Pema Khandu to take oath as Arunachal Pradesh CM today for third time
The BJP Legislature Party chose Khandu as its leader during a gathering in Itanagar. Tarun Chugh and Ravi Sankar Prasad, the BJP’s central observers, were present at the meeting.
Texas immigrants’ rights groups sue Biden administration over asylum restrictions
Both Democrats and Republicans have criticized the order, which limits asylum requests when illegal border crossings ramp up.
Fetterman ‘at fault’ for Maryland car accident that injured him, wife, and other driver
U.S. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., was at fault for a car accident that injured him, his wife and another driver, authorities said in a police report. Fetterman and his wife Gisele were involved in the car crash early Sunday in Maryland in the area of westbound Interstate 70 at Interstate 68, between Pennsylvania and West Virginia. According to a preliminary investigation, police said a Chevrolet Traverse was traveling “at a high rate of speed, well over the posted speed limit” before rear ending a Chevrolet Impala around 7:45 a.m., a six-page Maryland State Police report obtained by USA Today states. FETTERMAN’S EX-AIDES FUME IN PRIVATE OVER SENATOR’S ‘LOVE’ OF ATTENTION, SUPPORT FOR ISRAEL: REPORT Fetterman was driving the Traverse and struck the rear of a Chevrolet Impala on Interstate-70 in Hancock, a Maryland State Police spokesperson told USA Today. Both vehicles were towed from the scene. Fox News Digital has reached out to a spokesperson for Fetterman for comment. JOHN FETTERMAN TO RECEIVE TOP JEWISH COLLEGE’S HIGHEST AWARD FOR HIS STANCE ON ISRAEL Fetterman, 54, released a video on X on Monday evening with Gisele thanking everyone for well-wishes and shared that they were celebrating their 16th wedding anniversary when the crash happened. He was treated for a bruised shoulder, his spokesperson told the newspaper. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP “You might have heard G and I were in a car accident yesterday. Thank you all for the well wishes. Not the best way to spend our 16th wedding anniversary but we’re doing well and happy to be back home in Braddock with the family,” the senator wrote.
Democrats block Cruz’ IVF bill, saying it doesn’t go far enough to protect the procedure
The senator’s bill to protect in vitro fertilization would have withheld Medicaid funding from states that ban the procedure. Democrats say IVF should be a federal right.
Judge upholds Austin ordinance decriminalizing pot
The Texas attorney general accused Austin of violating state law after voters in 2022 approved an ordinance decriminalizing marijuana possession.
‘Privacy nightmare’: 19 states fight SEC’s investor tracker
EXCLUSIVE: Nearly two dozen state financial officers sent a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., late Wednesday demanding he take up a bill prohibiting the Biden administration from implementing a program that tracks private investment transactions. Twenty-three officials in 19 states crafted a letter that demands a bill from Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., the Protecting Investors’ Personally Identifiable Information Act, be immediately acted upon. Loudermilk’s bill, H.R. 4551, formally prohibits the SEC from requiring personally identifiable information to be collected under the SEC’s new program and “for other purposes.” If the bill passes, the signatories argue it could stymie the Securities and Exchange Commission from continuing its implementation of changes to the Consolidated Audit Trail (CAT), a tracking mechanism for trading activity on the stock market. SEC FACES LAWSUIT ALLEGING ‘MASS SURVEILLANCE’ OF STOCK MARKET DATA SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce, a Trump appointee, warned the CAT serves as a “comprehensive surveillance database that will collect and store every equity and option trade and quote from every account at every broker by every investor.” The signatories warned in the letter of civil liberties concerns in that regard as well as the CAT’s “questionable legality.” “We share the concerns of the American Securities Association … and numerous members of the House and Senate who … [have] expressed concern,” the letter states. SEC’S SCRUTINY OF BINANCE IS SIMPLY SEEKING INVESTOR PROTECTION: GARY GENSLER They also said it may be against the law to establish such a database via federal rule versus an act of Congress. The CAT’s collection of retail investors’ information “poses a clear threat to the security of every American investor,” the signatories argued, as a central database is also more susceptible to hackers. State financial officers who signed the letter included Pennsylvania Treasurer Stacy Garrity, who is up for re-election this fall, along with South Carolina Treasurer Curtis Loftis, West Virginia Treasurer Riley Moore, Alabama Auditor General Andrew Sorrell, Nevada State Controller Andy Matthews and Indiana Treasurer Daniel Elliott. Matthews said the bill gives Congress the opportunity to “resolve a serious threat to the privacy of the American people.” Elliott said the CAT is a “data privacy nightmare” that allows the feds to wrongly track financial information of typical American retail investors. “Our government has shown that when it gives itself this amount of power, it will act irresponsibly and in ways that will harm average American citizens. This entire project should be subject to an act of Congress, not un-elected Washington bureaucrats.” CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP A group tied to another noted Hoosier, former Vice President Mike Pence, also spoke out against the SEC’s move and pressed for Johnson to act. “Conservatives should co-sponsor and demand a floor vote on [the bill] … to ensure that Americans’ financial data is protected,” a June 5 release from Pence’s group, Advancing American Freedom, stated. “Traditionally, Americans’ financial holdings are kept between them and their broker, not them, their broker and a massive government database. The only exception has been legal investigations with a warrant.” The bill has 13 co-sponsors, all Republicans, the latest addition being Rep. Alex X. Mooney, R-W.V., who added his name to the legislation April 23. Meanwhile, the executive director of the State Financial Officers Foundation Action told Fox News Digital the SEC database was never congressionally authorized and called for a floor vote “as soon as possible,” highlighting due process concerns. The SEC formally adopted Rule 613 enacting the plan in 2023, while the CAT system has been in place in some form since 2012, according to the commission’s website. The finalized phase of implementation occurred May 31. The commission argued in announcing the new rule that it creates a trail that allows regulators to efficiently and accurately track all securities activity throughout U.S. markets. Calls placed to Johnson’s office for comment were not returned before press time.
Trump to meet face-to-face with this top Republican leader for first time in nearly four years
Longtime Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell says he’ll be in attendance on Thursday as Senate Republicans meet in the nation’s capital with former President Donald Trump. It will be the first time Trump and McConnell will have seen each other in person in nearly four years. Trump, the GOP’s presumptive presidential nominee, is holding behind closed doors meetings Thursday morning with House Republicans and Thursday afternoon with Senate Republicans. And McConnell reiterated to reporters on Wednesday that “I’ll be at the meeting tomorrow.” TRUMP’S IMMENSE GRIP OVER GOP REMAINS FIRM AS HIS ENDORSED CANDIDATES RUN THE TABLE IN REPUBLICAN PRIMARIES McConnell and Trump haven’t talked since December 2020, as their working relationship turned frosty following President Biden’s election victory over then-President Trump. McConnell formally recognized Biden’s presidential election victory after the former vice president was confirmed the winner by the Electoral College on Dec. 15, 2020. A few weeks later, McConnell said Trump was “morally responsible” for the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters who aimed to upend congressional certification of Biden’s White House win. Trump, in the ensuing years, regularly lambasted McConnell in social media posts, calling him, among other things, an “absolute loser.” And the former president also made derogatory remarks about McConnell’s wife, Elaine Chao, who served as Trump’s transportation secretary. But fast-forward to this year and McConnell endorsed Trump after the former president in early March clinched the 2024 GOP nomination. “It is abundantly clear that former President Trump has earned the requisite support of Republican voters to be our nominee for President of the United States,” McConnell said at the time. “It should come as no surprise that as nominee, he will have my support.” On Wednesday, McConnell emphasized during his weekly Senate leadership news conference that “I said three years ago, right after the Capitol was attacked, I would support our nominee regardless of who it was, including him. I’ve said earlier this year, I support him. He’s earned the nomination by the voters all across the country.” Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.
‘Nothing but hypocrisy’: House GOP doubtful DOJ will charge Garland like former Trump aides
House Republicans are skeptical that the Department of Justice (DOJ) will act on their newly passed criminal referral against Attorney General Merrick Garland. Multiple GOP lawmakers argued it would be hypocritical of the DOJ not to act, given the recent prosecutions and guilty verdicts for former Trump administration aides Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon following similar referrals. “I don’t have much hope that this administration is going to follow the letter of the law or the intent of Congress or the subpoenas for the president,” Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., told Fox News Digital. “It’s just a further manifestation of the weaponization of the DOJ. So they’re not playing umpire, they’re not behaving as the executive…they’re not calling balls and strikes. They’re just frankly doing things for what look like political purposes, which is not their job,” he said. JOHNSON FLOATS DEFUNDING SPECIAL COUNSEL’S OFFICE AMID JACK SMITH’S TRUMP PROBE Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., said when asked if he anticipated the DOJ following through on the House’s will, “Garland’s gonna take up his own contempt resolution? Not likely.” “There’s nothing but hypocrisy, especially considering the fact that President Trump cited executive privilege for Steve Bannon, and Merrick Garland had moved forward anyway,” Donalds said. GOP lawmakers aimed to hold Garland in contempt over his refusal to turn over audio recordings of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s interview with President Biden. HILL AID INTERFERES WITH FOX NEWS CAMERA CREW DURING TLAIB INTERVIEW Hur’s findings cleared Biden of wrongdoing in his handling of classified documents, but also said the 81-year-old president presented himself “as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” and that “it would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him-by then a former president well into his eighties-of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.” Biden and his allies aggressively pushed back on concerns about his mental fitness in the report’s wake. Republicans seeking the audio recording argued it would provide critical context about Biden’s state of mind. Democrats, meanwhile, have dismissed the request as a partisan attempt to politicize the Department of Justice (DOJ). TRUMP GUILTY VERDICT REVEALS SPLIT AMONG FORMER GOP PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY OPPONENTS The DOJ followed through on two of three criminal referrals sent to them by the previous Democrat-controlled Congress but did not act on a third criminal contempt resolution aimed at former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. Meadows, Bannon and Navarro were all targeted for dodging subpoenas from the now-defunct House select committee investigating January 6. “I’m not optimistic because I think the DOJ has proven themselves very partisan and not honest brokers of how they apply the law,” Rep. Rich McCormick, R-Ga., said of the Garland resolution. “I think there’s ample evidence that he is in contempt, and I hope that they’ll not be hypocritical. I mean, it’d be a sad day for America,” he said. Garland took an indirect shot at Republicans’ pushback on the DOJ in a Washington Post op-ed on Tuesday morning. “In recent weeks, we have seen an escalation of attacks that go far beyond public scrutiny, criticism, and legitimate and necessary oversight of our work. They are baseless, personal and dangerous,” he wrote. “These attacks come in the form of threats to defund particular department investigations, most recently the special counsel’s prosecution of the former president.”
‘Time for a change’: Ex-MLB star, GOP Senate candidate reveals top issues he will tackle in deep blue state
WASHINGTON D.C. – Republican Senate candidate and MLB legend Steve Garvey says that Californians are “tired” of the current statewide and national policies on inflation, crime, and the border – saying it’s “time for a change” in Golden State politics as he competes for the long-held Democrat seat. Garvey is up to bat in November to become the first Republican to serve in the California Senate since 1992 after defeating several Democrat challengers in the state’s jungle primary in March. While delivering batting tips to GOP lawmakers ahead of the annual congressional baseball game Wednesday, the former LA Dodgers first baseman told Fox News Digital that his campaign is gaining momentum. “We’re very proud of California for stepping up. It’s a very narrow path for a very conservative like myself, but I think we’ve run a very good race. We’ve got a great team. We built momentum,” Garvey said during an interview at Nationals Stadium. DEMOCRATS WANT TO DRIVE CALIFORNIA INTO THE GROUND, AND DRIVE OUR CARS FOR US TOO The baseball star, who played for the Dodgers and San Diego Padres, said that “it’s time to have political courage.” CALIFORNIA SENATE CANDIDATE BLASTS UC BERKELEY FOR ‘PANDERING’ TO ANTI-ISRAEL PROTESTERS AFTER DEBATE CANCELED “Political courage is standing up for what’s right. Walking away from what’s not. So I think it’s time for a change in this country and that’s going to start in California,” Garvey told Fox News Digital after swinging practice with Republican members of congress. A recent PODS report on 2024 moving trends found that the “cost of living is approximately 50 percent higher in California than the national average,” as residents are moving out of the blue state amid high prices. “We’re messaging common sense and compassion and consensus building. And, especially in California, people are tired of the economy. They’re tired of crime in the streets. The border issue is just horrendous now,” he said. Garvey highlighted the border as a key issue in 2024 as migrants continue to pour into California through the state’s southern border entrances. “We need to get back to law and order on our borders,” Garvey said, adding that he will be a “loud” advocate for more security as the illegal immigration crisis “has a direct influence on men and women in California.” Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., is competing for the California Senate seat, held by the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., before her passing, but Garvey says that the Democrat congressman “has failed the people of California.” Garvey said Wednesday’s Republican versus Democrat congressional baseball game could “set the tone” for battles on the ballot in November.
House votes to hold Garland in contempt, refer him for criminal charges at own DOJ
The House voted to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress on Wednesday, referring the top Department of Justice (DOJ) official for criminal charges. The measure passed nearly along party lines in a 216 to 207 vote, with just one Republican – Rep. David Joyce, R-Ohio, voting against it. Joyce said in a statement after the vote, “As a former prosecutor, I cannot in good conscience support a resolution that would further politicize our judicial system to score political points. The American people expect Congress to work for them, solve policy problems, and prioritize good governance. Enough is enough.” GOP lawmakers aimed to hold Garland in contempt over his refusal to turn over audio recordings of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s interview with President Biden. Hur’s findings cleared Biden of wrongdoing in his handling of classified documents, but also said the 81-year-old president presented himself “as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” and that “it would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him-by then a former president well into his eighties-of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.” JOHNSON FLOATS DEFUNDING SPECIAL COUNSEL’S OFFICE AMID JACK SMITH’S TRUMP PROBE Biden and his allies aggressively pushed back on concerns about his mental fitness in the report’s wake. The Justice Department released a statement from Attorney General Garland after the vote. “It is deeply disappointing that this House of Representatives has turned a serious congressional authority into a partisan weapon. Today’s vote disregards the constitutional separation of powers, the Justice Department’s need to protect its investigations, and the substantial amount of information we have provided to the Committees. “I will always stand up for this Department, its employees, and its vital mission to defend our democracy.” Republicans seeking the audio recording argued it would provide critical context about Biden’s state of mind. Democrats, meanwhile, have dismissed the request as a partisan attempt to politicize the Department of Justice (DOJ). “It’s a huge disappointment. I think it’s an abuse of the congressional contempt power,” Rep. Glenn Ivey, D-Md., told Fox News Digital of the GOP effort. HILL AID INTERFERES WITH FOX NEWS CAMERA CREW DURING TLAIB INTERVIEW Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, however, argued that the DOJ’s refusal meant Garland simply wanted it hidden. “There’s only one reason why the attorney general would do that. He doesn’t want us to hear it. That’s why,” Roy said on the House floor Wednesday. “And there’s really only two reasons why that would be the case – either the transcript doesn’t match the audio, or the audio is so bad that he doesn’t want us to hear it.” The pursuit of Hur’s audio tapes is part of the House GOP’s wider impeachment inquiry into Biden, investigating allegations he used his political position to enrich himself and his family. Biden has denied accusations of wrongdoing. House Republicans halted advancement of a contempt resolution against Hunter Biden, the president’s son, earlier this year after GOP investigators reached an agreement with his attorneys. Meanwhile, two ex-Trump administration aides – former Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro and former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon – were convicted on contempt of Congress charges for dodging subpoenas by the House select committee on Jan. 6. TRUMP GUILTY VERDICT REVEALS SPLIT AMONG FORMER GOP PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY OPPONENTS Both were referred for criminal charges by the previous Democrat-controlled House of Representatives. The DOJ did not act on a third referral by Democrats for former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. It’s highly unlikely the DOJ will act on House Republicans’ Garland referral, something that frustrated House Republicans who spoke with Fox News Digital on Wednesday. “I’m not optimistic, because I think the DOJ has proven themselves very partisan and not honest brokers of how they apply the law,” said Rep. Rich McCormick, R-Ga. When asked if he thought the DOJ might act, Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., quipped, “Not likely.” Garland took an indirect shot at Republicans’ pushback on the DOJ in a Washington Post op-ed on Tuesday morning. “In recent weeks, we have seen an escalation of attacks that go far beyond public scrutiny, criticism, and legitimate and necessary oversight of our work. They are baseless, personal and dangerous,” he wrote. “These attacks come in the form of threats to defund particular department investigations, most recently the special counsel’s prosecution of the former president.”