Select Menu

پاک اردو ٹیوب

پاک اردو ٹیوب

اہم خبریں

clean-5

Recent Posts

Islam

Iqtibasaat

History

Photos

Misc

Technology

Recent Comments

Trump squeezes Iran with maximum pressure — why it hasn’t forced a breakthrough

After two months of conflict, neither a deadly bombing campaign nor a blockade on Iranian exports has forced Tehran to make the concessions the Trump administration is seeking.

The campaign has intensified in recent weeks, targeting Iran’s oil exports and financial networks while a naval blockade has disrupted shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical artery for global energy flows. U.S. officials argue the combination of military pressure and economic isolation is intended to weaken Iran’s capabilities and force it back to the negotiating table on more favorable terms.

While the U.S. has killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and dozens of top military and political figures, the regime itself remains intact. His son, Mojtaba Khamenei, was selected to succeed him, and leadership remains firmly hardline.

Aaron David Miller, a former State Department Middle East negotiator and fellow at the Carnegie Endowment, said the administration may have misjudged the type of negotiating partner it would face.

HORMUZ CHOKE POINT PERSISTS AS IRAN HALTS OIL TRAFFIC DESPITE TRUMP CEASEFIRE

"Trump was looking for an Iranian Delcy Rodriguez," he told Fox News Digital. "More likely, he's going to end up with an Iranian Kim Jong Un."

He expressed doubt that any decisive victory was possible while the current Iranian regime remained in power.

"And we do not have the capacity to remove the regime."

The standoff increasingly has become a test of whether U.S. pressure can be converted into political concessions — or whether it is instead being diluted through workarounds, institutional resilience and competing constraints.

So far, analysts say, Iran has proven more capable of absorbing and rerouting pressure than Washington has been able to translate it into durable gains.

On Monday, Iran floated a proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for relief from the blockade, while deferring negotiations on more contentious issues.

But analysts caution that such proposals do not address the core dispute and may not even mean the same thing to both sides.

"What the Iranians mean by opening the straits, and what Trump means, may be two different sorts of things," Miller said.

At the center of the standoff is Iran’s nuclear program, where the gap between the two sides remains wide. The Trump administration has pushed for Iran to eliminate its uranium enrichment capability entirely, while Iran insists that enrichment is a sovereign right and non-negotiable — leaving little room for compromise.

That divide continues to block a broader agreement, even as both sides explore more limited steps to reduce immediate tensions.

US 'LOCKED AND LOADED' TO DESTROY IRAN’S 'CROWN JEWEL' 'IF WE WANT,' TRUMP WARNS

"It’s almost unimaginable that this administration and the Iranian leadership are willing to make the kinds of concessions that would allow this administration to walk away with a win," Miller said.

"Iranians are willing to give concessions, but Trump is looking for capitulation," said Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft think tank. "And you can't get a country to capitulate unless you have defeated them."

Instead of folding under pressure, Iran largely has responded by adapting. 

Despite the blockade, Iran has continued to move at least some oil through workaround methods, including sanctioned vessels, smaller ports and alternative routing strategies, even as overall exports have come under strain.

Those efforts have expanded in recent weeks. Reports indicate Iran is exploring overland shipments, including potential rail exports to China, while vessels have increasingly rerouted through Iranian territorial waters or controlled shipping corridors to bypass restrictions.

"The United States successfully closes off one avenue for them, and slowly but surely they are finding workarounds," Parsi said.

The financial impact of the campaign has been significant, even if uneven. Estimates vary, but some analysts put Iran’s potential losses from the blockade at roughly $400 million per day, largely driven by disrupted oil exports and reduced access to hard currency.

At the same time, Iran has not been fully cut off. The country has continued to generate billions in oil revenue in recent months, underscoring both the scale of the pressure and its limits.

While a sustained drop in oil revenue would strain the government’s official budget and force cuts to public spending, the country’s most powerful institution, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, operates through its own economic networks, including smuggling routes and cross-border trade.

That allows key parts of the regime to continue functioning even under heavy sanctions, meaning economic pain often falls unevenly — hitting civilians before it weakens the state’s coercive apparatus.

Even attempts to directly destabilize Iran’s leadership have not fundamentally altered that dynamic. U.S. and Israeli operations earlier in the conflict killed Khamenei along with dozens of senior military and political figures.

Yet the regime has remained intact, with power consolidating among remaining political and security elites aligned with hardline positions.

How long Iran can sustain that posture remains uncertain. Miller said a prolonged blockade could eventually force a breaking point — but only if Washington is willing to maintain it.

"If the administration is prepared for six months to keep up this blockade, I think they could probably break the Iranian economy," Miller said.

But he cautioned that such timelines are difficult to predict and that even U.S. intelligence lacks a clear picture of when economic pressure might translate into political concessions.

That uncertainty raises a broader question about the sustainability of the strategy. While Iran’s leadership may be willing to absorb significant economic pain, the U.S. faces its own constraints, including potential strain on military resources and growing risks to global energy markets.

"There are no midterms. There are no primaries. There are no sell-by dates for Iran," Miller said. "And Trump has a sell-by date."

The White House did not respond to a request for comment. 

For now, both sides appear to be waiting for the other to lose the political will to sustain the standoff, with global energy markets caught in the middle.



from Latest & Breaking News on Fox News https://ift.tt/uSg1N5J

Trump endorses the idea of changing ICE to NICE

President Donald Trump endorsed the idea of renaming U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as National Immigration and Customs Enforcement (NICE).

In a Truth Social post, he shared a screenshot of a post on X in which someone had written, "I want Trump to change ICE to NICE (National Immigration and Customs Enforcement) so the media has to say NICE agents all day everyday."

"GREAT IDEA!!! DO IT. President DJT" Trump wrote on the Truth Social post.

ILLEGAL ALIEN ACCUSED OF BITING 3-YEAR-OLD GIRL'S FACE AT TEXAS PARK; ICE LODGES DETAINER AFTER ARREST: DHS

Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House for comment.

The official White House rapid response X account shared a screenshot of Trump's Truth Social post.

ICE NABS ILLEGAL ALIENS CONVICTED OF CHILD SEX CRIMES AND METH TRAFFICKING IN NATIONWIDE ENFORCEMENT SWEEP

The Trump administration has been aiming to secure the border and crack down on illegal immigrants.

Some Democrats advocate for abolishing ICE.

ICE SAYS MORE CRIMINAL MIGRANTS ARRESTED ON 1-YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF PROGRAM TO SUPPORT VICTIMS OF MIGRANT CRIME

For example, progressive Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington declared earlier this month in a post on X, "ICE is not keeping us safe. It's terrorizing our communities, detaining U.S. citizens, and letting people die in custody. Abolish ICE."



from Latest & Breaking News on Fox News https://ift.tt/Tzh9Uaj

California DOGE leader slams Newsom, Bonta over state’s massive fraud issues: “Every day is opposite day"

Republican congressional candidate and CAL DOGE Director Jenny Rae Le Roux is slamming Gov. Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta for failing to crack down on widespread fraud after her watchdog group uncovered multiple cases she says state leaders ignored.

"Every day is opposite day when it comes to Gavin Newsom and Rob Bonta," Le Roux told Fox News Digital. "Whatever they say, I generally believe the exact opposite is true and so when Gavin Newsom says that fraud is under control, what that means is that either he's in on it or unwilling to do anything about it."

"They are either unwilling to do anything or they are not wanting to do it and they're just trying to spin what they are already doing in that way," she added.

CALIFORNIA REPUBLICAN SLAMS STATE'S HANDLING OF HOSPICE FRAUD AS SHE LOOKS TO FLIP BLUE SEAT

California has been at the center of the national fraud spotlight in recent months as the Trump administration has sent resources to the state to look into various accusations of fraud ranging from healthcare to homelessness to nonprofit organizations.

The CEO of a California hospice advocacy group told congressional lawmakers Tuesday that fraud in the industry is flourishing across the state, questioning how numerous fraudulent providers can continue to operate under the nose of regulators.

"You'd be amazed at how many hospices… the door you can walk up to in California and there is nobody there. Five months' worth of mail that you can see stacked… nobody's there," Sheila Clark, the president and CEO of the California Hospice and Palliative Care Association (CHAPCA), said. "And that passed a survey. How did that happen?"

Le Roux said her group uncovered what she described as "intentional fraud" in Sacramento, alleging funds are being redirected toward "Democrat base-building." Cal DOGE is a group that works to root out waste, fraud, and abuse in California that was launched in early 2026 by Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton.

The group says it has uncovered almost $700 million in waste, fraud, and abuse since its founding.

"We have been more effective with a group of volunteers in the last 10 weeks than Gavin Newsom and Rob Bonta have since they've been in office," Le Roux said.

She added Bonta’s office wasted resources on legal battles against the Trump administration instead of focusing on fraud patterns that her group identified using artificial intelligence and financial data.

"Rob Bonta's office billed over 150,000 hours a year going after President Trump and the Trump administration's policies that equates to almost 200 lawyers times when you extrapolate it out over an entire year, which is one-sixth of his entire office, and larger than the DOJ office that's actually doing something in California," she said.

Le Roux, a cousin of Democratic Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, launched her campaign in March and is running in the GOP primary for California’s 47th Congressional District with a focus on combating fraud.

"It doesn't just happen, it's the normal way of operating, which is why, again, the people who've been perpetrating the fraud and leading the charge on it, Newsom and Bonta, can't be the ones that are actually going to investigate it," she said.

GOP SHERIFF LEADING CALIFORNIA POLL RIPS NEWSOM’S ‘LOVE AFFAIR’ WITH CRIMINALS

In one example, she said her group uncovered a case where $370 million in cannabis tax revenue was routed through an intermediary and split into smaller grants that went to unrelated programs. She pointed to systemic flaws, including limited federal prosecution for funds "mostly under $1 million."

"There is no oversight, not one report that is required to explain where the money is spent," she said.

As a result, she said that a lack of oversight has contributed to an estimated $80 billion annually in "fraud, waste, or gross overpayments," arguing the problem is systematic.

Amid recent hospice fraud allegations, Le Roux said stronger oversight could have prevented the issue and curbed the fraud. Newsom’s office pushed back, saying enforcement falls to the federal government.

"These hospice agencies that we are now in the process of shutting down were licensed by the state of California," she said. "They should have never been opened. Every piece of oversight that the state of California should have been administrating had not been happening and so this is a California issue."

She said her group is pressuring officials to prosecute fraud.

"Newsom is trying to take credit for doing nothing instead of actually becoming a part of reform in our state, which is by the way, what not just Republicans, but independents and Democrats want desperately," she said.

However, she emphasized fraud extends beyond California.

"When money flows into California and nothing is checked, that is an American problem, not a California problem," she said.

Fox News Digital reached out to the offices of Newsom and Bonta for comment.

Newsom's office has responded to critics in general in recent weeks by saying the state is "leading the nation in preventing fraud."

"Since @CAGovernor Gavin Newsom took office: — $125 billion+ in fraud STOPPED — 1,200+ criminals ARRESTED — 83% reduction in EBT fraud in one year — New hospice licenses BANNED beginning in 2022," Newsom's press office posted on X last month.



from Latest & Breaking News on Fox News https://ift.tt/AwYiZIX

Dems put Trump on notice as redistricting battle ramps up ahead of midterms: 'Going to fight back'

As redistricting battles are reaching a boiling point, Democrats said President Donald Trump "started this" while defending their own party’s response ahead of the 2026 midterms.

"Donald Trump started this battle, and if people thought Democrats were going to sit on their hands while this happened, that was not the case," Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., said. "We’re going to fight back."

"Democrats did not want this," Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., added.

On Tuesday night, Virginia voters narrowly passed a congressional redistricting referendum backed by Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger, securing a victory for Democrats and shifting momentum in the race for the U.S. House of Representatives.

NEWSOM TURNS VIRGINIA REDISTRICTING VICTORY INTO WARNING SHOT FOR TRUMP ADMINISTRATION

The Virginia referendum, which comes after Trump’s push for redistricting in Republican-controlled states, could give Democrats four more House seats.

"It all starts with Donald Trump asking Gov. Abbott to do an unusual mid-decade redistricting," Rep. Mark Takano, D-Calif., said.

Aguilar said that President Trump’s push in Texas may have sparked the nationwide map fights, but "Democrats and the American people are going to end it."

"Republicans engaged in redistricting discussions in Indiana and in Kansas and in all these other places. It’s incredibly frustrating," Aguilar said. "Republicans started this fight, but Democrats and the American people are going to end it."

Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Pa., called the move "a grab by the president."

BETO ENCOURAGES DEMOCRATS TO FIGHT 'FIRE WITH FIRE' IN TEXAS REDISTRICTING BATTLE

"Mr. Trump said in Texas he was owed five seats, and that’s what triggered redistricting with no transparency," Dean said. "Just a grab by the president."

Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Ga., said states following Trump’s lead are "doing the bidding" of the president and escalating the fight.

"I think that Trump started a slippery slope that we’re sliding down," Johnson said. "Democrats have to match the overreach of complicit Republicans doing the bidding of Donald Trump."

Democrats justified their response as a strategic "play."

"What Democrats have done is just play defense," Takano said. "We’re not going to roll over and just allow this to happen."

Some Democrats said they had no choice but to join the gerrymandering efforts. Both parties hope to win the House using this strategy.

"No one should be interfering with the democratic process, but Mr. Trump was the one who initiated it," Shri Thanedar, D-Mich., said.

TRUMP FORCES INDIANA GOP INTO REDISTRICTING REVERSAL IN RACE TO DRAW NEW MAGA MAP

Johnson said he believes gerrymandering goes beyond politics and could also impact voter representation.

"Partisan gerrymandering is a fig leaf for what’s really happening, which is the racialized redistricting meant to make America great again by excluding Black folks from being able to elect the representatives of their choice, Black and brown people," he said.

One democrat suggested redistricting could wind down soon.

"I think we may have seen the end of any viable redistricting right now before the election," Rep. Judy Chu, D-Calif., said.

However, Takano said Democrats would not back down.

"You can’t bring a knife to a gunfight and say, ‘Hey, Republicans can just change districts mid-decade without a response,’" he said.



from Latest & Breaking News on Fox News https://ift.tt/cW1IQhJ

Americans choosing to visit smaller towns over big cities as travel costs rise

As travel costs continue to climb, some Americans are rethinking their destinations, swapping out trips to major cities for smaller towns.

In Arnaudville, Louisiana, that trend is starting to show up.

"[A] small town like Arnaudville is a great place to drop in and visit," said short-term rental host Larry Lemarié. "There’s no pressure here. There’s no traffic here. It’s very laid back people."

AMERICA’S AIRPORT AFFORDABILITY GAP: CITIES WHERE TRAVEL COSTS ARE CRUSHING FAMILIES

Lemarié has hosted nearly 500 stays at his small wooden cabin, known as "Cajun Acres," which draws visitors from across the country and around the world.

"Phoenix, Arizona… Auckland, New Zealand… Marseille, France," he said.

He said many guests are simply looking for a quiet getaway.

"We do get a lot of people who come to visit New Orleans, but they want to see what’s Louisiana life like," Lemarié said. "So they like to get out of the city for a few days… where it’s much more relaxed and laid back."

Arnaudville sits at the intersection of Bayou Teche and Bayou Fuselier, where visitors can explore swamp tours, local art spaces and live Cajun music.

Arnaudville was recently featured on a list by Airbnb highlighting 20 lesser-known destinations across the U.S.; places the company says travelers may not have considered before.

"86% of travelers said they’re very interested in visiting remote or rural destinations," said Laura Spanjian, Airbnb’s global head of public policy.

SOARING JET FUEL PRICES THREATEN TO DRIVE UP SUMMER TRAVEL COSTS

Spanjian said that reflects growing interest in trips that are less traditional.

"More and more people… really do value traveling off the beaten path," she said.

For some, the draw is the food.

"Yeah, it was great in New Orleans… but if you come down here, you’ll find out it’s better," Larry Thomas said.

That growing interest also comes as travel costs continue to rise.

"I think [the interest is up] particularly now with… the rising cost of living and gas and flights," Spanjian said.

HIGHER FARES COULD SLAM FLIGHT PASSENGERS TO POPULAR REGION AS AIRLINES SHIFT COSTS: 'NOT A FAN'

According to the U.S. Travel Association Travel Price Index, airfares have risen nearly 15% since March of last year, while food and beverage prices are up about 3.7% and hotel and motel prices up about 2.1%.



from Latest & Breaking News on Fox News https://ift.tt/hHA75y8

MORNING GLORY: End the filibuster, pack the Court, kiss the Constitution goodbye

The Democratic Party wants to break the United States Senate’s legislative filibuster in order to pack the Supreme Court with jurisprudential clones of Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who has quickly emerged as the most radical of the nine justices. (Justice Jackson is also the most loquacious, as Mollie Hemingway points out in her new bestseller, "Alito: The Justice Who Reshaped the Supreme Court and Restored the Constitution." Justice Jackson uttered 78,215 words from the bench in the 2023-2025 term. Justices Gorsuch and Kagan got the silver and bronze in the spoken-word competition, but it wasn’t close, as they were both around 50,000 words apiece.

President Joe Biden supported expanding the Court to 14 members in April 2021. Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey is one of many senators who have also applauded the number 14. That’s no surprise, as adding five radicals to Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor would lock in an eight-vote bloc of justices who, after that revolution, would simply be legislators in robes. Kiss the Constitution goodbye if and when "the Nine" becomes "the Fourteen." Hard-left progressivism, whatever the flavor of that day may be, will be in the saddle.

The Fifth and 14th Amendments to the Constitution guarantee every American "due process of law." Do those guarantees stand between a left-wing Congress and a left-wing president bent on torching the Constitution?

TRUMP BLASTS KETANJI BROWN JACKSON AS 'LOW IQ PERSON' IN SUPREME COURT TIRADE

It is hard to deny that all precedents would be out the door with a radicalized Court packed with progressive activist law professors. The precedents might end up out the door with a nine-justice court if Democrats win enough elections, as Father Time remains undefeated when it comes to the current membership of the Court. That would not be a radical change, but rather a process the public could see and intervene in via elections. There is no denying that the Supreme Court vacancy at the time of the 2016 election helped power President Donald Trump’s stunning upset win that year. More than a few voters that year were motivated by the fear of a Court dominated by nominees of prospective President Hillary Clinton.

Democrats are quick to point out that the Constitution is silent on the exact number of justices and that, in fact, Congress often tweaked the number of justices between 1789 and the Judiciary Act of 1869, which fixed the number of justices at nine, a number that has not changed since.

That 1869 act followed fast on the heels of the 14th Amendment, which was ratified in 1868 and which joined its guarantee of "due process of law" to that same guarantee in the Fifth Amendment. The 14th Amendment’s ratification in 1868 and the Court’s right-sizing, which followed the next year, suggests a consensus at the time of the amendment, one that has never been changed since. (The Court has also never had more than 10 justices, and that just briefly.) The Biden-Markey proposal is many things, but it is not rooted in American history, and it certainly would destroy "due process of law" in the nation.

JUSTICE THOMAS WARNS PROGRESSIVISM IS A THREAT TO AMERICA IN RARE PUBLIC REMARKS

Court-packing would, in fact, mark the actual end of the rule of law, and the manipulation of the Court would follow every future political upheaval in which both houses of Congress and the president controlled the federal legislative process. That’s just what happens when suddenly a major break with tradition and practice occurs. The other side of the aisle adopts the tactic too.

Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid broke the Senate’s filibuster rules via the "nuclear option" in order to confirm judges to the D.C. Circuit in 2013 over the objection and warning of then-Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. Soon the Senate’s majority switched from Democrats to Republicans, and McConnell made good on his warning by using simple majorities to confirm three nominees to the Supreme Court put forward by President Trump. Bad move, Harry, but not one that out-and-out destroyed the institution of the Court.

WHY JUSTICE JACKSON IS A FISH OUT OF WATER ON THE SUPREME COURT

Packing the Supreme Court via simple-majority votes — or even by supermajority — would be a disaster, the sort of convulsion that marked the end days of the Roman Republic, when political maneuvering and continual breaches of fundamental traditions occurred and relations between the two parties so soured more than two thousand years ago that civil wars were triggered and eventually dictatorship was the only answer. Republics built on the rule of law are not the norm. They are history’s exceptions. We have one. We should work hard to keep it intact.

There is an excellent argument that court-packing is actually rule-of-law-busting and thus violates the Fifth and 14th Amendments’ guarantees of due process of law. But who would be able to make that argument? Who would have standing to bring the challenge to proposed court-packing legislation, and when would such a challenge be ripe? These are difficult hurdles for any litigant bringing any case. A litigant must show actual injury — a "concrete and particularized" injury, one traceable to defendants’ conduct and an injury that the Court could actually redress.

DEM SENATE CANDIDATE CALLS TO 'SHUT THE WHITE HOUSE DOWN,' IMPEACH 2 SUPREME COURT JUSTICES

Certainly no challenge would lie from anyone in the immediate aftermath of the filibuster being broken, but how about the moment after the court-packing legislation was signed? Who could ask the Court if the destruction of the rule of law was OK by the Nine before their number soared to Fourteen?

Perhaps Professors Randy Barnett and Josh Holmes, co-authors of the best constitutional law casebook out there right now. All of their decades-long work on that terrific casebook would be destroyed immediately, as a 14-member court would make kindling out of all prior decisions (and all the casebooks that explain them) and do so in rather quick fashion.

Perhaps one of the nine justices could bring the case? Their individual authority would be diluted by the expansion to 14 — but would any of them want to be the justice arguing to keep their power intact?

CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS OPINION

Time for the people serious about preserving the rule of law to begin thinking through how to protect due process of law in this country come 2029, if a Democratic president and Democratic majorities in the House and Senate do what they will almost certainly pledge to do on the campaign trail: end the filibuster and pack the Court.

And it is also time for the Senate Republican caucus to bravely and fearlessly defend the legislative filibuster as it currently exists. The legislative filibuster is the biggest hurdle in the way of would-be court-wreckers, the early-warning system that danger to the rule of law is drawing close.

The GOP should be the party of the Constitution and the rule of law, and it ought to be out front right now defending the Court’s membership at nine and the filibuster generally. Win the argument about the filibuster, and you will never have to win the case against court-packing or even worry about "standing" and "ripeness."

Hugh Hewitt is a Fox News contributor and host of "The Hugh Hewitt Show" heard weekday afternoons from 3 PM to 6 PM ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh drives Americans home on the East Coast and to lunch on the West Coast on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable, hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990. Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcasting. This column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM HUGH HEWITT



from Latest & Breaking News on Fox News https://ift.tt/xDB2Y8A

Schlossberg unveils plan to crack down on 'new frontier' of AI putting the 'squeeze' on consumers: 'Harbinger'

FIRST ON FOX: NEW YORK, N.Y. — As thousands of New York City residents prepare to hit the road to leave town for Memorial Day and summer travel, Democratic House candidate Jack Schlossberg is calling for an investigation into the way rental car companies, and potentially other industries, are using artificial intelligence.

Schlossberg, the only grandson of former President John F. Kennedy, is calling on the Federal Trade Commission to look into reports that Hertz began using AI last year to scan cars for rental damages, prompting warnings that consumers could end up being overcharged.

"AI is being used in consumer-facing financial products, and Hertz is using AI to scan for microscopic damage on cars, invisible to the human eye, to charge people with fees for damage that they might not even be aware of, they have no opportunity to dispute, and the FTC should act here to investigate whether or not this constitutes an unfair trade practice," Schlossberg told Fox News Digital outside a midtown Manhattan Hertz location. 

Schlossberg’s concerns stem in part from a report from The Drive where a Hertz customer at location using the technology said he was notified minutes after dropping off his car that a 1-inch scuff on the driver’s side rear wheel resulted in a $440 charge that included $250 for the repair, $125 for processing, and a $65 administrative fee.

FROM CAMELOT TO ‘OUTSIDER’: JFK’S GRANDSON SHAKES UP NYC HOUSE RACE TAKING AIM AT GATEKEEPING DEM 'MACHINE'

The report claims the situation for the customer got even worse when he tried to dispute the charges, and the company’s chatbot did not offer a way to reach a live representative, instead routing the issue for review at a later time.

Hertz has been partnering with Israel-based Uveye to deploy AI scanning technology at airport locations over the past year and uses cameras and machine learning algorithms to scan returned cars in hopes of improving the "frequency, accuracy, and efficiency" of the process and phase out the need for manual inspections, Car & Driver reported.

Schlossberg is calling on the FTC to take four actions, adding that if elected to Congress in NY-12 he would move to enshrine them into federal law: conduct a full investigation into Hertz’s use of AI-driven damage detection, determine whether the practice constitutes an unfair or deceptive act under federal law, establish clear guidelines for the use of AI in consumer-facing financial decisions, and ensure that consumers have a transparent, fair, and accessible process to dispute charges.

'GODFATHER OF AI' WARNS MACHINES COULD SOON OUTTHINK HUMANS, CALLS FOR 'MATERNAL INSTINCTS' TO BE BUILT IN

"I think that this is a harbinger of what's to come," Schlossberg said. "This is the new frontier of corporate fine print because AI is being used in ways we couldn't imagine to price gouge, price fix, jack up prices on consumers without their consent, and basically just squeeze every nickel and dime out of consumers that they possibly can. And sometimes this can be unfair."

"We have elected officials in New York City who quietly work for the AI industry — meanwhile, like in the case of Hertz, consumers are being taken for a ride," Schlossberg’s campaign said in a Wednesday press release first obtained by Fox News Digital, adding that "innovation must not come at the expense of the consumer."

A Hertz spokesperson pushed back on Schlossberg's concerns in a statement to Fox News Digital, saying, "Digital vehicle inspections bring precision and transparency to a historically manual and inconsistent process while also enhancing the safety, quality, and reliability of our fleet. They protect customers from being charged for damage that didn’t occur during their rental while enabling faster, fairer resolution when it does."

The company added, "Since launching over one year ago, we’ve been listening, learning, and improving based on customer feedback — increasing communication, enhancing awareness at digital inspection locations, and strengthening our support channels. We’re committed to building upon the progress we’ve made to continue providing our customers with a more consistent rental experience and safer fleet." 

A company spokesperson also told Fox News Digital that customers are not charged for damages invisible to the human eye and are provided comprehensive reports that include before-and-after photos that can easily be discussed with a Customer Care team via email, phone or chat.

Schlossberg told Fox News Digital that his announcement in mid-April is intended to "get ahead of the peak season booking" as New Yorkers plan their Memorial Day weekend trips and should be aware of the potential pitfalls of renting a car within the landscape of emerging AI technology. 

The FTC declined to comment.

Schlossberg is running as a Democrat in a crowded primary on June 23 to represent New York's 12th Congressional District in Congress, where the winner is widely believed to be in the driver's seat to win the general election in one of the most heavily Democratic districts in the country.



from Latest & Breaking News on Fox News https://ift.tt/GAVvkdl