Can Arabs stop Trump’s Gaza displacement proposal?
Some Arab leaders have met to discuss an alternative plan for the Strip devastated by 15 months of Israeli war. US President Donald Trump has ruffled many feathers since he announced his proposal to “take over” Gaza. According to him, more than two million Palestinians should leave “to somewhere nice and safe” like Jordan or Egypt – while he builds a new riviera on the Mediterranean in Gaza. This idea has angered the international community, and the Arab world has downright rejected it. But what can they suggest instead? A meeting on Friday of Gulf nations in Riyadh joined by Egypt and Jordan, and ended with no concrete counter-proposals. They will be meeting in Cairo in the coming weeks. But will they be able to make Trump change his mind? Presenter: James Bays Guests: Dania Thafer – Executive director of Gulf International Forum and lecturer at Georgetown University Yossi Mekelberg – Senior consulting fellow at Chatham House Daoud Kuttab – Palestinian journalist and author of, State of Palestine NOW: Practical and Logical Arguments for the Best Way to Bring Peace to the Middle East Adblock test (Why?)
Pope in critical condition after suffering respiratory crisis: Vatican
Francis was admitted to Rome’s Gemelli hospital on February 14 after experiencing breathing difficulties. Pope Francis’s health has deteriorated over the past 24 four hours, the Vatican said, adding that the pontiff had suffered a “prolonged asthma-like respiratory crisis” and needed blood transfusions. “This morning Pope Francis presented a prolonged asthmatic respiratory crisis, which also required the application of high-flow oxygen,” the Vatican said on Saturday. “The Holy Father remains alert and has spent the day in a chair, though he is more unwell than yesterday,” it added. Francis was admitted to Rome’s Gemelli Hospital on February 14 after experiencing difficulty breathing for several days. He has since been diagnosed with double pneumonia. The pontiff’s doctors had told a news conference on Friday there was no imminent risk to his life but that he was “not out of danger”. But on Saturday, the Vatican said that “the Holy Father’s condition remains critical” and added that doctors had to administer a “high flow” of oxygen because of his breathing crisis. It also said that the blood transfusions were necessary because tests showed he had a low platelet count, associated with anaemia. Advertisement Double pneumonia is a serious infection that can inflame and scar both lungs, making it difficult to breathe. Francis has continued to work during his hospital stay, including making bishop appointments. Earlier on Saturday however, the Vatican announced that the pope would not appear in public on Sunday to lead prayer with pilgrims, the second consecutive week he will have missed the event. There is no provision in canon law for what to do if a pope becomes incapacitated. Pope Benedict XVI resigned in February 2013 citing declining health, but Francis has shown no signs of stepping down. Adblock test (Why?)
Kennedy Center shake-up will usher in ‘Golden Age of the Arts’ under Trump, Ric Grenell previews
The Kennedy Center will usher in the “Golden Age of the Arts” in Washington, D.C., as its new leadership under President Donald Trump plans to roll out productions that will “sell tickets” and appeal to the public, interim Executive Director Richard Grenell told Fox News Digital. “This will be the Golden Age of the Arts,” Grenell told Fox News Digital in an exclusive comment on the matter. “The Kennedy Center has zero cash on hand and zero dollars in reserves – while taking tens of millions of dollars in public funds. We must have programs that sell tickets. We can’t afford to pay for content that doesn’t at least pay for itself right now. I wish we didn’t have to consider the costs of production, but we do.” “The good news is that there are plenty of shows that are very popular, and therefore the ticket sales will pay for themselves,” Grenell added. The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts serves as the national cultural center of the U.S. and is now led by President Donald Trump as its chairman, Grenell and its board of trustees. TRUMP ENVOY RICHARD GRENELL SECURES FREEDOM FOR 6 AMERICANS FOLLOWING MEETING WITH MADURO IN VENEZUELA The center came under scrutiny this week as the media and liberal critics spotlighted that a performance by the Gay Men’s Chorus and National Symphony Orchestra slated for May as part of Washington, D.C.’s gay pride celebrations was canceled, with critics attempting to tie the cancelation to the Trump administration. The chorus and orchestra were scheduled to perform a show titled “A Peacock Among Pigeons,” which is based on an LGBT-themed children’s book. TRUMP FIRES KENNEDY CENTER BOARD MEMBERS CITING DRAG SHOWS, APPOINTS HIMSELF CHAIRMAN The performance, however, was put on the chopping block weeks before the center’s leadership change and was canceled due to lack of ticket sales, Fox News Digital learned. The center’s new leadership has not canceled any shows since taking the reins of the cultural center, a source familiar with the Kennedy Center’s operations told Fox Digital. “Artists who have pulled down their shows are only punishing themselves and the patrons. It shows the artists have an intolerance to engage with those of differing opinions. Republicans are patrons, too, they should remember that,” the source said of recent left-leaning performers and celebrities who have pulled out of shows. Grenell, who also serves as special presidential envoy for special missions under the second Trump administration, joined the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Friday, where he pushed back that the production had been canceled over Trump. “Suddenly it was, the Gay Men’s Chorus was dropping out because of Trump. That wasn’t true,” Grenell added. “It was replaced with with some other things, that happens all the time.” A production of “The Wizard of Oz” replaced the planned performance of “A Peacock Among Pigeons,” the executive director of the National Symphony Orchestra said earlier this week, underscoring that the planned performance had been canceled before the leadership change and was due to financial issues. “Before the leadership transition at the Kennedy Center, we made the decision to postpone Peacock Among Pigeons due to financial and scheduling factors. We chose to replace it with ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ another suitable program for World PRIDE participation,” the orchestra’s Executive Director, Jean Davidson, said in a statement earlier this week. ACTRESS ISSA RAE CANCELS SOLD-OUT KENNEDY CENTER SHOW AFTER TRUMP NAMED CHAIRMAN OF VENUE “Program changes are a common practice. We were unable to announce the replacement program until we had secured the rights to present it, but in the interest of transparency, we removed the original program from the website to prevent further ticket sales. The Gay Men’s Chorus was to be contracted as a guest artist for Peacock Among Pigeons,” Davidson added. Grenell previewed during his remarks at CPAC that the Kennedy Center will now focus on performances “the public want to see,” such as Christmas-focused productions in December. “We have to do the big productions that the masses and the public want to see, we want to have really good programming,” he said. “So the first thing that we’re doing … you’ve got to be at the Kennedy Center in December, because we are doing a big, huge celebration of the birth of Christ at Christmas. How crazy is it to think that we’re going to celebrate Christ at Christmas with a big traditional production to celebrate what we are all celebrating in the world during Christmastime, which is the birth of Christ.” Trump fired a handful of the center’s previous board members earlier this month, arguing that they did “not share our Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture.” He replaced the former members with 14 other members, including allies such as second lady Usha Vance and “God Bless the USA” singer lee Greenwood. “At my direction, we are going to make the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., GREAT AGAIN. I have decided to immediately terminate multiple individuals from the Board of Trustees, including the Chairman, who do not share our Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture,” Trump posted to Truth Social on Feb. 7. Trump indicated that the motivation behind firing the former board members was due to the Kennedy Center’s drag show performances under the Biden administration that targeted children. “Just last year, the Kennedy Center featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth — THIS WILL STOP. The Kennedy Center is an American Jewel, and must reflect the brightest STARS on its stage from all across our Nation. For the Kennedy Center, THE BEST IS YET TO COME!” Trump said on Truth Social earlier this month. TOP TRUMP OFFICIAL RALLIES BEHIND PRESIDENT AMID BACKLASH FOR ‘DICTATOR’ ATTACK ON ZELENSKYY “We will soon announce a new Board, with an amazing Chairman, DONALD J. TRUMP!” he added. The new board elected Trump as chairman on Feb. 12. Trump appointed Grenell – who became the U.S.’s first openly gay cabinet
Maine gov’s transgender athlete dust-up with Trump made WH confab ‘uncomfortable,’ govs say
Maine Democratic Gov. Janet Mills’ public dust-up with President Donald Trump during a White House meeting with most of America’s state leaders didn’t live up to governors’ collective goal of “disagree[ing] better,” the National Governors Association chairman said Saturday. Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis was asked about the exchange – in which Trump challenged Maine to comply with his executive order on transgender athletes in school sports, and Mills told Trump “see you in court.” The president remarked that any state that does not align its scholastic athletics with biological sexes will not receive federal funding. “As governors, we have our prior initiative that we continue to work on is to disagree better,” Chairman Polis said. “We always hope that people can disagree in a way that elevates the discourse and tries to come to a common solution around . . . what the issue is. I don’t think that that disagreement is necessarily a model of that,” he continued, adding that some governors may not have known the origins of the fiery exchange at the time. SLASHING ENERGY DEVELOPMENT RED TAPE, BEATING CHINA IN ‘AI ARMS RACE’ TOP PRIORITIES FOR NATION’S GOVERNORS Polis said governors do have the right to sue the federal government but that there are also other ways to understand where respective parties are coming from. “It was a little uncomfortable in the room,” added NGA Vice Chairman Kevin Stitt, Oklahoma’s GOP governor. “But like, like Governor Polis said, I wasn’t sure exactly what the backstory was behind the conflict there. Apparently, there had been some things that both sides have said.” Stitt remarked that the exchange may have been “good politics” for both Mills and Trump with their respective bases. HOCHUL DOES APPARENT ABOUT-FACE ON NATURAL GAS AS NYC UTILITY SIGNALS MAJOR RATE HIKES He added that he personally agrees with Trump’s stance and noted that he led a push in 2022 to ensure that scholastic athletes are competing against people of their own biological sex in Oklahoma. “The NCAA has followed that, I think the Olympics have. And then you have a governor saying that they’re not going to follow that. So, I don’t know what legal background she has, but they talked about seeing each other in court. And we’ll we’ll see what happens on it.” Polis added that Mills maintained that she is following current federal law under her current stance. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Later, Stitt said that Trump had invited all governors to give him a call, and had quipped that if a Democrat and a Republican call at the same time, he will take the Democrat’s call first. “He is a businessman. He is not ideological. He wants to get things done,” Stitt said. At the White House meeting, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey successfully asked cabinet officials to share their direct lines, to better facilitate cooperation between states and the Trump administration. That nugget was revealed by South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, who quipped that ther president had also offered governors an open line – but did not explicitly publicize his number. “I’ve got it, but I’m going to hold onto it,” McMaster joked.
CPAC straw poll reveals who conservatives believe will be 2028 presidential nominee
Conservative voters believe Vice President JD Vance will become the Republican Party’s presidential nominee in the 2028 election cycle, a straw poll conducted at the 2025 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) found. “You guys are the conservative movement, you guys are the thought leaders, the opinion leaders. We asked folks who they thought would be the Republican nominee, who they preferred for the Republican for president in 2028. And who is it?,” Jim McLaughlin, president of McLaughlin & Associates Polls, said Friday from the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Oxon Hill, Maryland, on Saturday. “JD Vance. And why? Because he’s viewed as the closest thing to Donald Trump,” McLaughlin added, he did not provide additional data on Vance’s support among CPAC attendees. Steve Bannon, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and others were also viewed by the attendees as the potential Republican nominee behind Vance, the full CPAC straw poll results posted to X found. The straw poll was conducted among more than 1,000 attendees of the conservative conference, which kicked off on Wednesday and wraps up on Saturday following President Donald Trump’s planned speech. ‘SAVED THE COUNTRY’: CPAC ATTENDEES SEE SILVER LINING AFTER ELON MUSK’S DOGE SPEECH McLaughlin noted that the straw poll has accurately predicted conservatives’ views and voting trends in previous years, including that Trump would win the 2024 primary and general election. “You know how I knew Donald Trump was going to win the people in this room? Because when we did the CPAC polls over the years, and you had the mainstream media saying, you know, ‘Donald Trump couldn’t win again.’ Donald Trump was winning overwhelmingly, not by a little bit, overwhelmingly in every single CPAC poll. You guys knew he was going to win the primary. You all knew that he was going to win the general election, no matter what the Democrats threw at us,” he said. This year’s straw poll overwhelmingly focused on Trump’s approval ratings since taking office, with a handful of results finding Trump’s approval sitting at 99% on various issues. “The first few weeks of Donald Trump’s presidency have been the best for the modern conservative movement in my lifetime. What do you think about that?” McLaughlin said of one of the poll questions. “Well, 99% agreed with that. Think about that. We don’t see 99% numbers.” KAROLINE LEAVITT OFFERS WORDS OF WISDOM TO YOUNG WOMEN AT CPAC: ‘JUST BELIEVE IN YOURSELF’ “But 99% say this is the best … in modern conservative history,” McLaughlin, who was joined on stage by CPAC chair Matt Schlapp on stage to announce the results, added. Ninety-nine percent of respondents also reported in the poll that Congress rapidly passing Trump’s agenda is important to them, while another 99% reported that Trump is doing a better job now than his first administration. All in, Trump’s job approval rating sits at 99%, according to the poll. VP JD VANCE SPEAKS ON ‘FUNDAMENTAL GOAL’ OF TRUMP ADMINISTRATION AT CPAC ADDRESS “It’s amazing. I’ve been working as a pollster now … going on four decades. . . . We’ve never seen numbers like this. We’ve never seen anybody unite the conservative movement the way Donald Trump has done this,” McLaughlin added of Trump’s high marks. Trump also earned support for his comments regarding the U.S. potentially establishing a national security and an economic alliance with Greenland. “Ninety-three percent of you approve of that, because it just makes sense for economic reasons, for national security reasons,” McLaughlin said of Trump’s support for establishing an alliance with Greenland. “And by the way, we do a little bit of work over in Europe and whatnot. They also think it’s a very good idea. Donald Trump again, being a visionary.” The straw poll comes just roughly one month into Trump’s second administration, which has been working at a break-neck pace as administration officials work to gut the federal government over overspending, while also stamping out potential fraud and mismanagement.
DNA TV Show: Rekha Gupta-led Delhi govt in ‘action mode’ after swearing-in, orders to remove…
After returning to power in Delhi 27 years later, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has handed over Chief Minister Rekha Gupta the responsibility to fulfil poll promises.
Former British PM reveals which Trump department is perfect ‘playbook’ for conservative revolution
EXCLUSIVE: Former United Kingdom Prime Minister Liz Truss is ready to bring the “conservative revolution” home from the 2025 Conservative Political Action Conference, telling Fox News Digital her plan to “Make the West Great Again.” World leaders took center stage at CPAC this week, telling the crowd of American conservatives they’re ready to see President Donald Trump’s agenda on the world stage. Truss, the shortest-serving prime minister in British history, said world leaders are envious of Trump’s second term and his Department of Government Efficiency. “There’s a lot of momentum, and people are very envious of what’s happening in the U.S. We’d love to be able to get the truth from government departments about what’s actually being spent,” Truss told Fox News Digital. Truss praised Elon Musk’s DOGE as a “playbook for what needs to happen” in the United Kingdom, but she said that a DOGE UK would be unrealistic under Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s leadership. ‘MR. BREXIT’ ADVOCATES FOR UK DOGE OVER ‘COMPLETE WASTE’ OF TAXPAYER MONEY “What Musk is doing, going straight to the payment system, is a fantastic idea that we need to adopt in Britain, but the reality is that is not going to happen under the current government, because the current government are part of the problem. They are defenders of the deep state. They’re not going to be investigating themselves. I think this is something that has to happen when there’s a change of government. We are watching very closely what Elon Musk is doing. It’s a fantastic playbook for what needs to happen in the U.K.” DOGE’s revelations about America’s federal funding and the mass layoffs of government employees have shaken up Washington this past month. Truss said that Musk is even holding the British government accountable. CHAINSAW-WIELDING ELON MUSK MAKES ‘DARK MAGA’ APPEARANCE WITH JAVIER MILEI AT CPAC “Sometimes I say that Elon Musk is the leader of the opposition in Britain, because he’s the one actually on X, challenging Keir Starmer’s policies, talking about issues like the grooming gangs, the appalling gangs who have been raping girls as young as 12. It’s Elon Musk that’s been taking the fight to Keir Starmer,” she said. Musk and Trump’s ability to seize the social media narrative and America’s growing independent media space inspired Truss to establish a “new free speech media network” in the United Kingdom. “We have a massive problem with free speech in Britain,” Truss said. “People are being locked up for posts on Facebook and on X, which is extraordinary. We’re the country that invented freedom of the press back in 1695. It was almost 100 years before the First Amendment. And now we are, as a country, locking people up for saying things online.” “This needs to change. So, what I’m establishing is a new free speech media network, which will enable people in Britain to hear what is actually going on, and people across Europe to hear what’s going on.” she continued. “I think that’s really important. If you look at the Trump revolution, independent media was a major part of that.” Trump leaned on new media during his 2024 presidential campaign, posting TikTok videos from the campaign trail, spending nearly three hours with the widely popular podcaster Joe Rogan and using Truth Social as a direct line to his core base. Truss said that Trump is leading a “conservative revolution” and attended CPAC this year to learn how she can model his American success back in the United Kingdom. “What we’re seeing happening in America is a revolution. It’s a conservative revolution. All of the problems we have in our societies in the West, the leftist ideology that’s taken over, whether it’s wokeism or extreme environmentalism or anti-capitalism, all of those are being taken on by President Trump. And I want to see a similar revolution in Britain, which is why I’m here to learn about how they’re doing it, to talk about how we build that kind of movement in Britain,” Truss said. The former prime minister said she agrees with Trump on “everything from deporting illegal migrants; to cutting taxes; to drill, baby, drill; to being clear that men can’t be in women’s bathrooms.” She said Britain needs to implement these policies and fire the “permanent bureaucrats who are part of the problem.” “The big difference with Britain is our bureaucracy is more powerful than the American bureaucracy. Most people working in government are career bureaucrats, and that’s what I think we need to learn from America. We need to change,” Truss added. Truss said she has had productive conversations with European and world leaders this week, strategizing about how to broaden their conservative coalition and create policies to bring energy prices down and boost the economy. Truss even said she had plans for a British CPAC. Truss resigned as British prime minister after 49 days in office in 2022 after her large tax cut plan destabilized the economy. She was one of three prime ministers in the United Kingdom within a four-month period in 2022. “I recognize that, given the situation, I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party,” Truss said in her resignation. The United Kingdom’s current prime minister and leader of the Labour Party, Keir Starmer, ended 14 consecutive years of Conservative party rule when he was elected in 2024. There is a UK DOGE movement gaining traction on social media for revealing wasteful British spending. The Procurement Files is an X account that combs through more than 300,000 contracts on the United Kingdom’s public government database to reveal mismanagement of British taxpayer money, much like the official US DOGE account does. Nigel Farage, the Reform UK party leader who initiated Britain’s departure from the European Union, has explicitly called for a UK DOGE. Despite the discontent from conservative leaders on British government efficiency, the prime minister’s office said that it has created initiatives to cut government waste. “The Chancellor has asked all departments to deliver
USAID workers send message to Trump on boxes while leaving office for last time
Sacked United States Agency for International Development (USAID) staffers left their Washington, D.C., offices for the last time on Friday, with some carrying boxes scrawled with messages that seemed to be directed at President Donald Trump, who is slashing the agency’s workforce. Thousands of staffers were notified weeks ago of their pending dismissals, while a federal judge on Friday cleared the way for the Trump administration to follow through with the mass layoffs as it aims to eliminate waste throughout the federal bureaucracy. “We are abandoning the world,” read one message on a box being hauled out by a grinning staffer as she walked out of USAID’s Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs office. ‘WASTEFUL AND DANGEROUS’: DOGE’S TOP FIVE MOST SHOCKING REVELATIONS Another smiling staffer’s box had a more upbeat tone, with her message reading: “You can take the humanitarians out of USAID but you can’t take the humanity out of the humanitarians.” The staffers were greeted outside the offices by a small group of well-wishing supporters and former USAID workers who carried signs reading, “We love USAID” and “Thank you for your service, USAID.” Other workers were seen leaving the offices in tears. The Trump administration plans to gut the agency and intends to leave fewer than 300 staffers on the job out of the current 8,000 direct hires and contractors. They, along with an unknown number of 5,000 locally hired international staffers abroad, would run the few life-saving programs that the administration says it intends to keep going for the time being. USAID has come in for particular criticism under the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) for alleged wasteful spending. For instance, Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, the Senate DOGE Caucus Chairwoman, recently published a list of projects and programs she says USAID has helped fund over the years, including $20 million to produce a Sesame Street show in Iraq. Several more examples of questionable spending have been uncovered at USAID, including more than $900,000 to a “Gaza-based terror charity” called Bayader Association for Environment and Development and a $1.5 million program slated to “advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in Serbia’s workplaces and business communities.” SECRETARY OF STATE RUBIO CONFIRMS BECOMING ACTING USAID CHIEF Trump has moved to gut the agency after imposing a 90-day pause on foreign aid. He also has appointed Secretary of State Marco Rubio as the acting director of USAID. Government employee unions had sued to stop the mass layoffs, but U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols on Friday lifted a temporary restraining order he had issued at the outset of the case and declined to issue a longer-term order keeping the employees in their posts. Nichols, who was appointed by President Trump during his first term, also wrote that because the affected employees had not gone through an administrative dispute process, he likely did not have jurisdiction to hear the unions’ case or consider their broader arguments that the administration is violating the U.S. Constitution by shutting down an agency created and funded by Congress. The judge said the issue was jurisdictional, that federal district courts should not be involved at this stage, and that the matter should be handled administratively under federal employment laws. “The court concludes that plaintiffs have not demonstrated that they or their members will suffer irreparable injury absent an injunction; that their claims are likely to succeed on the merits; or that the balance of the hardships or the public interest strongly favors an injunction.” The unions can now go to the Washington, D.C., federal appeals court for emergency relief to have the TRO put back into place, or possibly a preliminary injunction. Fox News’ Bill Mears, Andrew Mark Miller, Aubrie Spady, Deirdre Heavey, Morgan Phillips and Emma Colton as well as Reuters contributed to this report.
DOGE takes a chainsaw to federal spending with 7 major victories this week: ‘Got to be done’
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) spent another week slashing hundreds of millions in spending by the federal government, while dodging various legal attempts to block its cost-cutting efforts. Here are some of DOGE’s big wins this week: On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, an Obama appointee, shot down a request from several federal labor unions, including the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), to pause the mass firings of federal workers by the Trump administration. NTEU and four other labor unions representing federal employees filed a complaint Feb. 12 challenging the firing of probationary employees and the deferred resignation program, which gives workers the option to agree to work from an office or resign. EXPERT REVEALS MASSIVE LEVELS OF WASTE DOGE CAN SLASH FROM ENTITLEMENTS, PET PROJECTS: ‘A LOT OF FAT’ Cooper denied the request to stop the firings, saying the court lacked jurisdiction over the unions’ claims. Instead, Cooper ruled the unions must pursue their challenges through the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute, which provides for administrative review by the Federal Labor Relations Authority. DOGE was handed another victory by U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, who denied a request to issue a temporary restraining order preventing Musk and DOGE from accessing data systems at the Department of Education, Office of Personnel Management (OPM), Department of Labor, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Energy, Department of Transportation and Department of Commerce. The agencies were asking Chutkan to forbid both Musk and DOGE from terminating, furloughing or putting on leave any of their employees. Chutkin ruled that DOGE can continue to operate as it is now. The judge also issued a court briefing schedule for plaintiffs and defendants to file motions for discovery, preliminary injunctions and dismissals, which stretches through April 22. DOGE scored a win in court after a federal judge declined a request to temporarily block Elon Musk’s government efficiency team from accessing sensitive data from at least three federal agencies. Unions and nonprofits attempted to stop Musk’s DOGE from accessing records at the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The efforts were blocked by District Judge John Bates, who wrote in an opinion that the government was likely correct in categorizing DOGE as an agency, thereby allowing it to detail its staff to other government departments. Musk praised the decision on X with the caption: “LFG,” an abbreviation for “Let’s [expletive] go.” DEFENSE SECRETARY HEGSETH WORKING WITH DOGE TO CUT THE ‘BS’ Earlier this week, DOGE announced it had discovered an identification code linking U.S. Treasury payments to a budget line item, which accounts for nearly $4.7 trillion in payments, that was oftentimes left blank. “The Treasury Access Symbol (TAS) is an identification code linking a Treasury payment to a budget line item (standard financial process),” DOGE wrote in a post on X. “In the Federal Government, the TAS field was optional for ~$4.7 Trillion in payments and was often left blank, making traceability almost impossible. As of Saturday, this is now a required field, increasing insight into where money is actually going.” The agency thanked the U.S. Treasury for its work in identifying the optional field. According to the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, which is under the Treasury, TAS codes are used to describe any one of the account identification codes assigned by the Treasury and are also referred to as the “account.” Schools spent hundreds of billions of COVID relief funds on expenses that had “little” impact on students, such as Las Vegas hotel rooms and the purchase of an ice cream truck, according to the Trump administration’s cost-cutting department. DOGE revealed Thursday that schools have spent nearly $200 billion in COVID relief funds “with little oversight or impact on students.” WHITE HOUSE OUTLINES WHERE DOGE SAVINGS COULD GO AFTER TRUMP FLOATS RETURNING 20% TO AMERICANS Granite Public Schools in Utah spent COVID relief funds on $86,000 in hotel rooms at Caesars Palace, a ritzy Las Vegas Casino, while Santa Ana Unified spent $393,000 to rent a Major League Baseball stadium, according to a report by Parents Defending Education and shared by DOGE. The cost-cutting department also revealed that schools spent $60,000 in COVID relief funds on swimming pool passes, while a California district used its funds to purchase an ice cream truck. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is working with DOGE to make cuts within his department, saying he believes it will find waste “not core to our mission.” “They’re here, and we’re welcoming them,” Hegseth said in a recent video released Thursday. “They’re going to have broad access, obviously, with all the safeguards on classification. “They care just like we do, to find the redundancies and identify the last vestiges of Biden priorities — the DEI, the woke, the climate change B.S., that’s not core to our mission, and we’re going to get rid of it all.” Hegseth, who said many DOGE workers are veterans, met with Musk’s team and said they have already started their review of the Department of Defense. DOGE revealed on Tuesday that the U.S. government has more than 4 million active credit cards on its books. “The US government currently has ~4.6M active credit cards/accounts, which processed ~90M unique transactions for ~$40B of spend[ing] in FY24,” DOGE said in a post on X. The cost-cutting department broke down multiple federal agencies and their credit card use, with the DOD leading the way in both the number of transactions, about 27.2 million, and the number of individual accounts, roughly 2.4 million. Musk delivered a speech to conservatives Thursday in which he touted the accomplishments of DOGE and, at one point, stood on the stage holding a golden chainsaw given to him by Argentina’s President Javier Milei, symbolizing the cuts being made to government spending, to the delight of the crowd of conservatives at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland. “We’re fighting Matrix big time here,” Musk said. “It has got to be done.” Fox News’ Alex Nitzberg, Emma
Wisconsin Democratic governor proposes replacing ‘mother’ with ‘inseminated person’ in state law
Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, is facing backlash for introducing a budget recommendation that changes the word “mother” to “inseminated person,” and “paternity” to “parentage” in certain parts of state law. The Evers administration’s budget recommendation for the 2025-2027 fiscal period advises several other gendered terms be changed, as well. References to “wife” or “husband” are changed to “spouse” in the proposal. In other places, the word “father” is changed to “parent,” and “mother” is swapped out for the phrase “parent who gave birth to the child.” The budget was introduced by the state Senate’s Joint Committe on Finance on Tuesday. JUDGE BLOCKS PARTS OF TRUMP EXECUTIVE ORDERS TARGETING DEI, CITING FREE SPEECH Wisconsin radio host Dan O’Donnell noted the language change in a post on X, calling it “beyond parody.” Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, commented on the post, writing simply “red flag!” The Republican Governors Association (RGA) issued a statement in response to the language changes. Evers’ “latest left-wing push” is “offensive to mothers,” RGA executive director Sara Craig said in a statement. “Being a mother is the greatest privilege I will have in my lifetime, and every mother I know feels the same. If Tony Evers can reduce motherhood to an ‘inseminated person’ then our society is lost.” When introducing the budget proposal, Evers said his plan would eliminate income tax on tips, prevent homeowners from seeing property tax increases and improve the state’s infrastructure, among other things. However, he made no mention of the language in the bill. WISCONSIN BANS TRANS ATHLETES FROM GIRLS’ SPORTS, FOLLOWING TRUMP’S EXECUTIVE ORDER The cultural battle over gendered language has raged for the last few years with debates over the use of terms like “chestfeeding” instead of “breastfeeding” or “birthing person” instead of “mother.” On his first day back in the Oval Office, President Donald Trump attacked the issue head-on with an executive order called “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.” In the order, President Trump makes it official government policy “to recognize two sexes, male and female,” saying they are “not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.” The order also explicitly states that “’sex’ is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender ideology.’” Earlier this month, Trump issued another order on gender ideology called “Keeping Men out of Women’s Sports.” The order is designed to prevent transgender athletes from competing against women. On Friday, during an event at the White House, the president had a heated exchange with Gov. Janet Mills, D-Me., in which he threatened to pull federal funding if the state does not comply with his order. The exchange ended with both saying they would see the other in court over the issue. READ THE BUDGET RECOMMENDATION – APP USERS, CLICK HERE: Fox News Digital reached out to Evers’ office for comment.