By ANNE D’INNOCENZIO

NEW YORK (AP) — What sounds like President Donald Trump narrating a new Fannie Mae ad actually is an AI-cloned voice reading text, according to a disclaimer in the video.

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The voice in the ad, created with permission from the Trump administration, promises an “all new Fannie Mae” and calls the institution the “protector of the American Dream.” The ad comes as the administration is making a big push to show voters it is responding to their concerns about affordability, including in the housing market.

Trump plans to talk about housing at his appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where world leaders and corporate executives meet this week.

This isn’t the first time a member of the Trump family has used AI to replicate their voice. First Lady Melania Trump recently employed AI technology firm ElevenLabs to help voice the audio version of her memoir. It’s not known who cloned President Trump’s voice for the Fannie Mae ad. But ElevenLabs said in an email to The Associated Press on Sunday that the audio of Trump’s voice wasn’t generated by the company.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Last month, Trump pledged in a prime-time address that he would roll out “some of the most aggressive housing reform plans in American history.”

“For generations, home ownership meant security, independence, and stability,” Trump’s digitized voice says in the one-minute ad aired Sunday. “But today, that dream feels out of reach for too many Americans not because they stopped working hard but because the system stopped working for them.”

Fannie Mae and its counterpart Freddie Mac, which have been under government control since the Great Recession, buy mortgages that meet their risk criteria from banks, which helps provide liquidity for the housing market. The two firms guarantee roughly half of the $13 trillion U.S. home loan market and are a bedrock of the U.S. economy.

The ad says Fannie Mae will work with the banking industry to approve more would-be homebuyers for mortgages.

Trump, Bill Pulte, who leads the Federal Housing Finance Agency, and others have said they want to sell shares of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on a major stock exchange but no concrete plans have been set.

Trump and Pulte have also floated extending the 30-year mortgage to 50 years in order to lower monthly payments. Trump appeared to back off the proposal after critics said a longer-term loan would reduce people’s ability to create housing equity and increase their own wealth.

Trump also said on social media earlier this month that he was directing the federal government to buy $200 billion in mortgage bonds, a move he said would help reduce mortgage rates at a time when Americans are anxious about home prices. Trump said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have $200 billion in cash that will be used to make the purchase.

Earlier this month, Trump also said he wants to block large institutional investors from buying houses, saying that a ban would make it easier for younger families to buy their first homes.

Trump’s permission for the use of AI is interesting given that he has complained about aides in the Biden administration using autopen to apply the former president’s signature to laws, pardons or executive orders. An autopen is a mechanical device that is used to replicate a person’s authentic signature.

However, a report issued by House Republicans does not include any concrete evidence that autopen was used to sign Biden’s name without his knowledge.

By BECKY BOHRER

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — The aurora could be visible across Canada and much of the northern tier of U.S. states — and possibly further south — Monday night following a major disturbance in the Earth’s magnetic field, a forecast shows.

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The forecast, from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center, comes amid intense geomagnetic and solar radiation storms, said Shawn Dahl, service coordinator at the center.

Geomagnetic storms that can lead to vivid northern lights also can interfere with satellite operations, GPS communications and other infrastructure, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Dahl said the current storm isn’t expected to become much weaker until sometime Tuesday.

In November, solar storms brought vibrant auroras to parts of Europe including Hungary and the United Kingdom, and as far south in the United States as Kansas, Colorado and Texas.

Northern lights illuminate the cloud cover over Rushmere St. Andrew, Ipswich, England, Monday Jan. 19, 2026. (Joe Pickover/PA via AP)

Solar radiation storms can affect objects in space and certain types of communications systems, but Dahl said astronauts at the international space station currently are not at risk. The intensity of this storm has not been seen in more than two decades, he said.

By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge refused Monday to temporarily block the Trump administration from enforcing a new policy requiring a week’s notice before members of Congress can visit immigration detention facilities.

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U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb in Washington, D.C., concluded that the Department of Homeland Security didn’t violate an earlier court order when it reimposed a seven-day notice requirement for congressional oversight visits to Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities.

Cobb said she wasn’t ruling on whether the new policy passes legal muster. Rather, she said, plaintiffs’ attorneys representing several Democratic members of Congress used the wrong “procedural vehicle” to challenge it. The judge also concluded that the Jan. 8 policy is a new agency action that isn’t subject to her prior order in the plaintiffs’ favor.

Plaintiffs’ lawyers asked Cobb to intervene after three Democratic members of Congress from Minnesota were blocked from visiting an ICE facility near Minneapolis earlier this month — three days after an ICE officer shot and killed U.S. citizen Renee Good in Minneapolis.

Last month, Cobb temporarily blocked an administration oversight visit policy. She ruled Dec. 17 that it is likely illegal for ICE to demand a week’s notice from members of Congress seeking to visit and observe conditions in ICE facilities.

A day after Good’s death, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem secretly signed a new memorandum reinstating another seven-day notice requirement. Plaintiffs’ lawyers said DHS didn’t disclose the latest policy until after U.S. Reps. Ilhan Omar, Kelly Morrison and Angie Craig initially were turned away from an ICE facility in the Minneapolis federal building.

On Monday, Cobb ruled that the new policy is similar but different than the one announced in June 2025.

“The Court emphasizes that it denies Plaintiffs’ motion only because it is not the proper avenue to challenge Defendants’ January 8, 2026 memorandum and the policy stated therein, rather than based on any kind of finding that the policy is lawful,” she wrote.

Twelve other Democratic members of Congress sued in Washington to challenge ICE’s amended visitor policies after they were denied entry to detention facilities. Their lawsuit accused Republican President Donald Trump’s administration of obstructing congressional oversight of the centers during its nationwide surge in immigration enforcement operations.

A law bars DHS from using appropriated general funds to prevent members of Congress from entering DHS facilities for oversight purposes. Plaintiffs’ attorneys from the Democracy Forward Foundation said the administration hasn’t shown that none of those funds are being used to implement the latest notice policy.

“Appropriations are not a game. They are a law,” plaintiffs’ attorney Christine Coogle said during a hearing Wednesday.

Justice Department attorney Amber Richer said the Jan. 8 policy signed by Noem is distinct from the policies that Cobb suspended last month.

“This is really a challenge to a new policy,” Richer said.

Plaintiffs’ attorneys said the matter is urgent because members of Congress are negotiating funding for DHS and ICE for the next fiscal year with DHS’s annual appropriations due to expire Jan. 30.

“This is a critical moment for oversight, and members of Congress must be able to conduct oversight at ICE detention facilities, without notice, to obtain urgent and essential information for ongoing funding negotiations,” the lawyers wrote.

Government attorneys have said it’s merely speculative for the legislators to be concerned that conditions in ICE facilities change over the course of a week. But the judge rejected those arguments last month.

“The changing conditions within ICE facilities means that it is likely impossible for a Member of Congress to reconstruct the conditions at a facility on the day that they initially sought to enter,” wrote Cobb, who was nominated to the bench by Democratic President Joe Biden.

The New York Stock Exchange is working on a digital platform that would enable investors to trade digital tokens around the clock.

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The platform would be separate from the NYSE itself, which operates only on weekdays, and allow for instant settlement of transactions, orders sized in dollar amounts and stablecoin-based funding, NYSE owner Intercontinental Exchange said Monday.

Tokenization uses blockchain technology that powers cryptocurrencies to create digital tokens as stand-ins for things like stocks, bonds, real estate or even fractional ownership of a piece of art that can be traded like crypto by virtually anyone, anywhere at any time. Stablecoins, which are a type of cryptocurrency typically bought and sold for $1, have helped fuel the appetite to tokenize other financial assets.

Assuming it meets regulatory scrutiny, the platform would power a new NYSE venue that would support trading of tokenized versions of company shares, the exchange said.

The development of the platform is part of Intercontinental Exchange’s bid to broaden its transaction clearing capabilities to handle 24/7 trading of tokenized securities and, potentially, the integration of tokenized collateral.

Intercontinental Exchange said it’s working with Citigroup, Bank of New York Mellon and other lenders to support tokenized deposits across the company’s six clearinghouses around the globe.