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Elizabeth Holmes, founder of Theranos Inc., left, arrives at federal court in San Jose, California, on Tuesday, Oct. 12, 2021.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

SAN JOSE, CALIF. — A third juror was dismissed in Elizabeth Holmes’ criminal trial on Friday for what the judge said was “good cause.” That leaves only two alternates in a trial that’s expected to last until December.

U.S. District Court Judge Edward Davila told prosecutors and defense attorneys for Holmes that he received an email from juror No. 5 on Friday morning. The judge, along with Jeffrey Schenk, an assistant U.S. attorney, and Kevin Downey, a defense attorney for Holmes, spoke with the juror in chamber.

“The court had found good cause to excuse a juror,” Davila told the courtroom upon his return. There was no explanation given for excusing the female juror.

An alternate juror was selected to join the main bench. The impaneled jury deciding the fate of Holmes consists of eight men and four women.

“The juror raised the issue on their own, so they began to believe their ability to serve as an impartial juror was compromised,” said Danny Cevallos, an attorney and NBC News legal analyst, in an interview. “Apparently the court agreed with them,” said Cevallos, who’s been following the case but was not present in the courtroom.

Holmes’ high-profile trial began in San Jose seven weeks ago. The second juror was removed two weeks ago after revealing that, due to her Buddhist beliefs, she could not in good conscious return a verdict that may send Holmes to prison. Last month, a 19-year-old juror was dismissed for financial hardships.

Losing too many jurors runs the risk of a mistrial. However, Cevallos said that, according to a federal rule, after a jury has started deliberations a judge may permit a jury of 11 to return a verdict.

Holmes has pleaded not guilty to ten counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Federal prosecutors allege Holmes and her co-conspirator, former company president Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, engaged in a decade-long multimillion-dollar scheme to defraud investors and patients with regards to Theranos’ blood-testing technology.

Holmes and Balwani were indicted in 2018. Her trial has been delayed multiple times due to pandemic-related challenges and Holmes’ pregnancy. Balwani, who also pleaded not guilty, will face a separate trial next year.

Even in the case of a mistrial, Holmes would not be in the clear.

“A retrial, which the government certainly would do, would put Elizabeth’s life on hold again and drain her accounts even further,” Cevallos said. “So as much as a mistrial isn’t a conviction sometimes you’d rather get to the verdict.”

Skepticism from Pfizer

Following the juror’s departure, a scientist at Pfizer, Shane Weber, took the stand. Weber evaluated Theranos in 2008, and reviewed documents related to the blood-testing technology. He later concluded that Pfizer should not pursue a deal with the company.

In his December 2008 summary of a report, Weber recommended that “Theranos does not at this time have any diagnostic or clinical interest to Pfizer,” but he recommended the company revisit the matter every six months.

Weber’s report was shown to jurors. In it, Weber wrote, “Theranos has provided a poorly prepared summary document of their platform for home patient use with anti-angiogenic therapies.”

Further down, he wrote, “Theranos has provided non-informative, tangential, deflective or evasive answers to a written set of technical due diligence questions.”

Weber told his supervisors in an email in January 2009, that he spoke to Holmes to explain that Pfizer would not be using Theranos’ at-home products for patients.

“I was polite, clear, crisp and patiently firm as she pushed back,” the email said. “She asked for other names at Pfizer to approach and I politely deflected.”

Jurors were shown a version of a Theranos report that Holmes had sent to Walgreens executives with the Pfizer logo on it. Weber testified that Pfizer didn’t approve the use of its logo on the report.

“Would it be fair to say in 2010 or after that Pfizer endorsed Theranos technology?” Robert Leach, an assistant U.S. attorney, asked.

Weber responded, “Uh, no.”

Under cross-examination, Weber told jurors that his report on Theranos was never sent to Holmes.

‘Keep things under wraps’

Also on Friday, jurors heard from Bryan Tolbert, who made an investment in Theranos in 2006 and 2013 through Black Diamond Ventures. The firm, which was founded by by Chris Lucas, invested $5 million in the start-up.

Tolbert told jurors that there was limited information about Theranos at the time, but “it felt like a revolutionary technology and you wanted to preserve to your advantage.”

“Chris and I wanted more information, more financial information, more visibility about what was going on,” Tolbert said. “I certainly thought it was intentional they were trying to keep things under wraps.”

WATCH: Another Theranos insider testifies against founder Elizabeth Holmes

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Clout wars: Jensen Huang eclipses Elon Musk and Tim Cook in Washington

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Clout wars: Jensen Huang eclipses Elon Musk and Tim Cook in Washington

U.S. President Donald Trump (L) listens as Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang speaks in the Cross Hall of the White House during an event on “Investing in America” on April 30, 2025 in Washington, DC.

Andrew Harnik | Getty Images

The China-U.S. trade war in the first Donald Trump administration saw Apple CEO Tim Cook go on a charm offensive with the president while maintaining strong relations with Beijing.  

Apple avoided U.S. tariffs and continued to grow in China, while Cook earned the reputation as a skilled policy navigator and prominent American business envoy to Beijing.

But, in Trump 2.0, not only has Apple lost its crown to Nvidia as America’s most valuable company, several tech pundits say the AI darling’s charismatic leader, Jensen Huang, has left Cook far behind in political influence. 

“Huang has become a global figure and taken on a new role politically due to his success in the AI revolution,” said Wedbush’s Dan Ives, adding that the importance of Nvidia’s AI chips has “vaulted him ahead of Cook.”  

“He has found himself in a very strong position to navigate the political landscape … [as] there is only one chip in the world fueling the AI revolution, and that’s Nvidia’s,” Ives said.

The optics of Huang’s political ascendancy have never been stronger, as Nvidia last week announced during its CEO’s latest visit to Beijing that it expected to soon resume sales of its H20 AI chips to China.

Huang’s ‘historic’ week 

The exports of the H20 chip to China had been restricted earlier this year — a move that Huang openly lobbied against.

“It was a historic win for Nvidia and Jensen … and I think it shows the increasing political influence that Huang’s having within the Trump administration,” Ives said. Huang had met with Trump in DC right before his China visit. 

The H20 reversal has been linked to trade negotiations between the U.S. and China. However, several experts told CNBC that Huang’s lobbying played a large role in it. 

The Nvidia CEO has met with Trump many times this year, including joining him on a trip to the Middle East in May, which resulted in a massive AI deal that will see the delivery of hundreds of thousands of Nvidia’s advanced AI chips to the United Arab Emirates. 

The Emirates deal had been seen as a way for America to push its global tech leadership, solidifying its technology stack in a new market over potential rivals like China’s Huawei.

After the trip, Huang increasingly began making a case against U.S. chip restrictions, arguing that they would erode America’s tech leadership to the benefit of domestic Chinese players. 

According to a report from the New York Times, this had also been a narrative Huang had been pushing to Trump and his officials behind the scenes. 

Paul Triolo, senior vice president for China, and technology policy lead at DGA-Albright Stonebridge Group, told CNBC that Huang’s arguments aligned with the thinking of influential White House AI and Crypto Czar David Sacks, further swaying the administration to lift restrictions on H20 chip exports. 

“Sacks and Huang both argue that limiting exports of U.S. technology such as select and non-cutting-edge GPUs to China risks pushing Chinese companies to use domestic alternatives … At the end of the day, this argument likely carried the day on the H20 issue,” he said. 

It’s unclear when or if Nvidia will restart production lines of the H20, but if Nvidia is simply able to sell existing stocks of H20s, it will still be a “significant revenue boost and beneficial to Nvidia in terms of retaining clients’ goodwill in China,” Triolo added.  Nvidia said it took a $4.5 billion writedown on its unsold H20 inventory in May.

Huang said last week that every civil AI model should run on the U.S. technology stack, “encouraging nations worldwide to choose America,” as Nvidia announced resuming H20 sales soon.

Not Musk, not Cook

When Trump won his second presidential election in November, many had expected a different tech CEO to hold the most influence on the administration and to act as a bridge between the U.S. and China. But Tesla’s Elon Musk had a rather public break-up with Trump.

In November, experts told CNBC that Musk’s close ties to Trump and his business interests in China could help soften the president’s aggressive trade stance toward Beijing, while cautioning against putting too much stock into the Tesla CEO.

Meanwhile, under Trump’s second presidency, Apple’s Cook has seen some strong pushback from the administration.

In May, Trump expressed a “little problem with Tim Cook” over Apple manufacturing products in India, despite the iPhone maker’s commitment of a $500 billion investment in the U.S., announced in February.

In response to the latest trade tensions between China and the U.S., Apple has accelerated efforts to de-risk supply chains from China by moving more iPhone production to India.

Earlier this month, Trump adviser Peter Navarro also criticized Cook, saying he was not moving production out of China fast enough.  

Apple and Cook were seen as the most influential company and CEO, respectively, in the first Trump administration, but now its Huang and Nvidia, said Ray Wang, CEO of Silicon Valley-based Constellation Research Inc. “Almost everything rides on Nvidia’s chips.”

Risks remain

According Triolo, while Huang has so far been able to “fairly deftly straddle both the U.S. government and China market” and “President Trump appears to be a big fan,” it remains unclear exactly where the administration will draw the line on chip restrictions. 

“The goalposts here have been changed several times, causing significant and costly forced redesigns and booking capacity,” he said. 

Despite Huang’s growing influence in the tech world and in the Trump administration, there is no guarantee it will remain that way, other experts said. 

“For the moment, NVIDIA has gone from being the chief target of chip controls to chief influencer. The question is, how long will that moment last?” said Reva Goujon, director at Rhodium Group. 

The U.S. is also currently carrying out an investigation on the semiconductor industry that could result in sector-wide tariffs, and once again put the Trump administration’s aims at odds with Nvidia’s business. While Nvidia has been moving more manufacturing to the U.S., most of it remains in Taiwan. 

Cook may offer a lesson on how tricky it can be to operate a major technology business that views both China and the U.S. as key markets.

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YouTube wipes out thousands of propaganda channels linked to China, Russia, others

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YouTube wipes out thousands of propaganda channels linked to China, Russia, others

Beata Zawrzel | Nurphoto | Getty Images

Google announced Monday the removal of nearly 11,000 YouTube channels and other accounts tied to state-linked propaganda campaigns from China, Russia and more in the second quarter.

The takedown included more than 7,700 YouTube channels linked to China.

These campaigns primarily shared content in Chinese and English that promoted the People’s Republic of China, supported President Xi Jinping and commented on U.S. foreign affairs.

Over 2,000 removed channels were linked to Russia. The content was in multiple languages that supported Russia and criticized Ukraine, NATO and the West.

Google, in May, removed 20 YouTube channels, 4 Ads accounts, and 1 Blogger blog linked to RT, the Russian state-controlled media outlet accused of paying prominent conservative influencers for social media content ahead of the 2024 election.

Tim Pool, Dave Rubin and Benny Johnson — all staunch supporters of President Donald Trump — made content for Tenent Media, the Tennessee company described in the indictment, according to NBC News.

Read more CNBC tech news

YouTube began blocking RT channels in March 2022, shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine.

The active removal of accounts is part of the Google Threat Analysis Group’s work to counter global disinformation campaigns and “coordinated influence” operations.

Google’s second quarter report also outlined the removal of influence campaigns linked to Azerbaijan, Iran, Turkey, Israel, Romania and Ghana that were found to be targeting political rivals.

Some campaigns centered on growing geopolitical conflicts, including narratives on both sides of the Israel-Palestine War.

CNBC has reached out to YouTube for further comment or information on the report.

Google took down more than 23,000 accounts in the first quarter.

Meta announced last week it removed about 10 million profiles for impersonating large content producers through the first half of 2025 as part of an effort by the company to combat “spammy content.”

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New Astronomer CEO gives first statement since Coldplay kiss-cam scandal

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New Astronomer CEO gives first statement since Coldplay kiss-cam scandal

Chris Martin of Coldplay performs live at San Siro Stadium, Milan, Italy, in July 2017.

Mairo Cinquetti | NurPhoto | Getty Images

Astronomer‘s interim CEO said in his first public comment since unexpectedly taking over the role on Saturday that he hopes to move the tech startup past the viral moment that captured national attention last week.

Pete DeJoy was appointed to the top job due to the resignation of CEO Andy Byron, days after he was caught on video in an intimate moment with the company’s head of human resources at a Coldplay concert. Astronomer said over the weekend that it would begin a search for a new CEO.

“The events of the past few days have received a level of media attention that few companies — let alone startups in our small corner of the data and AI world — ever encounter,” DeJoy wrote in a LinkedIn post on Monday. “The spotlight has been unusual and surreal for our team and, while I would never have wished for it to happen like this, Astronomer is now a household name.”

Byron was shown on a big screen at the concert in Boston on Wednesday with his arms around Chief People Officer Kristin Cabot. Byron, who is married with children, immediately hid when the couple was shown on screen. Lead singer Chris Martin said, “Either they’re having an affair or they’re just very shy.” A concert attendee’s video of the affair went viral.

Read more CNBC reporting on AI

DeJoy helped start Astronomer in 2017, according to his LinkedIn profile, and had been serving as chief product officer since earlier this year.

In May, Astronomer announced a $93 million investment round led by Bain Ventures and other investors, including Salesforce Ventures.

“I’m stepping into this role with a wholehearted commitment to taking care of our people and delivering for our customers,” DeJoy wrote. He added that “our story is very much still being written.”

Astronomer is commercializing the open-source data operations platform Astro. DeJoy wrote that customers “trust us with their most ambitious data & AI projects” and that “we’re here because the mission is bigger than any one moment.”

WATCH: Tech’s latest job cuts raise questions about AI

Tech’s latest job cuts raise the question: Is AI to blame?

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