By ALI SWENSON

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on Thursday outlined a strategy to expand its use of artificial intelligence, building on the Trump administration’s enthusiastic embrace of the rapidly advancing technology while raising questions about how health information would be protected.

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HHS billed the plan as a “first step” focused largely on making its work more efficient and coordinating AI adoption across divisions. But the 20-page document also teased some grander plans to promote AI innovation, including in the analysis of patient health data and in drug development.

“For too long, our Department has been bogged down by bureaucracy and busy-work,” Deputy HHS Secretary Jim O’Neill wrote in an introduction to the strategy. “It is time to tear down these barriers to progress and unite in our use of technology to Make America Healthy Again.”

The new strategy signals how leaders across the Trump administration have embraced AI innovation, encouraging employees across the federal workforce to use chatbots and AI assistants for their daily tasks. As generative AI technology made significant leaps under President Joe Biden’s administration, he issued an executive order to establish guardrails for their use. But when President Donald Trump came into office, he repealed that order and his administration has sought to remove barriers to the use of AI across the federal government.

Experts said the administration’s willingness to modernize government operations presents both opportunities and risks. Some said that AI innovation within HHS demanded rigorous standards because it was dealing with sensitive data and questioned whether those would be met under the leadership of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Some in Kennedy’s own “Make America Health Again” movement have also voiced concerns about tech companies having access to people’s personal information.

Strategy encourages AI use across the department

HHS’s new plan calls for embracing a “try-first” culture to help staff become more productive and capable through the use of AI. Earlier this year, HHS made the popular AI model ChatGPT available to every employee in the department.

The document identifies five key pillars for its AI strategy moving forward, including creating a governance structure that manages risk, designing a suite of AI resources for use across the department, empowering employees to use AI tools, funding programs to set standards for the use of AI in research and development and incorporating AI in public health and patient care.

It says HHS divisions are already working on promoting the use of AI “to deliver personalized, context-aware health guidance to patients by securely accessing and interpreting their medical records in real time.” Some in Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again movement have expressed concerns about the use of AI tools to analyze health data and say they aren’t comfortable with the U.S. health department working with big tech companies to access people’s personal information.

HHS previously faced criticism for pushing legal boundaries in its sharing of sensitive data when it handed over Medicaid recipients’ personal health data to Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials.

Experts question how the department will ensure sensitive medical data is protected

Oren Etzioni, an artificial intelligence expert who founded a nonprofit to fight political deepfakes, said HHS’s enthusiasm for using AI in health care was worth celebrating but warned that speed shouldn’t come at the expense of safety.

“The HHS strategy lays out ambitious goals — centralized data infrastructure, rapid deployment of AI tools, and an AI-enabled workforce — but ambition brings risk when dealing with the most sensitive data Americans have: their health information,” he said.

Etzioni said the strategy’s call for “gold standard science,” risk assessments and transparency in AI development appear to be positive signs. But he said he doubted whether HHS could meet those standards under the leadership of Kennedy, who he said has often flouted rigor and scientific principles.

Darrell West, senior fellow in the Brooking Institution’s Center for Technology Innovation, noted the document promises to strengthen risk management but doesn’t include detailed information about how that will be done.

“There are a lot of unanswered questions about how sensitive medical information will be handled and the way data will be shared,” he said. “There are clear safeguards in place for individual records, but not as many protections for aggregated information being analyzed by AI tools. I would like to understand how officials plan to balance the use of medical information to improve operations with privacy protections that safeguard people’s personal information.”

Still, West, said, if done carefully, “this could become a transformative example of a modernized agency that performs at a much higher level than before.”

The strategy says HHS had 271 active or planned AI implementations in the 2024 financial year, a number it projects will increase by 70% in 2025.

By GERALD IMRAY

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — For 35 years, American zoologist Laurie Marker has been collecting and storing specimens in a cheetah sperm bank in Namibia, hoping conservationists never have to use them.

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But she worries that the world’s fastest land animal might be on the brink of extinction one day and need artificial reproduction to save it.

Marker says the sperm bank at the Cheetah Conservation Fund she founded in the southern African nation is a “frozen zoo” of cheetahs she’s been building since 1990. It would be utilized in a worst-case scenario for the big cats, whose numbers have dropped alarmingly in the wild over the last 50 years.

“You don’t do anything with it unless until it’s needed,” Marker, one of the foremost experts on cheetahs, told The Associated Press from her research center near the Namibian city of Otjiwarongo. “And we never want to get to that point.”

Conservationists mark World Cheetah Day on Thursday with less than 7,000 of them left in the wild, similar numbers to the critically endangered black rhino. There are only around 33 populations of cheetahs spread out in pockets mainly across Africa, with most of those populations having less than 100 animals, Marker said.

Like so many species, the sleek cats that can run at speeds of 70 miles per hour (112 kilometers per hour) are in danger from habitat loss, human-wildlife conflict and the illegal animal trade. Their shrinking, isolated groups mean their gene pool is shrinking also as small populations continuously breed among themselves, with repercussions for their reproduction rates.

Globally, cheetah numbers in the wild have dropped by 80% in the last half-century and they’ve been pushed out of 90% of their historical range.

Scientists believe that cheetahs already narrowly escaped extinction at the end of the last ice age around 10,000-12,000 years ago, which first reduced their gene pool.

Marker said the lack of genetic diversity, along with the fact that cheetahs have 70-80% abnormal sperm, mean they might need help in the future.

“And so, a sperm bank makes perfect sense, right?” Marker said.

A common conservation tactic

Storing sperm is not unique to cheetahs in the wildlife world. It’s a tactic that conservationists have developed for other species, including elephants, rhinos, antelopes, other big cats, birds and others.

The value of animal reproductive research, Marker said, is seen in the desperate battle to save the northern white rhino from extinction.

There are just two northern white rhinos left, both females, making the species functionally extinct with no chance of reproducing naturally. Their only hope lies in artificial reproduction using northern white rhino sperm that was collected and frozen years ago.

Because both remaining northern white rhinos — a mother and daughter — can’t carry pregnancies, scientists have tried to implant northern white rhino embryos in southern white rhino surrogates. The surrogates haven’t managed to carry any of the pregnancies to term, but the conservation team has committed to keep trying to save northern white rhinos against all odds.

Other efforts around artificial reproduction have been successful, including a project that bred black-footed ferrets using artificial reproduction after they’d been reduced to a single wild population in Wyoming in the United States.

Last resort

Marker doesn’t chase down cheetahs to collect their sperm but takes samples opportunistically. In Namibia, cheetahs are mostly in danger from farmers who view them as threats to their livestock, meaning Marker’s team are called out for cats that have been injured or captured and will collect samples while treating and releasing them.

Sperm samples can also be taken from dead cheetahs. “Every cheetah is actually a unique mix of a very small number of genes. We will try to bank every animal we possibly can,” Marker said.

The samples from approximately 400 cheetahs and counting are now stored at ultralow temperatures in liquid nitrogen at the Cheetah Conservation Fund laboratory. Marker’s research does not involve any artificial insemination as breeding wild animals in captivity is not allowed in Namibia.

Should cheetahs be threatened with extinction again, the first backup would be the roughly 1,800 cats living in zoos and other captive environments. But, Marker said, cheetahs don’t breed well in captivity and the sperm bank might be, like the northern white rhinos, the last resort.

Without it, “we’re not going to have much of a chance,” Marker said.

AP Africa news: https://apnews.com/hub/africa

By FATIMA HUSSEIN

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. Treasury Department imposed a $7.1 million fine on a New York-based property management firm Thursday, accusing it of violating sanctions by managing luxury real estate properties for oligarch Oleg Deripaska, who has close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

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Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control said Gracetown Inc. had received 24 payments between April 2018 and May 2020 totaling $31,250 on behalf of a company owned by Deripaska. OFAC says it gave Gracetown notice that dealings with Deripaska were prohibited, but the firm proceeded anyway.

Justice Department filings from 2022 connect Gracetown Inc. with U.K. businessman Graham Bonham-Carter, who was arrested in October 2022 for conspiracy to violate U.S. sanctions imposed on Deripaska as well as for wire fraud connected to funding Deripaska’s U.S. properties and efforts to expatriate the oligarch’s artwork to New York.

A lawyer who has represented Deripaska previously didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Gracetown couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

Deripaska has faced economic sanctions since 2018, when the Treasury Department accused him of acting for or on behalf of a senior Russian official and operating in the energy sector of the Russian economy. All of his assets subject to U.S. jurisdiction were blocked, and U.S. people and firms are prohibited from dealings related to Deripaska, his properties and his interest in properties.

Deripaska sued The Associated Press in 2017 over a story that March about his business dealings with Paul Manafort, a former campaign chairman for President Donald Trump. Deripaska said the AP article was inaccurate and hurt his career by falsely accusing him of criminal activity. A federal judge dismissed the defamation and libel lawsuit that October.

In 2022, Deripaska and three associates were criminally charged in New York with conspiring to violate U.S. sanctions and plotting to ensure his child was born in the United States.

Treasury says its Thursday enforcement action against Gracetown “highlights the importance of following OFAC-issued guidance and the significant consequences that can occur from failing to do so.”

John K. Hurley, Treasury’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial Intelligence, said “we will continue to investigate and hold accountable those who enable sanctioned actors.”

Gracetown was established in 2006 to manage three luxury real estate properties in New York and Washington, D.C., that Deripaska acquired around the same time through various legal entities.

By JACK BROOK and JOHN SEEWER

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Trump administration officials overseeing the immigration crackdown launched this week in New Orleans are aiming to make 5,000 arrests with a focus on violent offenders, a target that some city leaders say is not realistic.

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It’s an ambitious goal that would surpass the number of arrests during a two-month enforcement blitz this fall around Chicago, a region with a much bigger immigrant population than New Orleans.

In Los Angeles — the first major battleground in President Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration plan — roughly 5,000 people were arrested over the summer in an area where 10 million LA county residents are foreign-born.

“There is no rational basis that a sweep of New Orleans, or the surrounding parishes, would ever yield anywhere near 5,000 criminals, let alone ones that are considered ‘violent’ by any definition,” New Orleans City Council President J.P. Morrell said Thursday.

Census Bureau figures show the New Orleans metro area had a foreign-born population of almost 100,000 residents last year, and that just under 60% were not U.S. citizens.

“The amount of violent crime attributed to illegal immigrants is negligible,” Morrell said, pointing out that crime in New Orleans is at historic lows.

Violent crimes, including murders, rapes and robberies, have fallen by 12% through October compared to a year ago, from a total of 2,167 violent crimes to 1,897 this year, according to New Orleans police statistics.

A flood of messages about arrests

Federal agents in marked and unmarked vehicles began spreading out across New Orleans and its suburbs Wednesday, making arrests in home improvement store parking lots and patrolling neighborhoods with large immigrant populations.

U.S. Border Patrol agents stand on the street in New Orleans, La.,Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

Alejandra Vasquez, who runs a social media page in New Orleans that reports the whereabouts of federal agents, said she has received a flood of messages, photos and video since the operations began.

“My heart is so broken,” Vasquez said. “They came here to take criminals and they are taking our working people. They are not here doing what they are supposed to do. They are taking families.”

Several hundred agents from Customs and Border Protection and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are participating in the two-month operation dubbed “Catahoula Crunch.”

U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, who is from Louisiana, is among the state’s Republicans supporting the crackdown. “Democrats’ sanctuary city policies have failed — making our American communities dangerous. The people of our GREAT city deserve better, and help is now on the ground,” Johnson posted on social media.

Operation is being met with resistance

About two dozen protesters were removed from a New Orleans City Council meeting Thursday after chants of “Shame” broke out. Police officers ordered protesters to leave the building, with some pushed or physically carried out by officers.

Protesters participate in an anti-ICE demonstration during a meeting at the City Hall in New Orleans, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (Enan Chediak/The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate via AP)

Planning documents obtained last month by The Associated Press show the crackdown is intended to cover southeast Louisiana and into Mississippi.

Homeland Security Department spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said agents are going after immigrants who were released after arrests for violent crimes.

“In just 24 hours on the ground, our law enforcement officers have arrested violent criminals with rap sheets that include homicide, kidnapping, child abuse, robbery, theft, and assault,” McLaughlin said Thursday in a statement. Border Patrol and immigration officials have not responded to requests for details, including how many have been arrested so far.

She told CNN on Wednesday that “we will continue whether that will be 5,000 arrests or beyond.”

Immigration arrests go beyond violent criminals

To come close to reaching their target numbers in New Orleans, immigrant rights group fear federal agents will set their sights on a much broader group.

New Orleans City councilmember Lesli Harris said “there are nowhere near 5,000 violent offenders in our region” whom Border Patrol could arrest.

Protesters participate in an anti-ICE demonstration during a meeting at the City Hall in New Orleans, Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025. (Enan Chediak/The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate via AP)

“What we’re seeing instead are mothers, teenagers, and workers being detained during routine check-ins, from their homes and places of work,” Harris said. “Immigration violations are civil matters, not criminal offenses, and sweeping up thousands of residents who pose no threat will destabilize families, harm our economy.”

During the “Operation Midway Blitz” crackdown in Chicago that began in September, federal immigration agents arrested more than 4,000 people across the city and its many suburbs, dipping into Indiana.

Homeland Security officials heralded efforts to nab violent criminals, posting dozens of pictures on social media of people appearing to have criminal histories and lacking legal permission to be in the U.S. But public records tracking the first weeks of the Chicago push show most arrestees didn’t have a criminal record.

Of roughly 1,900 people arrested in the Chicago area from early September through the middle of October — the latest data available — nearly 300 or about 15% had criminal convictions on their records, according to ICE arrest data from the University of California Berkeley Deportation Data Project analyzed by The Associated Press.

The vast majority of those convictions were for traffic offenses, misdemeanors or nonviolent felonies, the data showed.

U.S. Border Patrol Commander at large Gregory Bovino, 1st right, walks on the street in New Orleans, La.,Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

New Orleans, whose international flavor comes from its long history of French, Spanish, African and Native American cultures, has seen a new wave of immigrants from places in Central and South America and Asia.

Across all of Louisiana, there were more than 145,000 foreign-born noncitizens, according to the Census Bureau. While those numbers don’t break down how many residents of the state were in the country illegally, the Pew Research Center estimated the number at 110,000 people in 2023.

Seewer reported from Toledo, Ohio. Associated Press journalists Sara Cline in Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Sophia Tareen in Chicago; Aaron Kessler in Washington, D.C.; and Michael Schneider in Orlando, Florida, contributed.