NationalWatch

FIRST ON FOX: A slew of veterans’ groups, along with Secretary of Veterans Affairs Doug Collins, are criticizing Senate Democrats for delaying key agency nominations over what some have called unserious or “DOGE-type” concerns.

One top nominee currently facing the collective procedural roadblock ahead of Memorial Day is wounded warrior Sam Brown, a former Nevada senatorial candidate and Army captain who was burned over more than one-third of his body when the Humvee he was riding in in Helmand, Afghanistan, hit a roadside IED that incinerated its fuel tank.

He was nominated by President Donald Trump as undersecretary for memorial affairs, which maintains cemeteries and facilitates veterans’ burial ceremonies – about 100,000 per year.

A letter from about two dozen veterans’ groups addressed to Senate VA Committee Chairman Jerry Moran, R-Kan., ranking member Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and caucus leaders was obtained Friday by Fox News Digital.

Doug Collins, left, Sam Brown, right (Getty)

The groups note that they respect the Senate’s advise-and-consent role, but object to the current situation. They note that the VA has the fewest presidentially nominated positions and that other agency nominees receive overnight and weekend considerations at times.

“We will be happy to bring the senators coffee and donuts during such late night and weekend sessions, of course in compliance with the Senate’s gift and ethics rules,” the groups wrote.

Brown and all other nominees since April have been held up by Blumenthal and Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz. – but the lawmakers say their move is not personal and instead aimed to halt mass firings and other Trump-era actions.

Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, indicated that he would join the two Democrats, after a confirmation hearing for Brown, Marine Lt. Col. James Baehr for general counsel and Army veteran Richard Topping for VA CFO, was mooted in April by the procedural hold.

“We’ve had 2,400 firings so far,” King said, according to Stars & Stripes.

Vietnam Veterans of America, in a separate letter obtained by Fox News Digital, demanded Brown, Baehr and Topping be confirmed summarily.

“All three of these veterans received favorable reports following the April 9th nominations process from the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee,” wrote VVA President Jack McManus.

NEW GOP SENATOR TEARS INTO DEMS ‘SEEKING TO DELAY’ PETE HEGSETH DOD CONFIRMATION

Senate VA Chair Jerry Moran of Kansas (Getty)

McManus said that many Vietnam Vets are concerned about the hold-up and agree that Brown and the others are eminently qualified, blaming “two members of the US Senate Veterans Affairs Committee” for “affecting services to our veterans.”

Another letter from the Independence Fund, which provides resources, including trackchairs, to severely wounded veterans, said a fully staffed VA central office is crucial to its mission.

Last week, when Moran again attempted to confirm Brown by unanimous consent – a voice vote that must have no audible objections – Blumenthal rose to block him.

“The chairman and I share a bipartisan commitment to putting our veterans first. . . . I think we also share a respect for Sam Brown [and] his service to our nation as a decorated veteran,” said Blumenthal. 

Blumenthal, whose own service was criticized by Trump with the nickname “Da Nang Dick” after a Vietnamese province, said that Brown’s nomination lacked unanimous support in committee, citing a 10-9 vote.

TRUMP VA PICK DOUG COLLINS ADVANCES TO FULL SENATE VOTE

“This issue is bigger than Sam Brown. It is about information that has been denied to our committee and to us as senators. The secretary of the VA is actively working to undermine our bipartisan oversight efforts.

Blumenthal told Fox News Digital he had a message for Collins: “Before you hire new top VA bureaucrats, you should be rehiring the dedicated veterans you fired.”

“Secretary Doug Collins is denying us essential information that is necessary for our oversight, and we want accountability. All Americans, especially veterans, deserve votes by the full Senate on top nominees—not rubber stamp unanimous consents,” he said, adding Collins can ask the Senate to hold floor-debate on the nominees through regular order.

In comments to Fox News Digital, Collins rejected Blumenthal’s claims and lambasted the delays.

“Imagine how much better off America’s veterans would be if Senators Blumenthal and Gallego cared as much about fixing the department’s broken bureaucracy as they do about preventing wounded combat veterans from coming to work at VA,” he said.

“Despite their obstruction, we will reform the department to make it work better for veterans, families, caregivers and survivors.” 

Gallego said he also does not object to Brown personally, and that he is instead seeking agency accountability – saying in a recent statement he wants to reverse “hack-job firings.”

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Primaries were held on Tuesday night to fill the seat being vacated at the end of this year by Rep. Ruben Gallego. (Getty Images)

In a statement to Fox News Digital, Gallego said Collins is “more concerned with three political appointees than the thousands of veterans who are going to lose their jobs and care.”

“I served this country and received care at the VA. I know how important it is for veterans. Abandoning them, like Secretary Collins wants to do, is reckless and un-American. Show Congress the plan on how care won’t be impacted. Anything short of that is political posturing,” he said.

In Gallego’s Arizona, the Phoenix VA hospital is letting go 800 employees, and a 2024 inspector general report found that the site already faced staffing shortages.

Recent surveys of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans show an elevated concern that VA cuts could impact benefits and health care.

Fox News reached out to King for comment for purposes of this story. 

President Donald Trump backed several House Republicans for reelection in Truth Social posts on Sunday, expressing support for Reps. Andrew Garbarino of New York, Troy Downing of Montana, Guy Reschenthaler of Pennsylvania, and Bryan Steil of Wisconsin.

Each lawmaker received an individual post from Trump, and each post declared that the given lawmaker has Trump’s endorsement.

Republicans currently hold the majority in the House, but the 2026 midterms will determine whether the GOP maintains control of the chamber during the tail end of Trump’s second term in office.

TRUMP ENDORSES JACK CIATTARELLI FOR NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR: ‘A WINNER’

Left: President Donald Trump arrives for a House Republican meeting at the U.S. Capitol on May 20, 2025 in Washington, DC; Right: Rep. Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., makes his way to a House Republican Conference meeting with President Donald Trump on the budget reconciliation bill in the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday, May 20, 2025. (Left:Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images; Right: Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

Trump’s show of support for Garbarino comes after the congressman failed to cast a vote on the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” that passed the House last week. 

House Speaker Mike Johnson said that “Garbarino did not make it in time,” but had fallen asleep.

“I am proud to have been the leading voice on Long Island during negotiations on this key reconciliation bill. I fought to lift the cap on SALT and ensure hardworking Long Island families see the benefits of this important legislation. I was moments away from the House floor, to vote ‘yes,’ when the vote was closed,” Garbarino said in a statement, according to reports. 

HOUSE GOP LEADERSHIP TAKES VICTORY LAP AFTER PASSING TRUMP’S ‘ONE BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’

“While I am frustrated that the vote was closed before I was able to cast my vote, I am proud of the work we accomplished to deliver huge results for Long Island. I congratulate President Trump on getting this bill passed and look forward to voting ‘yes’ when it comes back to the House floor from the Senate,” Garbarino said in a statement.

Fox News Digital reached out to Garbarino’s office on Monday morning but did not receive a response by the time of publication.

BY DAWN’S EARLY LIGHT: BATTLES TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ WILL FACE IN THE SENATE

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“Thank you, Mr. President, it’s an honor to serve NY-02,” Garbarino said in a Sunday night post on X in response to the president’s endorsment.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday evening.

Noem met the Israeli leader in Jerusalem, where she voiced “strong appreciation for the Prime Minister’s policies, particularly the construction of the border fence with Egypt and the conduct of the ongoing war,” Netanyahu’s office said. 

Others who attended the meeting were Israeli Military Secretary Maj. Gen. Roman Gofman; Foreign Policy Advisor Dr. Ophir Falk; Prime Minister’s Spokesperson Dr. Omer Dostri; and U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee.

NETANYAHU ACCUSES THE UK, FRANCE AND CANADA OF ‘ENABLING HAMAS’

Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met Sunday in Jerusalem. (Kobi Gideon / GPO)

Earlier in the day, Netanyahu met with Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nv.

“The U.S.-Israel alliance is strong and steadfast. The United States stands with the people of Israel!” Huckabee wrote on X.

The visit came on the eve of Jerusalem Day, which celebrates the reunification of East Jerusalem, which includes the Old City, with West Jerusalem. It also came days after a Chicago man shot and killed two Israeli Embassy staffers in Washington D.C., last week. 

Yaron Lischinsky, 31, was an Israeli citizen who had been granted “official guest” status by the U.S. State Department. The other victim, Sarah Milgrim, 26, was also employed by the Israeli Embassy. The young couple was set to be engaged.

TRUMP EYES ABRAHAM ACCORDS EXPANSION, GAZA REBUILD WITH NETANYAHU MEETING ON DECK

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with American officials, including Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, in Jerusalem.

Netanyahu has vowed to continue to go after Hamas and its leadership amid the terror group‘s failure to agree to a ceasefire and return its hostages. 

In a video statement released Thursday, he criticized U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney after all three countries issued a joint statement demanding that Israel end its military campaign in Gaza.

Netanyahu said Hamas does not want a Palestinian state; rather, the terror group wants the destruction of the state of Israel. 

Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meet. (Kobi Gideon / Israeli Government Press Office)

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He questioned how this “simple truth evades the leaders of France, Britain, Canada and others.” 

President Donald Trump told journalists that he was “not happy” with Russia’s recent large-scale strike against Ukraine while speaking to the press on Sunday.

Speaking to reporters at Morristown Municipal Airport in New Jersey, Trump accused Putin of “killing a lot of people” in the attack, which was launched on Sunday afternoon.

“I’m not happy with what Putin is doing,” Trump explained. “He’s killing a lot of people, and I don’t know what the hell happened to Putin.” 

“I’ve known him a long time, always gotten along with him, but he’s sending rockets into cities and killing people, and I don’t like it at all,” he added.

FEDERAL JUDGE BLOCKS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION FROM TERMINATING INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ LEGAL STATUS

President Donald Trump speaks to journalists before boarding Air Force One from Morristown Municipal Airport in Morristown, New Jersey, May 25, 2025. (SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)

Trump said that Putin was “shooting rockets into Kyiv and other cities” in the middle of negotiations.

“I don’t like what Putin is doing. Not even a little bit,” the president emphasized. “He’s killing people. And something happened to this guy.”

Trump’s comments came after Russian forces launched hundreds of drones and missiles at Ukrainian cities overnight. The attack, which has been called the largest aerial attack of the war so far, targeted the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION BEGINS NEW WAVE OF INTERNATIONAL STUDENT VISA REVOCATIONS: ‘NO ONE HAS A RIGHT TO A VISA’

President Donald Trump walks to speak to journalists before boarding Air Force One from Morristown Municipal Airport in Morristown, New Jersey, May 25, 2025. (SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)

Ukrainian officials said that at least 12 people were killed and dozens more were injured.

Though past strikes have proven more deadly, the attack is the largest-scale aerial assault of the war in terms of the number of weapons: 298 drones and 69 missiles were launched.

In a post on Telegram, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for an international response to the attack.

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President Donald Trump steps off Marine One in Morristown Municipal Airport in Morristown, New Jersey, May 25, 2025. (SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)

“The silence of America, the silence of others in the world only encourages Putin,” he wrote on Telegram. “Every such terrorist Russian strike is reason enough for new sanctions against Russia.”

Reuters and Fox News Digital’s Brooke Curto and Kyle Schmidbauer contributed to this report.

House Speaker Mike Johnson went to battle with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., over spending cuts and the national debt in President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” this weekend. 

Johnson made the comments during an appearance on “Fox News Sunday” with host Shannon Bream, after Paul had called the spending cuts in the current version of the bill “wimpy.”

“It sounds like his biggest objection is the fact that we are extending the debt ceiling. That’s a critically important thing to do. We have to do it. We’re not going to get any Democrats to assist on that,” Johnson said Sunday.

“So to get it through the Senate and make sure we don’t crash the U.S. economy and default on our debts for the first time in history, it has to be part of the reconciliation package. And that’s why President Trump and all the other Republicans in Congress, House and Senate understand the necessity of this,” he added.

MIKE JOHNSON, DONALD TRUMP GET ‘BIG, ‘BEAUTIFUL’ WIN AS BUDGET PASSES HOUSE

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., speaks during a news conference at the Capitol, May 6, 2025, in Washington.  (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr., File)

Paul himself also appeared on “Fox News Sunday” later in the show, and he continued to blast what he said was a lack of real spending cuts.

GOP HOLDOUTS SOUND ALARM ON $36T DEBT CRISIS AS TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ PASSES HOUSE VOTE

“I supported the tax cuts in 2017. I support making them permanent, so I support that part of the bill. I support spending cuts. I think the cuts currently in the bill are wimpy and anemic, but I still would support the bill, even with wimpy and anemia cuts, if they weren’t going to explode the debt. The problem is the math doesn’t add up. They’re going to explode the debt. The House’s is $4 trillion. The Senate’s actually been talking about exploding the debt by $5 trillion,” Paul said.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is standing in the way of passing President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.” (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

He went on to say that there is no way he can vote for a version of the bill that raises the debt ceiling by $5 trillion.

“There’s got to be someone left in Washington who thinks debt is wrong and deficits are wrong and wants to go in the other direction,” he said.

Paul instead proposed raising the debt ceiling for a period of three months, or $500 billion, on a rolling basis. He argued that voting on the issue every three months would force leadership to take the issue seriously by placing the lack of progress center stage in U.S. politics.

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“The deficit is a threat to our country. I think it’s the greatest threat to national security. And so I think you can’t do this,” Paul said.

President Donald Trump on Sunday criticized foreign countries for paying “nothing” toward the education of their citizens who are attending college at Harvard and other U.S. institutions.

This comes amid the fight between the Trump administration and Harvard for its plans to revoke the university’s ability to enroll foreign students.

“Why isn’t Harvard saying that almost 31% of their students are from FOREIGN LANDS, and yet those countries, some not at all friendly to the United States, pay NOTHING toward their student’s education, nor do they ever intend to,” Trump wrote early Sunday morning on Truth Social. “Nobody told us that!”

JUDGE TEMPORARILY PAUSES TRUMP MOVE TO CANCEL HARVARD STUDENT VISA POLICY AFTER LAWSUIT

President Donald Trump criticized foreign countries for paying “nothing” towards the education of their citizens who are attending college at Harvard and other U.S. institutions. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

“We want to know who those foreign students are, a reasonable request since we give Harvard BILLIONS OF DOLLARS, but Harvard isn’t exactly forthcoming,” he continued. “We want those names and countries. Harvard has $52,000,000, use it, and stop asking for the Federal Government to continue GRANTING money to you!”

On Friday, a judge temporarily blocked the administration from canceling Harvard’s student visa program after the university filed a lawsuit against the federal government.

Harvard argued that the policy would affect more than 7,000 visa holders — nearly a quarter of the student body — and that the administration’s effort is a “blatant violation of the First Amendment, the Due Process Clause, and the Administrative Procedure Act,” according to its court filing.

“It is the latest act by the government in clear retaliation for Harvard exercising its First Amendment rights to reject the government’s demands to control Harvard’s governance, curriculum, and the ‘ideology’ of its faculty and students,” Harvard wrote in its complaint.

A Graduate School of Arts and Sciences flag on the Harvard University campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, on Wednesday, April 16, 2025. (Getty Images)

FEDERAL JUDGE BLOCKS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION FROM TERMINATING INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ LEGAL STATUS 

The Department of Homeland Security moved to terminate Harvard’s visa program after the university allegedly failed to provide extensive behavioral records of student visa holders the agency had requested.

The records sought include any footage of protest activity involving student visa holders, even if it’s not criminal, and the disciplinary records of all student visa holders in the past five years. 

Requested records also include footage or documentation of illegal, dangerous or violent activity by student visa holders, any records of threats or the deprivation of rights of other students or university personnel.

DHS had moved to terminate Harvard’s visa program after the university allegedly failed to provide extensive behavioral records of student visa holders the agency had requested. (Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Harvard called the new policy “pernicious” and accused the administration of departing from “decades of settled practice” and coming “without rational explanation.” The university also said the policy was “carried out abruptly without any of the robust procedures the government has established to prevent just this type of upheaval to thousands of students’ lives.”

At least a dozen Harvard students have had their student visas revoked over campus protest activity. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said before Congress on Tuesday that the administration has probably revoked thousands already and would “proudly” revoke more.

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The administration has already frozen close to $3 billion in federal funding to the university, largely dedicated to research, over claims that Harvard has not adequately responded to alleged campus antisemitism in protests and has not moved to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion practices.

Fox News’ Morgan Phillips contributed to this report.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth denied China’s claim the Golden Dome would turn space into a “war zone.”

“All we care about is protecting the homeland,” Hegseth told Fox News Digital while departing from a trip to Fort Bragg, North Carolina. 

President Donald Trump has said for a long time defense of the homeland is critical to his “America First” policy, and the Golden Dome is a generational investment. 

Chinese Foreign Minister Mao Ning claimed this week the Golden Dome has a “strong offensive nature and violates the principle of peaceful use in the Outer Space Treaty.”

CHINA ACCUSES US OF ‘TURNING SPACE INTO A WARZONE’ WITH TRUMP’S GOLDEN DOME MISSILE DEFENSE PROJECT

“The project will heighten the risk of turning space into a war zone and creating a space arms race and shake the international security and arms control system,” Mao said. “We urge the U.S. to give up developing and deploying global anti-missile system.”

Trump, alongside Hegseth, released some details about the project earlier in the week, explaining there’s an ambitious plan to complete the missile defense shield in three years for $125 billion. 

Hegseth also responded to pushback over his decision to kick off a monthly Christian prayer service at the Pentagon, which sparked a debate over religious freedom and the separation of church and state. 

“Appealing to heaven, to God, is a longstanding tradition in our military,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said of his monthly Pentagon prayer service.  (Petty Officer 1st Class Alexander Kubitza/Navy)

“We’ve said it very publicly, and we’ve said it very proudly. Appealing to heaven, to God, is a longstanding tradition in our military,” Hegseth said, adding that George Washington got on bended knee alongside his continental Army forces. 

“I appeal to Jesus Christ for that protection, to speak that word and be open and willing to talk about it at the Pentagon. If they want to criticize that, they’re on the wrong side,” he said. 

His remarks came after he addressed the 82nd Airborne Division of Army paratroopers during “All-American Week.” 

There, he celebrated the name change of the North Carolina base from Fort Liberty back to Fort Bragg.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth speaks as he makes an announcement with President Donald Trump regarding the Golden Dome missile defense shield in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., May 20, 2025. (Reuters/Kevin Lamarque)

“It is Fort Bragg again,” Hegseth said to cheers from the crowd. 

“Nothing wrong with Fort Liberty. Give me liberty or give me death. I love it,” Hegseth said. “But give me Fort Bragg every day of the week.” 

He also addressed critics who said he didn’t have the strategic experience to serve as secretary of defense, and took a shot at the media. 

“Our friends in the fake news media are here,” Hegseth said. “Some of them said, ‘Critics might say you can’t choose an Army major to be the secretary of defense. It has to be, well, one of our many distinguished generals or congressmen or business leaders or corporate leaders.’

TRUMP, HEGSETH ANNOUNCE ‘GOLDEN DOME,’ A ‘GAME CHANGER’ TO PROTECT AMERICAN HOMELAND

“One of the critiques was we need somebody that can think strategically, big picture. We can’t have a guy who thinks like the troops, to which I say ‘Hell, yeah, we can have a guy that thinks like the troops.’”

He told a crowd of Army paratroopers, “I’ve been in that formation, loosening my knees, taking a deep breath, gazing over the horizon, sweating and wondering what time it is, but I can’t move my arm. I’ve been in your boots — not yours. The 101st is not the 82nd. I’ll admit that on a day like today. Not quite your boots or your beret, but close.” 

Paratroopers perform a pass in review drill while Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth visits. (Petty Officer 1st Class Alexander Kubitza/Navy)

Hegseth announced an increase in jump pay for paratroopers to more cheers from the crowd. 

Hazardous duty incentive pay, known as “jump pay” for Army troopers who jump out of airplanes, will increase from $150 a month to $200. 

Jump masters, the senior paratroopers who train and lead jump operations, will see their pay increase from $150 to $300. 

“Here’s to our paratroopers, our jumpmasters, who do the difficult things in difficult places that most Americans can never imagine,” Hegseth said.

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Since 2006, the Army has maintained 56,756 paid parachutist positions, according to Gen. Gregory Anderson, head of the 18th Airborne Corps. That number will decrease by 20,000, allowing for the increase in pay for those who do maintain their jump status.

Limited aircraft ability and resources has meant a “degradation in proficiency,” Anderson told reporters. “The goal has to be really good quality over quantity.”

Former President Joe Biden’s decision to run for re-election divided longtime Democratic advisors, a new book about Biden’s cognitive decline and his administration’s alleged cover-up revealed. 

Biden’s former Chief of Staff, Ron Klain, shut down former President Barack Obama advisor David Axelrod for repeatedly calling Biden’s age an issue. 

“The presidency is a monstrously taxing job and the stark reality is the president would be closer to 90 than 80 at the end of a second term, and that would be a major issue,” Axelrod told The New York Times. 

Soon after the Times’ story was published in June 2022, Klain called Axelrod fuming, CNN anchor Jake Tapper and Axios political correspondent Alex Thompson revealed in their book, “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again.”

BIDEN STRUGGLED TO FILM 2024 CAMPAIGN VIDEOS AMID DECLINING HEALTH, NEW BOOK CLAIMS: ‘THE MAN COULD NOT SPEAK’

Advisors to President Joe Biden and former President Barack Obama disagreed on whether Biden should run for re-election in 2024.  (REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY)

“Who’s going to beat Trump? President Biden is the only one who has done it. You better have a lot of certainty about a different candidate before you say the president should step aside. The future of the country depends on it!” Klain told Axelrod on the phone, according to Thompson and Tapper. 

FOX NEWS’ PETER DOOCY REVEALS HISTORY OF QUESTIONING BIDEN’S MENTAL FITNESS

Klain believed it was “sloppy thinking” that anyone other than Biden could beat Trump, the journalists said in the book. 

But Axelrod, like most Americans, worried about the first octogenarian president’s age and his ability to serve four more years. 

The chief strategist for Obama’s back-to-back winning campaigns, Axelrod was one of the last advisers to meet with Biden before Obama chose him as his running mate in 2008. Axelrod told Tapper and Thompson that they didn’t expect Biden to run for president at 73 and eventually discouraged Biden from running for president in 2015. 

They certainly didn’t expect Biden to run for president at 77. 

President Barack Obama presents Vice President Joe Biden with the Presidential Medal of Freedom during a ceremony in the State Dining Room of the White House in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 12, 2017.  (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

After Axelrod made some friendly comments about Biden to a reporter in 2018, Biden invited him to his rental home in Virginia, according to the book. 

“He was stunned by how much Biden had aged,” Tapper and Thompson wrote.

Axelrod told Biden that age would be an issue for his campaign but encouraged him to lean on his experience and wisdom, the journalists said. 

Axelrod’s apprehension about Biden’s age only grew, and when it came time for Biden to make a decision about his re-election, he knew Biden shouldn’t run in 2024. The longtime political advisor told Tapper and Thompson he wished someone in the White House had “come to their senses and [convinced] Biden and his family that this just wasn’t tenable.”

Joe Biden speaks during an Inflation Reduction Act event on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2022. (Samuel Corum/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Pointing to unfavorable battleground polls from 2023, Axelrod encouraged Biden to drop out of the race in a series of social media posts. He said the “stakes of miscalculation here are too dramatic to ignore.”

“Only @JoeBiden can make this decision. If he continues to run, he will be the nominee of the Democratic Party. What he needs to decide is whether that is wise; whether it’s in HIS best interest or the country’s?” Axelrod questioned on social media. 

Klain fired back, this time for the public to see: “Man who called Biden ‘Mr Magoo’ in Aug 2019 is still at it,” in reference to Axelrod’s comments following the 2019 Democratic presidential primary debate. 

Ron Klain, former White House chief of staff, speaks during a chief of staff transition event in the East Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, Feb. 1, 2023.  (Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

An excerpt from the book reads: “In response to Axelrod’s 2023 post, Biden called Axelrod a ‘prick’ – a private insult until someone leaked it to Jonathan Martin of Politico. Axelrod received confidential messages of agreement from prominent Democrats who remained silent, they explained, because they were resigned to Biden’s candidacy and did not want to weaken him as a looming rematch with Trump approached.”

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Fox News Digital has written extensively, dating back to the 2020 presidential campaign, about Biden’s cognitive decline and his inner circle’s role in covering it up.

“There is nothing in this book that shows Joe Biden failed to do his job, as the authors have alleged, nor did they prove their allegation that there was a cover-up or conspiracy,” a Biden spokesperson told Fox News Digital. “Nowhere do they show that our national security was threatened or where the president wasn’t otherwise engaged in the important matters of the presidency. In fact, Joe Biden was an effective president who led our country with empathy and skill.”

The Supreme Court heard a case this month centered on President Donald Trump’s executive order seeking to end so-called birthright citizenship, in one of the most closely watched and potentially impactful cases heard by the court in recent years.  

Though the case itself was used largely as a means of challenging lower court powers to issue so-called universal or nationwide injunctions, justices on the high court did inquire about the merits of the order itself, “Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship,” which Trump signed on the first day of his second White House term.

The order, which was slated to take force Feb. 20, directed all U.S. agencies to stop issuing citizenship documents to children born to illegal immigrants or children born to mothers living in the country on a temporary visa, if the father is not a permanent resident or U.S. citizen.

Despite the Supreme Court’s focus on universal injunctions in hearing the case, deep and unyielding concerns persist about Trump’s attempt to undo more than 100 years of legal precedent. 

JUDGES V TRUMP: HERE ARE THE KEY COURT BATTLES HALTING THE WHITE HOUSE AGENDA

U.S. President Donald Trump shakes hands with U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts (R) as Melania Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump look on after being sworn in during inauguration ceremonies in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol on January 20, 2025, in Washington, D.C. Chip Somodevilla/Pool via Reuters/File Photo (Reuters)

The ACLU included in its lawsuit the story of one couple from Indonesia but living in New Hampshire whom they said would be affected by the order.

“They arrived in 2023, applied for asylum, and their application awaits review,” ACLU attorneys said of the couple. “The mom-to-be is in her third trimester. 

“Under this executive order, their baby would be considered an undocumented noncitizen and could be denied basic health care and nutrition, putting the newborn at grave risk at such a vulnerable stage of life,” they added.

And such problems would persist throughout their lives, lawyers for the group noted. These persons would not be able to obtain necessary identification, such as drivers’ licenses, and would not be able to vote, hold some jobs or serve on juries.

Though Trump had spoken in detail in his first term and on the campaign trail about wanting to end birthright citizenship, his executive order sent shockwaves through the nation. It was met by a wave of lawsuits from Democrat-led states and immigrants’ rights groups. 

WHO IS JAMES BOASBERG, THE US JUDGE AT THE CENTER OF TRUMP’S DEPORTATION EFFORTS?

Demonstrators hold up signs during a “Hands Off!” protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025.  (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

One lawsuit, brought by 18 Democratic attorneys general, warned that ending birthright citizenship would strip hundreds of thousands of U.S.-born children of their citizenship as the result of a circumstance completely outside a child’s control.

Statistics also bear this out. Roughly 150,000 children are born annually in the U.S. to parents of noncitizens.  If the order were to take force as Trump envisioned, experts warned the impact would be catastrophic.

​​”President Trump’s attempt to unilaterally end birthright citizenship is a flagrant violation of our Constitution,” New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin, who joined 17 other Democrat-led states in suing to block the order, said earlier this year.

TRUMP FACES ANOTHER DEPORTATION SETBACK WITH 4TH CIRCUIT APPEALS COURT

The U.S. Supreme Court is at the center of fresh debate over the interpretation of a core clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

“For more than 150 years, our country has followed the same basic rule: Babies who are born in this country are American citizens,” Platkin added.

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More than 22 U.S. states and immigrants’ rights groups sued the Trump administration to block the change to birthright citizenship prior to the Supreme Court’s decision to take up the case, arguing in court filings that the executive order is both unconstitutional and “unprecedented.”

To date, no court has sided with the Trump administration in upholding the executive order.

The Texas House gave initial approval on Saturday to a bill that would require sheriffs to collaborate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement by serving federal immigration warrants at local jails.

Senate Bill 8 received preliminary approval with an 89-50 vote in the lower chamber after GOP state Rep. David Spiller, a sponsor of the legislation, amended the bill so it applies to all counties rather than just counties with populations over 100,000 as was the case in the original version, according to FOX 7 and The Texas Tribune.

“This bill is not immigration reform,” Spiller said Saturday. “This bill is the strongest border security bill — indirectly — that we could have this session.”

ALLEGED HUMAN SMUGGLERS ARRESTED IN TEXAS AFTER HIDING INSIDE HOLLOWED HAY BALES

The Texas House gave initial approval to a bill that would require local law enforcement to collaborate with ICE. (David Dee Delgado/Getty Images)

The measure needs another House vote before it can return to the Senate, where the upper chamber must agree to the changes or both chambers must straighten out their differences before the bill can be sent to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk.

“Gov. Abbott has made it clear that cities and counties across Texas must fully cooperate with the federal government efforts to arrest, jail, and deport illegal immigrants,” Abbott’s Deputy Press Secretary Eduardo Leal said in a statement to The Texas Tribune. “The Governor will review this legislation, as he does with any legislation sent to his desk that helps achieve that goal.”

Under the bill, sheriffs would be required to request partnerships with ICE, known as 287(g) agreements.

The agreements allow ICE to authorize local authorities to perform certain types of immigration enforcement in local jails, including allowing local law enforcement to question inmates about their immigration status and serve administrative warrants.

Senate Bill 8 received preliminary approval with an 89-50 vote in the lower chamber. (Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)

Local officers could also be authorized by ICE to question people about their immigration status during “routine police duties,” including DUI checkpoints, through a model the Trump administration has revived after it stopped being used over allegations that it led to racial profiling.

The bill would also allow the Texas attorney general to sue sheriffs who do not adhere to the agreement. Sheriffs would need to at least enter the “warrant service” agreement. They can choose to enter into other agreements to meet the requirement.

Additionally, the proposal would offer grants to sheriffs to help offset the costs of participating that are not reimbursed by the federal government.

TEXAS LAWMAKERS SEEK TO GET FEDERAL REIMBURSEMENT FOR BIDEN-ERA BORDER CONTROL EXPENSES

The bill needs another House vote before it can go back to the Senate, where the changes must be approved before it can be sent to Gov. Greg Abbott. (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)

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As of Friday, 72 Texas law enforcement agencies had signed 287(g) agreements with ICE, according to data published by ICE. Another four sheriff’s offices had pending agreements.

Roughly 20% of the agreements in place between Texas law enforcement agencies and ICE were for the “task force model,” which extends immigration authorities to officers performing routine police duties.

The legislation, filed by GOP state Sen. Charles Schwertner, could help the Trump administration’s mass deportation plans, but immigrants’ rights advocates say the requirement would lead to racial profiling of black and brown people and prompt fear among undocumented Texans who may be reluctant to report a crime or seek help from authorities who are collaborating with ICE, according to The Texas Tribune.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Friday that a federal court order requiring the U.S. government to maintain custody of deportees on a flight meant for South Sudan will cause “significant and irreparable harm to U.S. foreign policy.” 

The Trump administration late Friday filed two court documents after U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy of Massachusetts said the deportation flight violated his previous April injunction that allows deportees time to challenge an order to be sent to a country other than their own. 

“This Department of Justice believes that this situation urgently requires judicial intervention to restore President Trump’s full Article II authority to conduct foreign policy,” a U.S. Department of Justice official told Fox News Digital.

Rubio noted the order has already complicated U.S. diplomacy with Libya, South Sudan and Djibouti and presents a serious threat to the president’s Article II authority to conduct foreign policy. 

FEDERAL JUDGE ORDERS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION TO TRACK DEPORTED IMMIGRANTS TO SOUTH SUDAN

The Trump administration late Friday filed two court documents after a judge said a deportation flight violated his previous injunction that allows deportees time to challenge an order to be sent to a country other than their own.  (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Rubio said in his filing that the court’s orders had “already interfered with quiet diplomatic efforts and exacerbated internal political and security divisions” in Libya. 

The order also threatens to “derail efforts to quietly rebuild a productive working relationship with Juba,” the capital of South Sudan, he said. 

Rubio said before the court’s intervention that the South Sudan government had refused to accept a South Sudanese national but had since “taken steps to work more cooperatively with the U.S. government.” 

DHS EXPOSES CRIMES BY MIGRANTS DEPORTED TO SOUTH SUDAN AS JUDGE THREATENS TO ORDER THEIR RETURN

Thirdly, Rubio said the order “causes harm” in Djibouti, which is “strategically located in the Horn of Africa” with the only U.S. military base on the African continent. 

The deportees are being temporarily held at a U.S. Naval base in Djibouti. 

A deportation flight headed for Guatemala in January.  (AP Photo/Christian Chavez, File)

In the second filing, the administration asked the court to “reconsider” its order and “highly burdensome requirements.”

“Because of this Court’s Orders, [the U.S. government is] currently detaining dangerous criminals in a sensitive location without clear knowledge of when, how, or where this Court will tolerate their release,” the filing said.

JUDICIAL HALT OF DEPORTATION FLIGHTS PUTS US FOREIGN POLICY AT RISK, CAREER STATE DEPT OFFICIAL CLAIMS

“This development has put impermissible, burdensome constraints on the President’s ability to carry out his Article II powers, including his powers to command the military, manage relations with foreign nations, and execute our nation’s immigration authorities.” 

The deportees “enjoyed the benefit of full process under the laws of the United States and were lawfully removed from the country,” the filing claimed, calling for a stay if not a reconsideration of the order. 

“These criminal aliens needed only state that they had a fear of removal to South Sudan to receive the other procedures required by the Court’s April 18, 2025 injunction,” the administration wrote. “The aliens did not do so. Therefore, DHS attempted to remove these aliens — who have committed the most reprehensible violations of our nation’s laws — to a place where they no longer pose a threat to the United States.” 

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Friday that a court order requiring the U.S. government to maintain custody of deportees on a flight meant for South Sudan will cause “significant and irreparable harm to U.S. foreign policy.”  (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

The flight left from Texas earlier this week with eight migrants from Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Cuba, Mexico and South Sudan. 

Murphy issued the ruling Tuesday night after lawyers for the immigrants from Myanmar and Vietnam accused the Trump administration of illegally deporting their clients to third-party countries. They argue there is a court order blocking such removals.

Murphy’s ruling said the government must “maintain custody and control of class members currently being removed to South Sudan or to any other third country, to ensure the practical feasibility of return if the Court finds that such removals were unlawful.”

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Rubio announced in April that the U.S. would revoke visas held by South Sudanese passport holders and no others would be issued, attributing the change to “the failure of South Sudan’s transitional government to accept the return of its repatriated citizens in a timely manner,” according to a statement posted on X at the time. 

The U.S. has third-party deportation agreements with a handful of countries, the most prominent being El Salvador, which has accepted hundreds of Venezuelan deportees from the Trump administration.

Fox News’ Brooke Singman contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin about ending the war in Ukraine, hosted the president of South Africa at the White House and threatened more stringent tariffs against the European Union this week. 

During South African President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Oval Office visit on Wednesday, Trump got into a testy exchange with the South African leader about the treatment of White farmers there. Specifically, Trump aired a video that showed white crosses that Trump said were approximately 1,000 burial sites of White Afrikaner South African farmers. 

Trump has repeatedly asserted these farmers are being killed and pushed off of their land.

TRUMP TO MEET LEADER OF ‘OUT OF CONTROL’ SOUTH AFRICA AT WHITE HOUSE

President Donald Trump, right, and Cyril Ramaphosa, South Africa’s president, meet in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., on May 21. (Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Trump told Ramaphosa at the White House that the burial sites by the side of the road are visited by those who want to “pay respects to their family member who was killed.” 

“Now this is very bad. These are burial sites right here. Burial sites — over a thousand — of White farmers. And those cars are lined up to pay love on a Sunday morning. Each one of those white things you see is a cross. And there is approximately a thousand of them,” Trump said. “They’re all White farmers. The family of White farmers. And those cars aren’t driving, they are stopped there to pay respects to their family member who was killed. And it’s a terrible sight. I’ve never seen anything like it. On both sides of the road, you have crosses. Those people are all killed.”

“Have they told you where that is, Mr. President?” Ramaphosa said. “I’d like to know where that is. Because this I’ve never seen.” 

“I mean, it’s in South Africa, that’s where,” Trump said. 

“We need to find out,” Ramaphosa said.

The White House defended showing the clip and said that the video was “substantiated,” following reports that emerged after the encounter that said the crosses were from a memorial demonstration following the murder of a White farming couple, not actual burial sites.

Here’s what also happened this week:

Call with Putin 

Trump and Putin spoke over the phone on Monday to advance peace negotiations ending the war between Moscow and Kyiv. The call occurred just days after Russia and Ukraine met in Turkey to conduct their first peace talks since 2022. 

After the call, Trump said both countries would move toward a ceasefire and push discussions to end the war. But, Trump indicated that the U.S. would let Moscow and Kyiv take the lead on negotiations after his call with Putin. 

“The conditions for that will be negotiated between the two parties, as it can only be, because they know the details of a negotiation that nobody else would be aware of,” Trump said in a Monday post on Truth Social. 

TRUMP SAYS HE COULD ‘WALK AWAY’ FROM RUSSIA-UKRAINE TALKS, CITES ‘TREMENDOUS HATRED’ ON BOTH SIDES

President Donald Trump, left, and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke over the phone on Monday to advance peace negotiations ending the war between Moscow and Kyiv.  (Contributor/Getty Images; Bonnie Cash/UPI/Bloomberg via Getty Images; Fox News Digital)

Additionally, Trump has continued to distance the U.S. from the conflict this week, describing the conflict as a “European situation.” 

“Big egos involved, but I think something’s going to happen,” Trump told reporters on Monday. “And if it doesn’t, I’ll just back away and they’ll have to keep going. This was a European situation. It should have remained a European situation.”

Trump expressed similar sentiments on Wednesday when Ramaphosa visited and stated: “It’s not our people, it’s not our soldiers… it’s Ukraine and it’s Russia.” 

‘Evils of antisemitism’

The White House condemned the fatal attack against two Israeli Embassy employees in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, labeling that incident an act of antisemitism. 

A gunman opened fire and killed Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim as they were leaving an event at the Capital Jewish Museum. The two were planning to get engaged next week in Jerusalem, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said at a press briefing.

Authorities arrested a pro-Palestinian man identified as 31-year-old Elias Rodriguez of Chicago in connection with the attack, according to officials.

In response, Trump and other leaders of his administration said attacks like these must stop and said that those responsible will face justice. 

WHITE HOUSE DECRIES ‘EVILS OF ANTISEMITISM,’ VOWS JUSTICE AFTER FATAL SHOOTING OF ISRAELI EMBASSY STAFFERS

Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim, who were shot and killed as they left an event at the Capital Jewish Museum, pose for a picture at an unknown location in this handout image released by the Embassy of Israel to the U.S. (Embassy of Israel to the USA via X/Handout via Reuters)

“These horrible D.C. killings, based obviously on antisemitism, must end, NOW!” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. “Hatred and Radicalism have no place in the USA. Condolences to the families of the victims. So sad that such things as this can happen! God Bless You ALL!”

Leavitt later told reporters she’d spoken with Attorney General Pam Bondi and that those who conducted the attack would face prosecution. 

“The evil of antisemitism must be eradicated from our society,” Leavitt told reporters on Thursday. “I spoke to the attorney general this morning. The Department of Justice will be prosecuting the perpetrator responsible for this to the fullest extent of the law. Hatred has no place in the United States of America under President Donald Trump.”

EU tariff threats

Trump threatened to slap a 50% tariff on imports from the European Union on Friday amid ongoing trade negotiations and after locking down a trade deal with the U.K. 

The deal with the U.K. is the first historic trade negotiation signed following Liberation Day, when Trump announced widespread tariffs for multiple countries on April 2 at a range of rates. 

The administration later adjusted its initial proposal and announced on April 9 it would immediately impose a 145% tariff on Chinese goods, while reducing reciprocal tariffs on other countries and the EU to a baseline of 10% for 90 days. 

TRUMP SIGNALS CHINA ‘VERY MUCH’ INTERESTED IN SECURING TRADE DEAL AHEAD OF SWITZERLAND NEGOTIATIONS 

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent later said in an interview with Fox News he hoped the warning would “light a fire under the EU” and signaled Trump’s threats stemmed from frustration negotiating with European countries on trade deals.  (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

“Their powerful Trade Barriers, Vat Taxes, ridiculous Corporate Penalties, Non-Monetary Trade Barriers, Monetary Manipulations, unfair and unjustified lawsuits against Americans Companies, and more, have led to a Trade Deficit with the U.S. of more than $250,000,000 a year, a number which is totally unacceptable,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post on Friday about the EU. 

“Therefore, I am recommending a straight 50% Tariff on the European Union, starting on June 1, 2025,” he said. 

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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent later said in an interview with Fox News he hoped the warning would “light a fire under the EU” and signaled Trump’s threats stemmed from frustration negotiating with European countries on trade deals. 

“EU proposals have not been of the same quality that we’ve seen from our other important trading partners,” Bessent said. 

Fox News Digital’s Greg Norman contributed to this report. 

Earlier this year, Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) uncovered $4.7 trillion in untraceable Treasury Department payments. 

Prior to the discovery, Treasury Account Symbol (TAS) identification codes were optional for $4.7 trillion in Treasury Department payments, so they were often left blank and were untraceable. The field is now required to increase “insight into where the money is actually going,” the Treasury Department and DOGE announced in February. 

“Of the 1.5 billion payments that we send out every year, they are required to have a TAS, a Treasury Account Symbol. We discovered that more than one third of those payments did not have a TAS number,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government earlier this month. 

Fox News Digital asked Republican senators on Capitol Hill to respond to the approximately 500,000 in untraceable payments made by the Treasury Department each year. 

DOGE SAYS IT FOUND NEARLY UNTRACEABLE BUDGET LINE ITEM RESPONSIBLE FOR $4.7T IN PAYMENTS

GOP Sens. Dan Sullivan (left) and Roger Marshall railed against the Treasury Department’s untraceable payments.  (Nicholas Ballasy/Fox News Digital)

“I’m not surprised at all, unfortunately,” Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, said before adding, “They were leaving complete fields undone when they were filling out their financials, so this is a common theme. I’m not surprised.”

TOP 5 MOST OUTRAGEOUS WAYS THE GOVERNMENT HAS WASTED YOUR TAXES, AS UNCOVERED BY ELON MUSK’S DOGE

Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Missouri, called for an investigation into where those payments actually went. 

“There’s so much waste. There’s so much fraud, There’s so much abuse in our government,” Schmitt told Fox News Digital. “I’m glad there was a laser-like focus on it. We ought to make many of those reforms permanent, but there probably ought to be some investigations here about where this money actually went. I mean this is taxpayer money. People work hard.”

President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have worked to eliminate waste, fraud and abuse through the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).  (Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC)

After DOGE and the Treasury Department uncovered $4.7 trillion in untraceable funds, Marshall and Sen. Rick Scott of Florida introduced a bill in March requiring the Treasury Department to track all payments. 

The Locating Every Disbursement in Government Expenditure Records (LEDGER) Act seeks to increase transparency in how the Treasury Department spends taxpayer money. 

“When you hear about this story that they didn’t know where the money was going, it makes you mad because this is somebody’s money, this is taxpayers’ money when we have almost $37 trillion in debt, so this makes no sense at all,” Scott said. 

Elon Musk shows off his t-shirt reading “Tech Support” while speaking at the first cabinet meeting hosted by President Donald Trump, at the White House in Washington, D.C., Feb. 26, 2025. (REUTERS/Brian Snyder)

The Congressional Budget projects that interest payments on America’s national debt will total $952 billion in fiscal year 2025. That’s $102 billion more than the United States’ defense budget at $850 billion. 

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“We paid out more last year on our debt, $36 trillion in debt, with $950 billion in interest going to bondholders all over the world, including in China. That $950 billion didn’t go to build a bridge or an F-35. We paid more on the interest on debt than we did to fund our military,” said Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska. 

“That is an inflection point that when most countries hit, you look at history, that’s when great powers start to decline. So we have to get those savings.”

FIRST ON FOX: A group of House Republicans are requesting Fiscal Year 2026 spending bills to include language prohibiting federal funding for transgender experiments on animals. 

Republican Reps. Paul Gosar, Elijah Crane, Abraham J. Hamadeh of Arizona, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Brandon Gill of Texas, Nancy Mace of South Carolina, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Pete Stauber of Minnesota and Troy E. Nehls of Texas are urging the chairman and ranking member of the Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies to prohibit transgender experiments on animals in its FY2026 appropriations bill. 

House Republicans have requested the committee include the following language: “None of the funds made available by this or any other Act thereafter may be used for research on vertebrate animals for the purpose of studying the effects of drugs, surgery, or other interventions to alter the human body (including by disrupting the body’s development, inhibiting its natural functions, or modifying its appearance) to no longer correspond to its biological sex.”

The letter, addressed to Chairman Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Ala., and Ranking Member Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., points to the dozens of National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants issued during former President Joe Biden’s administration that are funding “wasteful and disturbing experiments to create ‘transfeminine’ and ‘transmasculine’ lab animals using invasive surgeries and hormone therapies.”

TRUMP ADMIN CUTS ADDITIONAL $1M IN FEDERAL FUNDING FOR ‘TRANSGENDER ANIMAL’ EXPERIMENTS

House GOP Reps. Nancy Mace (left) and Paul Gosar have spoken out against “transgender animal” experiments.  (Getty Images)

$10M IN TAXPAYER FUNDS SPENT CREATING TRANSGENDER ANIMALS: REP. NANCY MACE

“The transgender animals are then wounded, shocked, injected with street drugs and vaccines, and subjected to other disturbing procedures,” the House Republicans said in the letter, as Fox News Digital reported earlier this year. 

“President Trump has personally criticized these experiments on several occasions, and the Department of Government Efficiency has canceled millions in NIH grants funding transgender animal testing. However, many of these NIH grants funding gender transitions for lab animals are still active,” House GOP members said. 

President Donald Trump’s National Institute of Health quietly cut over $1 million in federally funded research evaluating if rats going through hormone therapy were more likely to overdose on a popular party drug. (Getty/AP)

President Donald Trump condemned transgender animal experiments during his joint address to Congress in March. The White Coat Waste Project, a government watchdog group that testified about transgender animal experiments on Capitol Hill earlier this year, told Fox News Digital there are still “29 active taxpayer-funded grants that have been used to fund transgender animal tests.”

“We urge you to include the language above in the FY26 Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies bill to ensure no more taxpayer dollars are wasted to fund transgender animal tests,” the Republicans said in the letter. 

The White Coat Waste Project, in a statement to Fox News Digital, touted their role in halting taxpayer-funded “transgender animal tests,” and celebrated the House Republicans’ bill, led by Gosar, to stop more federally funded experiments. 

The White Coat Waste project has spotlighted transgender animal experiments this year.  (iStock)

“Thanks to White Coat Waste’s viral investigations and collaboration with Rep. Paul Gosar and others in Congress, the Trump Administration has slashed spending on wasteful experiments that subject lab animals to invasive surgeries and hormone therapies to crudely mimic gender transitions in kids and adults and then wound, shock and inject the animals with vaccines and overdoses of sex party drugs,” Justin Goodman, Senior Vice President of White Coat Waste Project, said. 

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“These Trump cuts have already saved thousands of lab animals and millions of tax dollars, but dozens more NIH grants that funnel tax dollars to disturbing transgender animal tests are still active. Taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to foot the bill for wasteful and cruel transgender animal tests, and Rep. Gosar’s commonsense effort to permanently defund them will ensure they won’t have to.”

There’s a provision tucked into President Donald Trump’s broadly ranging “big, beautiful bill” that could see Texas get billions of dollars in funds that it spent on the state’s border security under the Biden administration.

The legislation earmarked $12 billion for a grant program allowing states to be reimbursed for costs they incurred trying to stem the flow of illegal immigration during the Democratic administration.

The measure was added to the bill hours before the final vote – but Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, the former chairman of the House Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs Committees, told Fox News Digital it was a product of months of negotiation.

“Early on, [Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green, R-Tenn., and I were discussing reconciliation going through the Homeland Security Committee. And, you know, there was about $70 billion for the border,” McCaul said. “Texas bore the brunt of the federal mission the last four years and deserves to be reimbursed. And so he agreed, had a conversation with Governor Abbott, and he agreed.”

HOUSE GOP TARGETS ANOTHER DEM OFFICIAL ACCUSED OF BLOCKING ICE AMID DELANEY HALL FALLOUT

Rep. Michael McCaul spoke with Fox News Digital about the weeks of talks it took to secure billions for states that incurred border-related costs during the Biden administration. (Getty Images)

While the text does not name Texas specifically, Fox News Digital was told that the measure’s inclusion was primarily sought by the Lone Star state’s congressional delegation.

The state of Texas, Fox News Digital was told, had incurred just over $11 billion in costs from Gov. Greg Abbott’s efforts to keep the border in his state secure.

“The fact of the matter is, when you look at the costs that were borne, Texas had the lion’s share of [the burden] carrying out the federal mission when the Biden administration completely failed to deliver on border security,” McCaul said. “My state built the border wall and built detention facilities. We bore a lot of costs.”

Operation Lone Star alone cost Texas $11.1 billion, according to The Texas Tribune.

Rather than add it to the initial text of the bill, McCaul said, leaders opted to include it in a “managers amendment” that was added on Wednesday night along with several other issues that lawmakers needed more time to negotiate.

“The legislative process, it’s something I’ve gotten to know over my 20 years and how to get things done up here. And I thought, you know, the way we worked it was strategically very smart,” McCaul said. “It’s going to the Senate now. And Senator Cornyn is going to take it up, be the champion in the Senate.”

The Texas Republican first met with Abbott and Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., on the matter in early February, Fox News Digital was told.

McCaul said Republican Study Committee Chairman August Pfluger also played a key role (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

McCaul said he also worked closely on the push with Republican Study Committee Chairman August Pfluger, R-Texas, who told Fox News Digital that “no state” carried more financial burden from the border crisis than Texas.

“Texas spent $11.1 billion on border security, including $5.87 billion on personnel costs and $4.75 billion on border wall and barriers. When the federal government failed to secure our border and protect our communities, Texans stepped up,” Pfluger said.

Johnson, for his part, thanked McCaul for his efforts in a public written statement.

“Thanks to Rep. McCaul, states that stepped up to protect Americans in the face of Biden’s border catastrophe will be reimbursed for doing the work the Biden Administration refused to do,” the speaker said. “Had those patriotic governors not taken action and used the resources of their state, the devastation from Biden’s wide-open border would have been significantly worse.”

MEET THE TRUMP-PICKED LAWMAKERS GIVING SPEAKER JOHNSON A FULL HOUSE GOP CONFERENCE

Green said of the need for the measure, “In the absence of help from the Biden-Harris administration, states were forced to take extraordinary measures to mitigate the crisis and protect their communities by building barrier systems and increasing law enforcement activity.”

And while McCaul and his colleagues’ efforts in the House do not guarantee that Texas will ultimately see those funds, it puts them one step closer to success.

The measure is one aspect in a multi-trillion-dollar bill that Republicans are working to pass via the budget reconciliation process. 

By lowering the Senate’s threshold for passage from 60 votes to 51, reconciliation enables the party in power to pass certain fiscal legislation while completely sidelining the minority – in this case, Democrats.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star cost Texas over $11 billion (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)

Trump directed Republicans to use reconciliation to advance his policies on taxes, immigration, energy, defense, and the national debt.

The Senate and House must pass identical versions of the bill before it gets to Trump’s desk.

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McCaul told Fox News Digital that he was confident the measure would stay in the Senate bill after conversations with the Trump administration on the matter.

“I anticipate it will go forward,” McCaul said. “I’m, just proud that we were able to get this done. I’m very proud of what my state did to stop the flow of illegals and dangerous actors coming into the country.”

When reached for comment, Abbott told Fox News Digital, “This is a national issue that Texas was proud to address, and we are grateful for the allocation that reduces the financial burden that Texas incurred.”

President Donald Trump this week enjoyed one of his biggest legislative victories during his second administration.

“THE ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL” has PASSED the House of Representatives!” Trump touted in a social media post Thursday.

The president’s post came soon after the GOP-controlled House passed Trump’s sweeping tax and spending cuts package by a razor-thin margin. The Republican-crafted measure is full of Trump’s campaign trail promises and second-term priorities on tax cuts, immigration, defense, energy and the debt limit.

Ahead of the House vote, two surveys released earlier in the week indicated that the president’s poll numbers remained underwater.

MIKE JOHNSON, DONALD TRUMP GET ‘BIG, ‘BEAUTIFUL’ WIN AS BUDGET PASSES HOUSE

President Donald Trump arrives on the South Lawn of the White House May 22, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (AP Photo/John McDonnell)

The president stood at 46% approval and 54% disapproval in a national survey by Marquette Law School. And Trump was at 42% approval and 52% disapproval in a Reuters/Ipsos poll.

Most, but not all, of the latest national surveys place the president’s approval rating in negative territory, with a handful indicating Trump is above water.

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Trump has aggressively asserted executive authority in his second term, overturning longstanding government policy and aiming to make major cuts to the federal workforce through an avalanche of sweeping and controversial executive orders and actions, with some aimed at addressing grievances he has held since his first term.

Trump started his second administration with poll numbers in positive territory, but his poll numbers started to slide soon after his late-January inauguration.

President Donald Trump signs an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., Jan. 23, 2025. (Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

But two issues where the president remains at or above water in some surveys are border security and immigration, which were front and center in Trump’s successful 2024 campaign to win back the White House.

Trump stands at 56% approval of border security and 50% approval of immigration in the Marquette Law School poll, which was conducted May 5-15.

But Trump’s muscular moves on border security and immigration, which have sparked controversy and legal pushback, don’t appear to be helping his overall approval ratings.

“Immigration is declining now as a salient issue,” said Daron Shaw, who serves as a member of the Fox News Decision Team and is the Republican partner on the Fox News poll.

Shaw, a politics professor and chair at the University of Texas, said “immigration and especially border security are beginning to lose steam as one of the top three issues facing the country. Republicans still rate them fairly highly, but Democrats and independents, who had kind of joined the chorus in 2024, have moved on and, in particular, moved back to the economy as a focal point.”

President Trump’s job performance numbers  (Fox News )

Pointing to Trump, Shaw added that “when you have success on an issue, it tends to move to the back burner.”

Contributing to the slide over the past couple of months in Trump’s overall approval ratings was his performance on the economy and, in particular, inflation, which were pressing issues that kept former President Joe Biden’s approval ratings well below water for most of his presidency.

Trump’s blockbuster tariff announcement in early April sparked a trade war with some of the nation’s top trading partners, triggered a massive sell-off in the financial markets and increased concerns about a recession.

But the markets have rebounded, thanks in part to a truce between the U.S. and China in their tariff standoff as Trump tapped the brakes on his controversial tariff implementation.

Trump stood at 37% approval on tariffs and 34% on inflation/cost of living in the Marquette Law School poll. And he stood at 39% on the economy and 33% on cost of living in the Reuters/Ipsos poll, conducted May 16-18.

President Donald Trump announces the imposition of tariffs on countries across the globe during a White House event April 2, 2025.  (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

Doug Heye, a longtime GOP strategist and former RNC and Bush administration official, pointed to last year’s election, saying, “The main reason Trump won was to lower prices. Prices haven’t lowered, and polls are reflecting that.”

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“With the exception of gas prices, there hasn’t been much of a reduction in prices,” Shaw said.

“Prices haven’t come down, and it’s not clear that people will say the absence of inflation is an economic victory. They still feel that an appreciable portion of their money is going to pay for basic things,” he added. “What Trump is realizing is that prices have to come down for him to be able to declare success.”

A court has temporarily paused the Trump administration’s move to cancel Harvard’s student visa program.

Harvard filed suit against the Trump administration over the policy, and a judge granted its request for a temporary restraining order to preserve status quo while the case plays out in court. 

Judge Allison Burroughs, a 2014 Obama appointee, set a hearing for 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday in Boston federal court. 

Harvard said the policy will affect more than 7,000 visa holders — nearly a quarter of the student body — and is a “blatant violation of the First Amendment, the Due Process Clause, and the Administrative Procedure Act,” per its court filing.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) moved to terminate the program after Harvard allegedly failed to provide it with the extensive behavioral records of student visa holders the department requested. DHS offered Harvard 72 hours on Thursday to come into compliance with the request and re-enter into the visa program. 

As of now, Harvard may no longer enroll foreign students in the 2025–2026 school year, and existing foreign students must transfer or lose their legal status to reside in the U.S. before the next academic year begins. 

University President Alan Garber said a motion for a temporary restraining order to put the policy on pause while their court case against it plays out would be filed next.

Harvard University President Alan Garber said a motion for a temporary restraining order to put the policy on pause while their court case against it plays out would be filed next. (Craig F. Walker/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)

FEDERAL JUDGE BLOCKS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION FROM TERMINATING INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS’ LEGAL STATUS

“It is the latest act by the government in clear retaliation for Harvard exercising its First Amendment rights to reject the government’s demands to control Harvard’s governance, curriculum, and the “ideology” of its faculty and students,” Harvard wrote in its complaint. 

The records requested include any footage of protest activity involving students on visas and the disciplinary records of all students on visas in the past five years. 

Requested records also include footage or documentation of illegal, dangerous or violent activity by student visa holders, any records of threats or the deprivation of rights of other students or university personnel.

Harvard called the new policy “pernicious” and accused the Trump administration of departing from “decades of settled practice and come without rational explanation.” It claimed the policy was “carried out abruptly without any of the robust procedures the government has established to prevent just this type of upheaval to thousands of students’ lives.” 

“Consequences must follow to send a clear signal to Harvard and all universities that want to enjoy the privilege of enrolling foreign students, that the Trump administration will enforce the law and root out the evils of antisemitism in society and campuses,” said Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. (Getty)

DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in response to the suit, “This lawsuit seeks to kneecap the President’s constitutionally vested powers under Article II.”

“It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multibillion-dollar endowments,” she said. “The Trump administration is committed to restoring common sense to our student visa system; no lawsuit, this or any other, is going to change that.”

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said on Thursday that in April, she requested the records related to visa-holding students, and Harvard’s counsel did not provide adequate information to meet the demand. 

After the DHS general counsel asked again for the information, Harvard provided an “insufficient, incomplete and unacceptable response,” she said. 

Student visa holders will not be allowed to study at Harvard next year over campus protests under a new DHS policy. (Brett Phelps/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION BEGINS NEW WAVE OF INTERNATIONAL STUDENT VISA REVOCATIONS: ‘NO ONE HAS A RIGHT TO A VISA’

“Consequences must follow to send a clear signal to Harvard and all universities that want to enjoy the privilege of enrolling foreign students, that the Trump administration will enforce the law and root out the evils of antisemitism in society and campuses,” said Noem.

In April, Harvard took action to prepare for the potential of the drastic policy change, announcing it would allow foreign students to accept admission to both Harvard and a foreign university as backup amid the Trump administration’s threats to move to block Harvard’s authorization to host them. Typically, students must accept enrollment at Harvard by May 1 and cannot commit to another university. 

At least a dozen Harvard students have had their authorization to study in the U.S. revoked over campus protest activity. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday told Congress the administration has probably revoked “thousands” of student visas by this point and would “proudly” revoke more. 

It is the latest development in the brewing battle between the Trump administration and some of the nation’s most prestigious universities. 

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The administration has already frozen close to $3 billion in federal funding to the university, largely dedicated to research, and launched investigations across the departments of Justice, Education and Health and Human Services. They claim Harvard has not adequately responded to campus antisemitism in protests or moved to root out diversity, equity and inclusion practices. 

Fox News’ Bill Mears contributed to this report. 

FIRST ON FOX: An internal House GOP memo sent to Republican lawmakers and obtained by Fox News Digital highlights the party’s key accomplishments included in President Donald Trump‘s “big, beautiful bill.”

House Republicans passed all 1,118 pages of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act on Thursday morning, after working through hourslong committee meetings, huddles in the speaker’s office and even a last-minute push from the president. 

Finally, late Wednesday night, House leadership found consensus among key factions of the Republican caucus. The late-night “manager’s amendment” appeased lingering Republican holdouts, including fiscal hawks who wanted more reform on Medicaid and former President Joe Biden’s green energy subsidies, and blue state Republicans seeking to raise the cap on the state and local tax (SALT) deduction. 

The bill is a sweeping multitrillion-dollar piece of legislation that advances Trump’s agenda on taxes, immigration, energy, defense and the national debt. It aims to slash the federal government’s spending trajectory by cutting roughly $1.5 trillion in government spending. The U.S. government is over $36 trillion in debt and has spent $1.05 trillion more than it has collected in the 2025 fiscal year, according to the Treasury Department. 

The bill raises the debt ceiling by $4 trillion. 

MIKE JOHNSON, DONALD TRUMP GET ‘BIG, ‘BEAUTIFUL’ WIN AS BUDGET PASSES HOUSE

House Speaker Mike Johnson, center, celebrated passing President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” on Thursday. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

The internal House Republican memo shared with Fox News Digital summarizes Republicans’ key legislative accomplishments. 

According to the memo, the bill reduces the deficit by $238 billion through the Agriculture Committee, securing $294 billion through Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefit reform. It reinvests $56 billion in SNAP benefit savings into rural America. 

HOUSE GOP LEADERSHIP TAKES VICTORY LAP AFTER PASSING TRUMP’S ‘ONE BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’

Republicans say the SNAP reform restores its integrity by requiring states to pay a larger share for its benefits and incentivizing more state efficiency. It requires congressional approval for states to increase enrollment eligibility and creates SNAP work requirements for able-bodied adults who do not have young dependents. 

The Armed Services Committee increased defense spending by nearly $143 billion with improvements to service members’ quality of life, healthcare and family support. There are billions of dollars allocated to building the military’s arsenal, advancing technology and infrastructure and expanding military readiness. 

House Speaker Mike Johnson, center, and House Republicans celebrated passing President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” on Thursday. (Getty Images)

The bill allocates $34 billion for shipbuilding, $5 billion for border security enforcement, $400 million for the Department of Defense and $25 billion for Trump’s Golden Dome, which is a layered missile defense shield. 

It reduces the deficit by $349.1 billion through the Education and Workforce Committee, which made a series of reforms to streamline student loan payment options, support students and save taxpayer money. 

Specifically, the bill caps the total amount of federal student aid a student can receive annually to the median cost of the college, which is $50,000 for undergrad, $100,000 for graduate students and $150,000 for professional graduate programs. There is also a “lifetime limit” of $200,000. 

The Education and Workforce Committee consolidated student loans into two plans — a fixed mortgage-style plan or a repayment assistance plan. 

The U.S. Department of Education headquarters building in Washington, D.C. (J. David Ake/Getty Images)

It also establishes a performance-based PROMISE grant program, prevents future attempts at the loan forgiveness program championed by the Biden administration and reforms Pell Grant programs. 

The Energy and Commerce Committee, which had a lengthy overnight budget markup last week, includes a series of Medicaid reforms, which Democrats have railed against as conservatives pushed for more cuts. The bill establishes work requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents, requires state cost-sharing for adults above the poverty line, eliminates illegal immigrants from enrolling and reduces state funding for states who prioritize coverage for illegal immigrants. 

The Financial Services Committee in the “big, beautiful bill” includes reforms to save taxpayer money and reduce federal bureaucracy. Meanwhile, the Homeland Security Committee increases spending by a little over $79 billion to expand border security, and the Judiciary Committee increases spending by about $7 billion to stop illegal immigration. 

The Energy and Commerce Committee also delivered on one of Trump’s key campaign promises to unleash American energy by supporting domestic energy production and eliminating Biden-era green energy projects, including eliminating electric vehicle mandates. 

DEMOCRATS PREDICT PASSING TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ WILL COST MANY REPUBLICANS THEIR SEATS

Demonstrators calling for the preservation of Medicaid funding are removed from the House Energy and Commerce markup of the FY2025 budget resolution in the Rayburn building on May 13. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

The Natural Resources Committee reduces the deficit by $18 billion to deliver Trump’s energy agenda. The bill reinstates quarterly onshore oil and gas lease sales, requires geothermal lease sales and mandates at least 30 lease sales in the newly-renamed Gulf of America over the next 15 years and six in the Cook Inlet in south-central Alaska.

It returns oil and natural gas royalty rates to before Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, resumes leases on energy production in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, resumes coal leasing on federal lands, increases timber sales and long-term contracts on federal lands and walks back funds allocated by the Biden administration for climate change. 

The bill includes amendments by the Oversight Committee that will reduce the deficit by $12 billion by eliminating retirement annuity payments for new federal retirees that are eligible to retire before age 62, allows new federal employee hires the option to elect to serve “at will” in exchange for higher take-home pay, requires a comprehensive audit of employee dependents currently enrolled in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program plans.

TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ PASSES KEY HOUSE HURDLE AFTER GOP REBEL MUTINY

President Donald Trump, left, and Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., talk with reporters after a House Republican Conference meeting on the budget reconciliation bill in the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

Finally, the Ways and Means Committee makes the 2017 tax cuts permanent, which prevents a 22% tax hike, and delivers Trump’s campaign promises, including no taxes on tips, overtime pay or car loan interests. It also provides additional tax relief for seniors. The bill increases the university endowment tax and subjects the largest endowments to the corporate tax rate.

As touted in the House GOP memo, the bill also prevents taxpayer benefits from going to illegal immigrants by requiring a Social Security number for individuals claiming tax credits and deductions, ends illegal immigrant eligibility for Obamacare premium tax credits and Medicare, and applies new remittance payment fees for illegal immigrants. 

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The One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed in the U.S. House of Representatives 215 to 214. All Democrats and just two Republicans, Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Warren Davidson, R-Ohio, voted against it. House Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris, R-Md., voted “present.”

Now, the Senate is tasked with passing their own version of the bill before it lands on Trump’s desk. Republican leadership is eyeing a July 4 deadline, but sparks are likely to fly in the Senate before Trump can claim a legislative victory. 

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson called President Donald Trump a “monster,” and U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, has accused the mayor of “bragging about” violating the law.

Johnson accused the president of “animus towards women, people of color, [and] working people.”

“We have always known who he has been,” he declared. “This is not a surprise. He’s a monster, period. We have the most diverse administration in the history of Chicago, and he is threatened by that.”

Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment but did not receive a response by the time of publication. 

DOJ LAUNCHES INVESTIGATION INTO BLUE STATE CITY OVER ALLEGED RACE-BASED HIRING

The mayor’s fiery comments come in the context of the Justice Department launching a probe into whether Chicago is engaging in race-based discrimination.

“Our investigation is based on information suggesting that you have made hiring decisions solely on the basis of race,” a letter signed by Assistant Attorney General, Civil Rights Division, Harmeet Dhillon declares.

The letter points to comments the mayor made while speaking to Dr. Byron T. Brazier, pastor of the Apostolic Church of God.

During the exchange, Johnson pointed to various roles occupied by Black individuals and said, “when you ask, how do we ensure that our people get a chance to grow their business, having people in my administration that will look out for the interest of everyone, and everyone means you have to look out for the interests of Black folks … that’s how we ensure long-term sustainable growth …”

POLICE RAID DC SHOOTING SUSPECT ELIAS RODRIGUEZ’S CHICAGO APARTMENT

Dhillon’s message to the mayor notes that “we have not reached any conclusions about the subject matter of the investigation.”

“Chicago’s mayor is about to find out,” Sen. Mike Lee declared in a post on X. “Racial discrimination is illegal.”

“There’s no such thing as benevolently racist hiring policies,” Lee said in another post. “Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson is breaking the law And bragging about it Then calling Trump a monster because his administration won’t tolerate that,” Lee wrote, adding, “He’s about to find out.”

GIANNO CALDWELL SEEKS JUSTICE FOR BROTHER KILLED IN BLUE CITY ‘ENAMORED WITH CRIMINALS’ RIGHTS’: ALDERMAN

Sen. Mike Lee, left, and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson. (TING SHEN/AFP via Getty Images | Graeme Sloan for The Washington Post via Getty Images)

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The mayor’s press office also did not respond to Fox News Digital’s comment request by the time of publication.

“This is one big ugly bill that House Republicans are trying to jam down the throats of the American people under the cover of darkness,” argued House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. at 6:09 a.m. Thursday morning on the House floor.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The sun was rising.

“Why are we here at 3 a.m., fast-tracking this bill?” asked Rep. Becca Balint, D-Vt., during House debate on the measure at 3:15 a.m. ET Thursday.

GOP HOLDOUTS SOUND ALARM ON $36T DEBT CRISIS AS TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ PASSES HOUSE VOTE

The U.S. Capitol is lit by the morning sun. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc)

The House debated the package well past the witching hour Thursday, but lawmakers approved the bill just before the break of dawn.

House Republicans squeezed out a victory, 215-214 with Freedom Caucus Chairman Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md., voting present.

There haven’t been many all-night sessions in Congress lately. Especially when moving a piece of legislation of his magnitude during off-hours – coated with high drama and towering political stakes. But it’s not surprising that the House had to burn the midnight oil – on three different occasions – just to finish the package in recent days. That’s typical for massive legislation with exponential consequences. It doesn’t matter what party or what the issue is. COVID-19 money. Obamacare. The infrastructure law. The Inflation Reduction Act. You name it. Congress works around the clock when they’re on the precipice of doing something big.

HOUSE GOP LEADERSHIP TAKES VICTORY LAP AFTER PASSING TRUMP’S ‘ONE BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’

House Speaker Mike Johnson, left, delivered the “big, beautiful bill” through the House by a narrow margin, but it faces a Senate fight before it could finally end up on President Donald Trump’s desk. (AP/Getty)

Whether it’s good is another question.

The week started with a Sunday night meeting of the House Budget Committee at 10:26 p.m. The House Rules Committee did the Budget Committee one better, meeting at 1 a.m. Wednesday. That session ran nearly 22 hours, ending late Wednesday night. The House then began floor action on the bill in the early hours of Thursday. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., gaveled the vote closed on the bill just before 7 a.m.

Talking about Congress is usually enough to put people to sleep, but with hours like these, if you snooze, you lose.

Rip Van Winkle, er, Rep. Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., accidentally caught a few zzz’s early Thursday at precisely the wrong time. Johnson said Garbarino “fell asleep in the back” of the House chamber during the vote on the “big, beautiful bill.”

House of Representatives. (Chip Somodevilla)

Garbarino and other Empire State Republicans lost sleep for weeks as they fought for a deal on SALT. They wanted a higher deduction for state and local taxes in exchange for their support of the bill. A sleeper issue, this wasn’t. A new pact was paramount to passing the bill. Still, Garbarino was less than satisfied with the compromise.

Perhaps it gets changed in the Senate.

Garbarino can only dream.

If you heard a creaky noise on the north side of the U.S. Capitol Thursday, that was the Senate awakening from its legislative slumber. The Senate has focused for most of President Donald Trump’s term on confirming his cabinet. Legislation hasn’t dominated Senate floor traffic this year, but that will change soon.

“Our team is suiting up for discussions with the Senate side of Capitol Hill,” said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt holds a press briefing at the White House in Washington, D.C., on April 15, 2025. (REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein)

But divisions are already emerging.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., abhors the House package.

“I have already said that in its current state it’s completely unacceptable to me,” said Johnson. “I would vote no.”

President Trump wants the Senate to finish the measure and deposit it on his desk by July 4, but the Wisconsin Republican quibbled with Mr. Trump’s timetable and demand for this version of the bill.

“I couldn’t care less if he’s upset,” said Johnson.

WHITE HOUSE: DEMS HAVE ‘NEVER BEEN MORE RADICAL, OUT OF TOUCH’ AFTER VOTING AGAINST ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’

Sen. Ron Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin, campaigned heavily for and supports President Donald Trump but is highly critical of the president’s “big, beautiful bill” headed to the Senate. (Jim Vondruska/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Other Republican senators were willing to grant some deference to President Trump.

But only to a point.

“He’s the leader of the band and he’s a heck of a good leader,” said Sen. Jim Justice, R-W.Va. “But with all that said, I would tell you we don’t want to get in a hurry just to meet a deadline date and everything. We want to get it right.”

Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., thought that July 4 was an “optimistic” deadline.

Sen. Thom Tillis, right, has been critical of some Trump nominees and policy proposals in President Donald Trump’s second term. (Getty Images)

“Look at how long it’s taken the House to get to this point,” said Tillis. “There’s still a lot of decisions to be made. So I think we’re talking about weeks or months.”

And the Senate will inevitably change the measure.

“The Senate’s going to want to put its own stamp on this. We’ll write our own version of the bill,” said Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo.

Senators are already making their demands.

“I’m not voting to raise the debt ceiling $5 trillion, because that’s not fiscally responsible and that’s not conservative,” said Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky.

Libertarian-leaning Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., left, is largely supportive of President Donald Trump but has staked out some areas of disagreement, including on spending. (Left: Samuel Corum/Getty Images; Right: Aaron Schwartz/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Trimming deficits worried other senators.

“Don’t get high on our horse here that we’ve somehow made some major advancement of reducing spending because we didn’t,” said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

What winds up in the bill hinges on a solitary factor.

“We’ve got to get to 51 votes,” said Tillis.

Senate Democrats are also thinking about the number 51, but in the context of 2026. Democrats believe this bill might help them get 51 Senate seats in the midterms.

“Based on what the House has passed our, chances of taking back the Senate have just increased,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, the Democrats’ leader in the Senate, sees the “big, beautiful bill” as a key rallying point to turn 2026 midterm voters against Republicans. (REUTERS/Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/File Photo)

House Democrats believe the early morning roll call vote in House will be the seminal ballot cast in this session of Congress.

“This day may very well turn out to be the day that House Republicans lost control of the United States House of Representatives,” said Jeffries.

That’s not a newsflash. Both parties customarily focus on a handful of votes each body takes over the course of a two-year Congress. They deploy the results of those votes against their opponents. Take a look at the tiny script on the lower portion of the TV screen when ads for the midterms begin running in September and October next year. You can bet Democrats will document the vote which closed at dawn Thursday.

Moreover, Republicans are stashing all of their political eggs in one basket. The bulk of President Trump’s agenda is tucked into this singular measure – for better or worse. Lawmakers must fund the government later this year. And next year, too. But after that, it’s unclear if Republicans have any other legislation which would compete with the breadth of this bill.

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Jeffries alleged that Republicans tried to advance the bill “under the cover of darkness.” That isn’t accurate. Democrats – and Republicans – will work to make sure voters know all about this bill. The political consequences of this legislation are too significant.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And voters will decide just how “beautiful” this big bill is.