President Donald Trump’s media company said Tuesday that institutional investors will buy $2.5 billion in the company’s stock with the proceeds going to build up a bitcoin reserve.
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About 50 institutional investors will put up $1.5 billion in the private placement for common shares in the company and another $1 billion for convertible senior notes, according to Trump Media and Technology Group, the operator of Truth Social and other companies.
Trump Media said it intends to use the proceeds for the creation of a “bitcoin treasury.”
“This investment will help defend our Company against harassment and discrimination by financial institutions, which plague many Americans and U.S. firms,” said Trump Media CEO and Chairman Devin Nunes in prepared remarks.
Shares of Trump Media & Technology Group Corp., based in Sarasota, Fla., tumbled 9%
Other companies have adopted similar strategies through cryptocurrency. Cloud and mobile software developer MicroStrategy Inc. has built up a treasury reserve containing billions worth of bitcoin through stock sales and debt financing.
Trump, who referred to cryptocurrencies in his first term as “not money,” citing volatility and a value “based on thin air,” has shifted his views on the technology.
During an event at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida during his presidential campaign in May 2024, Trump received assurances that crypto industry backers would spend lavishly to get him reelected.
Last week, Trump rewarded 220 of the top investors in one of his other cryptocurrency projects — the $Trump meme coin —with a swanky dinner luxury golf club in Northern Virginia, spurring accusations that the president was mixing his duties in the White House with personal profit.
But aside from shooting down the devices, which may create further danger, there’s often not much anyone can do to stop drones when they pose a threat or wander where they’re not welcome.
That’s beginning to change. Cheap and easily modified, unmanned aerial vehicles have become a part of daily life as well as a tool for governments and bad actors alike — used for intelligence gathering, surveillance, sabotage, terrorism and more. Concerns about their misuse have spurred a technological scramble for ways to stop the devices in midair.
“An adversary can use an off-the-shelf drone they bought for $500 and find out what’s going on at U.S. nuclear weapons bases,” said Zachary Kallenborn, a London-based national security consultant and expert on drone warfare. “China, Russia, Iran: If they’re not doing it they’re stupid.”
The rise in incidents involving unmanned aircraft — like the wave of sightings reported last year in New Jersey — has led to more research and investment into the most effective ways of countering drones, preferably while preventing injuries to those below.
D-Fend Solutions counter drone technology is demonstrated, Wednesday, May 14, 2025, in Reston, Va. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
D-Fend Solutions counter drone technology is demonstrated, Wednesday, May 14, 2025, in Reston, Va. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
D-Fend Solutions counter drone technology is demonstrated, Wednesday, May 14, 2025, in Reston, Va. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
D-Fend Solutions counter drone technology is demonstrated, Wednesday, May 14, 2025, in Reston, Va. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
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D-Fend Solutions counter drone technology is demonstrated, Wednesday, May 14, 2025, in Reston, Va. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
Some systems work by firing a projectile to destroy it. Others jam the radio frequencies used to control the drones, causing them to land in place or fly back to their origin. Another approach uses other drones to fire nets at the offending devices.
All the techniques have their strengths and weaknesses.
Jamming a drone is highly effective and relatively easy from a technical standpoint. But it’s a blunt tool — jamming not just the drone’s signal but other electromagnetic signals used by telephones, emergency responders, air traffic control and the internet.
The most basic anti-drone measures are called kinetic defenses, which involve shooting a missile, bullet, net or other projectile at the device to destroy or disable it.
Kinetic systems can be risky, however, by creating the threat that debris could fall on people or property or that a missile fired at unmanned aircraft could miss and hit civilians instead. In 2022, for instance, 12 people were injured in Saudi Arabia when they were hit by debris after authorities took down a drone launched by Houthi rebels near the Yemen border.
Hacking into drones
The Israeli firm D-Fend Solutions created a system it calls EnforceAir that allows the operator to hack into an adversarial drone and take over its controls. The equipment looks like a large computer router and can be set up on a tripod or a vehicle or carried in a backpack.
Like other anti-drone systems, D-Fend’s product also detects any drones entering a predetermined area, allowing the operator to permit friendly devices to fly through while disabling others.
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In a demonstration of the technology in an empty athletic field in suburban Washington, the system quickly hijacked a drone operated by one of D-Fend’s technicians as it entered an area being monitored.
“We detect the drone, we take control and we land it,” said Jeffrey Starr, the company’s chief marketing officer.
Landing the aircraft safely allows authorities to study the device — a critical benefit to law enforcement or national security investigations. It also allows the drone to be given back to its owner in the case of harmless mistakes involving hobbyists.
Anti-drone systems that involve hacking the invading aircraft may not work on military drones, however, as they come equipped with greater cyberdefenses.
Anti-drone efforts could be moving closer to the mainstream
National security experts predict that a variety of techniques to counter drones could soon become commonplace, used to protect sensitive buildings, pipelines, ports and public areas. But before that can happen, federal laws must catch up to the threat.
“Most of the laws we’re dealing with were written for manned aviation,” said DJ Smith, senior technical surveillance agent with the Virginia State Police’s Bureau of Criminal Investigations.
Smith, who oversees his department’s use of drones, said any new federal rules should come with a public awareness campaign so hobbyists and commercial drone users understand the law and the responsibilities of using a drone. Authorities also need greater powers to use systems to track suspicious drones, he said, and take action against them when they pose a threat.
“We want to detect, we want to track, we want to identify,” Smith said.
“It is paramount that our state and local law enforcement agencies are able to be granted the proper authority to protect citizens at large events and gatherings,” said Rep. Cory Mills, a Florida Republican and a sponsor of legislation designed to make it easier for local authorities to use technology to counter drones at large public events.
The bill, introduced this month, would give local law enforcement the ability to use anti-drone systems that have been approved by the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Aviation Administration and other agencies.
Both directions of Interstate 494 between Minnesota highways 100 and 77 will be closed Friday, May 30, through Monday morning, June 2, for bridge work, state transportation officials said.
Before the freeway is shut down at 10 p.m. Friday, all ramps along the route will close at 8 p.m. The freeway will open again at 5 a.m. Monday.
The closure is due to construction of a pedestrian bridge over I-494 near Chicago Avenue and the removal of the Portland Avenue bridge for reconstruction, according to the Minnesota Department of Transportation.
Motorists will be directed to Minnesota 62 via 100 and 77 as a detour.
NEW YORK — A former top aid to Sean “Diddy” Combs testified Tuesday at his sex trafficking trial that the music mogul threatened her with death on her first day on the job and later kidnapped her at gunpoint to join him in an effort to kill rapper Kid Cudi.
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The testimony from Capricorn Clark, the former global brand director for Bad Boy Entertainment, launched the third week of testimony in the trial on a violent note as prosecutors try to prove Combs led a racketeering conspiracy spanning two decades that relied on beefy security employees and others to ensure he got what he wanted.
Combs has pleaded not guilty to multiple counts of an indictment accusing him of a pattern of abuse toward his longtime girlfriend Cassie, whose legal name is Casandra Ventura, and others.
Clark’s testimony came days after Kid Cudi, whose legal name is Scott Mescudi, testified that Clark called him from a car outside his home in December 2011 and told him that Combs, angered because Cudi was dating the singer Cassie, had kidnapped her and forced her to ride him with him to Cudi’s home.
Clark, who mostly referred to Combs as “ Puff ” during her testimony, said he came to her home that morning with a gun in his hand, demanded that she get dressed and come with him because “we’re going to kill Cudi.”
She said they rode in a black Cadillac to Cudi’s home in Los Angeles, where Combs and a security aide entered the residence while Clark sat in the car and called Cassie.
Clark testified she told her that Combs “got me with a gun and brought me to Cudi’s house to kill him.”
Clark said she heard Cudi in the background of the call asking, “He’s in my house?” She told Cassie, “Stop him, he’s going to get himself killed.”
Cassie told her she couldn’t stop Cudi, she recalled.
Combs returned to the vehicle and asked Clark who she was talking to, Clark testified. He grabbed the phone and called Cassie back, she said.
They then heard Cudi’s vehicle coming up the road, she said. Combs and his bodyguard got back in the vehicle and chased after Cudi, finally giving up when they passed police cars that were heading for Cudi’s house.
After the break-in, Clark said, Combs told the people with him that they had to convince Cudi “it wasn’t me.”
“If you don’t convince him of that I’ll kill all you,” he said, punctuating his threat with an expletive, according to Clark.
On Thursday, Cudi testified that he dated Cassie briefly in December 2011, believing that she had broken up with Combs, but they agreed over the holidays to end the relationship after all that had happened.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Mitzi Steiner questioned Clark about her off-and-on employment with Combs between 2004 and 2018, beginning with the first day on the job when she said Combs and a security staff member took her to Central Park after 9 p.m. and said he hadn’t been aware of her past history working with other rappers.
Clark, her voice shaky at times, testified that Combs told her that if her past work for rap rivals became an issue, he’d have to kill her.
She said she was only weeks into the job when Combs tasked her with carrying some diamond jewelry on a flight to Miami and it went missing.
As a result, she said, she was taken to a largely empty building in Manhattan where, over a five-day stretch, she was repeatedly given a lie detector test by a man who seemed five times larger than her own size.
“He said: ‘If you fail this test they’re going to throw you in the East River,’” she recalled.
Clark said they eventually let her return to work.
If convicted, the 55-year-old Combs could face 15 years to life in prison.
