Exit leaves AI supporters without a leading voice as risk debate intensifies

Nvidia Chief Executive Jensen Huang has resigned, with the announcement of his departure coming the morning of Nov. 12, 2026, according to The Wall Street Journal’s CMO Today newsletter.

The resignation leaves the artificial intelligence industry without one of its most prominent advocates “just as the debate over the tech has reached a new pitch,” the newsletter reported. The newsletter’s headline described Huang’s resignation as quieting “the AI boom’s best PR asset.”

The decision followed two extramarital affairs, including one with a suspected Chinese spy and another with an employee, according to reporting by the Journal’s Robbie Whelan, Josh Dawsey and Amrith Ramkumar, citing people familiar with the situation.

In describing Huang’s public persona, the Journal’s reporters wrote that he had “vocally defended the technology against concerns that it could lead to widespread catastrophe.”

Other prominent figures make similar arguments as well, the newsletter noted, including AI pioneer Yann LeCun, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, whose company released an advertisement this summer expressing its optimism about AI.

Less sanguine figures continue to command attention, too. “It doesn’t matter whether people put the risk of catastrophe at 10% or 1% or 12% or 0.1%,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said at the United Nations in September, urging international cooperation to address AI concerns. “None of these levels are remotely acceptable.”

Huang is leaving what the newsletter called his “bully pulpit” just after the midterm elections concluded with victories for many candidates who campaigned to reconsider, slow or stop AI datacenter construction, according to the report.

AI’s defenders, the newsletter said, will be left looking to fill the void.

United’s stance on AI booking agents

The newsletter also reported that United Airlines will prevent personal AI assistants from accessing its systems to buy tickets, the Journal’s Alison Sider writes. The newsletter described United as “the latest big name to stiff-arm agents that promise to make consumers’ lives easier by taking on terrible, difficult or just plain boring tasks.” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said last month that travel planning is one of the top use cases for its Muse agent.

United said there were concerns that outside agents could expose customers’ sensitive information, make unintended purchases or fail to meet certain government requirements. The airline as a result will let agents look at flight options and fares — but not book seats.

United CEO Scott Kirby said Tuesday that the company would likely take a cautious approach to agentic commerce. “To be honest, I don’t want to create another middleman,” Kirby said at an event.

United is the first U.S. airline to make such a strong public stance against agentic transactions, Sider said. Other airlines are — at least for now — taking more of a wait-and-see approach. American and Delta allow agents to make bookings on their websites, at least through certain channels and when they can be authenticated.

AI tools are becoming more important resources for travelers as they plan trips and search for deals, and airlines don’t want to be left out of the comparison-shopping process. But so far, United said very few people are actually making bookings using AI agents.

It’s possible agentic AI will become an important distribution channel, but airlines also like to have a direct relationship with their customers. Carriers have long resisted so-called middlemen and spent years fighting online travel agencies for control over the way their tickets are displayed and sold.

Brands like Gap and Walmart quickly publicized their embrace of Meta’s Muse, getting headlines and maybe customers by association with a possible Next Big Thing.

It’s fair to say airlines have been playing a lot of catch-up with their technology in recent years, but they’ve gotten much savvier when it comes to new tech, Sider said. They recognized that they needed to improve their apps and make things more seamless for customers, especially when there are travel disruptions, and they’re starting to use AI to smooth out their operations and even to set pricing.

United taking the most skeptical stance on agentic transactions is notable, Sider said, since CEO Scott Kirby has probably been the most outspoken about making technology an advantage. Kirby has talked about his own AI “epiphany” — when he was able to vibe-code his own sports betting app after three hour-long tutoring sessions — as an “aha” moment when he understood AI as a potentially transformational power.

Ratings, releases and brief items

Average viewers for last week’s “Saturday Night Live” with guest host Druski and musical guest the Strokes marked the show’s biggest audience in two years.

Bart Spiegel, global media, entertainment, gaming and sports leader at PricewaterhouseCoopers, said the release of “Grand Theft Auto VI” will have ripple effects for competing entertainment properties. “It’s going to be a watershed moment for not only the gaming industry but also all the folks in the media and entertainment industry who are going to have to deal with the fact that eyeballs are going to be leaving their environments.” Spiegel’s remarks concerned the impact of “Grand Theft Auto VI” on audiences for entertainment properties like a new “Hunger Games” movie, “Ebenezer” starring Johnny Depp and Amazon’s new season of “The Rings of Power.”

On Nov. 17 and 18, CMOs will gather in New York for the WSJ Leadership Institute’s CMO Council Summit, featuring marketing leaders such as FUBU founder Daymond John, Visa’s Frank Cooper III, Mars Inc.’s Gülen Bengi, IBM’s Jonathan Adashek, United Airlines’ Josh Earnest, PepsiCo’s Mark Kirkham, e.l.f. Beauty’s Oshiya Savur, and the National Women’s Soccer League’s Rachel Epstein. Together, they’ll explore the power of participation in cultural events, social platforms, professional communities and anywhere that passionate consumers gather.

The newsletter rounded up shorter marketing and brand items:

  • Kraft Heinz’s comeback plan includes high-protein Jell-O and cheesy ramen mac and cheese. [WSJ]
  • Smoothie King capitalized on creator Connor Wood’s viral, smoothie-adjacent TikTok by rushing a “Connor’s Paid Me No Mind Smoothie” to menus in a little more than a week. [Ad Age]
  • CeraVe proclaimed itself the official moisturizer of Arrakis, the desert planet in the “Dune” trilogy that concludes next month. [CeraVe on Instagram]
  • Sustainable smartphone brand Fairphone struck a marketing partnership with Boost Mobile. [Wired]
  • The Web Summit canceled day two of its conference in Lisbon after the Portuguese government said Storm Charles could cause flooding, high winds and disruptions to mass transit. [BI]
  • Snoopy alter ego Joe Cool will join the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade this month as brand demand for Peanuts characters continues. [NYT]
  • Apple’s new holiday ad depicts a boy whose family reignites his repressed creativity with the gift of a MacBook. [Little Black Book]