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President Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday aimed at eliminating a handful of federal advisory committees. 

The order targets the Presidio Trust, the Inter-American Foundation, the United States African Development Foundation and the United States Institute of Peace – all of which have received federal funding. 

It comes as the president has been working along with Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, to aggressively reduce the size of the federal government and minimize government waste and abuse to reduce inflation.

TRUMP SIGNS ORDER INSTRUCTING DOGE TO MASSIVELY CUT FEDERAL WORKFORCE

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House, where he signed an executive order, on Thursday, Feb. 13. (AP/Ben Curtis)

Cutting these governmental entities and federal advisory committees will save taxpayer dollars, reduce unnecessary government spending, and streamline government priorities, according to Trump’s administration.

The named organizations were given 14 days to submit reports to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB Director) confirming that they are compliant and to give an explanation if any part of their government entity is required and to what extent.

In addition, the Administrator of USAID was asked to terminate the Advisory Committee on Voluntary Foreign Aid. The Director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection will have to terminate the Academic Research Council and the Credit Union Advisory Council. The FDIC Board will be required to terminate the Community Bank Advisory Council. The Secretary of Health and Human Services has been asked to terminate the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Long COVID and the Administrator of CMS has to terminate the Health Equity Advisory Committee.

DC FEDERAL WORKERS IN A ‘PANIC’ OVER NOVEL EXPERIENCE OF JOB INSECURITY WITH JOB CUTS

President Donald Trump and DOGE head Elon Musk address attempts to portray a rivalry between the pair on a ‘Hannity’ exclusive, airing Tuesday, February 18. (Fox News)

The newly signed executive order coincides with one Trump signed Tuesday instructing DOGE to coordinate with federal agencies and execute massive cuts in federal government staffing numbers.  

That order instructed DOGE and federal agencies to work together to “significantly” shrink the size of the federal government and limit hiring new employees, according to a White House fact sheet. Specifically, agencies must not hire more than one employee for every four that leave their federal post. 

Agencies will also be instructed to “undertake plans for large-scale reductions in force” and evaluate ways to eliminate or combine agency functions that aren’t legally required.

Elon Musk and President Donald Trump talk about DOGE’s efforts to investigate wasteful U.S. government spending from the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, on February 11, 2025. (JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images)

Trump is also requiring that within 30 days of the order, the President’s assistants for National Security Affairs, Economic Policy, and Domestic Policy identify and submit a list of additional committees and boards for termination.

The Trump administration stated that the American people elected President Trump to drain the swamp and end ineffective government programs that empower government without achieving measurable results.

Trump also voiced he wants to provide voters what they want – to tackle “all of this “horrible stuff going on” – and told reporters that he hoped the court system would cooperate. 

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“I hope that the court system is going to allow us to do what we have to do,” Trump said, adding that he would always abide by a court’s ruling but will be prepared to appeal.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order late Wednesday night ending the use of taxpayer money for federal resources supporting illegal immigration and illegal aliens.

The Trump administration said the goal of the executive order is to ensure “taxpayer resources are used to protect the interests of American citizens, not illegal aliens.”

Under the order, federal departments and agencies must identify and end all federally funded programs providing financial benefits to illegal aliens. It also aims to ensure federal funds are not being used to support “sanctuary” policies.

“President Trump is committed to safeguarding Federal public benefits for American citizens who are truly in need, including individuals with disabilities and veterans,” a White House fact sheet on the executive order said.

TRUMP EXPECTED TO SIGN EXECUTIVE ORDER TERMINATING ALL FEDERAL TAXPAYER BENEFITS TO ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS

President Donald Trump has signed an executive order ending the use of federal taxpayer money for resources supporting illegal immigration and illegal aliens. (Reuters)

The surge in illegal immigration over the past four years has come at a high price, costing American taxpayers an estimated $451 billion to care for illegal aliens and gotaways in the U.S. unlawfully since January 2021, according to the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee.

The executive order cited calculations from the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which stated that American taxpayers have spent at least $182 billion annually to cover the costs of 20 million illegal aliens and their children. While that number includes $66.5 billion in federal expenses, an additional $115.6 billion has come from state and local expenses.

The Center for Immigration Studies also estimated that one million illegal aliens could cost American taxpayers $3 billion annually through welfare programs, which are not supposed to be available to those unlawfully in the U.S. per the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996.

Though, illegal aliens granted parole become classified as “qualified aliens” when it comes to welfare programs, allowing them to become eligible for various benefits with full eligibility granted within five years.

TOP FEDERAL AGENCY EXPOSED FOR SPENDING BILLIONS ON MIGRANTS IN A SINGLE YEAR

The Trump administration also called out former President Joe Biden and his administration for its “enabling” of illegal immigration and allocation of funds to support the crime.

Seen from an aerial view, immigrants try to pass over razor wire after crossing the border into El Paso, Texas, in May 2024. Those who managed to get through the wire were then allowed to proceed for further processing by U.S. Border Patrol agents. (John Moore)

The executive order stated that federal and state taxpayers paid more than $16.2 billion to provide Medicaid-funded emergency services to illegal aliens through Biden’s open borders agenda – an estimate from the Congressional Budget Office.

“The Biden Administration gave billions in taxpayer dollars to left-wing groups that facilitated mass illegal migration and provided legal services to challenge deportation orders,” the fact sheet continued.

It was also shared that FEMA has allocated more than $1 billion to illegal aliens since 2021.

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The move comes in accordance with promises made by Trump during his presidential campaign to secure the borders and put America first.

President Donald Trump heavily campaigned on his promises to put American first and to immediately close America’s borders. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

“President Trump has delivered on his promise to secure the border and prioritize the needs of American citizens, taking immediate action to put an end to the previous Administration’s border crisis,” the fact sheet stated before listing other immigration-related moves made by Trump since he took office on Jan. 20.

President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he supports GOP-led efforts in Congress to put Washington, D.C., back under direct federal control.

Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump complained about crime and homelessness in the nation’s capital.

“I think we should take over Washington, D.C., — make it safe,” Trump said, adding: “I think that we should govern [the] District of Columbia.”

NINTH CIRCUIT REJECTS TRUMP’S BID TO REINSTATE BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP ORDER

President Donald Trump and Elon Musk arrive at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Wednesday, Feb. 19, after returning from Florida. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

Per the city’s Home Rule authority, Congress vets all D.C. laws and can overturn them, but some congressional Republicans want to go further by putting the District under direct federal control, as it was at its founding.

Trump said he liked DC Mayor Muriel Bowser personally, but complained about the city’s governance.

President Trump said while he likes DC Mayor Muriel Bowser personally, he doesn’t think the nation’s capital is being governed well. (Robb Hill for The Washington Post via Getty Images)

“They’re not doing the job,” Trump said, arguing that there was “too much crime, too much – too many tents on the lawns – these magnificent lawns.”

GOP SENATORS BACK TRUMP’S DEMAND FOR UKRAINE ELECTIONS, BUT WON’T CALL ZELENSKYY ‘DICTATOR’

He argued that he can’t have sights of homelessness when he hosts foreign leaders in Washington. 

President Donald Trump said he supports putting Washington, D.C., back under direct federal control while complaining to reporters about crime and homelessness in the nation’s capital. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

“You just can’t let that happen,” Trump said. “You can’t have tents on all your beautiful — your once magnificent plaza and lawns.”

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Fox News Digital has reached out to the mayor’s office for comment. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

MISSION, Texas – U.S. Border Patrol agents encountered nearly 220 people on Monday, a sharp decline from more than 1,800 on the same day last year.

As part of President Donald Trump’s sweeping immigration crackdown, the Coast Guard has ramped up its operations along the Rio Grande.

The U.S. Coast Guard is increasing its presence alongside Border Patrol, bolstering operations with additional boats and personnel.

TRUMP RAMPS UP CARTEL SURVEILLANCE EFFORTS TO STRENGTHEN BORDER SECURITY 

United States and U.S. Coast Guard flags are displayed on a Coast Guard vessel.  (Sarah Alegre )

“We are augmenting our Border Patrol partners in key areas along the Rio Grande,” said Capt. Torrey Bertheau, sector commander for Corpus Christi. “Our mission is to detect, deter, and interdict illegal migration, drug smuggling—really any kind of illicit activity.”

We embedded alongside the Coast Guard for a look at operations and activity along the Rio Grande, when the crew encountered a suspected cartel spotter along the riverbank, a common tactic used by smugglers to monitor law enforcement movements.

BORDER STATE OFFICIALS PUT CARTELS ON NOTICE 

U.S. Coast Guard Captain Torrey Burtheau points to debris belonging to suspected smugglers along the Rio Grande.  (Sarah Alegre)

Since Trump took office last month, border crossings have dropped significantly. According to new data from Customs and Border Protection, 61,465 people were apprehended at the southern border during the month of January for illegal crossings. That’s a 36% decline from the previous month and illegal crossings along the southwest border have fallen to their lowest levels in decades. 

Despite the decline, Bertheau emphasized that smuggling operations continue.

“This is still a high-threat area,” he said. “The augmentation mission here is really to assist the Border Patrol in the areas that they need it.”

ACTIVISTS IN MEXICO REPORT FLOW OF MIGRANTS HAS ‘ENORMOUSLY DECREASED’

A boat is filled with U.S. Coast Guard crew members assisting Border Patrol agents along the Rio Grande.  (Sarah Alegre)

Beyond the river, the Coast Guard is also stepping up patrols along all Texas maritime boundaries. Last week in Port Isabel, guardsmen detained two individuals aboard a fishing boat—one was in the country illegally, and the other was wanted on felony weapons charges.

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“Whether the surge is happening or not, our goal is to ensure the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the United States is protected,” Bertheau said.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the Trump administration’s ban on birth order immigration from taking force on Wednesday, a legal blow that could kick the issue into the hands of the Supreme Court.

The appellate judges ruled unanimously that the administration failed to show that it was likely to succeed on the merits of its appeal, prompting the panel to rule 3-0 against hearing their emergency request. 

“The emergency motion for a partial stay of the district court’s February 6, 2025, preliminary injunction is denied,” the judges wrote.

TRUMP ADMIN APPEALS RULING BLOCKING BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP

President Donald Trump speaks during an executive order signing in the Oval Office at the White House on February 11, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

The ruling leaves in place a Seattle district court’s decision to temporarily block the executive order from coming into force. The court said Wednesday it will proceed with its June deadline to consider more closely the merits of the case.

To date, no court has sided with the Trump administration’s executive order seeking to ban birthright citizenship, though multiple district courts have blocked it from taking effect. 

The Justice Department, for its part, has sought to characterize the order as an “integral part of President Trump’s broader effort to repair the United States’ immigration system, and to address the ongoing crisis at the southern border.”

TRUMP TO SIGN EXECUTIVE ORDER INSTRUCTING AGENCIES TO HUNT DOWN REGULATIONS THAT VIOLATE CONSTITUTION

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services seal is displayed on a mobile phone screen. (Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

The executive order banning birthright citizenship was slated to come into force Feb. 19, and would have impacted the hundreds of thousands of children born in the U.S. annually.  

To date, at least 22 U.S. states and immigrants’ rights groups have sued the Trump administration over the ban on birthright citizenship, arguing in court filings that the executive order is both unconstitutional and “unprecedented.”

The executive order in question sought to clarify the 14th Amendment, which states: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

Instead, the language put forth by the Trump administration, and subsequently blocked – would have clarified that individuals born to illegal immigrant parents, or those who were here legally but on temporary non-immigrant visas, are not citizens by birthright.

LAWSUIT TRACKER: NEW RESISTANCE BATTLING TRUMP’S SECOND TERM THROUGH ONSLAUGHT OF LAWSUITS TAKING AIM AT EOS

Protesters chant during a rally against President Donald Trump’s immigration policies in New York City on Jan. 29. (Yuki Iwamura/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

The U.S. is one of roughly 30 countries where birthright citizenship is applied.

States who have challenged the law have argued that the 14th Amendment does in fact guarantee citizenship to persons born on U.S. soil and naturalized in the U.S.

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Several district courts across the country previously have blocked the order, prompting the Trump administration to file for emergency relief earlier this month. 

Should the Trump administration appeal the Ninth Circuit Court decision to the Supreme Court, it would go to Justice Elena Kagan, who is the Justice overseeing the 9th Circuit.  

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered the agency to develop plans to slash 8% from the Department of Defense budget in each of the next five years to align with President Donald Trump’s priorities, specifically to achieve peace through strength, officials said.  

Hegseth is asking for plans in an effort to identify offsets from the Biden administration’s fiscal year 2026 budget that could be realigned from low-impact and low-priority Biden-legacy programs, a statement from Pentagon spokesman Robert Salesses said. 

LAWSUIT TRACKER: NEW RESISTANCE BATTLING TRUMP’S SECOND TERM THROUGH ONSLAUGHT OF LAWSUITS TAKING AIM AT EOS

Aerial view of the Pentagon. The Defense Department is expected to enact layoffs after members of DOGE arrived, according to a Washington Post report.  (DANIEL SLIM/AFP via Getty Images)

Hegseth ordered the proposed cuts to be drawn up by Monday, according to a memo. 

“The time for preparation is over. We must act urgently to revive the warrior ethos, rebuild our military, and reestablish deterrence,” Hegseth wrote. “Our budget will resource the fighting force we need, cease unnecessary defense spending, reject excessive bureaucracy, and drive actionable reform including progress on the audit.”

The Washington Post first reported the memo. Fox News Digital has reached out to the Pentagon. 

Salesses said that the money saved could be used to realign the defense agency towards Trump’s new priorities, including the “Iron Dome for America,” his catchphrase for a missile defense system.

 DOGE SCORES BIG COURT WIN, ALLOWED ACCESS DATA ON 3 FEDERAL AGENCIES

U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth delivers remarks during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the Pentagon on Feb. 5 in Arlington, Va.  (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

“The Department of Defense is conducting this review to ensure we are making the best use of the taxpayers’ dollars in a way that delivers on President Trump’s defense priorities efficiently and effectively,” he said. 

“The Department will develop a list of potential offsets that could be used to fund these priorities, as well as to refocus the Department on its core mission of deterring and winning wars,” he added. “The offsets are targeted at 8% of the Biden Administration’s FY26 budget, totaling around $50 billion, which will then be spent on programs aligned with President Trump’s priorities.”

The cuts will allow the Defense Department to halt all unnecessary spending that set the military back under the Biden administration through climate change and other “woke” programs, Salesses said. Hegseth has stressed that the U.S. aims to “revive the warrior ethos.”

Pentagon schools accused of woke indoctrination (MARTIN BUREAU/AFP via Getty Image | PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP via Getty Images)

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The request for cuts comes amid a separate order from the Trump administration to fire thousands of probationary DOD employees, which is being overseen by the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.

FIRST ON FOX: President Donald Trump will sign an executive order Wednesday that will require federal agencies to evaluate all of their regulations that could violate the Constitution in the latest effort from his administration to prioritize slashing red tape. 

The executive order — which senior administration officials are calling a first of its kind and an attempt to ensure the government isn’t weaponized against the American people — will require agencies to submit a list to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) within the next 60 days of all regulations that could violate the Constitution or could cause harm.

OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) and the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will spearhead the effort and evaluate regulations across the federal agencies, senior administration officials told Fox News Digital on Wednesday. 

DOGE officials at federal agencies will gather an inventory of regulations that could violate the Constitution and then share them with OMB. After the 60 days, the OIRA will go through the list of regulations and make individual decisions on which are unconstitutional and will launch the process of repealing the regulations on a case-by-case basis, the senior administration officials said. 

OIRA oversees executive branch regulations, while the newly created DOGE aims to eliminate government waste, fraud and spending. 

HERE’S THE ARGUMENT TRUMP HOPES WILL NET FIRST MAJOR SCOTUS WIN IN SECOND TERM 

President Donald Trump has signed more than 60 executive orders during his second term as president. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

The order comes as the U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled against federal agencies who have sought to broadly enforce their own regulations outside the scope of their jurisdiction, including when the Supreme Court ruled against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in May 2023 in the case Sackett v. EPA. 

In that case, Mike and Chantell Sackett purchased a residential lot near Priest Lake, Idaho, in 2005 to build a home. However, the EPA stepped in as the Sacketts kicked off leveling the ground and told them to halt plans to start construction — or face massive fines — because the property fell on federally protected land covered under the jurisdiction of the Clean Water Act of 1972. 

The law sets standards for regulating pollutants into “waters of the United States,” and Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the majority opinion that the EPA sought to classify the wetlands on the Sacketts’ property as “waters of the United States” because they were “near a ditch that fed into a creek, which fed into Priest Lake, a navigable, intrastate lake.” 

Ultimately, the Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that the Clean Water Act applies only to waters that are “relatively permanent, standing, or continuously flowing bodies of water.” 

TRUMP ADMIN SEEKS PERMISSION TO FIRE HEAD OF THE OFFICE OF SPECIAL COUNSEL

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the Environmental Protection Agency in May 2023 in the case Sackett v. EPA, which sought to determine which waters were covered by the Clean Water Act. (The Associated Press)

“Understanding the (Clean Water Act) to apply to wetlands that are distinguishable from otherwise covered ‘waters of the United States’ would substantially broaden (existing statute) to define ‘navigable waters’ as ‘waters of the United States and adjacent wetlands,'” Alito wrote.

Wednesday’s executive order will build on the Trump administration’s efforts to cut down on regulations. 

For example, Trump signed an executive order in January ordering that federal agencies eradicate 10 regulations for every new one implemented. 

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Trump said at the World Economic Forum oln Jan. 23 that his administration would launch the “largest deregulation campaign in history, far exceeding even the record-setting efforts of my last term.”

Previous steps Trump took during his first term to cut regulations included ordering federal agencies to nix two regulations for every new regulation issued. The White House has touted that agencies ultimately cut five and half regulations for every new one introduced during Trump’s first term. 

Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., is seeing more staff turnover as he fosters his reputation as a sometimes-rebellious Democrat. 

Two top staffers are leaving Fetterman, a source familiar confirmed to Fox News Digital.

Both Deputy Chief of Staff and Legislative Director Tré Easton and Communications Director Charlie Hills decided to leave the Pennsylvania senator’s office, as NBC News first reported. 

SCOOP: TOP GOP SEN. COTTON TO MEET WITH EMBATTLED TRUMP DEFENSE NOMINEE AS DOUBTS SWIRL

Fetterman suffered more staff departures as he continues to buck his party.  (Getty Images)

In a statement, Easton said, “Working for John afforded me the opportunity to build a diligent policy team from scratch,” per NBC News. 

“Together we created a legislative body of work that I think is a blueprint for how Democrats should be governing when they have power. I’ll forever be grateful,” he continued. 

Easton and Hills are only the latest departures from the controversial Democrat’s office. 

In early 2024, three communications staffers for the senator all left within the span of one month. Former Communications Joe Calvello, former Deputy Communication Director Nicholas Gavio and former Digital Aide Emma Mustion each departed, taking on roles with other Democratic lawmakers and with a progressive political party, respectively. 

BATTLE OF THE CHAMBERS: TRUMP BUDGET TEST VOTE CLEARED IN SENATE AS HOUSE GOP LAGS BEHIND

The senator has developed a reputation for sometimes bucking his party.  (Nathan Howard/Getty Images)

The departures didn’t end there, however. 

After getting a new communications chief in Carrie Adams, she virtually disappeared from the Senate hallways after publicly disagreeing with Fetterman in an August 2024 conversation with the Free Press. 

“I don’t agree with him,” the publication quoted Adams as saying about her boss’ stance on Israel and its war with Hamas. 

Her absence around the Capitol left reporters wondering whether she was still in the senator’s office. 

It wasn’t reported until last month that Adams had stopped working for Fetterman. 

MCCONNELL’S MENTAL ACUITY TARGETED BY TRUMP AFTER EX-SENATE LEADER JOINS DEMS AGAINST CABINET NOMINEES

Fetterman has been outspoken in support of Israel.  (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Since entering the Senate, Fetterman has made waves due, in part, to his colorful vocabulary and also his willingness to cross the aisle and side with Republicans, particularly when it comes to supporting Israel. 

The Democrat notably expressed openness to President Donald Trump’s proposal to annex Gaza, bringing it under U.S. control. “It’s a provocative part of the conversation, but it’s part of the conversation, and that’s where we are,” he told Jewish Insider. 

Fetterman has also been willing to buck his party on illegal immigration. He signed onto Republicans’ Laken Riley Act recently, an immigration bill deemed too harsh and too broad by most Democrats. He was the first Democrat to co-sponsor the bill. 

DEMS TORCHED OVER DOGE SECURITY CLAIMS AFTER ALLOWING ‘WIDE-OPEN’ BORDER, ‘EMPOWERING IRAN’

Fetterman co-sponsored the Laken Riley Act. (Getty Images)

“Laken Riley’s story is a tragic reminder of what’s at stake when our systems fail to protect people. No family should have to endure the pain of losing a loved one to preventable violence. Immigration is what makes our country great. I support giving authorities the tools to prevent tragedies like this one while we work on comprehensive solutions to our broken system,” the senator said in a statement at the time. 

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The Pennsylvania senator has further crossed the ideological threshold on multiple occasions to back Trump cabinet nominees, in some cases being the only Democratic supporter. 

Fetterman’s office did not immediately provide comment to Fox News Digital. 

President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy exchanged terse insults on Wednesday, following meetings between the U.S. and Russian officials in Saudi Arabia Tuesday without representatives from Ukraine. 

Trump repeatedly has said that he is the only one who can bring an end to the war between Ukraine and Russia, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump was in contact with Zelenskyy and was working to ensure “that all parties are heard” during the peace talks. 

Yet Ukraine’s absence from the negotiations Tuesday appears to have exacerbated a wedge between Washington and Kyiv. 

While Zelenskyy accused Trump of perpetuating Russian “disinformation” on Wednesday, Trump clapped back and labeled Zelenskky a “dictator” who has failed his country. 

“A Dictator without Elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left. In the meantime, we are successfully negotiating an end to the War with Russia, something all admit only ‘TRUMP,’ and the Trump Administration, can do,” Trump said in a social media post Wednesday. 

“I love Ukraine, but Zelenskyy has done a terrible job, his Country is shattered, and MILLIONS have unnecessarily died,” Trump said. 

RUSSIA, UKRAINE TAKE ‘SIGNIFICANT FIRST STEP TOWARD PEACE’ AFTER RUBIO-LED NEGOTIATIONS, WHITE HOUSE INSISTS

Then-Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy meet at Trump Tower in New York City, New York, Sept. 27, 2024.  (Shannon Stapleton/Reuters)

Trump’s post included a series of inaccurate statements, including that Zelenskyy “talked the United States of America into spending $350 Billion Dollars, to go into a War that couldn’t be won, that never had to start.” Meanwhile, Congress has appropriated $175 billion since 2022 for aid to Ukraine, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. 

Trump’s comments build on statements he delivered Tuesday at his Florida Mar-a-Lago estate, where he said that Russia wasn’t the only one exerting pressure to force Ukraine to hold an election. One of Russia’s conditions for signing a peace deal includes Ukraine holding an election, nearly a year after Zelenskyy’s five-year term was slated to end. 

But Zelenskyy has remained in his position leading Kyiv because the Ukrainian constitution bars holding elections under martial law. Ukraine has been under martial law since February 2022. 

Additionally, Trump chastised Ukraine on Tuesday for not ending the war sooner, and also appeared to suggest that Ukraine started the conflict, even though Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

‘MAKE NATO GREAT AGAIN’: HEGSETH PUSHES EUROPEAN ALLIES TO STEP UP DEFENSE EFFORTS 

Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a meeting with members of the Security Council at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Monday, May 13, 2024.  (Aleksey Babushkin, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo)

“I think I have the power to end this war, and I think it’s going very well. But today I heard, ‘Oh, we weren’t invited,'” Trump said Tuesday at Mar-a-Lago. “Well, you’ve been there for three years. You should have ended it three years (ago). You should have never started it. You could have made a deal.”

In response, Zelensky delivered his own jabs toward Trump, and said the U.S. president lived in a “disinformation space” peddling inaccurate information that originated from Russia. 

“We have seen this disinformation,” Zelenskyy said at a news conference Wednesday before meeting with retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellog, the U.S. special envoy for Ukraine and Russia. “We understand that it is coming from Russia.”

“I think Putin and the Russians are very happy, because questions are discussed with them,” Zelenskyy said. 

Zelenskyy has stressed in recent days that Ukraine must be involved in negotiations for a peace deal with Russia, and said Sunday that Ukraine wouldn’t accept a peace deal if his country was absent from negotiations. 

He also announced Tuesday he would postpone a scheduled trip to Saudi Arabia until March, after revealing during a joint press conference with Turkish President Recept Tayyip Erdoğan that Ukraine wasn’t invited to the U.S.-Russia discussions in Riyadh.  

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, White House National Security Advisor Mike Waltz and Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff met in Riyadh with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and President Vladimir Putin’s foreign affairs advisor Yuri Ushakov to hash out ways to end the conflict. 

TOP RUSSIAN, US OFFICIALS MEET IN SAUDI ARABIA TO BEGIN TALKS ON UKRAINE WAR WITHOUT OFFICIALS FROM KYIV

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other U.S. officials met with Russian leaders to discuss a peace agreement to end the war between Russia and Ukraine at Diriyah Palace, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Tuesday Feb. 18, 2025.  (Evelyn Hockstein/Pool Photo via AP)

The first action the U.S. plans to take after the meetings with Russian officials is to “reestablish the functionality of our respective missions in Washington and in Moscow,” Rubio told reporters from the Associated Press and CNN.

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“For us to be able to continue to move down this road, we need to have diplomatic facilities that are operating and functioning normally,” Rubio said, according to a State Department transcript. 

Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, and Trump vowed on the campaign trail in 2024 that he would work to end the conflict if elected again.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Three new national polls released on Wednesday indicate President Donald Trump’s approval ratings are edging down slightly since taking over the White House one month ago.

Forty-five percent of voters questioned in a Quinnipiac University survey said they approve of the way Trump is handling his job as president, with 49% disapproving.

That’s down from a 46%-43% approval/disapproval in a Quinnipiac poll conducted in late January, during the president’s first week back in office following his inauguration.

And a new national poll from Gallup indicated the president at 45% approval and 51% disapproval, down from 47%-48% approval/disapproval late last month.

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President Donald Trump speaks at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., Tuesday, Feb. 18, 2025.  (Pool via AP)

And according to a Reuters/Ipsos national survey also released on Wednesday, the president stood at 44% approval and 51% disapproval. Trump registered at 45%-46% approval/disapproval in the previous poll by Reuters/Ipsos, which was conducted late last month during the first week of the president’s second administration.

The latest Quinnipiac poll was conducted Feb. 13-17, with Gallup in the field Feb. 3-16, and Reuters/Ipsos conducting their survey Feb. 13-18.

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Recent surveys from other polling organizations indicate Trump’s approval ratings remain above water.

Trump has kept up a frenetic pace during his opening weeks back in the White House, with an avalanche of executive orders and actions. His moves not only fulfilled some of his major campaign trail promises, but also allowed the returning president to flex his executive muscles, quickly put his stamp on the federal government, take a meat cleaver to the federal workforce, and also settle some longstanding grievances.

President Donald Trump signs an executive order, at the White House on Feb. 10, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Reuters)

Trump has signed nearly 70 executive orders since his inauguration, according to a count from Fox News, which far surpasses the rate of any recent presidential predecessors during their first weeks in office.

The president, never shy about advertising his accomplishments, took to social media last week to tout “THREE GREAT WEEKS, PERHAPS THE BEST EVER.”

And at a news conference Tuesday, Trump argued that “incredible things are happening in our country.”

“I think we’ve made more progress in three weeks than they’ve made in four years,” he added, as he appeared to point to his predecessor in the White House, former President Biden.

While Trump’s approval ratings for his second term are an improvement from his first term — he started in 2017 in negative territory and remained underwater throughout his tenure in the White House — his numbers are below where Biden began his single term in office.

Biden’s approval rating hovered in the low to mid 50s during his first six months in the White House, with his disapproval in the upper 30s to low to mid 40s. 

Former President Joe Biden speaks about his administration’s accomplishments during a speech on Dec. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

However, Biden’s numbers sank into negative territory in the late summer and autumn of 2021, in the wake of his much-criticized handling of the turbulent U.S. exit from Afghanistan and amid soaring inflation and a surge of migrants crossing into the U.S. along the nation’s southern border with Mexico.

Biden’s approval ratings stayed underwater throughout the rest of his presidency.

The new polls indicate a massive partisan divide over Trump’s performance.

Nine in 10 Republicans questioned in the Quinnipiac survey gave Trump a thumbs-up. But his approval dropped to 43% among independents and just 4% among Democrats.

President Donald Trump arrives prior to his inauguration at the United States Capitol on January 20, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Melina Mara/Pool/Getty Images)

It was a similar story in the Gallup poll.

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“Ninety-three percent of Republicans, 37% of independents and 4% of Democrats approve of Trump’s job performance overall,” the release from Gallup highlighted.

Meanwhile, the Gallup poll noted that while Trump’s ratings have edged down, Americans’ approval of Congress has surged 12 points since early January, to 29% in their latest survey. That’s the highest approval rating for Congress in Gallup polling since May 2021.

The Trump administration revised federal acquisition rules this week requiring the government to stop considering diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) when awarding contracts. This change aligns with the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) broader efforts to fundamentally transform federal operations.

The General Services Administration (GSA) on Tuesday announced changes to the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) that are meant to align with the president’s executive order aimed at restoring meritocracy and ending discrimination in the public and private sectors. The move reverses previous Biden administration executive orders that made it mandatory to consider DEI when reviewing contract proposals. 

Elon Musk, who has been leading the charge to radically reform the government, praised the move on X, formerly Twitter, in advance of the GSA’s formal announcement about the changes. “Major FAR reform is needed,” Musk said in a post highlighting GSA acting administrator Stephen Ehikian’s announcement about the changes. 

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION CANCELS ANOTHER $350M IN ‘WOKE’ SPENDING FOR CONTRACTS, GRANTS

“These actions are the first steps in transforming the FAR into a sensible, common sense guideline to ensure that the federal government is working with industry as an attractive partner for business,” Josh Gruenbaum, commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service, told Fox News Digital on Wednesday. 

“Coming from private industry, I know how convoluted working through government regulations that don’t make sense can be. We’re going to streamline the FAR and make it industry friendly, more efficient, and deliver cost savings and better value.”

FEDERAL JUDGE TEMPORARILY STOPS TRUMP ADMIN FROM FIRING 11 INTELLIGENCE OFFICERS ASSIGNED TO DEI PROGRAMS

President Donald Trump speaks as Elon Musk, joined by his son X Æ A-Xii, listens in the Oval Office at the White House, Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Trump’s Day One executive order, which the GSA is aligning its actions with, directed the federal contracting process to “be streamlined to enhance speed and efficiency, reduce costs, and require Federal contractors and subcontractors to comply with our civil-rights laws.” The order also commanded the Office of Federal Contract Compliance to “immediately cease” promoting “diversity,” as well as any encouragement of federal contractors and subcontractors to engage in affirmative action-like efforts that consider race, color, sex, sexual preference, religion or national origin when making hiring decisions.

Trump’s order added that the heads of each executive agency must begin including contractual language that requires federal contractors to agree to comply with federal anti-discrimination laws. Meanwhile, language associated with DEI principles was also ordered to be removed from any federal acquisition, contracting, grant or financial assistance procedures.

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Criticism over workplace DEI commitments was bolstered following last year’s affirmative action ruling from the Supreme Court that barred racial preferences in university admissions. (Getty Images)

“The steps taken by GSA will make it easier for industry to sell their products and services to the government,” acting administrator Ehikian said Tuesday. “GSA is leading the way in transforming government and strongly encourages other agencies to follow our lead.”

Trump and fellow Republicans have pushed hard against DEI policies in recent weeks, making the case that the government should instead focus on meritocracy. DOGE claims it has already addressed hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in DEI-related contract cuts, including $350 million at the Department of Education last week. 

Last month, DOGE announced that taxpayers would see just over a $1 billion savings through the elimination of 104 DEI contracts. 

An immigration judge appointed by former President Joe Biden is lashing out after being fired by President Donald Trump.

“It was political,” Judge Kerry Doyle said, according to a report from WGBH.

Doyle, who worked in Massachusetts, was one of more than 20 immigration judges fired in recent days without explanation, with Doyle saying she received an email from the Executive Office of Immigration Review (EOIR) last week that read the agency had “determined that retaining” her was “not in the best interest of the agency.”

Administrative judges like Doyle do not have the same protection from firing as federal judges, who are nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate to fill lifetime terms.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION FIRES MORE THAN A DOZEN IMMIGRATION JUDGES

Judge Kerry Doyle and President Donald Trump (ICE/Getty Images)

Nevertheless, Doyle told WGBH in an interview that Trump’s decision will undermine faith in the nation’s immigration system.

“If you start making it political, it really does blow the system up and blow up people’s faith in the system,” said Doyle, who previously helped lead a court challenge against Trump’s 2017 travel ban for people from multiple Muslim-majority countries. “None of us were there to drive a political agenda. We were there to do our jobs.”

Doyle noted that many judges in the Boston area have served on the immigration court across multiple administrations, arguing that those appointed to fill the roles don’t act in a partisan manner.

“It would be problematic for it to be political because what civil servants do is they serve the public – we swear an oath to the Constitution,” she said.

But the firings have raised concerns that the already large backlog of immigration cases will now take even longer to clear, with International Federation of Professional & Technical Engineers President Matthew Biggs pointing out that a single judge can rule on 500 to 700 cases per year.

US IMMIGRATION BACKLOG REACHES NEW RECORD OF 3 MILLION PENDING CASES: REPORT

The U.S.-Mexico border wall in Sasabe, Arizona, on Dec. 8, 2023. (Valerie Macon/AFP via Getty Images)

“Look up the definition of ‘hypocrisy.’ It’s ‘when someone says one thing but does another.’ The firing of immigration judges when we need more judges to enforce our immigration laws by this administration is a perfect example of hypocrisy,” Briggs, whose organization represents the nation’s roughly 700 immigration judges, told WGBH.

Massachusetts alone has a backlog of about 160,000 cases, the report notes. Doyle was readying to take over the cases of a colleague who had just left the court, meaning some of those cases could now be on an extended timeline.

“Those cases will have to be handed out to all the other judges. So it’s going to be even more work for them,” she said. “They need every judge, every person available. And so it will just make the court more congested. Folks are working very hard already.”

The report notes that the recent firings are not the first time a new administration has fired judges, pointing to a 2021 example in which Judge Marna Rusher, who was hired by Trump, was fired shortly after Biden took office.

President Joe Biden during an Oval Office meeting on June 17, 2024. (Chris Kleponis/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

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But Doyle had less of an issue with that decision, reasoning Biden’s decision was less likely to be “politically motivated.”

“Maybe it’s just that each president wants to have his imprimatur and people who will follow his agenda. I don’t know,” Doyle said. “I don’t think that I would call that politically motivated in as much as they think they have a better idea for America and fairly treating people that come across the border.”

FIRST ON FOX: GOP Sen. Joni Ernst sent a letter to newly confirmed Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins calling for cooperation on key measures to address the bird flu epidemic ravaging farms across the country. 

“We know many pressing concerns await you as you begin your new role. We write to ask that you enhance the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) response to the ongoing outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in our nation’s animal agriculture sector, which we greatly appreciate you announcing as a top priority in your testimony before the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry,” the letter from Ernst, a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, states. 

“The United States is now entering the fourth year of an outbreak of HPAI that has devastated farms, required the depopulation of more than 136 million birds on commercial poultry operations, and infected a small but growing number of farm workers. A new urgency is required from the USDA to address the evolving situation.”

The letter promotes ways to address the crisis that have been outlined by egg and turkey farmers, including an aggressive vaccination strategy for hens and turkeys, stockpiling vaccines, and outreach to trading partners to ensure that trade is not negatively impacted. 

MINNESOTA DECLARES STATE OF EMERGENCY AS DISEASES CRIPPLE MIDWESTERN FARMS

Sen. Joni Ernst is calling on Trump’s USDA to take action on the bird flu crisis. (Getty)

The senators also called on the USDA to shift attention to a Biden order in 2024 that requires biosecurity audits on previously infected farms, or farms placed within a buffer zone of a control area, to be eligible for indemnities.

“In principle, this change would appear to enhance biosecurity measures and accountability for indemnity, but the rule was rushed,” the letter states. “As a result, nearly no auditors have been trained to complete these audits, and the audit itself was posted in draft form. USDA should provide adequate numbers of qualified auditors prior to enforcement of the rule.”

The letter explains that “current indemnity rates for laying hens and pullets are based on inaccurate data and are artificially low” and offers solutions on how to address that, including an egg industry proposal to revise the calculations relying on data from USDA and land grant institutions that would make the indemnities “fairer.”

BIRD FLU FOUND IN ARIZONA DAIRY CATTLE MILK AFTER BEING FIRST DETECTED IN NEIGHBORING NEVADA

“Even with revisions to indemnity formulas proposed by egg farmers, these payments will not come close to making producers whole for their losses. In reviewing indemnity activities, we would also urge you to ensure proper outreach to all farmers,” the letter says.

The bipartisan letter was signed by Democratic Sens. John Fetterman, Amy Klobuchar, Tina Smith, Raphael Warnock, Mark Warner and Jon Ossoff, and Republicans Sens. Bernie Moreno, Jerry Moran, Roger Marshall, Todd Young, Dave McCormick, Ted Budd, Thom Tillis and Chuck Grassley. 

“I’m working to protect and preserve the livelihoods of our farmers, the stability of our local economies, and our food supply chain impacted by the spread of HPAI,” Ernst told Fox News Digital in a statement. “By partnering with the Trump administration to identify solutions, we can ensure our producers have the tools they need to stop avian flu.” 

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American farmers and those in the agricultural business continue to reel over the spread of H5N1 bird flu. (Lokman Vural Elibol/Anadolu via Getty Images)

American farmers and those in the agricultural business continue to reel over the spread of H5N1 bird flu, which apparently shows no sign of slowing to “disaster” status, FOX Business previously reported. 

“The real crisis is that we’re going through the worst bird flu outbreak that we’ve had in the last 10 years since 2015, potentially the worst bird flu outbreak that we’ve ever had in the history of this country,” Eggs Unlimited Vice President Brian Moscogiuri said on “Fox & Friends” last week. 

“We’ve lost 120 million birds since the beginning of 2022. In the last few months alone, since the middle of October, we’ve lost 45 million egg-laying hens,” he added. “We’ve lost a significant amount of production, more than 13%. So we’re just dealing with supply shortages. And it’s just a disaster right now because this virus is in three of the top egg-laying states in the country. It doesn’t seem like it’s stopping anytime soon.”

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During her confirmation hearing, Rollins said she is “hyper focused” on finding the team to combat bird flu and other diseases.

“Secretary Rollins received the letter from Sen. Ernst and her colleagues yesterday,” a USDA spokesperson told Fox News Digital. 

“She will respond in short order and is looking forward to working with Sen. Ernst and her colleagues to tackle this critical issue. The Biden administration failed to sufficiently address the avian flu, and his inflationary economic policies only made the problem worse. The American people deserve affordable eggs, and Secretary Rollins is fully committed to taking aggressive action to combat the avian flu and help lower the price of eggs. She is working with the White House to implement a comprehensive strategy that will be rolled out very soon.”

Fox News Digital’s Kristen Altus contributed to this report

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday requesting the Domestic Policy Council to examine ways to make in vitro fertilization, known as IVF, more affordable and accessible for Americans – despite the fact Democrats cautioned that Trump would seek to ban the procedure. 

“Americans need reliable access to IVF and more affordable treatment options, as the cost per cycle can range from $12,000 to $25,000,” the executive order said. “Providing support, awareness, and access to affordable fertility treatments can help these families navigate their path to parenthood with hope and confidence.”

Specifically, the order requires the assistant to the president for domestic policy to provide a list of policy recommendations aimed at “protecting IVF access and aggressively reducing out-of-pocket and health plan costs for IVF treatment” within 90 days, according to the order. 

‘PROMISES KEPT’: TRUMP SIGNS EXECUTIVE ORDER TO ‘AGGRESSIVELY’ MAKE IVF MORE AFFORDABLE AND ACCESSIBLE 

President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Feb. 18, 2025, to make in vitro fertilization more affordable and accessible. (Getty Images)

The directive comes months after former Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate in the 2024 election against Trump, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, accused the Trump administration of being “anti-IVF.” 

Specifically, Walz singled out Trump’s running mate, then-Sen. JD Vance, a practicing Catholic who voted in June against the Right to IVF Act. The Catholic Church opposes IVF, saying unused embryos pose a moral dilemma. 

But Vance said in August 2024 he doesn’t believe all his religious views should translate to public policy since the U.S. is a “democratic society,” he told the New York Post. 

“Catholic social teaching is obviously very robust,” he told the Post. “I think that no person who, or at least no one I know who’s Catholic, doesn’t accept that just because the Catholic Church teaches something, doesn’t mean you necessarily as a legislator need to affect that to public policy.” 

The Right to IVF measure would establish a nationwide right to IVF and other assisted reproductive technology, but it failed to pass in the Senate. 

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“JD Vance opposing the miracle of IVF is a direct attack on my family and so many others,” Walz said in a social media post on X in July 2024. 

Walz previously claimed that he and his wife, Gwen, struggled to conceive and shared details during the 2024 campaign about the couple’s experience using IVF to become pregnant with their two children. 

But Gwen Walz later clarified in August 2024 in an interview with Glamour magazine that the couple actually used intrauterine insemination, known as IUI, to conceive. The process involves using a catheter to place the sperm directly into the uterus to increase odds of conception. 

DOGE SCORES BIG COURT WIN, ALLOWED ACCESS DATA ON 3 FEDERAL AGENCIES

JD Vance and Tim Walz sparred over statements regarding in vitro fertilization during the 2024 campaign. (Matt Rourke/The Associated Press)

In contrast, IVF requires the removal of a woman’s eggs and injecting them with sperm to create embryos, which then are placed back into the woman’s uterus. 

More than 85,000 babies born in 2021 were from IVF, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. 

Costly IVF treatments are rarely fully covered by health insurance, and only 25% of employers report providing coverage to their employees, according to the White House.

Trump unveiled plans in August 2024 that he’d seek to require insurance companies to cover the cost of IVF, stating he was pushing the policy “because we want more babies, to put it nicely.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

The Senate voted Tuesday to confirm the nomination of President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Small Business Administration (SBA). 

Kelly Loeffler, a prominent business executive and philanthropist who served as a senator from Georgia for two years, will now lead the agency. She unveiled plans during her confirmation hearing to reduce regulatory burdens on small business owners, and enhance access to SBA-backed loans and grants. 

The agency aims to provide small business owners with counseling, capital and contracting expertise to advance their businesses. 

Loeffler appeared before the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee Jan. 28 to outline her vision and promised that Trump’s policies would “restore the small business economy” that would lead to a “golden era of prosperity and growth.” 

TRUMP’S SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION NOMINEE ADVANCES TO THE SENATE FLOOR 

The Senate voted Feb. 18, 2025, to confirm the nomination of President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Small Business Administration, Kelly Loeffler, a Republican from Georgia.  (Alyssa Pointer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

“That’s exactly what the America First agenda does — by ending inflation, cutting taxes, unleashing American energy dominance, slashing regulation, and reining in fraud, waste, and abuse across government,” Loeffler said in her opening remarks. 

Loeffler and her husband, Jeff, created a Fortune 500 financial services and technology company together, and she has told lawmakers she intends to donate her annual $207,500 salary as SBA administrator to charity.

Loeffler, whose net worth is estimated at roughly $1 billion, previously donated her annual Senate salary of $174,000 between 2019 and 2021 to more than 40 Georgia charities and nonprofits. 

Those organizations included food banks, faith groups and organizations opposed to abortion, foster care/adoption groups as well as organizations promoting health care, agriculture, education, law enforcement and disaster relief.

The Senate voted Thursday by a 51–43 margin to advance Loeffler’s nomination for the final confirmation vote.

Chair of the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, backed Loeffler’s nomination, citing Loeffler’s “zero-tolerance policy for waste, fraud and abuse” within the agency. 

Additionally, Ernst voiced support for Loeffler’s plans to conduct a full-scale audit of the SBA to weed out any wasteful spending. 

TRUMP CABINET NOMINEE LOEFFLER PLEDGED TO DONATE SALARY IF CONFIRMED 

Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, voiced support for Kelly Loeffler’s nomination on Feb. 13, 2025, saying Loeffler understood the requirements of entrepreneurship.  (Reuters)

“Senator Loeffler is immensely qualified for this role,” Ernst said on the Senate floor Thursday. “As a successful businesswoman, it is abundantly clear that Senator Loeffler truly understands what it takes to be an entrepreneur and will be an effective voice for small businesses across America.”

However, ranking member of the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass, pushed back on Loeffler’s nomination amid concern that her confirmation would pave the way for the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to “illegally cut off funding” for small business owners. As a result, he said that Trump is looking to fill his cabinet with those that will follow his “illegal bidding.” 

Markey and Loeffler also sparred during her confirmation hearing in January after the Trump administration announced Jan. 27 that it would freeze federal funds and grants that aimed to eradicate “wokeness” and the “weaponization of government.” 

TRUMP SIGNS ORDER INSTRUCTING DOGE TO MASSIVELY CUT FEDERAL WORKFORCE

Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass, sparred with Kelly Loeffler during her confirmation hearing about government spending.  (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

While the White House rescinded the memo on Jan. 29, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the federal funding freeze remained in effect. 

As a result, Markey pressed Loeffler on whether she believed the move was lawful or not, following backlash from members of Congress that the Trump administration attempted to illegally circumvent Congress and withhold funds. 

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“I fully agree with President Trump’s decision to stop wasteful spending,” Loeffler told Markey. “It resulted in a landslide victory that many Americans were waiting for relief against excessive government spending.” 

The Trump administration has frozen applications for three Biden-era migrant parole programs, including for Ukrainians and migrants from Latin America, as it continues to crack down on what conservatives say was an abuse of parole by the prior administration.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has implemented an agency wide administrative pause on all pending benefit requests for migrants filing under the three programs.

“This is an administrative hold on all pending USCIS Benefit Requests filed by Parolees Under the Uniting for Ukraine (U4U) Process, Processes for Haitians, Cubans, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans (CHNV) Process, or Family Reunification Parole (FRP) Process,” a DHS spokesperson told Fox News Digital. 

“This is pending the completion of additional vetting to identify any fraud, public safety, or national security concerns,” they said.

DHS SAYS IT ‘CAN, SHOULD AND WILL’ ADMINISTER POLYGRAPH EXAMS AMID ICE RAID LOCATION LEAKS

Migrants outside two shelters in Brooklyn on July 24, 2024 in New York City. President Donald Trump’s administration has frozen applications for three Biden-era migrant parole programs. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

President Donald Trump had already ordered an end to multiple parole programs on his first day in office, which was quickly enacted. The DHS has also allowed for those in the U.S. on parole processes to have their parole status canceled. 

However, CBS News first reported that a Feb. 14 memo also pauses pending requests already allowed into the U.S. under three programs. The first program is Uniting for Ukraine, which used humanitarian parole to allow in Ukrainians in the wake of the Russian invasion.

The CHNV program was highly controversial and allowed for migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela to receive travel authorization and fly into the United States under parole. Over 500,000 migrants flew in under that program. It was briefly paused last year after DHS discovered fraud in sponsor applications, a development first reported by Fox News Digital.

The third program impacts the family reunification parole process, which was opened up to nationals from countries including Guatemala, Ecuador, Colombia, Cuba and Haiti, and allowed nationals who have relatives who are U.S. citizens or green card holders to enter the U.S. for parole as they also apply for a green card.

“The Family Reunification Parole process promotes family unity consistent with our laws and our values,” then-DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in 2023. 

‘RAMPANT’ ABUSE IN BLUE STATE MIGRANT SHELTER SYSTEM, SAYS FORMER DIRECTOR: ‘COLOSSAL MESS’

At the time, the Biden administration said the expanded “lawful pathways” were part of an effort to reduce illegal crossings, but Republicans accused the administration of abusing limited parole power and allowing in migrants who should not legally have entered.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE IMMIGRATION COVERAGE

A DHS memo from last month said that parole “has been repeatedly abused by the Executive Branch over the past several decades in ways that are blatantly inconsistent with the statute.”

“Most important, the parole statute does not authorize categorical parole programs that make aliens presumptively eligible on the basis of some set of broadly applicable criteria,” it says.

ACTIVISTS IN MEXICO REPORT FLOW OF MIGRANTS HAS ‘ENORMOUSLY DECREASED’ ONE MONTH INTO TRUMP ADMIN

This split shows President Donald Trump and migrants at the southern border. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci | Christian Torres/Anadolu via Getty Images)

The new pause is the latest in a slew of measures to overhaul the immigration system and shake off programs championed by the Biden administration. The Trump administration has suspended refugee resettlement and has also ended the use of the CBP One app to allow migrants to be paroled into the U.S. at ports of entry.

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That is connected to a mass deportation operation launched by the administration on day one, as well as a rapid-fire series of moves to increase border security. The administration has also ordered a review of parole programs, and has also taken limits off the use of expedited removals in order to quickly remove recently-arrived illegal immigrants. 

House Democrats have a new coordinated pressure campaign aimed at restricting Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), based on leveraging the GOP’s razor-thin majority.

Recent days have seen Democratic lawmakers take to both traditional and social media to publicly urge “just three House Republicans” to cross the aisle and vote for a bill designed to stop Musk from accessing U.S. citizens’ records in the Department of Treasury. 

“I’m supporting the Taxpayer Data Protection Act because it will protect Americans’ private data from Elon Musk and his reckless DOGE employees,” Rep. Susie Lee, D-Nev., wrote on X. “Republican leadership has to let us vote. If they don’t, it only takes three lone Republicans to join us and make it happen.”

Generally, legislation needs to have the blessing of majority party leaders to get a House-wide vote. 

BLACK CAUCUS CHAIR ACCUSES TRUMP OF ‘PURGE’ OF ‘MINORITY’ FEDERAL WORKERS

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries is one of several Democrats saying it only takes three House Republicans to oppose Elon Musk. (Getty Images)

But Lee’s comments appear to signal that House Democrats are prepared to use a discharge petition to end-run GOP leaders’ likely opposition. It’s a mechanism to force legislation up for a House-wide vote, provided the petition gets signatures from a majority of House lawmakers.

Meanwhile, in an MSNBC interview earlier this week, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., suggested Democrats’ highlighting of Republicans’ thin majority could be a running theme in the 119th Congress.

“What we’ve been saying to our Republican colleagues is that on any issue that the American people are concerned about, it only takes three Republicans to break with the other side of the aisle, join the 215 Democrats, and we can stop them in their tracks. It only takes three,” Jeffries said.

“Meanwhile, they’re in the witness protection program as it relates to the things that are taking place – don’t want to take a stand, don’t want to offend Elon Musk, don’t want to offend Donald Trump, but they’re really offending the people that they were elected to represent.”

SCOOP: KEY CONSERVATIVE CAUCUS DRAWS RED LINE ON HOUSE BUDGET PLAN

Democrats are opposed to Musk and President Trump’s DOGE efforts. (Roberto Schmidt/AFP via Getty Images)

He stopped short of endorsing any specific legislation, however. Fox News Digital reached out to Jeffries’ office to ask if he would be supportive of a discharge petition.

Other Democrats were more targeted in their approach, like progressive Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., who wrote on X, “It’s not rocket science: an unelected billionaire should NOT have access to your personal financial info!”

“If just three House Republicans join us, we can pass a bill that stops Musk from accessing your private info. But the [House GOP] is siding with their favorite billionaire donor over everyday Americans,” Pocan wrote on Tuesday.

Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, D-Fla., said on the site, “This isn’t complicated: allowing access to these sensitive IRS records by an unelected businessman is dangerous. We can protect your privacy if just three House Republicans join us to pass legislation that stops accessing your private information.”

It will likely be an ongoing theme for the next two years as Republicans navigate a majority of less than a handful of House seats.

Top progressive Rep. Mark Pocan is among those pressuring the GOP. (Reuters/Christopher Aluka Berry)

The number three also coincides with how many House Republicans won districts that former Vice President Kamala Harris prevailed over Trump in last year. 

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Those Republicans – Reps. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., and Don Bacon, R-Neb. – are likely to be main targets for Democrats.

The vast majority of House Republicans have been supportive of Musk’s DOGE efforts, however, even as Democrats sound alarm bells about the billionaire’s lack of government experience and accuse him of possible conflicts of interest.

Republicans have argued that the $36 trillion national debt amounted to a fiscal crisis that called for extraordinary measures.

President Donald Trump‘s return to the White House appears to have sparked a change in tune on K Street, the heart of lobbyist influence in Washington, D.C., as several prominent lobbyist voices are now pledging to work with the new president after previously criticizing him.  

“Manufacturers are ready to work with @realDonaldTrump to roll back the federal regulatory onslaught, unleash American energy and build on the success of the pro-growth Trump Tax Cuts,” Jay Timmons, president and CEO of the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), posted on X after Trump’s victory, adding in a press release that he congratulates Trump on “on his historic victory and strong performance across manufacturing intensive states.”

The praise of Trump comes after years of vigorously criticizing him, including after the January 6 riot, when he said that Trump “incited violence in an attempt to retain power, and any elected leader defending him is violating their oath to the Constitution and rejecting democracy in favor of anarchy.”

Additionally, Timmons called on then-Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove Trump from office.

NEW POLL REVEALS WHICH TRUMP POLICIES AMERICANS LOVE AND HATE

Past President Donald Trump skeptics on K Street have voiced support for him since the November election. (Getty)

“What we saw on January 6th was absolutely one of the most horrifying things that any of us who love America could have ever witnessed,” Timmons said.

Timmons also said that Trump’s handling of the coronavirus appeared to have been “weaponized, and it became a political tool.”

Timmons also had a long history of praising the Biden administration for its accomplishments, saying that he “built a substantial legacy” in four years and celebrating Biden’s work on the coronavirus when he was elected by saying “it is fantastic to have a partner in the White House”, adding that “we felt like we were fighting this fight, frankly, all alone for the last year.”

In a statement to Fox News Digital, a NAM spokesperson said, “President Trump wants to grow manufacturing in the United States. The NAM is working with him to do that.” 

Shortly after Biden announced he was dropping out of the presidential race, NAM put out a press release saying that Biden “Has Rallied the World to the Cause of Democracy.”

SETH ROGEN EXPLAINS TRUMP VICTORY BY SAYING PEOPLE GOT ‘SICK OF F—ING HIPPIES DOING ACID’ IN THE STREETS

President Donald Trump speaks as Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is sworn in at the Oval Office of the White House on Wednesday, Feb. 12. (AP/Alex Brandon)

Stephen Ubl, president and chief executive officer of PhRMA, also spoke out about January 6, calling it “appalling,” and took issue with some aspects of Trump’s agenda items, including his executive order push to “Buy American,” which Ubl said would create “even more barriers to innovation and efforts to develop a vaccine for COVID-19.”

Ubl’s company, along with other organizations, filed a lawsuit in 2020 “against the Trump administration’s new rules for lowering drug prices.”

Ubl, who has donated at least $15,000 to Democrats, has struck a more positive tone since Trump’s victory, posting on X that he is “committed to working with the Trump administration and the new Congress to make our health care system work better for patients while preserving our unique ecosystem that enables greater innovation and lower costs for patients.” 

Ubl met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in early December, and PhRMA donated funds to Trump’s inauguration. 

“With President Trump now officially sworn into office, I look forward to working with his administration to address key challenges facing our industry and fighting for solutions to help patients access and afford the treatments they need,” Ubl posted on X in January. 

Neil Bradley, the vice president of the Chamber of Commerce, said after January 6 that Trump’s words and actions “have no place in a free and Democratic society” and the New York Times reported that he said the chamber is “evaluating how lawmakers voted last week during the electoral vote certification process and how they vote in the coming days when the House moves to impeach Mr. Trump when making decisions about donations.”

President Donald Trump holds up an executive order after signing it at an indoor Presidential Inauguration parade event in Washington, D.C., on Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Bradley was also critical of President Trump’s decision to end DACA, saying in 2017 that it “runs contrary to the president’s goal of growing the U.S. economy.”

Bradley, a Democratic donor who donated to former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney after she voted to impeach Trump, said after Trump’s election that “his actions are a long overdue change in direction that will help unleash the American economy, resulting in more innovation and faster growing paychecks for American workers.”

Then-Vice President Kamala Harris, left, fields questions during a town hall style campaign event with former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) on Oct. 21, 2024 in Brookfield, Wisconsin. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Shortly after Trump’s victory, the Business Roundtable (BRT) put out a press release saying that it “congratulates President-elect Donald Trump on his election as the 47th President of the United States.”

“We look forward to working with the incoming Trump Administration and all federal and state policymakers.”

Before Trump’s re-election, several members of the BRT were highly critical of Trump, including CEO Joshua Bolten, who called Trump unfit for office in 2016, before he joined BRT in 2017, and donated to prominent Trump critic Liz Cheney in 2021 and 2022. 

Bolten also donated to Trump critic and former GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger in 2021 after he voted to impeach Trump. 

Kristen Silverberg, president and COO of BRT, signed a letter opposing Trump’s election in 2016, before she joined BRT in 2019, and donated several thousand dollars to Cheney’s re-election efforts after she voted to impeach Trump, FEC records show. 

Records also show that Silverberg donated multiple times to Nikki Haley’s presidential campaign against Trump in the Republican primary in 2023, as well as Chris Christie’s campaign in the same primary. 

Then-former President Donald Trump speaks to a crowd during a campaign rally on Sept. 25, 2023 in Summerville, South Carolina. (Sean Rayford/Getty Images)

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BRT hosted President Trump twice during CEO Quarterly Meetings with Bolten and Silverberg at the helm, and the group also met with then-vice presidential candidate JD Vance during their Q3 2024 meeting with CEOs in September. 

The organization pointed to Bolten and Silverberg making no public anti-Trump statements since 2016 and said they have worked “closely” with both Trump administrations on important policy initiatives. The organization also said that donations to Cheney, a former colleague, were for her reelection and not her anti-Trump efforts.

“Business Roundtable worked with President Trump to advance tax reform and USMCA during his first term, and we look forward to working together in his second to continue advancing economic policies that expand opportunity for all Americans,” BRT spokesperson Michael Steel told Fox News Digital. “Those policies include extending and strengthening the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, securing major regulatory and permitting reforms, and ensuring a skilled U.S. workforce.”

FIRST ON FOX: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) still employs more people than it did in 2019, despite “Democrat hysteria” over recent cuts within the department’s agencies, Fox News Digital exclusively learned. 

A senior Trump administration official told Fox News Digital that there have been 6,000 departures from HHS since Jan. 20, Inauguration Day. The agency, however, still employs nearly 6,000 more people than it did in 2019, including more than 2,000 employees at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) relative to 2019 numbers, and 1,200 employees at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). 

Hiring at HHS ballooned between fiscal year 2019 and 2024, the senior Trump administration official said, with 17% more full-time employees by 2024. Fifty percent of overall jobs in the U.S. that were created in 2024 were indirect or direct government jobs, the official added. 

“Democrat hysteria about essential offices in HHS being culled — again, every operating division has either more or roughly stagnant headcount relative to” fiscal year 2019, a senior Trump administration official told Fox News Digital. 

ACADEMIC UNIONS PLAN DEMONSTRATIONS OUTSIDE HHS BUILDING, AT MED SCHOOLS, TO PROTEST TRUMP RESEARCH CUTS

President Donald Trump, right, signed an executive order creating the Make America Healthy Again Commission after Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation. (Getty Images)

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was confirmed and sworn-in as the nation’s 26th secretary of Health and Human Services on Thursday, when President Donald Trump also signed an executive order creating the Make America Healthy Again Commission, which is “investigating and addressing the root causes of America’s escalating health crisis.” The commission initially will focus its investigations into childhood chronic diseases, such as autism. 

News reports spread shortly after Kennedy’s confirmation that widespread layoffs were headed to HHS employees, including within the CDC and FDA. The Trump administration is in the midst of working to streamline the federal government by cutting overspending and stamping out potential fraud or mismanagement, which has included mass layoffs at various agencies. 

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The head of the FDA’s food division, Jim Jones, submitted his resignation letter Monday, according to various news reports, arguing the administration’s “indiscriminate firing” of staff in his division will be a “roadblock to achieving the Secretary’s stated objectives of making America healthy again.”

Hiring at Health and Human Services ballooned between fiscal year 2019 and 2024, a senior Trump administration official said, with 17% more full-time employees by 2024. (Jacqueline Larma/The Associated Press)

“I was looking forward to working to pursue the Department’s agenda of improving the health of Americans by reducing diet-related chronic disease and risks from chemicals in food,” Jones said. “It has been increasingly clear that with the Trump Administration’s disdain for the very people necessary to implement your agenda, however, it would have been fruitless for me to continue in this role.”

Federal employees also staged a protest outside HHS in Washington, D.C., on Friday, while a cohort of academic unions around the country are rallying the science community to join another protest outside HHS on Wednesday, billed as a “National Day of Action.”

TRUMP’S ‘MAKE AMERICA HEALTHY AGAIN’ COMMISSION TO TARGET AUTISM, CHRONIC DISEASES

The Trump administration explained to Fox News Digital that those who were terminated over the weekend included probationary employees — who are individuals recently hired by the agency and still under consideration for long-term employment. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was confirmed and sworn-in as the nation’s 26th secretary of Health and Human Services Feb. 13. (Jon Cherry/Getty Images)

“Not people carrying longtime essential ‘institutional’ knowledge,” the admin official said of those terminated. 

The recent HHS culling over the weekend did not include key personnel focused on emergency preparedness and response within the Administration for Strategy Preparedness and Response (ASPR), the CDC and other divisions of HHS, nor did it cull research scientists at the CDC or National Institutes of Health, or frontline healthcare providers at the Indian Health Service, employees working on Medicare and Medicaid at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or those reviewing and approving drugs or conducting inspections at FDA. 

Additionally, employees working on refugee resettlement within the Administration of Children and Families were exempt from the weekend layoffs. 

TRUMP SIGNS EXECUTIVE ORDER TO BLOCK FEDERAL MONEY FOR SCHOOLS, UNIVERSITIES WITH COVID VACCINE MANDATES 

“Cuts we made at HHS over the weekend did not compromise health and safety of Americans,” the admin official added.

Kennedy vowed during his Senate confirmation hearings that he would scrutinize the department’s previous modus operandi, remove potential financial conflicts and ensure tax dollars were spent on both bolstering healthy foods for Americans, and providing “unbiased” scientific reports. 

“We will make sure our tax dollars support healthy foods. We will scrutinize the chemical additives in our food supply. We will remove the financial conflicts of interest in our agencies,” he told the Senate Finance Committee in describing his goals. “We will create an honest, unbiased, science-driven HHS, accountable to the president, to Congress, and to the American people.”

Both Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of Health and Human Services, and President Donald Trump, left, pledged on the campaign trail to “Make America Healthy Again,” including directing their focus on autism among youths in recent years. (Jason C. Andrew/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Both Kennedy and Trump pledged on the campaign trail to “Make America Healthy Again,” including directing their focus on autism among youths in recent years. The recently minted MAHA commission will investigate chronic conditions for both adults and children, including those related to autism, which the White House said affects one in 36 children.

The commission is expected to publish “an assessment that summarizes what is known and what questions remain regarding the childhood chronic disease crisis, and include international comparisons,” within 100 days of the commission’s founding. Within 180 days, it is expected to “produce a strategy, based on the findings of the assessment, to improve the health of America’s children,” Fox Digital reported. 

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Since Kennedy’s confirmation, state-level lawmakers have introduced a wave of bills aimed at advancing priorities championed by Kennedy and the MAHA movement, including prohibiting junk food like candy and soda from school lunches and other bills aimed at amending state vaccine rules. 

Fox News Digital’s Alec Schemmel contributed to this report. 

An Arizona state bill would allow local and state authorities to shoot down drones used by drug cartels.

House Bill 2733, sponsored by Republican state Rep. David Marshall, would provide qualified immunity to authorities for injuries that may be caused by taking out an “unmanned” drone within 30 miles of the southern border. Cartels regularly use drones as a tool to monitor law enforcement activity around the border in hopes of evading them in their own smuggling operations, even using the technology to send their drugs into the country.  

Although the situation at the border is calming down, there are still plenty of issues to tackle when it comes to crime, according to one sheriff. 

BOSTON POLICE COMMISSIONER DOUBLES DOWN ON ICE RESISTANCE: ‘WE DON’T ENFORCE’ DETAINERS

A drone reportedly flew into a crowd of Boston Celtics fans Tuesday night at an outdoor party. (Jens Büttner/picture alliance via Getty Images)

“As the border gets more secure under President Trump’s new administration, we didn’t think for a second that drug cartels were just gonna go away,” Yavapai County Sheriff David Rhodes, who is the president of the Arizona Sheriffs’ Association, told Fox News Digital in an interview.

“They’re getting more creative now – drone technology for smuggling drones over the border and dropping them, you know, external loads out in the desert to be picked up. They’ve been doing that for a while, but it’s increasing in frequency. And so local law enforcement can literally see these things fly through the air, but you don’t know where they’re going,” he continued.

HOMAN TAKES VICTORY LAP AFTER ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT CROSSINGS PLUMMET DURING TRUMP ADMIN: ‘HE IS DELIVERING’

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes speaks during a rally for then-Vice President Kamala Harris in Douglas, Arizona, on Sept. 27, 2024. (Rebecca NOBLE / AFP)

The use of small aircraft is becoming a key concern for not only local and state authorities, but also federal border agents, as an expert recently told Fox News Digital that the cartels are trying to find ways to keep the cash flowing in despite the recent border crackdown.

The state-level legislation is co-sponsored by a mix of Republicans and Democrats, which is a rare moment of bipartisanship, as some of the state’s leaders are bitterly divided on the new administration’s border and immigration policies. Still, drug interdiction has been a point of common ground in the Grand Canyon State.

ILLEGAL-SMUGGLING COYOTES NOW ADVERTISING AT CANADA BORDER AMID TRUMP MIGRANT CRACKDOWN: REPORT

A sign warning of smuggling and illegal immigration stands in the Organ Pipe National Monument near the U.S.-Mexico border on Dec. 8, 2023 in Lukeville, Arizona. (John Moore/Getty Images)

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“This bill gives them the tools they need to do exactly that. Let’s empower Arizona law enforcement to disable these cartel drones. Let’s give our sheriffs the authority to fight back by passing this bill. And let’s work together to take back our border from the Mexican drug cartels,” Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes said at a news conference on Monday, as she’s been asking for a policy to be enacted on the issue as of last spring.

If the bill passes the Republican-majority legislature, it will then head to Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs’ desk. The governor’s office did not respond in time to comment on whether she plans to sign the legislation.