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Rep. Bill Foster (D-IL): “How do you think we should be thinking about the transition to agentic finances, where most transactions happen not between consumers and businesses or business to businesses, but through agents, and the choice of the exact payment rails may be sort of a side issue to these two agents that have already negotiated identity and authorization, and all these other things that you struggle with all the time, that will sort of be built in automatically to the agent to agent interaction?

The star-studded opening brought out three former presidents, musical legends and former staffers to celebrate a center that former President Barack Obama said will “serve as an affirmation of just how special, how precious our democracy truly is.”

Standing in front of his namesake presidential center near the neighborhood where he launched his historic political career, former President Barack Obama paid homage Thursday to the city that inspired him to run and led him to love.

A group of Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday pressed the Trump administration for more information about its proposed "Golden Dome" missile defense shield.

Led by Senators Edward Markey and Jeff Merkley and Representatives John Garamendi and Don Beyer, the lawmakers sent a letter to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth seeking answers about the system's mission, capabilities, cost, and strategic implications.

Rep. Bill Foster issued an artificial intelligence-related warning to federal banking regulators at a recent House Financial Services Committee hearing.

“I don’t think that we are prepared for an agentic AI bank run,” Foster, D-IL, told leaders of the Federal Reserve, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and National Credit Union Administration on June 4. 

Bill Foster is a U.S. congressional representative of Illinois and a member of the Democratic Party. Before entering politics, he worked as a business executive and a physicist, including at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), where he contributed to high-energy particle physics research.

[This interview was edited for length and clarity.]

How do you see the current state of American science right now?

WASHINGTON, June 15 (Reuters) - The Trump administration is moving forward with talks with companies to turn Cold War-era plutonium into a fuel for new nuclear reactors, part of a multi-pronged strategy to ensure there is enough ​power to feed the U.S. data center boom.

But the scheme risks extensive delays and exorbitant security costs - to the point it may be unfeasible - due to a simple ‌fact: plutonium is incredibly dangerous.

Illinois Democratic congressmen are blasting the federal spending bill for ICE that lawmakers approved on a partisan vote.

“It is beyond irresponsible to hand ICE – an agency that has murdered Americans, kidnapped people off our streets, and ignored the constitutional rights of those they’ve detained – a $70 billion check and no accountability,” said U.S. Rep. Sean Casten, D-Downers Grove. “To do so less than one year after providing ICE with an additional $140 billion in the Big Ugly Bill is downright negligent.

Illinois congressional members watched pigs be born, spread fertilizer, saw a bioreactor demo from the back of a pickup and more during visits to Illinois Farm Bureau members’ farms this spring.