Smarter Gov Tech, Stronger MerITocracy

Weslan Hansen

MeriTalk

Weslan Hansen is a MeriTalk Staff Reporter covering the intersection of government and technology.

The Department of Energy (DoE) will have at least three small modular reactors (SMRs) running by July of next year, Energy Secretary Chris Wright told Congress on Wednesday – announcing a significant step forward for next-generation nuclear energy.  […]

Army DoD military Defense AI

If signed into law, a new discussion draft of legislation to execute oversight of the Department of Veterans Affairs’ Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) program would centralize oversight and standardize workflows while modernizing the VA’s systems.  […]

Department of Homeland Security DHS

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said on Thursday that its U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) component plans to make further investments in blockchain technology to assist in criminal investigations.   […]

More than 30 Democratic members of the House of Representatives are urging top Senate leaders to reconsider a proposal being offered in the Senate that would require states seeking Federal broadband support to abide by a proposed ten-year moratorium on creating state-level artificial intelligence (AI) regulations.    […]

Agentic artificial intelligence services – those that are designed to act with more autonomy than their generative or predictive AI forebears – drew a mixed reception today from lawmakers and witnesses who talked about the advantages of the latest AI flavor along with cybersecurity concerns during a hearing held by the House Homeland Security Committee’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee.   […]

IRS

A Federal watchdog said in a new report that the Internal Revenue Services (IRS) is falling short on overseeing its identity verification vendor’s use of artificial intelligence, even as it earns high marks for protecting taxpayer data.  […]

CISA

The House Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee voted on Monday to approve a 4.6 percent year-over-year budget cut for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) for fiscal year 2026 – versus the 16 percent budget reduction that the Trump administration has been offering in its budget request to Congress last month.   […]

Weslan Hansen
MeriTalk