Ted Turner, founder of news outlet CNN and founding co-chair of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, died at home in Tallahassee, Fla. Wednesday at age 87 due to Lewy body dementia.
According to a statement by NTI, Turner launched the non-profit organization in 2001 with Sam Nunn and Charlie Curtis after watching a report on 60 Minutes on the number of nuclear weapons in the world after the Cold War.
“From launching a communications revolution with the founding of CNN to turning philanthropy on its head with his remarkable generosity, Ted changed the world through his creativity, vision, courage, passion, and heart,” the statement said.
Rep. Mark Alford (R-Mo.) is pushing legislation aimed at increasing scrutiny of foreign property ownership near U.S. nuclear weapons facilities, according to his opinion piece published Wednesday in the The Kansas City Star.
Alford said language from his Strategic Assets Protection Act was included in the fiscal 2027 Financial Services and General Government appropriations bill, which passed the House Appropriations Committee. The measure would require the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States to review transactions near nuclear triad sites dating back to 2017.
“Our nuclear triad is too important to leave unprotected,” Alford wrote, citing concerns about alleged Chinese Communist Party-linked property ownership near Whiteman Air Force Base and other strategic military installations.
Jay Tilden, formerly director of intelligence and counterintelligence at DOE and NNSA, will be the new executive director at the Nuclear Energy and National Security Coalition, according to a LinkedIn post.
Tilden’s background “spans senior roles at DOE and NNSA” with “deep expertise in counterproliferation and nuclear threat science,” the post said.
Additionally, Christopher Ploch will serve as deputy director of NENSC. Ploch “served in DOE and on Capitol Hill advancing nuclear energy initiatives,” the post said.
Bechtel and an organized labor group have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to revamp apprenticeship programs supporting nuclear power projects.
Bechtel and North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU) announced the MOU in a Tuesday press release. The longtime builder of nuclear infrastructure and NABTU, a large confederation of construction unions, will look to modernize industry training. The parties said they would identify special craft skills for nuclear construction; work with existing union training centers to update curricula and coordinate recruitment of young talent to build new large nuclear projects and small modular reactors.
“This agreement ensures a continuous pipeline of highly skilled, job-ready craft professionals to build nuclear power’s next fleet of reactors,” NABTU President Sean McGarvey said in the release.
Texas-based Fluor has sold its remaining 40 million shares of NuScale Power Corp., and generated gross proceeds of $473 million, Fluor said in a recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC).
The sale of Fluor’s remaining shares in NuScale, the small modular reactor developer, was completed April 23, Fluor said in the SEC filing. Fluor “made a total investment of $570 million in NuScale and has generated approximately $2.43 billion in open market sales since September of 2025.”
Fluor, a global engineering, procurement and construction company, has held an ownership stake in NuScale since 2011.
Fluor has hired Bradley Smalldridge, most recently an executive with Aecon Group, as Fluor Energy Solutions vice president of nuclear operations.
Smalldridge said Monday on LinkedIn that he has joined Irving, Texas-based Fluor. A Fluor spokesperson subsequently confirmed the executive hire. “In this role I am providing executive leadership and management oversight for Fluor nuclear power operation, focused on development and growth of Fluor domestic and international new nuclear design build” capacity, Smalldridge said in the post.
Smalldridge has been a vice president with the U.S. operations of Toronto-based Aecon for about three years, according to his LinkedIn bio. He has also held vice president-level posts with Dairyland Power Cooperative, BHI Energy as well as Day & Zimmermann. In the late 1990s he was an inspector for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and before that worked at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard.