OUR PICKSThe Terrible Optics of ICE Enforcement | Trump’s Brain Drain Will Be Europe’s Gain | Deepfakes, Scams, and the Age of Paranoia, and more

Trump’s Brain Drain Will Be Europe’s Gain  (Daniel B. Baer, Foreign Policy)
Brussels and London should go big on siphoning American science and technology talent.

White South Africans Granted Refugee Status by Trump Leave for U.S.  (John Eligon, New York Times)
A U.S.-funded charter plane carrying dozens of white South Africans who claim to have been victims of discrimination in their home country left Johannesburg on Sunday, heading for the United States, where the Trump administration is welcoming them as refugees.
The departure of the white South Africans, who say they have been denied jobs and have been targeted by violence because of their race, was a remarkable development in President Trump’s redefining of U.S. foreign policy.
Mr. Trump has halted virtually all refugee admissions for people fleeing famine and war from places like Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. But he has created an expedited path into the country for Afrikaners, a white ethnic minority that created and led the brutal apartheid regime in South Africa.

Trump’s Gifted Qatari 747 Would Be a Security Problem, Officials Say  (Natalie Allison, Ellen Nakashima, Dan Lamothe, Derek Hawkins and Warren P. Strobel, Washington Post)
The luxury jet was moved five weeks ago to San Antonio International Airport, suggesting that preparations for improvements to the plane might already be underway.

The Terrible Optics of ICE Enforcement Are Fueling a Trump Immigration Backlash  (Nick Miroff, The Atlantic)
The president was elected, in part, on a pledge to crack down on immigration. But he may be overinterpreting his mandate.

An $8.4 Billion Chinese Hub for Crypto Crime Is Incorporated in Colorado  (Andy Greenberg, Wired)
Before a crackdown by Telegram, Xinbi Guarantee grew into one of the internet’s biggest markets for Chinese-speaking crypto scammers and money laundering. And all registered to a US address.

Deepfakes, Scams, and the Age of Paranoia  (Lauren Goode, Wired)
As AI-driven fraud becomes increasingly common, more people feel the need to verify every interaction they have online.

Indiana Sees Nation’s Highest Spike of Antisemitism  (Arika Herron, Axios)
Antisemitic incidents in Indiana more than doubled in 2024, the biggest increase nationwide in a year when anti-Jewish activity reached its highest level recorded in nearly half a century.

For Geopolitics, What AI Can’t Do Will Be as Important as What It Can  (Jacob Parakilas, RAND / Udenrigs)
Geopolitics is no exception to the rapid spread of AI through the fields of human endeavour. As elsewhere, the rapid emergence of AI into the popular narrative has led to the commonly held belief that AI’s technical capabilities, and therefore its transformational potential, are somewhere between vast and unlimited. However, like any category of technology, AI has limits and understanding where those limits lie is crucial to understanding how it might shape global affairs in the near future.