US & Canada

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,

Nvidia loses more than $600bn in market value as CEO Jensen Huang steps down amid espionage and affair allegations.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has stepped down from the company following his reported affairs with a suspected Chinese spy and an Nvidia executive.

The $4.2 trillion tech giant has lost more than $600bn in market value this week as Huang’s scandals rocked the company, which supplies most of the chips powering advanced artificial intelligence (AI) technology. The stock slid more than 10 percent in premarket trading on Thursday.

The company appointed Colette Kress, Nvidia’s chief financial officer and executive vice president, as interim CEO on Thursday.

Nvidia’s board met on Wednesday night to discuss ousting Huang, whose relationship with the alleged Chinese spy triggered investigations by the FBI, the United States Congress and the California-based tech giant. Nvidia is also facing a shareholder class-action lawsuit.

The alleged Chinese intelligence asset, Alice Huang, is a former executive at Singapore-based Megaspeed, Nvidia’s primary business partner in Southeast Asia. Founded in 2023, Megaspeed has been investigated over whether it helped Chinese companies access its $4.8bn stock of powerful Nvidia chips.

The affair has raised national security concerns in the US, which restricts chip sales to China over concerns that the Chinese military, intelligence agencies or companies could use the advanced technology.

Huang, 63, is Nvidia’s co-founder, president and CEO. A close ally of United States President Donald Trump, he has pushed to ease US restrictions on chip exports to China. Trump said earlier this week that Huang told him he had “absolutely no idea” that he was in a relationship with an intelligence operative.

Huang owns about 3.6 percent of Nvidia’s stock, making him one of the richest people in the world. He is a powerful figure in the AI industry, which has driven record stock market and wider economic gains.

Nvidia’s board, which hired a law firm to investigate the affair with Alice Huang, met to decide Huang’s fate on Wednesday shortly after the New York Times reported that Huang also had an extramarital relationship with a Nvidia vice president who reports to him.

Nvidia’s stock has tumbled since the scandal erupted, falling to a 14-year low, the Reuters news agency reported.

Russian, Belarusian athletes and officials will be prevented from entering Canada regardless of their visa status.

Canada says it will prevent Russian athletes and officials from entering the country for ice hockey’s World Junior Championship in Alberta, effectively barring their participation weeks before the tournament begins.

Canada’s Secretary of State for Sport Adam van Koeverden said on Wednesday that Ottawa opposes Russian and Belarusian participation in international sport “as long as Russia continues its war of aggression against Ukraine with Belarus’s complicity”.

The minister for immigration, refugees and citizenship “will take measures to individually assess and prevent Russian and Belarusian athletes and officials from entering Canada to compete, regardless of whether they already hold valid visas”, Van Koeverden said.

Hockey Canada has previously said it supports the government’s position.

Late last month, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ordered the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) to admit Russian teams to five upcoming championships, beginning with the World Junior Championship.

The IIHF, which has barred Russia from most international competitions since Moscow’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, said it disagreed with the CAS decision.

The hockey federation’s statement followed announcements from Norway, Denmark, Sweden and the Czech Republic that ⁠⁠their national teams will refuse to play against Russia at next year’s men’s World Championships in Germany.

Latvia and Finland have also said their teams will not play Russia, while the Finnish city of Turku threatened to ⁠⁠drop its hosting duties for the 2028 World Junior Championship.

Belarus’s team will not participate in the championship following a separate decision by the IIHF.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has previously said Ottawa would not permit Russian athletes to compete for their country on Canadian soil, a statement some perceived as keeping the door open for their participation as neutrals.

Van Koeverden said Canada allowed neutral participation only by individual athletes, ruling out the option for the Russian team.

“Canada’s position is unequivocal: as long as Russia continues its war of aggression against Ukraine, there can be no return to business as usual,” he said. “Canada will continue to stand with Ukraine.”

The World Junior Championship runs from December 26 to January 5.

Doha, Qatar — Late one morning in March 1999, a United States B-52 bomber took off from RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire, headed southeast. Seven more jets followed, at two-minute intervals.

It was the start of the US-led NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, a campaign in which the Fairford base served as both a pivotal launchpad for American jets and as a fuel station for fighter planes. The British base had served a similar role during the Gulf War in 1991, and would do so again during the 2003 Iraq war and in the early stages of the US-Israeli war on Iran that began on February 28, 2026.

But in October, the US pulled all 12 of its B-1 Lancer bombers from the Gloucestershire base, amid fears that they were no longer safe there from a growing Iranian threat. Days earlier, British security forces had made several arrests, and the country’s government has accused Iran of being behind a plot to target the base — a charge Tehran has denied.

RAF Fairford is not alone. Earlier this month, the US withdrew a dozen planes from another British base, RAF Mildenhall. And in July, reports said that the US had relocated many of its military assets from its bases in the Gulf that were badly hit by Iran during the war, instead moving them to bases in Jordan, while also considering a proposal to shift them to Israel.

For decades, these bases have served as the sharp edge of the US military’s ability to project power and wage wars thousands of miles from home. For close allies, whether in Europe or the Gulf, they also worked as security guarantors against other threats.

But Iran’s ability to severely damage US facilities in the Middle East during the war, and pose a threat as far as the UK, has for the first time turned these critical strategic assets into potential liabilities, both for American allies and for the US itself, say analysts.

“The US security umbrella is becoming a double-edged sword,” Simon Mabon, a professor of international politics at Lancaster University, told Al Jazeera. “When the security of US bases is called into question, it changes Washington’s calculation of their strategic benefits. It also gives European and Gulf states reason to think seriously about the bases, given that they are becoming targets.”

How the Iran war changed the bargain

Hosting American bases has long been perceived as integral to how US allies, whether in Europe, the Gulf or East Asia, deter threats that they themselves face.

Former US President Barack Obama once spoke of an “ironclad commitment” to Gulf security, while Britain regularly invokes its so-called “special relationship” with the United States. In doing so, Britain and the Gulf have long cast themselves as willing partners to a power that — at least before current President Donald Trump — presented itself as the benevolent guarantor of its allies’ security.

But a spate of recent security incidents, many linked to the war on Iran, is testing that narrative and raising questions about whose interests these commitments serve, and whether hosting American forces could be bringing danger closer to home.

US prosecutors have charged three men they describe as Iranian-backed operatives over their alleged roles in plotting nearly 20 attacks across the United States and Europe, including on RAF Fairford.

Meanwhile, in the Gulf, Iran explicitly cited the presence of US bases as justification for targeting its neighbours, bombing Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Kuwait. Iran also bombed Oman, which does not have a permanent US base; and Jordan and Iraq, beyond the Gulf, which do host major US military facilities.

A report by the Pentagon’s watchdog released in September revealed that Iranian attacks damaged and destroyed hundreds of buildings and structures at US military installations in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman and Jordan in the first four months of the war.

At least five KC-135 aerial refuelling tankers were damaged when they were hit at the Prince Sultan airbase in Saudi Arabia. At least one of these airborne early-warning and control aircraft was damaged on the ground in a subsequent strike.

Experts say these incidents are sharpening a security dilemma for US allies in the Gulf and Europe. Hosting US forces can expose them to retaliation in a war they had no say in starting, while those same bases help defend some of those host countries from attacks, including by intercepting missiles and providing weapons transfers.

The war has disrupted flights and shipping, threatening the oil and gas exports on which much of the region depends. US President Donald Trump said on Monday that further military action against Iran was unnecessary for now. But the US naval blockade remains in place, and shipping through the Strait of Hormuz has yet to return to normal.

“While the utility of hosting foreign military bases has always involved a calculus of risk versus the assumed assurance it provides, the perception among Gulf Arab states is certainly shifting,” Mohammad Ali Shabani, a Middle East analyst, told Al Jazeera. “The vulnerability of these assets is increasingly front-of-mind for host governments, who have not sought war, yet have been drawn into it without having had any real say.”

The US calculation

Washington faces a dilemma of its own. Bases in Europe or the Middle East give it the reach to fight faraway wars, but their presence has also provided Iran with a litany of targets.

In March, an Iranian drone hit a hangar at a British base in Cyprus that the US also uses for intelligence and logistics operations. Tehran threatened Bulgaria after reports emerged that the Eastern European NATO nation had allowed the US to use its Bezmer airbase for refuelling of planes used to attack Iran. Weeks later, Bulgaria’s defence minister announced that the US air tankers had left Bezmer for good, with the country’s president declaring that the “mission is over,” bringing relief to the village that the base draws its name from.

And in the Middle East, several key bases used by US troops have been almost rendered unusable, with those in Kuwait suffering the heaviest damage, say analysts. An attack on the Port of Shuaiba killed six US service members and destroyed an army operations centre. Iranian drones and missiles damaged aviation facilities and injured personnel at Ali Al Salem airbase, while strikes on Camp Buehring damaged maintenance and refuelling facilities.

In Qatar, an Iranian strike damaged the early warning radar system at Al Udeid airbase, which houses the headquarters of US Central Command’s (CENTCOM) air operations. In Bahrain, an Iranian drone struck communications equipment at the headquarters of the US Fifth Fleet.

This damage raises a question about how much the US can still use these bases once they come under attack. Gerd Nonneman, a professor of international relations and Gulf studies at Georgetown University in Qatar, told Al Jazeera the war had shown that some bases were “themselves very vulnerable” and “unable to fulfil many of the tasks they were established for”.

Why bases are harder to defend

Mark Hilborne, a senior lecturer at the Defence Studies Department at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera “large bases are indeed becoming more easily targeted”.

“One of the technologies that has allowed this, alongside fairly cheap ballistic missiles, is drones,” he added.

Iran has invested heavily in developing cheap, domestically produced drones that inflict disproportionate damage to targets and exhaust far more expensive interceptor missiles.

Meanwhile in the UK, drones present US airbases with different challenges. While the nature of the reported threat to RAF Mildenhall remains unclear, the Fairford case concerns an alleged plot. “The range of actors who might target bases has changed,” Urban Coningham, a research fellow and course lead at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) in the UK, told Al Jazeera. “Bases are more vulnerable, and that changes the risk calculation.

“Anyone can manufacture a drone in a basement … People looking to create mischief or mayhem can recruit organised criminals, making attacks harder to attribute.”

All of that, he said, makes bases “more vulnerable, and that changes the risk calculation”.

‘Policy conundrum’

As Washington moves some military assets out of bases in the Gulf and Europe, it could also come to rely more heavily on Israel, its closest ally in the Middle East. Shabani said there were “already signs that CENTCOM is moving towards using Israel as a key forward base”.

Israel launched the war on Iran in February alongside the US. With the oil and gas exports on which Gulf economies depend at risk, keeping US forces nearby allows Washington to respond, but it also leaves those forces exposed to Iranian attacks.

“The longer-term solution is to work with partners and ensure that allied forces are ready to fend for themselves,” RUSI’s Coningham said.

“There is a debate within the US policy establishment, and the Iranians are referencing it and saying that as long as US forces are there, they are a target,” he said. “That is the policy conundrum for the US. Ultimately, they can’t see any alternative to having bases in some form.”

The meeting with Kushner and Witkoff comes after two days of trilateral talks in the UAE yielded no breakthrough.

United States envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff have ⁠arrived in ⁠Moscow for talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in their latest push for a peace deal ⁠in Ukraine.

Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s special envoy, met Kushner and Witkoff at their plane on Thursday morning and accompanied them to central Moscow.

The meeting comes on the heels of two days of trilateral peace talks in the United Arab Emirates that concluded in the capital, Abu Dhabi, on Wednesday with news of another planned major prisoner exchange but no breakthrough on ending the nearly five-year war.

The US said differences remained on major issues, including territory, but some progress had been made on post-war security guarantees.

Kyiv has strongly rejected Putin’s demands to surrender all of its eastern region of Donbas in ⁠return for peace.

The Abu Dhabi talks were the first direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine mediated by the US in nine months.

Al Jazeera’s Yulia Shapovalova, reporting from Moscow, said one of the goals of Thursday’s visit would be for the US team to persuade Putin to invite Europeans to the negotiation process.

“Ukraine and the US want the European partners to be involved while Moscow is adamant about talks without the Europeans, and that’s why they’ve been largely excluded from the process,” she said.

Shapovalova added that the US delegation would bring Putin an updated proposal for a peace plan and the presence of Dmitriev in the talks was an indication that they would address some of the more complex issues.

European leaders meet in Dublin

During the US-backed effort to revive talks, leaders from more than 40 European countries gathered in Dublin on Thursday for a summit focused on the continent’s security.

The meeting of the European Political Community (EPC) brought together heads of state and government from the European Union and other European countries, including the United Kingdom. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte also attended.

The EPC was established in 2022 as a forum for countries both inside and outside the 27-nation EU.

Zelenskyy and his European allies are expected to discuss this week’s talks in Abu Dhabi.

Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, and Witkoff are scheduled to meet Zelenskyy in Dublin on Friday after talking to Putin.

Audrey Macalpine, reporting from Kyiv, said Ukrainians do not believe the talks in Moscow will yield results. “Over the past two days, we saw just another prisoner exchange, which has been the case in previous talks,” the correspondent said.

“When it comes to the negotiations, not much has changed in terms of where these two sides stand,” Macalpine added. “Perhaps the biggest thing of note [in the talks] was that they took place at all.”

Meanwhile, French Minister Delegate for European Affairs Benjamin Haddad on Thursday ‌said the ⁠EU will approve more sanctions ⁠against Russia.

“On Monday, we will take new sanctions against ⁠Russia on 150 additional ⁠entities, 50 banks, and it’s ⁠France which proposed the ⁠bulk ⁠of the entities to add,” Haddad ‌told LCI television.

United States lawmakers are pushing for answers from Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang amid growing concerns over whether an affair he had compromised national security.

Huang, 63, has admitted to having extramarital relations during his time leading Nvidia, a major US tech firm. Media reports indicate the woman involved was Alice Huang, a former executive at Singapore-based tech company Megaspeed who is accused of working for Chinese intelligence.

As the scandal continues to grip Washington, Republican leaders of three committees in the House of Representatives have asked Huang to appear at a closed-door briefing to testify about the relationship.

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Brian Mast said he was prepared to subpoena Huang if he did not respond by the end of Wednesday.

According to The New York Times, US intelligence officials believe Alice Huang was recruited by Chinese intelligence to gather information about the Nvidia CEO and influence him to push for looser restrictions on chip sales to China.

In a statement on Sunday, Jensen Huang apologised to his family and Nvidia employees about the affair.

His company also launched an independent investigation, saying it had no reason to believe that “either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised”. Still, by Wednesday, media reports emerged that Nvidia was preparing to part ways with Huang over the controversy.

US President Donald Trump confirmed on Monday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was looking into the matter, but he has stood by Huang, calling him an “honourable guy”.

But the pressure on Huang intensified on Tuesday when Republican Senator Kevin Cramer called for him to resign.

“The potential for extortion is so tremendous that something as sensitive as Nvidia chips, I just think he’s got to go,” Cramer said in an interview with Politico.

But Huang, who co-founded Nvidia more than 30 years ago, has shown no signs of heeding that call.

Despite the company’s assurances, experts say the affair raises concerns about what information Alice Huang may have been privy to and what role the relationship may have played in the Nvidia CEO’s decisions.

What are the national security concerns surrounding Nvidia?

Nvidia’s advanced chips, which power much of today’s artificial intelligence, have put the company at the centre of the race for tech dominance between China and the US.

Since 2022, Washington has restricted sales of some of the most advanced chips to China over concerns that they could be used by the country’s military or intelligence agencies.

According to US intelligence officials cited by The New York Times, Alice Huang was tasked with getting Jensen Huang to lobby for looser restrictions on chip exports.

The Nvidia CEO had already been pushing for an easing of the rules, arguing that China’s domestic chip industry would get stronger without better access to US products.

But some experts say it is worth looking at how Alice Huang may have influenced decisions Nvidia made specifically about her former employer Megaspeed, which bought more than $4.8bn worth of Nvidia chips over the span of about two years.

Megaspeed has also been investigated over allegations that it helped Chinese companies get access to restricted chips. Megaspeed denies the allegation.

Ryan Fedasiuk, a fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation who studies Chinese technology and intelligence activities, pointed to reports from Bloomberg and The New York Times that Nvidia contacted the US Commerce Department about its investigation into Megaspeed.

He also noted that, in disclosures to the government, Nvidia appeared to vastly undercount the value of the chips it sold to the company.

“The question at hand is whether Nvidia took specific actions with respect to Megaspeed that it might not otherwise have done,” Fedasiuk told Al Jazeera, “possibly as a result of the personal relationship between the two executives.”

What sensitive information could have been a risk?

There are also questions about what sensitive information Alice Huang may have had access to through her relationship with Jensen Huang.

In an analysis published by the Council on Foreign Relations, a think tank, senior fellow Jessica Brandt pointed to information about how Nvidia designs its China-specific chips.

“Information about its conversations with policymakers could be helpful for anticipating where those controls and other policies are headed,” she said. “Understanding where it disagrees with government could expose fault lines to exploit. And that’s before we get into anything touching R&D [research and development].”

Fedasiuk raised similar concerns about what Alice Huang could have learned about Nvidia’s internal operations and plans for future products, as well as its customer base, which includes American and foreign tech companies.

He also pointed to Jensen Huang’s close ties to Trump and other senior White House officials.

“I have to wonder what kind of information about those people and about those relationships may have inadvertently made its way to Ms Huang or to Chinese intelligence,” he said.

So far, however, there is no publicly available evidence that Alice Huang got access to sensitive information from Nvidia or influenced Jensen Huang’s decisions. US intelligence also has not made public any evidence that Alice Huang was working for Chinese intelligence.

China has flatly denied the allegations of espionage.

“The claim of so-called ‘Chinese spies’ is completely groundless and is nothing but a smear campaign against China,” said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun on Monday.

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,

Chip giants stock price falls more than 8 percent amid speculation over co-founder’s position.

Chip giant Nvidia’s stock price has tumbled amid reports that its board of directors is meeting to consider the future of CEO Jensen Huang.

Nvidia shares fell more than 8 percent in after-hours trading on Wednesday as questions swirled over Huang’s position at the top of the $4.2 trillion company.

The plunge comes after The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times reported that Nvidia’s board of directors would discuss Huang’s position amid controversy over his personal life.

Nvidia did not immediately respond to Al Jazeera’s requests for comment.

The reported meeting comes amid reports that Huang engaged in an extramarital relationship with an Nvidia employee, in addition to an affair with a woman accused of working the Chinese intelligence services.

This is a developing story.

BREAKINGBREAKING,

The historic victory delivers an eighth US Senate seat to Democrats after last week’s pivotal midterm election.

Democrat Scott Colom has won Mississippi’s closely watched United States Senate race, giving his party a rare, historic victory in a Republican stronghold that has eluded them for decades.

Colom, a prosecutor who will become the state’s first Black senator in more than 140 years, garnered a narrow victory on Wednesday over incumbent Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith in one of the US midterms’ biggest upsets.

The win builds on Democrats’ success after the party delivered an electoral drubbing last Tuesday, winning at least eight US Senate seats that are currently held by Republicans. A US Senate race in Alaska remains uncalled.

For more than a week, the Mississippi contest has remained too close to call as election officials worked to count more than 100,000 mail-in ballots. Thousands of other residents, who could not confirm their registration at voting sites, cast provisional ballots that required confirmation of their eligibility.

Colom and Hyde-Smith took markedly different approaches as remaining ballots were counted.

Hyde-Smith, who was not seen publicly until she returned to Washington this week as the Senate returned to session, had expressed confidence she would win after “every legally cast vote is fully and accurately counted”. But after the election, Colom continued to hold a series of public events where he castigated his opponent.

“Ultimately, at some point, the senator needs to speak out. Where is Cindy Hyde-Smith?” Colom told reporters on Friday in Jackson, Mississippi. “We want to hear from her. She needs to answer questions. What is her path to victory? She doesn’t have one”.

The US Senate race also was not the first time the two had crossed political paths.

Hyde-Smith, citing concerns about Colom’s position on transgender athletes, previously blocked him from serving as a federal judge in 2023 after he was nominated by former US President Joe Biden. The position had required Senate approval.

Colom’s win defies political gravity in a state that US President Donald Trump won by just over 22 points in the 2024 presidential election.

The last Democrat to win a US Senate race in Mississippi was 1982, when John Stennis claimed victory over Republican challenger Haley Barbour, who later became governor of the state.

Colom, who has been a proponent of raising the minimum wage, increasing protections for rural hospitals and ending the US war in Iran, will be sworn in next January. He will be the chamber’s seventh Black lawmaker.

It has been more than a week since voters in the United States cast ballots in the midterm elections.

But the size of Democrats’ majorities in the House of Representatives and Senate remained undetermined. More than a dozen congressional races are still waiting to be called.

Democrats have already won 54 Senate seats in the incoming Congress in January, but they could pick up one or two more as votes are counted in Alaska and Mississippi.

Meanwhile, in the House of Representatives, Democrats have notched their largest elected majority since 2008, with 255 seats in the 435-member chamber. But they have the potential to add to their lead with several more seats as the remaining races are decided.

Here’s a look at where things stand in some of the uncalled races:

Mississippi’s Senate seat remains too early to call

Late on Tuesday, Democrat Scott Colom was about 2,600 votes ahead of Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith in the race for the US Senate in Mississippi.

There are two key deadlines in the vote-counting process in Mississippi this week: Mail-in absentee ballots must be received by Tuesday, and counties are required to submit their certified election results — including tallies of provisional ballots — to the state by Friday.

It is unclear exactly how many ballots are left to count.

Unlike in some other states, there is no central vote reporting system for Mississippi, and few counties release election results online. Instead, journalists from The Associated Press and analysts communicate with each of the state’s 82 counties directly for the latest available information on vote counts.

The state will certify its results on December 3.

On Monday, Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson said about 14,200 provisional ballots had been processed, of which about 80 percent were accepted, and about 2,700 mail-in absentee ballots had not yet been returned.

Mississippi does not have automatic recounts or permit candidates to request a recount. Recounts in the state are held only in the event of a court order. The Associated Press may declare a winner in a race that is eligible for a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.

The vote count is ongoing in Alaska’s Senate race

Democrat Mary Peltola led Republican Senator Dan Sullivan by about 2,500 votes in Alaska’s US Senate race as of Tuesday, with an estimated 76 percent of the vote counted.

Absentee ballots are among those that continue to be counted. The final absentee ballots mailed from outside the US are accepted as late as November 18, which is 15 days after Election Day.

Ranked-choice voting could also affect the timeline. Peltola is just over one percentage point short of the majority needed to win outright. If neither candidate wins a majority, the race will proceed to ranked-choice tabulation on November 18.

The state’s “target date” for certifying the election results is November 25.

Recounts in Alaska are automatic only in the event of a tie vote. Candidates may also request a recount within five days of the state’s certification.

A dozen House races are still up in the air

In most of the US House races that have not been called, the margin between the leading candidates was less than one percentage point among votes counted, as of late Tuesday afternoon.

In North Carolina, four races remain undecided, the most of any state, and Republican incumbents were being challenged in each one. There are no automatic recounts in North Carolina, but candidates may request a recount if the margin between candidates is one percent or less of the total votes.

The state must receive the recount request by noon Eastern Time (17:00 GMT) on November 17, two business days after the county canvass in the state. The state is scheduled to certify its results on November 24.

In California, only one of the remaining House races, in the 23rd District, will affect the chamber’s balance of power. The other uncalled race is between two Democrats. Mail-in ballots must be received by Tuesday, and counties must certify their results by December 3. The state will certify its results on December 11.

In South Carolina’s 2nd District, a recount is ongoing in the race between Republican incumbent Joe Wilson and Democrat Zyon Khalifa. Wilson led Khalifa by only about 3,000 votes in the original tally by late Tuesday afternoon, when 99 percent of the votes had been counted.

In Minnesota’s 1st District, the race was still undecided late by Tuesday, with about 300 votes separating the top two candidates and an estimated 99 percent of votes counted. Recounts are not automatic in Minnesota, but a candidate can request a publicly funded recount if the margin between the winning and losing candidates is less than 0.25 percent of the vote.

In Tennessee’s 4th District, about 300 votes lay between Democrat Victoria Broderick and Republican incumbent Scott DesJarlais as of Tuesday. In that state, recounts are held only as part of a legal challenge in the courts. There are no automatic recounts, and losing candidates may not request recounts.

Two governorships remain undecided

In the race to be Kansas’s next governor, Democratic state Senator Cindy Holscher led state Republican Senate President Ty Masterson by less than one percentage point on Tuesday.

On November 4, the state announced that a close-race audit had been triggered in six close Kansas races, including the gubernatorial race.

That process requires a hand count of selected ballots, and it must be completed before November 16, the day by which counties must certify their results.

In the race for governor of Alaska, only about 76 percent of votes were estimated to have been counted by Tuesday.

The Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Jonathan Kreiss‑Tomkins, was leading Bernadette Wilson by about 45,000 votes, 49.6 percent to 28.9 percent. The race will advance to ranked-choice tabulation if no candidate receives more than 50 percent of the vote.

Wexford, Ireland – They cross the ocean floor between continents, carrying nearly all our data, from messages and calls to trillions of dollars in financial transactions each day.

Subsea cables underpin global communications and power economies, but they are also increasingly seen as vulnerable to sabotage.

About 75 percent of transatlantic subsea cables pass through or near Irish waters, according to the Irish government, connecting North America with Europe – giving the small European Union member outsized strategic importance.

Ireland is also a major hub for United States tech multinationals, including Google, Microsoft and Meta, with a growing concentration of data centres supporting the digital economy.

But increased activity by Russian vessels near undersea infrastructure in recent years has raised concerns that cables around Ireland could become targets of interference.

In November 2024, the Russian ship Yantar, officially an oceanographic research vessel but described by the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence as a spy ship, was monitored near undersea infrastructure in the Irish Sea before being escorted out of Ireland’s exclusive economic zone by the Irish Navy.

Two months later, the UK’s Defence Ministry said the vessel had been “caught loitering over critical undersea infrastructure in UK waters.”

In late 2025, the British government accused Yantar of directing lasers at Royal Air Force (RAF) pilots monitoring its movements in the North Sea.

‘Ireland is absolutely Europe’s weakest link when it comes to defence’

Ireland has limited capability to monitor its waters – it has the lowest defence spending as a share of gross domestic product (GDP) in the EU, and its navy has no submarines. It is militarily neutral and not part of NATO.

Irish senator Tom Clonan, a strong supporter of Irish neutrality, argued that it should not be a barrier to boosting defence.

“Because of the end of the violence and the conflict in Ireland, and with the ceasefires and the peace agreement, we’ve had a peace dividend. So for the last 30 years, successive governments have really taken their foot off the accelerator when it comes to defence and security. And then, more broadly, Europe has enjoyed a peace dividend after the fall of the Berlin Wall,” he told Al Jazeera.

“So as a consequence of those two things, Ireland is absolutely Europe’s weakest link when it comes to defence in the air, maritime, ground and cyber domains,” he added.

The Irish government recently boosted its naval powers, allowing the navy to board and inspect suspicious vessels.

Ensuring defence against “emerging threats in our waters, particularly from vessels linked to the Russian shadow fleet” is a priority, Defence Minister Helen McEntee said in March, referring to the ageing, often uninsured tankers used to transport Russian oil and circumvent Western sanctions.

Their presence in Irish waters has raised concerns about both accidental damage and deliberate interference with undersea infrastructure. Moscow disputes the term “shadow fleet” as a political fabrication.

“Recent events in the Baltic Sea and the activities of Russia’s shadow fleet have highlighted the importance of ensuring that we have the legal framework necessary to respond to evolving threats,” McEntee continued.

In December 2024, a tanker suspected of belonging to Russia’s shadow fleet was investigated after power and telecoms cables were damaged in the Gulf of Finland.

A year later, in December 2025, a cargo ship sailing from St Petersburg under the flag of St Vincent and the Grenadines damaged telecommunications cables between Finland and Estonia. A Finnish court convicted its Russian captain and Azerbaijani boatswain of aggravated sabotage, according to the Reuters news agency. Both denied wrongdoing, and the conviction can be appealed.

For Daniel Mulhall, Ireland’s former ambassador to the US, that much of the world’s digital infrastructure passes through Irish waters means the country can no longer assume that its geographical position offers protection.

“It’s the fact that there are 850 US multinationals that have operations in Ireland. Many of them have big data centres to manage their data in our country,” he told Al Jazeera. “We are an integral part of the Western digital economy. And therefore, any sort of cyber threat to that economy is going to be potentially aimed at Ireland, or at least we could be victims of it, even if we’re not the prime target. So I think the world has become a far more complex place. And I think Irish people are waking up to that fact.”

Mulhall argued that protecting the cables will require international cooperation.

“I don’t think anyone can guarantee that those cables will be safe, least of all Ireland. But I think with collective effort, we can make reasonable preparations to strengthen our ability to protect those cables from malign actors that might wish to interfere with them,” he added.

“They’re the bloodstream of our economy. And if that bloodstream is interfered with, the economy will have serious trouble.”

United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that Washington’s economic pressure campaign against Iran is proving so effective that a resumption of large-scale military operations is unnecessary.

His remarks are the latest in an often-evolving series of messages from US President Donald Trump’s administration on the conflict with Iran. They also come after a crushing midterm defeat for Trump’s Republican Party, which the president acknowledged was likely partly driven by public opposition to the war.

So how do Rubio’s latest remarks compare with the positions of other administration officials, and what do they say about the state of the conflict?

What have Trump, Rubio and Vance said about the conflict?

Rubio made his latest comments on Tuesday after meeting with foreign ministers from the Group of Seven (G7) forum in Paris.

He said he told G7 allies that “the economic campaign [against Iran] is so devastating that right now there is no need for major combat operations”.

“We don’t need to conduct military strikes if we’re achieving the same objective through economic means and economic pressure. That’s not stalemate,” Rubio said.

“The economic pressure on Iran is going to get even worse,” he added.

Rubio also pushed G7 allies to help “protect shipping” around the embattled Strait of Hormuz, where he said US forces would stay.

The secretary of state’s remarks were largely in line with Trump’s comments on Monday, when the president said further strikes against Iran were “quite unlikely”.

Writing on his Truth Social platform, Trump said the US’s Gulf allies preferred a continuation of the “status quo”, referring to the US’s blockade of Iranian ports. Trump added that there appears to be “positive momentum” towards ending the conflict, but that the US remains “locked and loaded” should circumstances change.

Vice President JD Vance, who has been more critical of the war and recently wrote a lengthy social media post blaming the Republican Party’s midterm defeat on the conflict, favours a deal with Iran, which Trump does not believe is possible right now, the Reuters news agency cited an informed source as saying.

Between sanctions and diplomacy: What are the divisions on Iran war strategy?

Negotiations to end the US-Iran conflict have been largely stalled for months, as Iran continues to target vessels it claims are violating its conditions for transit through the Strait of Hormuz and the US ramps up sanctions against Iran and continues to blockade Iranian ports, with plans to block Iran’s land-based supply routes as well.

Back in September, Iran proposed a seven-day plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and restart talks. Tehran has since said that timeline could be brought down to two days. Tehran’s demands for the US include lifting sanctions Washington imposed after the collapse of a June memorandum of understanding (MoU), reducing the US military presence in the region, reinstating oil waivers and releasing frozen Iranian funds.

Trump, torn between restarting an unpopular war or pushing harder for a deal with Tehran, has for now settled on a middle ground: doubling down on the pressure campaign against Iran while avoiding a return to full-scale military action, according to officials quoted by Axios.

That strategy is backed by several key administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, as well as Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, Axios cited US officials as saying.

However, several US allies in the region, including Pakistan, Iraq and Turkiye, are concerned that a drawn-out US pressure campaign against Iran could hurt their own business interests, said one official cited by the news outlet.

Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, said that a long-term US policy of intensive sanctions and a blockade against Iran would only prolong an “unstable status quo” that would eventually escalate into more military confrontation.

However, he said one “walk-away” option for Trump could be to quietly relax the sanctions and blockade while maintaining them “on paper”.

In this case, “Trump walks away and claims to retain the blockade and sanctions infrastructure, but in reality, allows it to imperceptibly wither away,” Parsi told Al Jazeera. “The blockade begins to loosen, sanctions enforcement begins to decay, and slowly but surely, Asian and Middle Eastern countries begin trading with and investing in Iran.”

“A new equilibrium emerges in which sanctions enforcement is strong enough for the US to claim the restrictions are still in place, yet weak enough to prevent Tehran from challenging the new status quo,” Parsi said.

Have the midterm election results impacted Trump’s strategy?

Yes, according to analysts.

Negar Mortazavi, senior non-resident fellow at the Center for International Policy in Washington, DC, said the Republicans’ resounding election defeat “dramatically raised the political cost of more escalation” and gave the Democrats a stronger mandate to challenge the war.

“If Democrats unite and use their new power aggressively, they can make it increasingly difficult for Trump to continue the war, pressuring him to end it,” Mortazavi told Al Jazeera.

“A diplomatic breakthrough is not guaranteed, but the political and strategic costs of escalation keep growing, making another round of war less likely,” she added.

Both Trump and Vance have acknowledged that the Iran war was partly to blame for the Republicans’ loss, with Trump saying voters were not ready for petrol prices to rise.

According to a poll by Reuters/Ipsos completed on Monday, 71 percent of Americans – including 93 percent of Democrats and 51 percent of Republicans –  favour congressional legislation that would halt the Iran war.

What is Iran saying?

Iranian officials have upped their rhetoric even as Washington appears to be moving away from military escalation.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Tuesday said the war will “not end either through military means or by increasing sanctions”, but only through “using the language of respect”.

In comments carried by Iran’s IRNA news agency, he urged the US “to act on Iran’s demands and conditions”, adding that Trump “should have realised much earlier that he has not achieved, and will not achieve, any of his goals in the war with Iran”.

Iran’s top security chief Mohsen Rezaei, in a social media post on Monday, said the US government had been “wrecked” by the war and that it was time for it to “surrender” to Iran’s demands.

Al Jazeera’s Mohamed Vall, reporting from Tehran, noted that Iran’s language has become “more confident than ever before”.

“They’re trying to convey to the public, internally, and also to the Americans, that there is no way this war can be declared over without responding to those conditions presented by Iran during the negotiations,” said Vall.

What is the current status of diplomacy?

There are mixed messages.

The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday said that Doha is “working tirelessly” in its ongoing mediation efforts, and has received positive reactions from both sides.

Trump, the day before, after hosting Qatar’s prime minister at the White House, also spoke of “momentum towards the end of this conflict”, adding that “Iran is talking to us, and they’re talking very politely”.

Rubio, for his part, said the US remains “open to diplomacy”, but called Iran’s current demands “totally unrealistic”.

“We expect that could change – and if it does, we’re prepared for diplomacy,” he said.

Iranian officials, meanwhile, have appeared more sceptical of the latest reports of mediation, insisting that the US must accept their demands.

Rezaei on Tuesday said there ⁠were no negotiations taking place between Tehran and Washington and that Iran would retaliate against any new US attack by targeting US bases “far away”. He also said Iran would not let any of its enriched nuclear material leave the country, ruling out a concession the US has sought in potential nuclear talks.

In a social media post, Rezaei went on to accuse the US of “manufacturing FAKE NEWS about imaginary talks”.

If Michael Carrick’s departure as head coach of Manchester United is confirmed, Mauricio Pochettino is reportedly the man tasked with turning the fortunes of the Old Trafford club around.

United lie in the Premier League’s relegation zone, one point off the bottom in 18th, after winning just one of their opening 10 matches, that coming against Ipswich in August.

It’s the club’s worst start to a season in 30 years, and the expectations will be high for whoever takes the role, with their first league game coming away at bitter rivals Liverpool on November 22.

Pochettino – whose release from the contract extension he signed as USA head coach has reportedly been arranged while Carrick officially remains in position – would become the eighth permanent man in charge at Old Trafford since Sir Alex Ferguson’s departure in May 2013 after more than 26 years in the job.

Who is Mauricio Pochettino?

The 54-year-old Argentinian was known during his playing career as a no-nonsense central defender, but as a manager he has evolved into one known for attractive, attacking football, with a focus on developing young talent.

He began playing in 1989 with Newell’s Old Boys before a switch to Spain in 1994, joining La Liga side Espanyol, where he played more than 200 league games across a seven-year career and broke into the Argentina squad, winning 20 caps and starting every game in the 2002 World Cup.

He had spells with Paris Saint-Germain and Bordeaux in France’s Ligue 1 before ending his career with Espanyol, for whom he passed 300 appearances in all competitions.

His first job in management came in January 2009, when he became Espanyol’s third coach of the season and successfully guided the Barcelona-based club away from the threat of relegation and beat city rivals Barcelona at Camp Nou for the first time in 27 years along the way.

He left the club by mutual consent in November 2012 and landed his first job in the Premier League at Southampton two months later, earning plaudits as Saints climbed the table before leading them to an eighth-placed finish in his first full season and the club’s highest points tally since the Premier League’s formation in 1992.

He moved to Tottenham in 2014 and oversaw the most successful run in the club’s recent history, reaching the League Cup final in his first season and finishing in fifth. He also allowed young prospects like Harry Kane, Dele Alli and Eric Dier the chance to shine – something which has been a focus for the Argentinian during his coaching career, often watching youth games and allowing young prospects to train with first-team set-ups to help their progress.

Spurs recorded their highest league finish since 1990 in 2016 and in 2017 finished second with a club-record 86 points, their highest finish since 1963.

Pochettino guided Tottenham to the Champions League final in 2019, overcoming Man City and Ajax in dramatic style along the way before losing 2-0 to Liverpool in the final in Madrid.

He was, however, sacked five months later after a poor start to the Premier League season before becoming head coach of Paris Saint-Germain from January 2021 to July 2022, departing after winning his first league title.

He spent the 2023-24 season in charge of Chelsea but departed two days after guiding the Blues to a sixth-place finish and took over the USA national team in September 2024, guiding the cohosts to the last-16 exit at the hands of Belgium at the 2026 World Cup before extending his contract in August.

Is Pochettino’s style a good fit?

Man United have long been associated with free-flowing attacking football, and Pochettino’s style was always likely to make him a more appealing option for the club’s hierarchy than the more pragmatic approach of another of the potential frontrunners for the job, Antonio Conte.

The Italian’s style is built more around tactical discipline, high work rate and defensive stability with reliance on quick counter-attacks.

Across his coaching career, Pochettino has become known for his attacking style of play, which relies on pressing high to win the ball back, focuses on keeping possession and usually adopts a 4-2-3-1 formation – which might suit the squad he inherits, as it becomes more of a 3-2-5 when building from the back, employing one inverted full-back and allowing the other to provide width in attack.

The likes of Bruno Fernandes, Matheus Cunha and Bryan Mbeumo would likely thrive in his system, but the lack of a top-class No. 9 will be a hindrance, with Benjamin Sesko sidelined through injury and Joshua Zirkzee having struggled to make an impact.

The defence will come under huge scrutiny too; United have conceded 30 goals in their 15 games in all competitions this season and Pochettino’s defence can be exposed on the counterattack with so many men committed forward.

One of the factors which Pochettino is known for is his willingness to integrate young talent into training and match day squads and help establish a club’s identity, particularly at Southampton, where he previously worked with United’s Luke Shaw, and at Tottenham. That is also something United have traditionally been associated with, with Sir Alex Ferguson taking the likes of Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Paul Scholes and Gary Neville and turning them into global stars. The likes of Shea Lacey might benefit particularly from Pochettino’s tutelage.

Any potential pitfalls?

There might be some. One of Tottenham fans’ main gripes during Pochettino’s largely successful period at the club was that he prioritised league games over cup games, and team selections often reflected that.

United are already out of the League Cup, but a new boss appointed during the international break will face 16 games in 60 days starting with the trip to Anfield, with four Champions League games and an FA Cup third-round tie to fit in around 11 Premier League games which might prove crucial to their season.

Pochettino’s style also places a heavy reliance on fitness, intensity and discipline, something which has been somewhat lacking in large parts of the season so far at the Red Devils.

There were also issues arising from his spell at PSG. He was able to call upon some of the icons of the sport in Kylian Mbappe and Neymar in 2021, but PSG failed to win Ligue 1 for the first time in the past nine seasons, finishing a point behind Lille after losing four games down the stretch. He did win the title the following year, with Lionel Messi added to the ranks, but they failed to make even the quarterfinals of the Champions League or the Coupe de France.

The United States House ⁠of Representatives has blocked an attempt to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in a surprise reprieve for President Donald Trump’s administration as Republicans reel from their midterm election defeat.

The impeachment articles were introduced by Republican Congressman Thomas Massie, but the effort was backed primarily by Democrats. They accuse Hegseth of abuses of power and conducting illegal military operations.

The Republican-led House voted 211-204 on Tuesday to refer the articles back to the House Judiciary Committee, where they could remain indefinitely. The procedural move in effect killed the impeachment drive for the duration of the current Congress’s term, which ends in eight weeks. On January 3, Democrats will take control of the House and Senate.

In a twist, the absence of 11 Democratic lawmakers during the vote proved decisive.

Here’s what to know about the vote to block Hegseth’s impeachment and what could happen next:

What was Tuesday’s vote about?

The vote was not on whether to impeach Hegseth. It was on whether to refer the articles of impeachment to the Judiciary Committee, where they may be further investigated or amended.

Such procedural moves are often used as stalling tactics. With the current Congress due to conclude soon, the resolution is unlikely to return to the House floor before its term ends.

Massie called the vote “a procedural motion to kill the resolution”.

What was the result of the vote?

It narrowly passed 211-204.

Massie was the sole Republican to oppose the measure. The remaining votes fell along party lines with Republicans supporting the measure and Democrats opposing it.

Eighteen representatives were absent from the vote – 11 Democrats and seven Republicans. Had the Democrats shown up and voted with their colleagues, they would have had the numbers to defeat the procedural move, forcing a full House vote on whether to impeach Hegseth as early as this week.

Trump cheered the result of Tuesday’s vote in a social media post, saying the Democrats’ impeachment effort had “miserably FAILED!”

Who were the 11 absent Democrats, and why did they miss the vote?

The Democrats absent from the vote were:

• Julia Brownley (California)
• Lou Correa (California)
• Nancy Pelosi (California)
• Laura Gillen (New York)
• Steven Horsford (Nevada)
• Jonathan Jackson (Illinois)
• Brittany Pettersen (Colorado)
• Melanie Stansbury (New Mexico)
• Haley Stevens (Michigan)
• Marilyn Strickland (Washington)
• Frederica Wilson (Florida)

The representatives have given varying explanations for why they did not show up.

Strickland, Jackson, Stansbury and Gillen all blamed a traffic delay in Washington, DC.

Pelosi said she was in her home state for a veterans event while Correa said he was in California before undergoing a health procedure. Horsford’s office cited a personal emergency.

Pettersen, who said she helped introduce articles of impeachment against Hegseth in April, said she had been “denied the ability to vote on this motion” without elaborating.

Jackson, Stansbury, Gillen, Strickland, Horsford, Pelosi and Pettersen all said they would have joined their Democratic colleagues in opposing the measure. Jackson and Stansbury also said they had formally recorded their opposition in the Congressional Record although this does not change the official vote count.

There was no immediate comment from Stevens, Brownley or Wilson on their absences.

Stevens previously criticised the Trump administration for launching the war on Iran with Israel and sought more congressional oversight. But days before the US midterm elections on November 3, the Michigan congresswoman, who had lost the Democratic primary for the state’s open Senate seat earlier to Abdul El-Sayed, endorsed Republican candidate Mike Rogers against her own party’s nominee.

Wilson, 83, on Monday attended the groundbreaking for a housing project in Miami-Dade County. Wilson and Brownley, like Stevens, previously opposed Trump’s handling of the war on Iran and demanded the administration seek congressional approval for the fighting.

What has been the reaction?

Democratic politicians and progressive commentators have expressed outrage that poor attendance from Democrats impacted the outcome of the vote.

Congresswoman Sydney Kamlager-Dove from California said: “We knew that this vote was coming, so people should have gotten their raggedy selves up these steps to vote.”

“There is no reason why we should have lost this vote because of attendance issues,” she added.

Senator-elect El-Sayed, responding to a question about the absent Democrats, said: “You should show up and do your job.”

Some pundits pointed the finger at Democratic House leader Hakeem Jeffries, who is expected to become the new speaker of the House in January. They accused him of failing to exert sufficient pressure on party members to defeat the measure.

Political commentator Krystal Ball called the vote “a major Hakeem Jeffries fail”.

“You could have impeached the war criminal Pete Hegseth but Dems didn’t show up to vote,” she said.

Progressive writer Laura Bassett said: “Jeffries didn’t even whip the vote. He told people to ‘vote their conscience’, and 11 members of his caucus didn’t show up. This is why people want a stronger leader.”

Could Hegseth still be impeached?

Yes. When the new Democratic-controlled Congress convenes in January, they could begin the process again and will be in a stronger position to advance impeachment articles.

Jeffries has said he will consult members about another potential bid to impeach Hegseth next year. “We’ll have that conversation at the appropriate time,” he said.

However, a vote to impeach Hegseth does not necessarily mean he will be removed from office. Impeachment itself means the House has formally brought charges against a federal official, similar to a criminal indictment.

A successful impeachment vote triggers a trial in Congress’s upper chamber, the Senate, on whether to convict.

A conviction, which immediately removes the official from office, requires at least two-thirds support in the Senate. That means Democrats, even with their incoming majority in the chamber next year, would likely need about a dozen Republicans to join them to secure Hegseth’s removal.

Only eight officials – all federal judges – have ever been convicted by the Senate. Trump has been impeached twice – in December ⁠2019 and January 2021 – but the Senate acquitted him on both occasions.

Hackers have twice taken control of supermarket fridges across Europe in less than a month, sparking fires and spoiling millions of euros’ worth of food.

On October 11 and 12, attackers heated units at about 700 French stores to as high as 50C (122F). On November 2, a second wave of suspected cyberattacks affected supermarkets and food businesses in at least nine European countries, including Belgium, Estonia, Finland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden.

France has since blamed the first attack on Shahid Kaveh, a cyberunit affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), calling it the first large-scale sabotage cyberattack on French soil. It is not yet clear who was behind the second wave.

The attacks have raised concern about how exposed internet-connected equipment has become, from industrial machinery to household appliances. Al Jazeera illustrates the devices at risk in your home and the essential services you rely on, and what you can do to protect yourself.

How can a fridge be hacked?

A supermarket’s fridges and freezers are run from one control panel, which is connected to the internet so contractors can manage it remotely. Home smart fridges connect the same way, through Wi-Fi, an app or a cloud service.

The attackers reportedly found the supermarket systems using Shodan, a search engine for internet-connected devices. According to Vincent Strubel, head of France’s National Cybersecurity Agency (ANSSI), they got in through basic security failures:

• Exposed: The equipment was directly connected to the open internet with no extra protection.
• Weak passwords: Many systems were protected only by weak or default logins.
• Outdated: Many units were old models that no longer get security updates.

Once inside, hackers can switch a fridge off, raise its temperature or steal account details. In France, they simply used the controllers’ own defrost function. A poorly protected fridge can also be a doorway to other devices on the same network, from laptops to smart locks.

Speaking to the French Senate on October 21, Strubel warned that the healthcare sector uses the same type of equipment to store vaccines and hazardous materials, from research laboratories to pharmacies.

How hackable is your home?

Essentially, anything connected via the internet could potentially be hacked.

There are about 21 billion short-range connected devices, such as smartwatches, worldwide and 5.4 billion long-range ones, such as remote monitoring systems, according to Kepios’s Digital 2027 Global Overview Report. US internet households now have an average of about 18 connected devices, nearly double the number a decade ago, according to Parks Associates.

Routers are among the biggest targets because they are always online. In April, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) warned that hackers linked to Russia’s GRU military intelligence were hijacking home and small business routers. By tampering with their DNS settings, which turn website names into IP addresses, the hackers redirected users to fake websites to steal passwords and personal details.

Smart TVs can be hacked without their owners knowing. In June, researchers found that more than a third of apps on LG and Samsung smart TVs could let strangers secretly use a household’s internet connection, hiding their own activity behind that home’s IP address.

Robot vacuums can expose even more. Earlier this year, a programmer reportedly found he could control almost 7,000 DJI Romo robot vacuums with a PlayStation 5 controller. Using Claude Code, an AI coding tool made by Anthropic, to work out how the vacuums talked to DJI’s servers, he gained access to their live camera feeds, audio and floor plans of people’s homes.

What vital services can be hacked?

The same weaknesses that expose a fridge can affect power plants, water supplies, banks and hospitals.

Many of these services are run by industrial computers that can be reached online. Since the US-Israel war on Iran began, US agencies have warned that Iran-affiliated hackers are attacking these systems.

In July, a cyberattack in the US state of Minnesota targeted more than 30 community water systems, according to the state’s IT agency. Officials suspected Iran-aligned hackers, and the FBI and CISA warned that water and wastewater systems were increasingly being targeted, with facilities in 12 states affected at the time.

That same month, a cyberattack attributed to Iran-linked hackers forced a small British power plant offline for four days. It was reported as the first successful attack of its kind on UK energy infrastructure.

The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) lists sectors it considers critical infrastructure. The graphic below shows some of the key ones, and what a hack on each could mean for you.

Banks are targets, too. In late September and early October, hackers stole personal data from at least seven South Korean financial firms, affecting about 68,000 people. Yegaram Savings Bank and Shinhan Bank were hit hardest, with about 40,000 and 25,000 customers affected, respectively.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the attacker used ARTEX, an open-source AI tool developed in China to test networks for weaknesses. US cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike said the attacker was likely a China-based individual who also used Claude Code, an assessment it made with moderate confidence.

Which industries are most politically targeted?

The European Repository of Cyber Incidents (EuRepoC), a research database tracking political cyberattacks worldwide, logged 4,932 major incidents between January 2000 and November 2026.

The number of incidents has grown sharply in recent years, peaking at 795 in 2024. About two-thirds of all incidents recorded since 2000 have occurred since 2022.

Governments are the biggest target. State institutions account for nearly 40 percent of all targets, led by the civil service and government ministries, followed by the military, police, political parties and legislatures.

Critical infrastructure is the second most targeted sector, led by health, finance, telecommunications, transport and energy, followed by defence firms, manufacturing, research and digital service providers. Companies, schools, civil society groups and media outlets make up most of the rest.

EuRepoC tracks only politically significant attacks, a fraction of all cyberattacks. Beyond these, hackers often target individuals and companies with scams.

How to protect oneself?

Hackers rely on weaknesses such as weak passwords and devices that no longer receive updates.

Awais Rashid, a professor of cybersecurity at the University of Bristol, told Al Jazeera that as infrastructure becomes more digitised, the risk of disruption from cyberattacks has risen. But, he added, “the world works because cybersecurity works effectively”.

The UK’s NCSC also advises people to turn off features they don’t use, such as remote camera access.

If a power plant or water system is hacked, there is little individuals can do. The UK’s Be Ready campaign, launched last month partly in response to cyber-threats, urges households to keep a three-day supply of water, food, medicine, cash and torches.

The graphic below shows five simple steps you can take to protect yourself from hackers.

A Chinese defence-linked university bought two H200 chips last month, as scrutiny grows over Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s affair with an alleged spy for Beijing.

A Chinese university with ties to the army bought Nvidia’s powerful H200 AI chips last month despite being on a US export blacklist.

Northwestern Polytechnical University, a member of China’s “Seven Sons of National Defense” group of elite defence-focused universities, bought two H200 chips last month for 874,700 yuan ($123,000), according to an October 21 procurement record on its website, the Reuters news agency reports.

The chips were bought for its management school from Shaanxi Bosuan Network Technology rather than directly from Nvidia, the record showed.

The Reuters investigation comes as Nvidia and its CEO Jensen Huang face mounting scrutiny in Washington, DC, over his lobbying for looser ⁠⁠restrictions on sales of AI chips to China, following reports alleging he was targeted by a Chinese spying operation.

The H200 is among Nvidia’s most capable chips for training and running advanced AI systems and is subject to US export licence approvals, which are normally denied for blacklisted institutions such as Northwestern Polytechnical.

Northwestern Polytechnical also bought access this year to H200 ‌‌chips and other powerful Nvidia AI processors through five contracts for rented computing capacity from Chinese companies, procurement records show.

Nvidia CEO Huang has argued that continued US sales to China would preserve US technological leadership and keep Chinese customers reliant on its technology.

However, some US lawmakers say access to Nvidia’s most powerful AI chips can speed China’s development of AI systems for weapons design, intelligence analysis and military modernisation.

US blacklist

Based in the northwestern city of Xi’an, Northwestern Polytechnical conducts research related to military aircraft, missiles and satellites.

Washington’s Department of Commerce added the university to its trade blacklist, known as the Entity List, in 2001 over the institute’s alleged involvement in missile-proliferation activities, and its military research. Washington tightened the restrictions in 2019, making licences for exporting controlled US technology to the university subject to a policy of denial in most circumstances.

Northwestern Polytechnical’s purchases show how Chinese institutions with military ties continue to obtain US AI computing power through domestic suppliers, either by buying chips outright or renting access to servers containing them.

A Reuters review of 26 Chinese procurement and corporate records from this year found universities and research institutions buying US-restricted Nvidia chips or renting access to Nvidia-powered computing services ⁠⁠that use such chips through domestic suppliers.

Several had close links to China’s defence industry or military research.

US President Donald Trump’s administration began allowing some H200 exports to China on a case-by-case basis in January. But that policy did not lift the separate restrictions applying to Entity List organisations such as Northwestern Polytechnical.

Both Democrats and Republicans in the US Congress have urged stronger controls on China’s access to advanced AI ⁠⁠chips, such as chip-tracking requirements, and greater congressional oversight of exports.

The Huang affair

This comes at a time of increased pressure on Nvidia’s Huang. Republican US Senator Kevin Cramer from the Senate Banking Committee called on Huang to step down as CEO after his intimate relationship with Alice Huang, accused of working for Chinese intelligence, plunged the company into crisis.

“The potential for extortion is so tremendous that something as sensitive as Nvidia chips, I ⁠⁠just think he’s got to go,” Cramer told Politico late on Tuesday.

Three Republican congressional committee chairmen have requested a briefing with Huang on November 18 over his reported contacts with the alleged Chinese intelligence operative.

Jensen Huang – who cofounded Nvidia, the world’s second-most valuable company after Apple, more than three decades ago – admitted on Sunday to being unfaithful to his wife, but the company said it has no reason to believe US national security or confidential information has been compromised.

Nvidia’s board announced an independent investigation on Sunday into whether the 63-year-old Taiwan-US dual national had been targeted by a foreign intelligence operation after media reports linking him to Alice Huang, a former executive at a Singapore-based data centre company.

Kennedy dynasty has filed a motion to stop Trump’s arch from obscuring JFK Eternal Flame and slain family gravesites.

Members of the prominent Kennedy family have filed a legal motion to halt the construction of US President Donald Trump’s 76-metre (250ft) “triumphal arch” in Washington, DC, arguing it mars the area near the graves of the family’s famous forebears.

On Tuesday, the nine plaintiffs, children and grandchildren of former Senators Robert F Kennedy and Edward M Kennedy, filed a motion to intervene and an accompanying complaint in two existing federal lawsuits to block the arch’s construction.

The project would sit near the final resting places of the late senators, buried alongside their brother, former President John F Kennedy, and the Eternal Flame commemorating him at Arlington National Cemetery.

Plaintiffs argued the proposed arch would “fundamentally alter the experience of visiting the gravesites”, a site that draws millions of visitors each year.

The intervention motion was filed by veteran Washington lawyer Norm Eisen and Democracy Defenders Fund, a centre-left legal advocacy group.

It contends that the National Park Service and the Department of the Interior authorised the granite, gold-ornamented structure, dubbed the “Arc de Trump” by critics, without required congressional approval.

The plaintiffs also argue the megastructure would destroy the intentionally designed, century-old line of sight between the Lincoln Memorial and the cemetery’s Arlington House across the Memorial Bridge.

Many plaintiffs

The high-profile intervention adds to an already sprawling roster of plaintiffs who have launched legal challenges against the polarising monument, including Vietnam War veterans, a historian, and the governments of the District of Columbia, Virginia and Arlington County.

Last week, District Judge Tanya Chutkan prohibited the Trump administration from breaking ground on the structure for another 14 days following the string of lawsuits.

Building the arch would be a “permanent denigration” of the gravesites, and the Kennedy offspring “would never again be able to appreciate both sites as they always have before, and as the Kennedy family always intended”, lawyers for the relatives wrote on Tuesday.

The project is just one component of the president’s effort to remodel much of Washington, DC, alongside a historic golf course renovation and threats to demolish the Kennedy Center.

But with Democrats seizing control of Congress in last week’s midterm elections, the overhauls may be set for heightened scrutiny.

Speaking on behalf of the Kennedy family, Rory and Maxwell Kennedy, children of the late senator Robert F Kennedy, said the action is about “protecting sacred spaces that belong to the American people”. They said several members of their slain family are “among the more than 400,000 veterans and family members buried or honored on this hallowed ground”.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr, a Trump appointee who is estranged from much of his family,  did not join the litigation.

Announcement follows Trump administration crackdown on visa programs for skilled foreign workers.

United States technology giant IBM has said it will stop sponsoring US foreign worker visas and green cards for most roles in its largest division.

A company spokesperson told Reuters on Tuesday that its consultancy unit had opted to end sponsorship for most roles.

The company said its participation in US high-skilled visa programmes had been declining for years, adding that the decision came “as skill availability and client needs have evolved”.

IBM Consulting employs more than 150,000 of IBM’s 264,300-strong global workforce.

IBM has become less reliant on so-called H-1B visas for highly skilled foreign workers in recent years. Only 1,611 H-1B petitions were approved for the company in fiscal year 2026, according to data from US Citizenship and Immigration Services.

The announcement comes as the Trump administration has increased pressure on major companies to cut down on their highly skilled foreign workforce in the US. US President Donald Trump has claimed the programme is often subject to fraud and takes work away from skilled Americans and gives it to immigrants.

Last year, the administration announced it would require a one-time $100,000 fee on new H-1B petitions.

The administration said in October it was suspending a number of tech companies from a programme that allows H-1B workers to apply for green cards, saying it was cracking down on fraud and ensuring American workers were not being laid off and replaced by foreigners.

The suspended companies included Adobe and top H-1B employers Cognizant, Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services and Microsoft.

The suspensions were announced within hours of Trump honouring Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella with the National Medal of Technology and Innovation.

India-born Nadella was one of six business leaders honoured by Trump. Five were foreign-born US citizens, including Tesla boss Elon Musk, who was born in South Africa, and Google co-founder Sergey Brin, who immigrated from Russia with his family as a child.

Trump administration awarded more than $60m each to St Louis, Missouri, and Jackson, Mississippi, in crime push.

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has said that it will award the cities of St Louis, Missouri, and Jackson, Mississippi, more than $60m each to expand law enforcement resources as part of a bid to combat violent crime.

The White House stated in a social media post on Tuesday that the so-called “Model Cities Initiative” would help the municipalities increase their capacity for prosecutions and policing activities.

“The Model Cities Initiative reflects the Trump Administration’s commitment to reducing crime across the country and ensuring the safety of every American,” Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a press release describing the programme last month.

The initiative has said that it will distribute nearly $300m for such efforts among the cities of St Louis and Jackson, along with Jacksonville, Florida, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

The Trump administration has promoted a largely punitive approach to combatting crime in cities across the country, including controversial steps such as the deployment of the National Guard to large, Democrat-led cities that have drawn accusations of executive overreach, civil liberties violations and political intimidation.

While Trump and his supporters have credited their policies with a drop in violent crime, that trend predates his return to office and has taken place in cities with a wide variety of approaches towards criminal justice across the country.

Homicides in St Louis, for example, have been falling for several years after a brief surge during the COVID-19 pandemic, and hit their lowest levels in more than a decade during the first half of 2026.

While Democratic officials have denounced Trump’s crackdowns, some Republican-led states have embraced them.

The government deployed members of several federal agencies to the city of Memphis, Tennessee, governed by Democrats at the local level but located in a Republican-led state.

The Trump administration has touted that effort as an inspiration for the Model Cities Initiative along with other cases, such as Washington, DC.

The government has hailed the Memphis deployment as a success, but some residents and civil liberties groups have accused the task force of widespread civil rights violations and excessive force.

A video released earlier this month as part of an investigation into a shooting by a member of the Tennessee National Guard, deployed in Memphis as part of Trump’s task force, showed the soldiers aiming their guns at a man as he lay dying on the street after being shot in the back.

The midterms are over, and Democrats have scored a decisive victory, exceeding even their most optimistic expectations. But does this result signal a country turning blue – or a country simply fed up with the status quo? And how much of this was a rejection of a system, rather than an endorsement of the Democratic Party?

Josh Rushing is joined by Emma Vigeland, cohost of The Majority Report, and Olivia Troye, who served as a national security adviser to former Vice President Mike Pence, to unpack the results and what they reveal about the state of American politics.

Contributors:
Emma Vigeland – Cohost, The Majority Report
Olivia Troye – Former national security adviser to Mike Pence

A new poll shows that the majority of Americans want the Democrats in Congress this January to deliver an end to the war in Iran, reverse US President Donald Trump’s trade policies, and bring down the high cost of living.

A Reuters/Ipsos poll published on Tuesday found that 71 percent of Americans supported Congress passing legislation to end the war with Iran, including 93 percent of Democrats and 51 percent of Republicans. About 62 percent backed repealing Trump’s import tariffs, while nine in 10 respondents said Congress should focus on the cost of living during its first 100 days.

The war with Iran and Trump’s tariffs have both contributed to economic pressures, linking voters’ concerns about living costs to the administration’s foreign and trade policies.

Americans also expect some degree of cooperation between the White House and the incoming Congress. Large majorities of respondents from both parties said it was important for Trump to work with Democrats, and for Democratic leaders to try to work with the president.

Political retaliation against the Trump administration is a lower priority. Forty-two percent said it would be bad for the country if the new Congress tried to impeach Trump, compared with 33 percent who thought it would be good.

Democrats will have between 54 and 56 Senate seats next year, depending on results from uncalled races in Mississippi and Alaska. But delivering on voter priorities could still be difficult. Most bills need 60 votes to overcome a Senate filibuster, and Trump can veto legislation that passes both chambers.

Repealing tariffs or reversing other administration policies would therefore require either sufficient Republican support or a willingness to confront the president politically.

Seth Masket, a political science professor at the University of Denver, said voters are motivated by opposition to the Trump administration on several fronts, including the economy, the war, corruption and immigration enforcement.

“They want to see Democrats working to fix these things. And also to some extent, to hold the Trump administration accountable,” Masket told Al Jazeera.

A fight over who leads the Democrats

The pressure to deliver on those priorities is unfolding alongside a growing dispute over who should lead the Democratic Party.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll did not measure public support for individual congressional leaders. It did, however, find that the Democratic Party itself remains unpopular, with 45 percent of respondents viewing it favourably and 51 percent unfavourably.

Hakeem Jeffries is widely expected to become speaker of the House, despite calls for an alternative. No challenger has publicly emerged, but a Change.org petition urging Democrats to reject his leadership has attracted more than one million signatures. House Democrats are due to hold leadership elections on November 18 and 19.

The Senate contest is less settled. Chuck Schumer, who has led Senate Democrats since 2017, faces calls to step aside. Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen has said Schumer should not receive a “blank check” and is considering a possible challenge. Michigan Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed has backed Van Hollen.

The backlash reflects broader dissatisfaction with the party’s direction. Jeffries and Schumer have been criticised over their positions on Israel and Gaza, their relationships with corporate donors and pro-Israel lobbying groups such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), and what voters see as a failure to confront the Trump administration forcefully.

The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), which counts several elected officials among its members, has not backed Jeffries or Schumer for their respective leadership posts. In a statement to Al Jazeera, the DSA said Democrats must reject “half-measures” and deliver on popular policies.

“We the people must be a counterweight both to the internal politics of Congress and the corporate donors who want to keep business as usual,” DSA spokesperson Priscilla Yeverino wrote to Al Jazeera.

Political commentator Bea Neilson said some progressives see the two leaders as representing an older Democratic establishment that is out of step with the party’s base.

“They want an avatar of a fighter,” Neilson told Al Jazeera.

But Neilson argues that the role of the House speaker is not simply to dictate the party’s legislative agenda. Rather, they respond to the positions of lawmakers across the caucus, working with policy committees and other groups to identify legislation that can secure enough votes to pass.

Individual members or blocs of lawmakers can withhold their support, making the job an exercise in negotiating competing interests as much as setting political direction.

Masket agreed that the effectiveness of congressional leaders is often measured less by their public speaking than by their ability to manage their caucuses and get legislation through Congress.

“People wanting their speaker or a Senate majority leader to be a more inspiring leader, I think they’re just asking for the wrong person,” Masket said. “That’s the wrong title for that role.”

That role, he suggested, may fall more naturally to the next generation of presidential contenders, who are expected to begin emerging early next year.

The leadership elections will take place before the new Congress begins in January. The larger question for Democrats is whether their leaders can turn a sweeping electoral mandate into tangible change.

Rare bipartisan bill requires data centres to pay for infrastructure, but environmental groups say it falls short.

The United States Senate has voted to move forward on a bipartisan bill that would speed up the process to build new data centres and energy infrastructure in the country.

Nearly all of the chamber’s Republicans, as well as more than a dozen Democrats, voted 73-25 on Monday to take up the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act, which supporters, including US President Donald Trump, have said is necessary to meet the nation’s growing demand for electricity.

“This Bill is a BIG WIN for U.S. ENERGY INDEPENDENCE and DOMINANCE”, Trump posted on social media Monday as he encouraged lawmakers to support it.

The legislation would overhaul the permitting process for major energy projects – both clean energy and fossil fuel-run – across the US, reduce deadlines for environmental reviews and impose restrictions on when projects can be challenged in the country’s courts. It would also force owners of energy-hungry data centres to pay for the infrastructure that is needed to power them.

Growing anger in the US over those facilities’ use in powering artificial intelligence (AI), which has resulted in rising electricity bills for customers across the country, helped fuel last week’s takeover of the US Congress by Democrats.

“The people sent us a very clear message on Tuesday that they expect us to lower the costs in their daily lives,” Democratic Senator Martin Heinrich, the ranking member on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said on Monday. “We don’t have to wait for the new Congress to start lowering costs. We can do that today.”

Authors of the bill claim it will provide $19bn in savings on residential electricity bills through 2040. The number of solar and wind projects connecting to the US electric grid would be doubled, with data centres paying $55bn over the next 10 years to cover their power usage.

But despite the bill’s claims of increasing clean energy projects, environmental organisations are opposed to the legislation. They argue it would also lock in development of fossil fuels, weaken environmental laws and make it harder for US residents to challenge projects in their communities.

Earlier this year, a coalition of national groups – including the Climate Justice Alliance, Indigenous Environmental Network and Western Environmental Law Center – issued a joint statement opposing the bill.

“We cannot allow the lies to continue, as the facts are clear: If this backroom permitting reform deal is pushed through, it will enable a no-guardrails buildout of dangerous projects that will harm our health and environment, drive up energy costs, and violate our rights,” they said in September.

“This will be especially harmful for communities of color and lower income neighborhoods already overburdened by pollution and climate impacts.”

While the legislation received rare overwhelming support from both major political parties, the Democrats’ midterm win could complicate its final passage.

Some in the party argue that the legislation should be shelved until new Democratic majorities in the US House and Senate are sworn in early next year.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who is on track to become the body’s new speaker in January, criticised the bill last week, warning it “falls short” in several areas.

“We must once again support the clean energy economy and combat the climate crisis with the fierce urgency of now,” a Jeffries spokesperson said in a statement released to the Associated Press.

Jeffries’s office added: “Leader Jeffries will not rubber-stamp legislation that emerges from the Senate without more constructive involvement with our Caucus as we fight to make life more affordable for the American people.”