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GOP governor calls on incoming Trump officials to ban junk food in food stamps: ‘Make America Healthy Again’

FIRST ON FOX: Arkansas Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders has sent a letter to the incoming Trump administration heads of the Health and Agriculture departments, calling for the end of junk food as part of the federal food stamp program. “As you know, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is a $113 billion federal program designed to support low income families with food assistance,” Sanders wrote in a letter obtained by Fox News Digital to HHS Secretary-nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Agriculture Secretary-nominee Brooke Rollins. “Unfortunately, this ‘Nutrition Assistance’ program is undermining the health of millions of Americans, on the taxpayers’ dime, by encouraging families to eat highly processed, unhealthy junk food.” “In fact, soda, unhealthy snacks, candy, and dessert account for nearly 23 percent, or $25 billion, of all SNAP purchases. Given the relationship between junk food and poor health, our federal food assistance policies are fueling obesity, diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, and a wide range of chronic health conditions around America.” Sanders cited her experience as a mother of three as motivation for “improving maternal health outcomes” in children and explained that one third of the people in her state suffer from diabetes or pre-diabetes, and 40% struggle with obesity. TRUMP TAPS RFK JR. TO LEAD DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES “Sadly, these health conditions disproportionately affect lower-income families-the same people who rely on SNAP for food,” Sanders wrote. Sanders cited the work of Stanford University Professor Jayanta Bhattacharya, nominated by President-elect Donald Trump to head the National Institutes of Health, which concluded that removing sugary drinks and snacks from the SNAP program would prevent obesity in 141,000 children and Type 2 diabetes in 240,000 adults. TRUMP-RFK JR. ALLIANCE BECOMES BEACON OF HOPE FOR ‘CRUNCHY MOMS’: ‘STANDING UP FOR OUR CHILDREN’ “Health-centered SNAP reform also offers a great opportunity for Americans to support Arkansas farmers by enjoying Arkansas-grown and harvested poultry, eggs, beef, pecans, peanuts, soy, strawberries, sweet potatoes, rice, peaches, oats, and more,” Sanders wrote. “As someone who believes in the Trump administration’s unifying, aspirational vision for the future, the time has come to support American farmers and end taxpayer-funded junk food.” “As Secretaries, I ask that you work collaboratively across the Administration to prohibit the sale of junk food in SNAP and end taxpayer-funded junk food. I also wish to notify you of my intent to pursue a SNAP waiver from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service that would support fresh fruits, vegetables, eggs, and protein and prohibit using SNAP for junk food.” Sanders closes the letter by saying, “Together, we can, and we will, Make America Healthy Again.” Sanders’ letter is likely to have a sympathetic ear in the form of Kennedy Jr., who has openly expressed his desire for healthier food in the United States. “We have a generation of kids who are swimming around in a toxic soup right now,” Kennedy previously told Fox News in regards to process foods. “We’re letting these industries corrupt our agencies and mass poison them.”

Biden, Democrats back away from bill that would give Trump more federal judges to appoint

President Biden and key Democrats are now opposing a once bipartisan bill that would have authorized 63 new permanent district judgeships now that President-elect Donald Trump would be the one to fill 21 of those slots once he takes office. The Senate in August passed the “Judicial Understaffing Delays Getting Emergencies Solved Act” or the “JUDGES Act of 2024,” which staggers the 63 new permanent judgeships the president may choose over the next 10 years. Citing how courts are burdened by heavy caseloads, the bill says the president shall appoint 11 of those permanent judgeships in 2025 and 11 more in 2027. The president would tap another 10 judges in 2029, 11 in 2031, 10 in 2033 and 10 more in 2035, the bill says. Democrats are decrying how the bill did not come to a vote in the House before the election – when control of the next presidency, and therefore which party would choose those next 21 judges, still hung in the balance. The White House released a statement on Tuesday saying Biden would now veto the bill if it came to his desk. “While judicial staffing is important to the rule of law, S. 4199 is unnecessary to the efficient and effective administration of justice,” the White House said. “The bill would create new judgeships in states where Senators have sought to hold open existing judicial vacancies. Those efforts to hold open vacancies suggest that concerns about judicial economy and caseload are not the true motivating force behind passage of this bill now.” TRUMP WILL APPOINT ‘DOZENS’ OF JUDGES, EXPERTS SAY, DESPITE DEMS RAMMING THROUGH NOMINEES IN LAME-DUCK SESSION “In addition, neither the House nor the Senate fully explored how the work of senior status judges and magistrate judges affects the need for new judgeships,” the White House continued. “Further, the Senate passed this bill in August, but the House refused to take it up until after the election. Hastily adding judges with just a few weeks left in the 118th Congress would fail to resolve key questions in the legislation, especially regarding how the judges are allocated.” During a House Rules Committee hearing on Monday, Rep. Chip Roy, R-N.C., and House Judiciary Committee chair Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, made the argument that a significant number of districts in states, regardless of their political make-up, have sounded the alarm about staffing shortages worsening the backlogs of cases. However, despite the significant need, they argued, the appointment process has become politicized. “We need the number of judges,” Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee, admitted. “However, President Trump has shown, he bragged that by his three appointments, he overturned Roe v. Wade. He said he was going to do it. He did it. So don’t tell me it’s not political.” “Under this legislation, we all promised to give the next three unknown presidents a certain number of judges,” Nadler said. “Because no one can tell the future we were all at an equal disadvantage, but for this deal to work, the bill had to be passed before Election Day.” The bill text cites how as of March 31, 2023, there were 686,797 pending cases in the district courts across the country, with an average of 491 weighted case filings per judgeship over a 12-month period. Shortly before the White House released its statement signaling Biden would veto the bill, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., gave a speech noting how the JUDGES Act passed the Senate by unanimous consent in August. TRUMP NAMES ALINA HABBA AS COUNSELOR TO THE PRESIDENT; REVEALS SEVERAL STATE DEPARTMENT PICKS The bipartisan support, McConnell argued, proved “that the right to a speedy trial still enjoys overwhelming popularity.” “I was particularly encouraged by the vocal endorsement of our friend, the Democratic leader, who recognized the measure as, quote, ‘very responsible, bipartisan and prudent bill that would lead to a better functioning judiciary.’ Soon, we expect the House to take up and pass the JUDGES Act with similar overwhelming support,” McConnell said. “And normally, we could rest assured that such popular action would be signed into law without further ado. But maybe not this time.” “Last week, the White House seemed to suggest, through anonymous comment that President Biden has concerns with the bill. I, for one, would be curious to hear the president’s rationale. It’s hard to imagine a justification for blocking the JUDGES Act that doesn’t smack of naked partisanship,” McConnell, who did lead the GOP effort to block former President Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, said. “It’s almost inconceivable that a lame duck president would consider vetoing such an obviously prudential step for any reason other than selfish spite.” CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP “Litigants across America deserve their day in court,” he said. “They deserve to know the federal judiciary has the bandwidth to carefully and thoroughly consider their cases. The president, former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is well equipped to appreciate this fact, and I hope he acts accordingly.”

Federal judge who refuses mental evaluation at age 97 fights suspension

Judge Pauline Newman, the oldest federal judge in America at age 97, is continuing to fight against a suspension from the bench by her colleagues who found her mentally not fit enough to serve. Newman is appealing her suspension and has also filed a motion to unseal documents related to an investigation which ultimately led to her being temporarily removed from the bench. Newman, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1985 to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, was barred from serving in September 2023 for a year by the Federal Circuit’s Judicial Council after the panel said she refused to cooperate with an investigation into “reasonable concerns” surrounding her mental fitness. The suspension was extended for another year by the panel in September. The Committee on Judicial Conduct conducted more than 20 interviews with court staff pointing to her “significant mental deterioration including memory loss, confusion, lack of comprehension, paranoia, anger, hostility and severe agitation,” per court documents. FEDERAL JUDGE, 96, BARRED FROM HEARING CASES AFTER PANEL CLAIMS LACK OF MENTAL FITNESS: ‘BASELESS ALLEGATIONS’ The suspension order also said Newman was slower than her colleagues in issuing opinions and had “amassed a troubling backlog of cases,” which her team has said is not accurate. The Federal Circuit Court on which Newman has served for nearly 40 years deals frequently with patent, intellectual property and copyright cases. Newman is considered a leading intellectual property jurist. The investigation into Newman led her to file a federal lawsuit against her fellow judges. U.S. District Judge Christopher R. Cooper, a President Obama appointee, threw out most of Newman’s lawsuit in February, then dismissed the entire case on the pleadings in July, per Law & Crime. In his 15-page ruling, Cooper rejected the legal challenges Newman had raised to the Judicial Conduct & Disability Act and did not focus on the factual allegations against Newman. Newman appealed the ruling Monday and argued via counsel to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that although advanced in age, she “retains her sharp intellect,” and both lay and expert witnesses have described her as an “unusually cognitively intact … woman” whose cognitive and physical abilities make her appear “20 or more years younger than her stated age,” per Law & Crime. She says she is physically and mentally fit enough to continue doing her job, and has obtained independent evaluations from doctors issuing the same opinion, court documents revealed. REAGAN-APPOINTED JUDGE, NOW 95, FACES PROBE INTO WHETHER SHE CAN STILL DO THE JOB In the appellate brief, cited by Law & Crime, Newman’s counsel said she was in sound mental and physical health, and argued that the only reason Newman was late in submitting written opinions is that “she takes extraordinary pains to ensure that her opinions fully reflect her views and remain consistent from case to case and year to year.” Newman is being represented in the lawsuit by the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA), a nonprofit civil rights group that says it views the “administrative state” as an especially serious threat to constitutional freedoms. The group says that the suspension is illegal and that Newman was removed without due process. “Judge Newman’s indefinite, complete suspension is unprecedented in American judicial history, exceeding sanctions imposed on judges who committed serious misconduct and improprieties,” the group said in a statement. “Suspending an Article III judge from all judicial functions of her office is unconstitutional.” The group said that world-renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Aaron G. Filler recently directed a cutting-edge Perfusion Computed Tomography (PCT) scan of Newman’s brain and administered a full neurological examination that turned up “no relevant deficits, confirming that she is fully fit to perform the duties of the office.” On Thursday, Greg Dolin, who has represented Newman throughout the case, said via a statement that the entire disciplinary process against Judge Newman was “always factually baseless and legally meritless.” “But the issues are more important than Judge Newman,” said Dolin, a senior litigation counsel for the NCLA. “At stake is the very independence of American judiciary and our system of checks and balances. The D.C. Circuit should put a stop to the Federal Circuit Judicial Council’s unconstitutional and ultra vires actions against Judge Newman.” Newman also filed a motion to unseal documents related to the committee’s investigation and findings that are subject to a Dec. 4 gag order, per Law & Crime. Newman’s legal team said that Newman’s judicial colleagues have refused to abide by rules of judicial conduct and have “threatened Judge Newman and her counsel with unspecified sanctions” for making documents public. Her team also accused the defendants of seeking to “direct the process within their own forum” in an “entirely inappropriate effort” to contradict the law. Former senior U.S. District Judge Wesley Brown, was the oldest person to serve as a federal judge in the history of the United States, actively hearing cases until approximately one month before his death at age 104, according to the U.S. Courts. Fox News’ Brianna Herlihy and Elizabeth Pritchet contributed to this report.

Biden admin extends $10B Iran sanctions waiver 2 days after Trump election win

Biden admin extends B Iran sanctions waiver 2 days after Trump election win

The Biden administration has renewed a controversial sanctions waiver that will allow Iran access to some $10 billion in payments from Iraq – an action that came just two days after President-elect Trump emerged victorious on Election Day. Secretary of State Antony Blinken again extended the waiver for humanitarian trade, which permits Iran to access accounts in Iraq and Oman. However, Republican critics have said that allowing the Iranian regime access to these funds frees up money Iran can use to support terrorism in the Middle East or advance its nuclear program. “On November 7th, the department did renew Iraq’s electricity waiver for the 23rd time since 2018. It was done so for an additional 120 days,” State Department spokesman Vedant Patel confirmed last week. US NAVY DEFEATS HOUTHI ATTACKS IN GULF OF ADEN FOR SECOND TIME IN WEEKS “We remain committed to reducing Iran’s malign influence in the region. Our viewpoint is that a stable, sovereign and secure Iraq is critical to these efforts,” he added, pointing out that this sanctions waiver began in 2018 during the first Trump administration. Congress has passed several sanctions targeting Iran that give the president authority to temporarily suspend, or “waive” the sanctions if the president determines doing so is in the interests of U.S. national security. GOP SENATOR QUESTIONS FBI OVER REPORTED IRANIAN HACK ATTEMPT OF TRUMP PICK KASH PATEL The waiver is set to expire after Trump takes office in January. It is unclear whether the Trump administration would again extend the sanctions relief. The Trump transition team did not immediately respond to a request for comment. House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, argued Tuesday that the sanctions waiver allows Iran to fund proxy terror groups that have attacked U.S. forces in the Middle East. FALL OF SYRIA’S BASHAR ASSAD IS STRATEGIC BLOW TO IRAN AND RUSSIA, EXPERTS SAY “The House voted to eliminate these waiver authorities — twice. But the Biden administration is still waiving the sanctions, putting more money in the Iranian regime’s pockets to fund its terrorist proxies and nuclear weapons program,” McCaul posted on X. “The U.S. should not be subsidizing Iran’s malign activities.”

Outgoing Rep. Jamaal Bowman issues ‘Dear White People’ thread following Daniel Penny acquittal

On the heels of Marine veteran Daniel Penny’s acquittal, outgoing Rep. Jamaal Bowman issued a “Dear White People” thread on X which he started by saying he did not know why he felt the need to keep talking to white people. “Dear White People, I don’t know why I feel the need to keep talking to you. I don’t know why part of me still has hope for you and for us. Some of you are too far gone. But maybe enough of you aren’t and will join us in fighting to end white supremacy,” Bowman declared in the first post of his thread. Bowman, who decisively lost the Democratic primary in New York’s 16th Congressional District earlier this year, will soon depart from Congress because his term ends in less than a month. JAMAAL BOWMAN LOSS ENRAGES LIBERALS, LEFT-WING COMMENTATORS: ‘WILLING TO BUY OUR DEMOCRACY’ “I just wanna call out the hypocrisy and evil of it all and just continue to hope. I won’t rely completely on you because I know what’s most important is to work with my community and other like minded allies in the fight for justice. But I guess I’ll just offer this,” Bowman wrote. “I am 48 years old and I have seen countless incidents of brutal police violence and killings in my lifetime,” he declared before going on to mention individuals including Rodney King, George Floyd, and others. “Jordan Neely is the latest. He was sick. He was not a threat. He was subdued. Still not a threat. Daniel Penny choked him for 6 minutes. And killed him. We all watched it on camera, and he was still acquitted,” the lawmaker asserted. The congressman made the posts after Marine veteran Daniel Penny was found not guilty of criminally negligent homicide in the death of Jordan Neely. DANIEL PENNY SAYS HE COULDN’T LIVE WITH GUILT IF JORDAN NEELY HURT SUBWAY PASSENGERS “I’ve left out probably another hundred instances of this trauma in my life. For comparison, I ask white people, how many times have you seen a white man killed in cold blood on camera on your newsfeed? How many times have you even heard about this?” Bowman asked. “The answer is never. You never have. And whenever you feel discomfort from your whiteness, Black people are harmed or killed. And there is never accountability or justice. This is the evil of white supremacy. It spans across geography and political parties and sickens us all,” he declared. “I wish I didn’t have to live with all of this trauma deep in my bones. I wish I could just be free to be me. I marvel at the beauty and greatness of my people in spite of white supremacy. It’s extraordinary. That is what I will continue to lean on.” NEW YORK GOP LEADER CELEBRATES BOWMAN’S DOUBLE-DIGIT DEFEAT TO PRO-ISRAEL DEMOCRAT: ‘GOOD RIDDANCE, JAMAAL’ Bowman retweeted his “Dear White People” post, the first part of his multi-post thread, and commented, “Seems like I hit a nerve. White people on X going crazy on this one. Must’ve been a lot of truth in what I posted.” “Wow. This has been so triggering for so many of you. Do you realize you’re actually proving my point? If you are that triggered by this, imagine how I must feel when Black people are murdered consistently and there is no Justice. Y’all can’t handle a tweet. Fascinating,” Bowman wrote in another post.

Florida lawmaker introduces bill to require DACA students to pay out-of-state tuition

Florida state Sen. Randy Fine, a Republican, proposed a bill to require high school graduates with Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, status to pay out-of-state tuition for college. Fine claims the state cannot afford to subsidize tuition for students who are not in the country legally and says the policy passed in 2014 offering them in-state tuition costs Florida $45 million a year. Under S.B. 90, DACA students would no longer qualify for in-state tuition, which costs an average of $6,143 for the 2024-2025 academic year, according to the State University System of Florida. The University of Florida, for example, is $6,381 for in-state tuition but $28,658 for out-of-state tuition, according to US News & World Report. DESANTIS WELCOMES FLORIDA STATE LAWMAKER TO REPUBLICAN PARTY AS SHE DITCHES DEMOCRATS “While blue-collar Floridians are struggling to make ends meet, it is not fair to require them to pay $45 million a year to subsidize sweetheart deals for college degrees to those who should not even be here,” Fine said in a statement. “This is a no-brainer way to reduce the size of government and free up resources to help Floridians in need,” he continued. “We must put Floridians first, and I am proud to do my part to rebalance the scales for our citizens.” The bill would not modify the admission policies of Florida’s 12 state universities and 28 state colleges. State Rep. Anna Eskamani, a Democrat, has expressed strong opposition to the bill, arguing that the proposed change would create significant financial barriers for students who have lived in Florida most of their lives. “These are students who have only known the United States as home,” Eskamani said, according to Fox 13. Eskamani also noted that many DACA students do not qualify for scholarships and are already at a financial disadvantage. The legislation, Fine argues, is about “ensuring people who shouldn’t be in the country aren’t getting discounted educations,” according to Fox 13. TRUMP PRESSING DESANTIS TO NAME LARA TRUMP AS RUBIO’S SENATE SUCCESSOR: SOURCE CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Fine’s previous attempts to pass similar legislation have come up short, but Democrats worry that increased national focus on immigration issues, such as President-elect Trump promising mass deportations in his second term, could give the bill momentum this time around. “I am concerned this policy may have legs this year,” Eskamani said. Fine, who joined the state Senate last month, is resigning from the legislature, effective March 31, so he can run for the U.S. House seat that is expected to be vacated by U.S. Rep. Michael Waltz, R-Fla., who was nominated by Trump to be his White House national security advisor.

Protesters attempt to stop removal of hundreds of migrants from public-funded housing

Activists and several elected officials gathered outside New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office in the Capitol in Albany on Monday to protest the closure of two hotels housing several hundred migrants in the state’s capital region. New York City has a “right to shelter” law, requiring the city to provide shelter for anyone who asks for it and has no other options. Protest organizers said they were advocating for Hochul to intervene to prevent the migrants’ eviction and to provide new state funding to shelter the migrants. Speaking during the protest, Angelica Perez-Delgado, president of the pro-migrant nonprofit Ibero-American Action League, said, “Our need right now is to ensure that people in our hotels are not evicted. We need leadership and money from Gov. Hochul right now to fund at least six months of housing and related services.” BLUE STATE TO SHUTTER OVER DOZEN MIGRANT SHELTERS AS TRUMP’S SET TO IMPLEMENT DEPORTATION AGENDA The migrants in Albany have been staying at a Ramada Plaza and Holiday Inn Express, both of which are being paid for by the New York City government and are set to close this month. The hundreds in Albany are just a fraction of the 58,000 migrants being housed by the city of New York and the more than 223,000 migrants who have received taxpayer aid since 2022. According to a report released this year by the New York City Comptroller’s Office, the city is projected to spend $987 million in two years on contracted hotels for tens of thousands of migrants. In total, the city is projected to spend more than $12 billion in responding to the migrant surge through fiscal 2025. Since the election of President-elect Donald Trump last month, however, the city has moved to scale back its shelter program, closing some 12 shelters by the end of the year. NYC HOME TO NEARLY 60K ‘CRIMINAL’ MIGRANTS: REPORT New York City Mayor Eric Adams has been behind many of the moves to crack down on services for migrants, saying, “We have been wasting taxpayers’ money for far too long.” The city has already shuttered two hotels-turned-migrant shelters: the Hotel Merit in Manhattan and the Quality Inn JFK in Queens. Eight more shelters in Dutchess, Erie, Orange and Westchester counties are also set to close by the end of the year. The protest against the closures was organized by a group called Columbia County Sanctuary Movement and a coalition of local nonprofits. One of the protest leaders, Bryan McCormack, co-executive director of the Columbia County Sanctuary Movement, said migrant families “should not be forced to abandon their jobs or uproot their lives to return to New York City shelters.” MAYOR ADAMS CALLS FOR ‘INVOLUNTARY REMOVAL’ OF PEOPLE WHO ARE ‘A DANGER TO OTHERS’ ON THE STREETS Speaking with Fox News Digital after the rally, McCormack said it is important to quickly find the migrants shelter as the harsh New York winter approaches. He also said New York City has used the crisis and migrants as a “political football” and “mismanaged the whole process.” He said the migrants being sheltered in the hotels have “already established gainful employment and a life here” and have “been a major contributor to New York’s communities, cultures and economies.” “As somebody from upstate New York, I see every day how the immigrant community has impacted our lives as New York residents, from the food that’s put on our table to the revitalization of our cities through construction to caring for sick and elderly folks throughout the pandemic and on to now,” he said. “So, we hope that they will be able to continue to contribute to the capital region’s culture and economy and make a full integration into our community.” New York State Assembly member Matt Slater, however, told Fox News Digital that the protesters outside Hochul’s office are “out of touch” with the real feelings of New Yorkers about the migrant crisis. TOP CONSERVATIVE GROUP REVEALS ROAD MAP TO REBUILD NEW US IMMIGRATION SYSTEM ‘FROM THE ASHES’ “New Yorkers have had it,” he said. “My constituents are demanding accountability. They want to make sure that we live in a state that respects the rule of law, that understands that illegal immigration is illegal. Hard stop.” According to a Siena poll published this week, a majority of New York voters (54% to 35%) say the state should support rather than oppose the upcoming Trump administration’s efforts to deport illegal immigrants in the state. “It is a real concern for my constituents in the Hudson Valley,” said Slater. “If people are protesting the fact that we’re finally getting real about illegal immigration, they should open their own doors and welcome these people in. By all means, no one’s stopping them. But to sit here and say that taxpayers should be fronting billions of dollars to continue to incentivize those who are breaking our laws is madness and insanity.” Slater said that though he is hopeful about the Trump administration clamping down on the border, he said New York state and city governments must also do their part. According to Slater, New York, which is a sanctuary state, allocated $4.3 billion of taxpayer money in the latest budget to provide a host of services for migrants, like housing, clothing, food and cellphones. “We cannot continue to allow a state government, a city government, to continue to incentivize illegal immigration by utilizing taxpayer dollars,” he said. “It is wrong, and it must end.”

Biden could pardon these Trump adversaries amid Dem fears that ‘revengeful first year’ is looming

President Biden’s days in office are coming down to the wire, and amid President-elect Donald Trump’s transition into the Oval Office, the 46th president is reportedly considering pardoning high-profile allies and fellow Democrats who are viewed as Trump’s political foes. After Trump’s election win over Vice President Harris last month, Massachusetts Democrat Sen. Ed Markey said he expects Trump to act in a “fascistic way” as president and called on Biden to pardon Democrats and the party’s allies who could face prosecution under a second Trump administration. “I think that, without question, Trump is going to try to act in a dictatorial way, in a fascistic way, in a revengeful first year at least of his administration toward individuals who he believes harmed him,” Markey said during a local radio interview last month. “If it’s clear by Jan. 19 that that is his intention, then I would recommend to President Biden that he provide those preemptive pardons to people because that’s really what our country is going to need next year.” MOTHER OF HUNTER BIDEN’S DAUGHTER DEFENDS PARDON, SAYS HE’S ‘TARGETED BECAUSE OF WHO HIS DAD IS’ The comments were soon echoed by other Democrats and some legal experts in a bid for Biden to sink any prospect of Trump getting “revenge” against his political enemies. “Biden should keep going with his pardons: Trump, Jack Smith & team, Mueller & team, and a blanket pardon for all on Trump’s enemies list for any and all political statements before December 25, 2024! Merry Christmas,” John Dean, CNN contributor and former President Nixon’s White House counsel during the Watergate scandal, posted to social media this month. “Take the wind out of retribution/revenge!” HOW BIDEN – AND TRUMP – HELPED MAKE THE PARDON GO HAYWIRE As Biden wraps up his final days, Fox News Digital compiled a list of prominent Trump antagonists who have been rumored to be among those considered for pardons. Cheney, the Republican former Wyoming congresswoman, and Rep. Bennie Thompson, the Jan. 6 House Select Committee chair, were the targets of Trump’s ire during a recent interview on NBC’s “Meet The Press.” “Cheney did something that’s inexcusable, along with Thompson and the people on the un-select committee of political thugs and, you know, creeps,” he said in the interview. “They deleted and destroyed all evidence.” “And Cheney was behind it, and so was Bennie Thompson and everybody on that committee,” he continued. “For what they did, honestly, they should go to jail.” The Jan. 6 committee was founded in July 2021 to investigate the breach of the U.S. Capitol earlier that year by supporters of Trump ahead of President Biden officially taking office on Jan. 20. The Jan. 6 committee’s investigation was carried out when Democrats held control of the House. BIDEN’S PARDONING OF HUNTER INDICATES HE HAS ‘A LOT MORE TO HIDE’: LARA TRUMP Cheney slammed Trump’s remarks in a statement this week, saying they were a “continuation of his assault on the rule of law,” but she did not address a potential blanket pardon or whether she would accept such an offer. “There is no conceivably appropriate factual or constitutional basis for what Donald Trump is suggesting – a Justice Department investigation of the work of a congressional committee – and any lawyer who attempts to pursue that course would quickly find themselves engaged in sanctionable conduct,” Cheney said in her statement. Thompson’s office also slammed Trump’s comment in a statement provided to Fox Digital this week, arguing that “no election, no conspiracy theory, no pardon, and no threat of vengeful prosecution can rewrite history or wipe away his responsibility for the deadly violence on that horrific day.” “We stood up to him before, and we will continue to do so,” he added. The former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, was a keystone of the nation’s pandemic response, including advising then-President Trump in 2020 on how to handle COVID-19 as it swept across communities. Fauci’s tenure under the first Trump administration, however, devolved with Trump slamming him and fellow pandemic task force adviser Dr. Deborah Birx as “two self-promoters trying to reinvent history to cover for their bad instincts and faulty recommendations.” FAUCI RIPPED OVER NEW PAPER CRITICIZING TRUMP ON CORONAVIRUS, PROMOTING NATURAL ORIGIN THEORY: ‘EMBARRASSMENT’ Conservatives, including lawmakers such as Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., slammed Fauci for his promotion of mask mandates, vaccine mandates and strict lockdown orders that upended the day-to-day lives of Americans. “Dr. Fauci should be voluntarily removed from TV because what he says is such a disservice, and such fearmongering and almost all of what he says isn’t even matched by the science of his own institute,” Paul, who is a doctor, said in 2021 during an appearance on Fox Business. “It doesn’t obey the science,” he said at the time. “There is no scientific evidence that the lockdowns in Michigan have done anything or in California. In fact, the daily incidents of the disease in the last two months has been about almost one and a half times greater in California than it has been in Florida. The death rate is lower in Florida. So there is no real correlation between economic lockdowns, mask mandates or any of this.” Trump allies, including tech billionaire Elon Musk and Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr, have endorsed calls to prosecute Fauci if evidence is found of any crimes during the pandemic, including the Wuhan lab leak in China. BIDEN, TRUMP BOTH RIP DOJ AFTER PRESIDENT PARDONS HUNTER “If there were crimes that he committed, of course I would tell the attorney general to prosecute him, not hold off,” Kennedy said on Fox News last year. Fauci has denied any wrongdoing amid the pandemic, and he told CNN this year, “I don’t know what one would prosecute me for. … I played a major role in the development of the vaccine that was responsible for the saving of millions

Democrats in a bind over defense bill that bans transgender surgeries for minors but boosts enlisted pay

The House is set to vote Wednesday on its must-pass yearly defense bill that would give junior enlisted troops a significant pay bump and work to eliminate DEI programs at the Pentagon. The 1,800-page bill known as the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), details how $895.2 billion allocated toward defense and national security will be spent. It will be voted on more than two months after the start of the fiscal year. The $895.2 billion represents a 1% increase over last year’s budget, a smaller number than some defense hawks would have liked. A significant portion of the legislation focused on quality-of-life improvements for service members amid record recruitment issues, a focus of much bipartisan discussion over the last year. That includes a 14.5% pay increase for junior enlisted troops and increasing access to child care for service members while also providing job support to military spouses. The measure authorizes a 4.5% across-the-board pay raise for all service members starting Jan. 1. The NDAA typically enjoys wide bipartisan support, but this year’s focus on eliminating “woke” policies could be hard for Democrats to stomach. PENTAGON ANNOUNCES NEW COUNTER-DRONE STRATEGY AS UNMANNED ATTACKS ON US INTERESTS SKYROCKET The policy proposal to prohibit Tricare, the military’s health care provider, from covering transgender services for the minor dependents of service members has raised concerns, prompting the leading Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Adam Smith of Washington, to reconsider his support for the bill. “Blanketly denying health care to people who clearly need it, just because of a biased notion against transgender people, is wrong,” he said in a statement. “This provision injected a level of partisanship not traditionally seen in defense bills.” The goal of that provision is to prevent any “medical interventions that could result in sterilization” of minors. Other provisions, like a blanket ban on funding for gender transition surgeries for adults, did not make their way into the bill, neither did a ban on requiring masks to prevent the spread of diseases. The bill also supports deploying the National Guard to the southern border to help with illegal immigrant apprehensions and drug flow. Another provision opens the door to allowing airmen and Space Force personnel to grow facial hair; it directs the secretary of the Air Force to brief lawmakers on “the feasibility and advisability” of establishing a pilot program to test out allowing beards. US SCRAMBLES AS DRONES SHAPE THE LANDSCAPE OF WAR: ‘THE FUTURE IS HERE’ Democrats are also upset the bill did not include a provision expanding access to IVF for service members. Currently, military health care only covers IVF for troops whose infertility is linked to service-related illness or injury. But the bill did not include an amendment to walk back a provision allowing the Pentagon to reimburse service members who have to travel out of state to get an abortion. The bill extends a hiring freeze on DEI-related roles and stops all such recruitment until “an investigation of the Pentagon’s DEI programs” can be completed. It also bans the Defense Department from contracting with advertising companies “that blacklist conservative news sources,” according to an internal GOP memo. The memo said the NDAA also guts funding for the Biden administration’s “Countering Extremist Activity Working Group” dedicated to rooting out extremism in the military’s ranks. The annual defense policy bill also does not authorize “any climate change programs” and prohibits the Pentagon from issuing climate impact-based guidance on weapons systems. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., touted $31 billion in savings in the legislation that would come from cutting “inefficient programs, obsolete weapons, and bloated Pentagon bureaucracy.” The compromise NDAA bill, negotiated between Republican and Democrat leadership, sets policy for the nation’s largest government agency, but a separate defense spending bill must be passed to allocate funds for such programs.

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