Hunter Biden breaks silence on pardon from dad Joe: ‘I realize how privileged I am’
Former first son Hunter Biden is claiming that his father only pardoned him because Donald Trump reclaimed the presidency in November 2024 — and “would not have” done so under “normal circumstances” while the appeals process played out. HUNTER BIDEN WAS INVOLVED IN PARDON TALKS TOWARD END OF FATHER’S TERM, SOURCE SAYS “Donald Trump went and changed everything,” Hunter said in an interview released Monday on journalist Tommy Christopher’s Substack platform. “And I don’t think that I need to make much of an argument about why it changed everything.” The 55-year-old — who pleaded guilty last year to evading $1.4 million in back taxes to the IRS and was convicted on felony gun charges — declined to mention that he had apparently been present for discussions on pardons during Joe Biden’s final months in the White House. HUNTER BIDEN SAYS HE’S STARTED NEW JOB WITH CALIFORNIA NONPROFIT “I’ve said this before,” Hunter went on. “My dad would not have pardoned me if President Trump had not won, and the reason that he would not have pardoned me is because I was certain that in a normal circumstance of the appeals [I would have won].” The Biden scion added that Trump was planning a “revenge tour” against his father, which would have made himself the “easiest target to just to intimidate and to not just impact me, but impact my entire family into, into silence in a way that at least he is not — it’s not as easy for him to do [with] me being pardoned.” FIRST LADY MELANIA TRUMP PUTS HUNTER BIDEN ON $1B NOTICE OVER ‘FALSE, DEFAMATORY’ EPSTEIN COMMENTS “I realize how privileged I am,” Hunter went on. “I realize how lucky I am; I realize that I got something that almost no one would have gotten. “But I’m incredibly grateful for it and I have to say that I don’t think that it requires me to make much of a detailed argument for why it was the right thing to do, at least from my dad, from his perspective.” Ex-White House chief of staff Jeff Zients spilled last month that Hunter “was involved” in clemency talks and even “attended a few meetings,” a source with knowledge of the Biden official’s testimony to the House Oversight Committee told The Post.
Speaker Johnson hit with Democrat-led lawsuit over delayed swearing-in amid House shutdown chaos
The state of Arizona is suing Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., over the delayed swearing-in of Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz. “Speaker Mike Johnson is actively stripping the people of Arizona of one of their seats in Congress and disenfranchising the voters of Arizona’s seventh Congressional district in the process,” Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, a Democrat, said in a statement. “By blocking Adelita Grijalva from taking her rightful oath of office, he is subjecting Arizona’s seventh Congressional district to taxation without representation. I will not allow Arizonans to be silenced or treated as second-class citizens in their own democracy.” Johnson dismissed the lawsuit as a bid to get “national publicity” in comments to reporters earlier this week and on Tuesday evening. BATTLEGROUND REPUBLICANS HOLD THE LINE AS JOHNSON PRESSURES DEMS ON SHUTDOWN “I think it’s patently absurd. We run the House. She has no jurisdiction. We’re following the precedent,” Johnson said in response to the state attorney general. “She’s looking for national publicity, apparently she’s gotten some of it, but good luck with that.” Grijalva won a special election on Sept. 23 to replace her father, late Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., after he passed away from cancer at age 77. Johnson has repeatedly said that Grijalva will be sworn into office when the House returns to its regular sessions. But it’s not clear when exactly that will be — the House GOP leader has threatened to keep his lawmakers out of Washington, D.C., until the ongoing government shutdown is over. It’s a bid to pressure Senate Democrats, led by Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., to agree to the GOP’s plan to fund the federal government through Nov. 21. But Schumer and his allies have resisted thus far, sinking the Republican-led bill 11 times and keeping the shutdown going for 21 days. House Democrats have accused Johnson of playing politics and depriving Arizona’s 7th Congressional District of representation in the process. “Republicans on vacation for four weeks — and one of the consequences of that is that Republicans have refused, now for four consecutive weeks, to swear in Representative-elect Adelita Grijalva, depriving hundreds of thousands of people in the state of Arizona of the representation that they deserve, particularly during this challenging moment in the country,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said during a press conference on Tuesday. Johnson, in response to Democrats’ criticism, has repeatedly pointed out that the House was not in session when Grijalva won her election. He’s also argued that he was following precedent set by former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who waited 25 days to swear in Rep. Julia Letlow, R-La., in 2021. Letlow had won a special election to replace her husband, Rep.-elect Luke Letlow, R-La., who died during the COVID-19 pandemic before he could be sworn into office in January 2021. “We are not in legislative session. The chronology is important. Rep. Grijalva won her race, I think it was the last week of September, after we had already gone out of session. So I will administer the oath to her, I hope, on the first day we come back,” Johnson said. 58 HOUSE DEMS VOTE AGAINST RESOLUTION HONORING ‘LIFE AND LEGACY’ OF CHARLIE KIRK “I’m willing and anxious to do that. In the meantime, instead of doing TikTok videos, she should be serving her constituents.” Grijalva has argued she cannot perform her legislative or constituent duties without being sworn in first, which Johnson and Republicans have disputed. But her swearing-in is also key to the ongoing battle over Jeffrey Epstein documents going on in the House. Once made a member of Congress, Grijalva is expected to be the deciding signature on a measure aimed at forcing a House-wide vote on releasing Epstein documents in the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) possession. The measure, called a discharge petition, is designed to end-run House leaders on specific legislation — provided it has a majority of lawmakers’ signatures. Johnson and House GOP leaders have called the measure superfluous and political, pointing to the chamber’s own ongoing investigation and procedures aimed at widening transparency into Epstein’s case. However, the speaker has signaled he would not block the measure if it came to the House floor when Grijalva was sworn in. Fox News Digital reached out to Johnson for a response but did not immediately hear back.
Undercover video reveals red state university employee suggesting DEI is simply being rebranded
FIRST ON FOX: A conservative watchdog group has released a video that it says raises concerns that administrators at the University of Utah are continuing to push diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), possibly at odds with a relatively new state anti-DEI law. “No, no comment,” University of Utah education coordinator Lucas Alvarez told Accuracy in Media when asked about an allegation he was pushing DEI in violation of a 2024 law aimed at curbing DEI practices inside state universities. Accuracy in Media President Adam Guillette then showed Alvarez video of him explaining the current DEI practices at the university. “We’re still, I think, figuring out as we go, like, HB261,” Alvarez said in the video. “It’s complicated, I mean, like, the programs that we’re doing, I think technically we’re still allowed to do them, but they have to be marketed in a certain way.” BOMBSHELL REPORT EXPOSES ‘DEEPLY CONCERNING’ MIDWEST UNIVERSITY INITIATIVE PUSHING FAR-LEFT K-12 LESSON PLANS When pressed by Guillette on what he meant by changing “marketing,” Alvarez once again said no comment. Alvarez was also pressed about another comment he made on video suggesting DEI was still a focus at the university, explaining that his department has been “meeting with a lot of campus partners” to do the “strategic work” of being in “compliance” but pointing out that these partners have “academic freedom.” “I think what he was referring to was the professors have academic freedom to do research and speak from their expertise in the field that they’ve studied,” LeiLoni McLaughlin, the university’s director of the Center for Community & Cultural Engagement, told Guillette when asked what Alvarez meant. UNIVERSITY DOCTOR RESIGNS AFTER UNEARTHED AUDIO EXPOSES HIM BOASTING ABOUT SKIRTING ANTI-DEI LAWS “He kind of suggested that they shifted things over to the professors though,” Guillette said, prompting McLaughlin to explain she thinks that was a “false statement.” McLaughlin was then asked by Guillette what Alvarez meant by changing the “marketing.” “I think with the legislative changes, every university has had to shift,” McLaughlin said. “Shift their actions or just shift how they market what they are doing,” Guillette responded. “Both,” McLaughlin answered. WATCH: DEI STILL IN PLACE AS COLLEGE ‘FINDING WAYS’ AROUND BAN, OFFICIAL ADMITS: ‘PROUD OF THE FIGHT’ A University of Utah spokesperson told Fox News Digital in a statement, “I reject the assertion that the university is hiding diversity work with rebranding and remarketing.” “The changes required under HB 261 transformed how we support student success, recruit faculty, celebrate events and create a sense of belonging on our campus.” The spokesperson added that Alvarez is “not a spokesperson for the University of Utah.” “His comments do not reflect the position of the institution,” the spokesperson continued. “The comments of LeiLoni McLaughlin, director of our Center for Cultural and Community Engagement…were much more aligned with university leaders.” The spokesperson also pointed to an interview that she said showed the Black Student Union was “extensively mourning the loss of their center and identity-based resources” due to the school following the new law. The school has previously outlined measures taken to conform with the law, including closing identity-based resource centers, transferring DEI employees to other jobs on campus, and prohibiting diversity statements in hiring. “This isn’t about one or two bad apples — it’s about a broken system,” Guillette told Fox News Digital about his video footage, filmed in October 2024 and May of this year. “Utah needs a Kansas-style DEI ban with a reporting mechanism and actual legal consequences. And more importantly, America’s university system needs to be fundamentally reshaped with a focus on education rather than activism.” Republicans across the country, along with President Donald Trump’s administration, have scored major victories pushing back on DEI in favor of meritocracy standards, but experts have warned that universities and organizations will be hostile toward the idea of giving up those methods and will instead attempt to rebrand them under different banners. “At first, they just pushed back on, tried to defend DEI itself, but when that became so obvious that what DEI really was anti-White, anti-Asian, sometimes anti-Jewish discrimination in hiring and promotion, they abandoned that,” Consumers’ Research Executive Director Will Hild told Fox News Digital earlier this year. “Now what they’re trying to do is simply change the terminology that has become so toxic to their brand. So we’re seeing a lot of companies move from having departments of DEI, for example, to ‘departments of belonging’ or ‘departments of inclusivity.’” Hid added, “It is the exact same toxic nonsense under a new wrapper, and they’re just hoping to extend the grift, because a lot of these people — I would say most of the people — working in DEI are useless.”
Fox News Politics Newsletter: Bill Nye, Buttigieg boost Spanberger amid Jones scandal
Welcome to the Fox News Politics newsletter, with the latest updates on the Trump administration, Capitol Hill and more Fox News politics content. Here’s what’s happening… -Winsome Sears responds to JMU fan telling her to ‘go back to Haiti’ after weekend of leftist invective -DOJ argues judge’s decision blocking Mahmoud Khalil’s removal was ‘indefensible’ –Charlie Kirk assassination sparks Senate hearing on ‘left-wing political violence,’ Schmitt vows action Former PBS host and ex-Boeing engineer Bill Nye “The Science Guy” will join former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to headline a rally with Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger on Tuesday in the hometown of their party’s forefather. Spanberger will rally with Buttigieg and Nye in Charlottesville – the city that birthed President Thomas Jefferson – while across town at the college founded by America’s third president, GOP lieutenant gubernatorial candidate John Reid will headline a public “Dome Room” forum hosted by pollster Larry Sabato’s University of Virginia Center for Politics. Spanberger’s rally occurs as she tries to separate herself from scandal-plagued attorney general candidate Jay Jones…READ MORE. ‘CRAZY PLOT’: Trump says Schumer, Senate Democrats holding government ‘hostage’ with shutdown: ‘We will not be extorted’ HILLARY’S TANTRUM: Hillary Clinton fires up voters against Trump’s White House ballroom construction: ‘It’s your house’ SPEAKING HER MIND: Karine Jean-Pierre reveals she never thought Kamala Harris would win DRUG WAR DISPUTE: San Francisco mayor rejects Trump’s National Guard deployment plan over drug dealer arrest authority GUNBOAT DIPLOMACY: US military buildup in the Caribbean sees bombers, Marines and warships converge near Venezuela CYBER CLASH: China accuses NSA of cyberattack on national timekeeping system MEASURE OF SECURITY: Vance warns Hamas as Gaza peace plan’s Civilian Military Cooperation Center opens INFLUENTIAL: Dem senator says Melania Trump is America’s ‘secret weapon’ against Putin’s ‘war criminality’ MONEY TRAIL: National Dems bankroll campaign of ‘Fake Independent’ Senate candidate from Midwestern state LIAR EXPOSED: House Judiciary Committee refers former CIA Director John Brennan to the Justice Department for prosecution SENATE FLIP-FLOP: Fetterman calls out Dems’ flip: ‘We ran on killing the filibuster, and now we love it’ FISCAL FRICTION: Republicans push to renew Obamacare subsidies while rejecting Democrats’ shutdown tie-in LINKED BY LOYALTY: Blackburn says Trump support was ‘common thread’ among lawmakers reportedly targeted by Jack Smith RULES FOR THEE: Jay Jones murder texts latest case of Democrats circling the scandal wagons HONOR CODE BROKEN: ‘She lied’: Mikie Sherrill classmate says involvement in cheating scandal deeper than she claims POLITICAL KRYPTONITE: New Jersey Dems snub endorsing socialist candidate Mamdani as gubernatorial election looms OFF THE JOB?: Dem Rep Mikie Sherrill skips 145 House votes as NJ governor’s race heats up ‘I SAID NO’: Defiant Sliwa says ‘I am not dropping out’ of NYC mayor race: ‘Under no circumstance’ ‘DISOBEY’: Portland city council member calls on National Guard troops to defy deployment orders AUSTIN ATROCITY: Illegal immigrants arrested after woman found shot to death in Texas woods, 1 wanted by Mexican feds: police Get the latest updates on the Trump administration and Congress, exclusive interviews and more on FoxNews.com.
Schumer requests meeting with Trump ‘any time, any place’ as Democrat stalemate drags on
The top congressional Democrats want a meeting with President Donald Trump as the government shutdown stretches on. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said that both he and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., reached out to Trump on Tuesday to set up a confab with the president. The top Senate Democrat said the duo “urged” Trump to meet with them, and that they were open to setting up “an appointment with him any time, any place.” SENATE DEMS EMBOLDENED BY WEEKEND RALLIES BLOCK GOP PLAN TO END SHUTDOWN FOR 11TH TIME “Hakeem and I reached out to the president today and urged him to sit down and negotiate with us to resolve the healthcare crisis, address it and end the Trump shutdown,” Schumer said. “He should sit — the things get worse every day for the American people. He should sit down with us, negotiate in a serious way before he goes away.” Congressional Democrats, particularly Schumer and his Democratic caucus, have remained steadfast in their demands for an extension to expiring Obamacare subsidies. Though Senate Republicans have been open to holding a vote on the matter after the government reopens, Democrats want an ironclad guarantee that the subsidies will be extended well before their expiration at the end of this year. Should Trump relent to their request, it would mark the first meeting among the trio since Schumer, Jeffries, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., met in the Oval Office a day before the shutdown began. ‘GOOFBALLS’ AND HOSTAGES: GOP SENATORS SAY SCHUMER’S SHUTDOWN TACTICS DESTROYING THE SENATE Lawmakers left that meeting with no agreement to avert the shutdown, which has now dragged on for 21 days. Senate Democrats have also blocked Thune and Republicans’ attempts to reopen the government 11 times. Another vote on the House-passed continuing resolution, which would reopen the government until Nov. 21, is expected on Wednesday. And like the many attempts before, that latest effort is expected to fail. Meanwhile, Senate Republicans met with Trump for lunch at the White House Tuesday afternoon. THUNE SLAMS SCHUMER’S ‘KINGMAKER’ POLITICS, REFUSES TO ‘KISS THE RING’ IN SHUTDOWN TALKS Speaking to reporters afterward, Thune reiterated that Senate Republicans were united in their war of attrition strategy to continue putting the same bill on the floor again and again. He noted that Trump would likely agree to meet with Schumer and Jeffries, but only after Senate Democrats unlocked the votes needed to reopen the government. “We have negotiated. I don’t know what there is to negotiate. This is about opening up the government,” Thune said. “We have offered them several off-ramps. Now, the Democrats want something that’s totally untenable. I mean, they want $1.5 trillion in new spending. They want free healthcare for people who are noncitizens in this country. That is just a flat nonstarter. It doesn’t pass the Senate. It won’t pass the House. It won’t be signed into law by the president.” Fox News Digital reached out to Jeffries’ and the White House for comment but did not immediately hear back.
Trump claims Middle East countries offered to fight Hamas in Gaza
United States President Donald Trump has suggested that several countries in the Middle East have offered to send forces to Gaza to fight Hamas, renewing his threats to the Palestinian group amid the fragile ceasefire in the territory. “Numerous of our NOW GREAT ALLIES in the Middle East, and areas surrounding the Middle East, have explicitly and strongly, with great enthusiasm, informed me that they would welcome the opportunity, at my request, to go into GAZA with a heavy force and ‘straighten our Hamas’ if Hamas continues to act badly, in violation of their agreement with us,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Tuesday. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list Trump did not specify which countries offered to go into Gaza, but he did single out Indonesia for its assistance in the region. “I would like to thank the great and powerful country of Indonesia, and its wonderful leader, for all of the help they have shown and given to the Middle East, and to the USA,” Trump said. Jakarta and other governments have offered to send peacekeeping troops to restore security and stability in Gaza, but no country has said that it would be willing to clash directly with Hamas. “The love and spirit for the Middle East has not been seen like this in a thousand years! It is a beautiful thing to behold! I told these countries, and Israel, ‘NOT YET!’ There is still hope that Hamas will do what is right,” the US president said. “If they do not, an end to Hamas will be FAST, FURIOUS, & BRUTAL!” Israel has killed nearly 100 Palestinians since the ceasefire took effect on October 10. Trump often issues similar threats to Hamas. But it is not clear what the US or any other force can do to strong-arm the Palestinian group that Israel has not. Advertisement Over the past two years, Israel has killed most of Hamas’s political and military leaders, while also levelling Gaza to the ground and imposing famine on the territory in a campaign that leading rights groups and United Nations investigators say is a genocide. Shaky ceasefire Trump had been hailing the ceasefire, which his administration helped broker, as a historic turning point to bring peace to the region. But from the outset of the truce, Israel has been killing Palestinians it claims were approaching areas under control of the Israeli military, which are not clearly marked. Moreover, Israel has continued to restrict aid to Gaza despite commitments in the deal to allow a surge in humanitarian assistance to the territory. According to the Gaza Government Media Office, Israel has only allowed the entry of 986 aid trucks into the enclave since the start of the ceasefire, a fraction of the expected 6,600 trucks, at a rate of 600 daily. On Sunday, the agreement was pushed to the brink when Israel launched a wave of air strikes that killed dozens of Palestinians and fully suspended the entry of aid to Gaza after two Israeli soldiers were killed in Rafah. Israel blamed Hamas for killing the troops, but the Palestinian group denied any involvement, underscoring that the incident took place in an area under Israeli control. Some US media outlets reported that the Israeli soldiers were killed after they drove over an unexploded ordnance. Besides the day-to-day issues threatening the truce, question marks continue to hang over the long-term future of Gaza, including how the territory will be governed. Trump has stressed that Hamas must disarm, but the Palestinian group has linked giving up its weapons to the establishment of a Palestinian state. On Sunday, Trump told Fox News that there is no hard timeline for Hamas disarmament. Later that day, his vice president, JD Vance, who is currently visiting Israel, suggested that an international force needs to deploy to Gaza and establish “security infrastructure” before Hamas disarms. Vance optimistic about ceasefire Speaking to reporters in Israel later on Tuesday, Vance expressed optimism about the future of the ceasefire, saying that the bursts of violence were not unexpected. “We are doing very well. We’re in a very good place. We’re going to have to keep working on it, but I think we have the team to do exactly that,” he said. Vance reiterated that Hamas must disarm, but he acknowledged that the process will take time. Asked about efforts to return the bodies of slain Israeli captives, an issue that Israel has cited to justify blocking aid to Gaza, the US vice president highlighted the difficulty in reaching the remains amid the widespread destruction. Advertisement “This is not going to happen overnight,” he said. “Some of the hostages are buried under thousands of pounds of rubble. Some of the hostages no one even knows where they are.” While the bodies of around 15 Israelis remain in Gaza, thousands of Palestinians have gone missing throughout the war, many are presumed dead and buried under the rubble. Israel has returned the bodies of at least 135 Palestinian captives to Gaza with many showing signs of torture and execution, according to health official in the territory. On Tuesday, Vance announced opening the Civilian Military Co-operation Centre (CMCC), a US-led base in Israel that will facilitate reconstruction and aid delivery to Gaza. Brad Cooper, the commander of the Middle East-based Central Command of the US military, said there are 200 American troops serving at the centre. “This facility will be the hub for the delivery of everything that goes into Gaza as we look to the future,” he told reporters. The US military had said that American soldiers will not be on the ground inside Gaza. Adblock test (Why?)
Dutch privacy watchdog warns voters against asking AI how to vote
Body finds that chatbots provide biased advice, including by leading voters to the hard-right Party for Freedom. Published On 21 Oct 202521 Oct 2025 Click here to share on social media share2 Share The Netherlands’s data protection watchdog has cautioned citizens against consulting with artificial intelligence on how to vote, warning that popular chatbots provide a “highly distorted and polarised view” of politics. The Dutch Data Protection Authority said on Tuesday that an increasing number of voters were using AI to help decide who to vote for, despite the models offering “unreliable and clearly biased” advice. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list The watchdog issued the warning as it released the results of tests conducted on four popular chatbots – ChatGPT, Gemini, Mistral, and Grok – in the run-up to parliamentary elections on October 29. The research found that the chatbots more often recommended parties on the fringes of the political spectrum when asked to identify the three choices that best matched the policy preferences of 1,500 fictitious voter profiles. In more than half of cases, the AI models identified the hard-right Party for Freedom (PVV) or left-wing Green Left-Labour Party as the top choice, the watchdog said. Parties closer to the political middle ground – such as the right-leaning People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy and the centre-left Democrats 66 – were recommended much less often, according to the watchdog. Meanwhile, some groupings, including the conservative Christian Democratic Appeal and left-leaning Denk, were “almost never suggested”. Monique Verdier, deputy chair of the authority, said that voters who turned to AI risked being encouraged to vote for parties that do not align with their preferences. Advertisement “This directly impacts a cornerstone of democracy: the integrity of free and fair elections. We therefore urge voters not to use AI chatbots for voting advice because their operation is neither transparent nor verifiable,” Verdier said in a statement. “Additionally, we call on chatbot providers to prevent their systems from being used as voting guides.” The October 29 election comes after the PVV, led by anti-immigration firebrand Geert Wilders, pulled its support for the government after its coalition partners refused to back a 10-point plan to radically curtail immigration. Wilders’s PPV, which scored one of the biggest upsets in Dutch political history by winning the most seats in the 2023 election, has consistently led opinion polls before next week’s vote. While the PPV is on track to win the most seats for a second straight election, it is all but certain to fall far short of a parliamentary majority. The other major parties in the Netherlands, which has been governed by coalition governments without interruption since the 1940s, have all ruled out supporting the PPV in power. Adblock test (Why?)
LIVE: Arsenal vs Atletico Madrid – UEFA Champions League
blinking-dotLive MatchLive Match, Follow our live build-up, with the latest team news coverage, ahead of our full text commentary stream of the UCL football fixture. Published On 21 Oct 202521 Oct 2025 Click here to share on social media share2 Share Adblock test (Why?)
Agra-Lucknow Expressway toll plaza employees refuse to collect toll, here’s all you need to know
The company officials and police arrived at the scene to negotiate with the employees and resolve the issue.
Delhi-NCR pollution soars after Diwali fireworks; AQI in ‘very poor’ category; Check 10 most polluted areas in Delhi
Delhi’s air quality worsened sharply after Diwali, reaching the ‘Very Poor’ category on the Air Quality Index. The city recorded alarming AQI levels due to fireworks, with Punjabi Bagh topping the list. Despite green cracker regulations, air pollution remains a significant issue.