Reuters US Domestic News Summary

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

Trump's Justice Department has failed to award 75% of anti-trafficking grants, senator finds

The US Justice Department has failed to award roughly 75% of congressionally appropriated grants to combat human trafficking in the last two fiscal years, according to a letter from Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal shared exclusively with Reuters. The result is a delay in more than $130 million in funding for anti-trafficking legal clinics, advocates and nonprofit groups, forcing some providers to ​curtail or eliminate critical support services for survivors, including children.

Lindsay Clancy loses bid to dismiss murder charges, retrial looms

A Massachusetts judge cleared the way on Monday for Lindsay Clancy to be tried again on murder charges for killing her three young children at her home in 2023, saying a retrial would ​not unconstitutionally subject her to a double prosecution for the same crime. Judge William Sullivan in Plymouth rejected a bid by Clancy's attorneys to have the case against her dismissed. The judge on September 4 declared a ‌mistrial after the jury reported that ​a holdout juror was preventing it from reaching a unanimous verdict.

House Democratic leader says lawmakers need answers on Nvidia, wants China chip restrictions

US House of Representatives Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries said on Monday that Congress needs more answers after reports emerged that Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had been targeted by a foreign intelligence effort. Jeffries also called for the House to pass an annual defense bill that includes restrictions on chip sales to China that are included in a bill now before the US Senate.

France's president and wife file new lawsuit against US podcaster Owens

French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte have filed a second set of defamation complaints against Candace Owens two weeks after a US court narrowed a first one, the US right-wing podcaster said late on Monday in a post on X. The Macrons had sued Owens and two businesses associated with her in July 2025 in a Delaware court over what they called her lie-filled "campaign of global humiliation," including the false claim that France's first lady was born a male

Most Americans ‌want new Democratic Congress to end Trump's Iran war, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds

Majorities of Americans want the newly elected Democratic-majority US Congress to act to end the war with Iran and to repeal tariffs put in place by President Donald Trump, signaling demand for quick action to address the high cost of living, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll found. The four-day poll, completed on Monday, showed 71% of Americans -- including 93% of Democrats and 51% of Republicans -- want US Congress to pass legislation ending the conflict with Iran that Trump launched alongside US ally Israel in February.

What we know about Nvidia's probe into CEO Jensen Huang

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang faces a board probe into whether he was the target of a foreign intelligence effort after a media report linked him to a Chinese businesswoman accused of passing information to Beijing. The New York Times reported last month that Huang had a relationship with Alice Huang, an unrelated former executive of Singapore-based company Megaspeed, who US authorities investigated and concluded was a Chinese intelligence asset.

Analysis-AI debt faces pressure as Democrats prepare to take over Congress

Bond investors are growing more cautious on debt tied to the artificial intelligence boom, highlighting concerns over the expected efforts of a Democrat-controlled Congress to slow the pace of AI investment and data center expansion. US high-yield credit spreads widened to 348 basis points in last Thursday's stock-market swoon, ICE BofA US Corporate Index data showed. That was the highest since May 2025, just a month after President Trump imposed ‌global tariffs. Spreads narrowed on Friday to 342 basis points.

Trump sets off bedlam in White House briefing room with UFC chief Dana White

President Donald Trump set off a scramble in the White House press briefing room on Monday with an appearance so sudden that aides had no time to place the presidential seal on the podium. The cause of the sudden bedlam? Trump was eager to show off UFC CEO Dana White, a close friend more comfortable with watching fighters bash each other in the Octagon than mixing it up with reporters.

At a Jackson store, high prices show why Mississippi US Senate race is so close

Maria Lopez sees the customers at ‌the Mississippi grocery store she manages struggle to afford the basics. It's not much easier for her: she keeps the heater off in her car to save gas and even buying milk at her own store can be hard. "Instead of getting a big gallon, we'll do half a gallon," Lopez, a 42-year-old whose store is in Jackson, said, adding that she is also struggling to afford health insurance and prescriptions. "It's just me and my daughter... I don't know how other families are making it happen that don't have food stamps."

Nvidia spy allegations likely to spur laws to tighten China's access to AI chips

Congress is more likely to pass legislation aimed at tightening China's access to AI chips in light of news that Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had a relationship with a suspected Chinese intelligence agent, lawmakers and advocates said. Three chip-related measures are slated for possible inclusion in the annual defense authorization bill for fiscal year 2027, which began in October. Huang's affair, and his close relationship with President Donald Trump, has added new urgency to concerns about China's access to advanced chips that could undermine US national security.

Billionaire tax measure on California ballot defeated

A billionaire tax that US Senator Bernie Sanders and other progressives championed as an antidote to economic inequality and a potential model for the rest of the country was defeated in California, US media projected on Monday. Proponents had estimated Prop 40 would raise $100 billion in revenue, most of which would have been earmarked for healthcare programs to offset federal funding cuts designed to pay for tax breaks enacted last year under President Donald Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill." Those tax breaks, largely benefiting wealthy individuals and corporate interests, passed with Republican-only support in the US Senate.

Trump says he would give baseball player ⁠Pete Rose a pardon

US President Donald Trump ​told reporters on Monday that he would give a pardon to former professional baseball player Pete Rose.

US Congress gets first post-'Blue Wave' crack at data centers with permitting bill

A sweeping bipartisan energy ⁠bill has unexpectedly emerged as the US Congress' first test of how to tackle public anger over data centers and rising electricity costs, which helped to power Democrats to a landslide election victory last week. The legislation, years in the making and due to come before the Senate for debate on Monday, would speed approvals for new power plants and transmission lines, while requiring large data center operators to bear more of the cost of grid upgrades needed to serve them.

Supreme Court allows Trump border wall at Big Bend National Park in Texas

The US Supreme Court gave President Donald Trump's administration the green light on Monday to proceed with the construction of barriers along the US-Mexico border in a remote region in West Texas that includes Big Bend National Park, fast-tracking one of his longstanding priorities. The court granted the administration's emergency request to lift ⁠a federal judge's order halting the border wall's construction in the region while a lawsuit against the project brought by an environmental group and other challengers plays out.

White House nominates Palantir's LoSapio to lead Homeland Security's cyber agency

The White House said on Monday it has nominated Michael LoSapio to be the director of the US Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. LoSapio will take over from acting CISA Director Nick Andersen

Accused Ecuadorean thief agrees to plead guilty in largest US jewelry heist

An Ecuadorean man has agreed to plead guilty to a federal robbery charge for his role in the theft of roughly $100 million worth of jewelry from an armored truck five years ago in California, considered the largest such heist in US history. Carlos Victor Mestanza Cercado, 32, an Ecuadorean national arrested ​two years ago in Panama during a layover on a flight from Guatemala to his home country, was one of seven men indicted on charges of robbing a Brink's truck at a highway rest stop north of Los Angeles on July 11, 2022.

Microsoft presses Trump to scuttle expected ban on Chinese data center technology

Microsoft has been pressing the Trump administration to halt plans to bar Chinese imports of a key component used in AI data centers, three people familiar with the situation said. Reuters reported in August that the Trump administration wants to ban US imports of new models of Chinese optical transceivers, which ⁠allow data to travel over fiber-optic cables at the speed of light within data centers. The concern is that they could be used by Beijing to steal data, install malware or disrupt service at US data centers.

US to skip UN human rights review, drawing censure

The United States will spurn a UN meeting on Tuesday where its human rights record under President Donald Trump was due to be examined, drawing criticism from rights groups who say violations have surged to levels not seen in decades. Washington disengaged from the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council last year, citing an anti-Israel bias, and this is the second year in a row that it has skipped its own review — a process that even dictatorships take part in.

How the US was left exposed to the flesh-eating screwworm, years into the outbreak

For decades, planes dropped billions of factory-bred sterile flies to keep the flesh-eating New World screwworm ⁠out of ​North America’s cattle. That controls the pest because sterile males mate with wild females – whose eggs then fail to hatch. But the strategy works only if the supply of flies never runs short.

Utah judge sets 2028 trial date for Charlie Kirk killing

A Utah judge on Monday set a June 2028 trial date for Tyler Robinson, the man accused of murdering prominent right-wing activist Charlie Kirk last year. Robinson, 23, has pleaded not guilty to seven counts, including aggravated murder, in the shooting of Kirk as the conservative held one of his trademark debates at Utah Valley University in Orem.

Pentagon chief Hegseth expected to face House impeachment vote this week

Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, calls himself the secretary of war, part of his effort to rebrand a military he said was too weak and "woke" when he took office last year. Now, with an expected House impeachment vote this week, he could soon share something in common with an actual secretary of war. William Belknap, who held that title in 1876, became the first, and to date only, civilian leader of the US military to be impeached by Congress.

Senate advances energy permitting bill opposed by some Democrats, tribes

The US Senate voted to advance debate on a sweeping bipartisan energy permitting bill on Monday, handing a victory to Democratic Senators Martin Heinrich and Sheldon Whitehouse as they seek to pass the ambitious infrastructure legislation before Congress adjourns. The Senate voted 73-25 ⁠to invoke cloture on a motion to proceed to the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act, clearing the way for debate on legislation that would speed approvals for power plants, transmission lines, mines and other infrastructure projects while requiring large data centers to pay more of the costs of grid upgrades needed to serve them.

Trump approval holds at 32%, near lowest of his career, Reuters Ipsos poll finds

President Donald Trump's approval rating held near the lowest level of his political career, depressed by national concerns over rising prices that tanked his Republican Party in last week's midterm elections, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Monday. Some 32% of Americans approve of Trump's ⁠performance in the White House, unchanged from two prior Reuters/Ipsos polls conducted between late October and early November. It was one percentage point higher than his 31% rating in a Reuters/Ipsos poll in mid-October, ⁠the lowest of his career in politics.

Court blocks California from enforcing climate disclosure laws

A federal appeals court dealt a setback to California's desire to enforce first-of-its-kind climate disclosure laws, blocking the state from requiring large companies to disclose climate-related financial risks and "indirect" greenhouse gas emissions. Monday's decision by a three-judge panel of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco is a partial victory for the US Chamber of Commerce, the American Farm Bureau Federation and several California business groups that sued to block the two state laws.

'Trump has cost us': After midterm losses, MAGA asks if it's over

As Republicans faced a nationwide drubbing in Tuesday’s midterm elections, supporters streamed out of a Dallas ballroom where they’d hoped to toast a win for US Senate candidate Ken Paxton, a favorite of President Donald Trump. In the hotel bar, Michael Little, a 59-year-old businessman and three-time Trump voter, stared at the president’s image on a television screen. “People are pissed off at Trump. Trump has cost us,” he said, capturing a sentiment rippling through the president’s Make America ‌Great Again movement after the Republican Party’s worst electoral defeat in decades.

A week after huge election losses, Republicans to choose their leaders ‌in Congress

One week after the massive election defeat that repudiated their fealty to President Donald Trump, Republicans in the US Congress were set on Tuesday to decide who will lead their party next year when Democrats take over the Senate and House of Representatives. Senate Majority Leader John Thune appeared to face no challengers to his bid to become minority ​leader in January, even as a group of hardline Republican senators pressed to delay party leadership elections in favor of holding a post-mortem session on the election defeat.