in a statement.

Noncitizen voting in federal elections is extremely rare, but Trump and his administration have falsely portrayed it as a widespread issue.

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, Nevada Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar and Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson are among those who said they received the letters from the Justice Department.

The letters say state election officers “could be criminally prosecuted for aiding and abetting” noncitizen voting. They further specify that any election officer who knowingly retains noncitizens on a statewide voting registration list or who facilitates noncitizens’ receiving and casting ballots could be subject to criminal liability.

“An intentional act that is aimed at diluting the votes of citizens could also constitute a violation” of federal law, the letters said.

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Henderson wrote on social media that the threats constitute “truly bizarre behavior.”

“Got another love letter this morning from the DOJ sprinkled throughout with threats of criminal prosecution,” she wrote. “I’m sure I’m not the only chief election officer of a state who is being targeted for following state and federal laws by resisting DOJ’s demands for private voter data that have thus far been ruled illegal by at least a dozen courts.”

The letters are the latest move in the Justice Department’s campaign to assert more federal control over state elections.

While some states have complied with the administration’s demands that they hand over voter roll data, the Justice Department has sued 30 states and Washington, D.C., for resisting. So far, 11 different federal courts have dismissed the Justice Department’s efforts to seize voter rolls.

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Reigning champion Argentina escapes with remarkable World Cup victory over Egypt

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Reigning champion Argentina escapes with remarkable World Cup victory over Egypt

Lionel Messi #10 of Argentina celebrates scoring his team’s second goal during their World Cup match against Egypt in Atlanta on Tuesday.

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They looked beaten. And out. Argentina, the defending World Cup champion and No. 1-ranked team, was down 2-0 late against Egypt.

Then, in a span of 13 remarkable minutes, Argentina scored not once, not twice, but three times, capping a comeback for the ages and leaving Egypt stunned and shellshocked.

For much of the game in Atlanta, Egypt was in control, hobbling Argentina early. The Egyptian attack began almost immediately with a stunning header goal delivered by Yasser Ibrahim in the 15th minute. After that, Egypt’s defense closed ranks, making it practically impossible for Argentina to equalize.

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It was downhill from there for the Argentines: team captain Lionel Messi failed to convert a penalty kick, and in the 67th minute, Egypt got a second goal from Mostafa Ziko (after an earlier Egyptian goal had been disallowed after a video review). It looked like Argentina was finished. On the brink of elimination.

But no one told the Argentine players that.

In the 79th minute, Lionel Messi began doing his thing. He fired a cross near the Egyptian goal, and Cristian Romero headed it in. Messi was not done. Four minutes later, he powered a shot past the Egyptian keeper. It was his eighth goal of this tournament, the most of any player. The score was 2-2.

Then, in stoppage time, yet another Argentina header and another goal, this time from Enzo Fernandez.

“This is the World Cup for you,” said Messi after the game. “It wasn’t easy to come back from two goals down. But as I always say, this group never gives up. We always try to fight until the end.”

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French referee François Letexier speaks with Egypt forward Mohamed Salah during the World Cup Round of 16 match between Argentina and Egypt in Atlanta.

French referee François Letexier speaks with Egypt forward Mohamed Salah during the World Cup Round of 16 match between Argentina and Egypt in Atlanta.

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Afterward, Egypt coach Hossam Hassan complained about the French referee and the officiating. “I am not convinced. I am not convinced with this outcome. I’m not convinced with the way things unfolded during this match,” said Hassan in a post-match news conference. “We have been treated unfairly today. We have suffered injustice.”

“We would have deserved to earn this win, but we are leaving with honor, with pride, regardless of this defeat,” said Hossan.

African soccer teams have been the stars of this World Cup. Morocco has yet to lose a game. Cape Verde qualified for the first time in its history and stymied Spain, Uruguay and Saudi Arabia. Argentina barely beat them in a nail-biter of a match.

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