Happy Tuesday. Here’s your Tuesday Tech Drop, the week’s top stories from the intersection of technology and politics.
Scientists warn about Russell Vought plan
Monday marked the final day of the public comment period for the Trump administration’s widely decried proposal, pushed by Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought, to vet all public grants to ensure they promote “American values” rather than for projects that are “woke,” a term no one in the administration has shown an ability to define.
Tech Policy reported on a wave of opposition to the proposal from the scientific and academic communities, who warned that placing ideological litmus tests on scientific grants pose an existential threat to scientific and technological development in the United States.
Read more in Tech Policy here.
AGs move to scuttle proposed merger
A coalition of state attorneys general is suing in an effort to stop Paramount-Skydance from acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery. Writer Seth Stern explained why observers should be wary of Trump ally David Ellison’s company acquiring another massive media company as Trump seeks to wield control over the press.
Read his op-ed for MS NOW.
Chips for Trump family business partners
The Trump administration took steps Friday to make it easier to send valuable, American-made computer chips to MGX, a United Arab Emirates-backed firm that has invested in the Trump family’s cryptocurrency trading platform.
Read more on CNBC.
Brad Parscale aids Israel online
Former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale has been paid by Israel to steer a social media campaign targeting conservatives with pro-Israel messaging,“but neither the Trump Administration nor the Israelis appear happy about how it’s going,” according to the report in Time magazine.
Read more in Time.
Apple sues OpenAI
Apple threw down the gauntlet last week with a lawsuit accusing OpenAI of launching a coordinated effort to extract trade secrets from current and former Apple employees. In response, OpenAI said, “We have no interest in other companies’ trade secrets. We remain focused on building innovative technology that empowers people everywhere.”
Read more at TechCrunch.
Insecure administration
MS NOW host Rachel Maddow gave a great explanation of the Trump administration’s effort to target New York Times journalists who reported on security features that were apparently missing from the jet President Donald Trump accepted as a gift from the Qatari government and has hoped to use as his presidential plane.
Check it out here:
Ja’han Jones
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC
