Epstein estate to hand over ‘birthday book’ to lawmakers, House Dem says
Lawmakers could soon have Jeffrey Epstein’s infamous “birthday book,” which could potentially give insight into the disgraced late financier’s social ties. Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., who serves as the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, told MSNBC on Friday that Epstein’s estate “is actually going to actually now get us that book and a bunch of other documents that they have that’s not actually been reported yet.” He added that the lawmakers expect to receive the book and the documents on Sept. 8. Garcia also told MSNBC that “many of the victims” of Epstein would speak to lawmakers on Capitol Hill next week to “highlight their stories.” He did not name the lawmakers or accusers expected to meet. EPSTEIN ESTATE HIT WITH NEW HOUSE SUBPOENA FOR ‘CLIENT LIST,’ CALL LOGS The release date is confirmed in the subpoena signed by House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. James Comer, R-Ky. The specific deadline listed in the subpoena is Sept. 8 at 12 p.m. “The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is reviewing the possible mismanagement of the federal government’s investigation of Mr. Jeffrey Epstein and Ms. Ghislaine Maxwell, the circumstances and subsequent investigations of Mr. Epstein’s death, the operation of sex-trafficking rings and ways for the federal government to effectively combat them, and potential violations of ethics rules related to elected officials,” Comer stated in a cover letter that accompanied the subpoena. TRUMP DOJ HANDING EPSTEIN DOCUMENTS TO HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE ON FRIDAY AS SUBPOENA DEADLINE LOOMS “Recent reporting indicates the estate of Mr. Epstein has access to documents relevant to the Committee’s investigation, including the alleged ‘birthday book’ prepared for Mr. Epstein by Ms. Maxwell… It is imperative that Congress conduct oversight of the federal government’s enforcement of sex trafficking laws generally and specifically its handling of the investigation and prosecution of Mr. Epstein and Ms. Maxwell,” Comer added. BILL BARR, FORMER TRUMP ATTORNEY GENERAL, TO FACE HOUSE INVESTIGATORS IN EPSTEIN PROBE House Oversight Democrats released a statement Monday supporting the subpoena for the book and calling on former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida and Trump Labor Secretary Alex Acosta to testify before Congress. He is expected to appear for a closed-door transcribed interview next month. With a federal probe of the case under way, lawmakers have sought the testimony of several former high-ranking officials, such as former Attorney General Bill Barr. While Barr testified before lawmakers, Democrats, such as Reps. Suhas Subramanyam, D-Va., and Jasmine Crockett, D-Texas, were not pleased with Republicans’ questions. Comer, who argued those accusations were baseless, implored Democrats not to politicize a bipartisan investigation. Divisions deepened after Comer said Barr had no knowledge of, nor did he believe there were any implications of wrongdoing on President Donald Trump’s part related to Epstein. Garcia disagreed. Though he did not attend the deposition, he said in a statement that Barr did not clear Trump. Fox News Digital’s Elizabeth Elkind contributed to this report.
DNC’s summer showdown: Infighting exposes cracks in Democrats’ unity narrative against GOP agenda
MINNEAPOLIS — Democrats came ready to fight as they huddled this week at the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) annual summer meeting. Despite repeated talk that the party is unified as it aims to exit the political wilderness following last year’s election setbacks, Democrats fought among themselves multiple times during the three-day confab, which was held in Minnesota’s largest city. As Democrats hunger for a more forceful response to counter President Donald Trump’s sweeping and controversial agenda, DNC Chair Ken Martin targeted the president, arguing Trump’s acting as “a dictator in chief” and that his second administration is “fascism dressed in a red tie.” Martin pointed to pushback by Democrats against moves this summer by Trump and Republicans to create more right-leaning U.S. House seats in states across the country through rare mid-decade congressional redistricting ahead of next year’s midterm elections. Martin said he’s “sick and tired of this Democratic Party bringing a pencil to a knife fight.” TRUMP, DEMOCRATS, MULL HOLDING PRESIDENTIAL-STYLE CONVENTIONS AHEAD OF 2026 MIDTERMS “We cannot be the only party that plays by the rules anymore,” he urged. And DNC Vice Chair Malcolm Kenyatta, in a Fox News Digital interview on the sidelines of the meeting, urged that Democrats “have to engage in a level of fight, not power for power’s sake, but we have to fight hard because we understand what’s at stake for working people and working families.” DNC CHAIR DEMANDS DEMOCRATS ‘STOP BRINGING A PENCIL TO A KNIFE FIGHT’ Echoing Martin, he said, “We’ve been playing checkers. They’re playing Grand Theft Auto.” He was referring to the long-running and popular action-adventure video game series that revolves around shooting, driving and stealing cars. Amid talk that the party remains divided over a slew of policy and political issues, leaders preached unity. “We do not have the luxury to fight amongst ourselves while that thing sits in the White House,” 2024 Democratic Party vice presidential nominee and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz emphasized, referring to Trump. And Martin highlighted that “in this big tent party of ours, we are unified towards one single goal: to stop Donald Trump and put this country back on track.” At several smaller panel discussions during the confab, a leader from the donor portal for Democrats known as ActBlue shared what was described as a fight song to energize party members. The song and the lyrics, which were reported by Semafor, were mocked by conservatives on social media. While unity was a top theme in Minneapolis, divisions did flare during the summer meeting. There was plenty of disagreement as the DNC’s Resolutions Committee considered two dueling resolutions on the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. The panel voted down a symbolic resolution calling for an arms embargo and suspension of U.S. military aid to Israel, which has long been the top American ally in the Middle East. A separate resolution introduced and supported by Martin that called for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, as well as unrestricted access to humanitarian aid to civilians in Gaza, was unanimously passed by the panel. But the defeat of the second, more forceful resolution, which was introduced by 26-year-old Allison Minnerly, a new DNC member from Florida, sparked opposition among some members on the panel. DEMOCRATS DIVIDED: TENSIONS FLARE OVER WAR IN GAZA “It’s not enough,” Sophia Danenberg, a DNC committee member from Washington, D.C., said as she pointed to Martin’s resolution. “People want to hear a louder, stronger statement.” Danenberg emphasized, “I do fear that we’re losing our future as the Democratic Party by not being courageous on this issue.” Minutes later, after a private conversation between Martin and Minnerly, the DNC chair asked the committee to “withdraw my resolution so we can move united today and have the conversation.” “We need to keep working through this. We have to find a path forward as a party, and we have to stay unified,” the chair added. Martin’s move, which was embraced by the committee, may buy a little bit of time, but the party remains divided on the issue. Joe Salas, a DNC committee member from California and a Muslim American, told Fox News after the defeat of Minnerly’s resolution, “I think there is a disconnect between the people on the committee and the average lock-stock-and-barrel voters who identify with the Democratic Party.” The showdown over the resolutions came as the Democratic Party’s once nearly unshakable support for Israel has fractured amid the bloodshed. And concerns over the growing death toll among Palestinians by many in the party’s progressive base have soared this spring and summer amid what many describe as a famine in Gaza. Recent polling indicates support for Israel’s continued military actions in Gaza is plummeting among Democrats. Democrats are aiming to rebound after last year’s elections when the party lost control of the White House and the Senate. Democrats also fell short in their bid to win back the House majority, and Republicans made gains with voters who make up key parts of the Democratic Party’s base. But the situation has only deteriorated for the Democrats in the 10 months since last year’s election setbacks, according to key metrics. The Democrats’ brand is deeply unpopular, especially with younger voters, and the party’s poll numbers continue to drop to all-time lows in national surveys. The DNC continues to face a massive fundraising deficit at the hands of the rival Republican National Committee (RNC), as well as concerns over lagging party registration. But Martin was optimistic. While he acknowledged “that our cash on hand seems to be low by comparison to the Republicans,” he touted at Wednesday morning’s Executive Committee meeting that “we have raised $70 million so far this year, which is a record.” And Martin pointed to a special election victory Tuesday night in red state Iowa, where the Democrats flipped a GOP-held state Senate seat. “This is now 40 key elections this year that we’ve won or overperformed in,” Martin touted. “I want you to think about that for a second.
HUD launches crackdown on illegal immigration in public housing: ‘Riding the coattails’
The Trump administration has ordered a nationwide review of public housing in an effort to root out residents who are in the country illegally, according to Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner announced Friday. Turner wrote that each Public Housing Authority has 30 days to conduct an audit to ensure that the existing orders are enforced. The department is asking for information about the public housing units, as well as verifiable citizenship or “eligible immigration status.” “No longer will illegal aliens be able to leave citizenship boxes blank or take advantage of HUD-funded housing, riding the coattails of hardworking American citizens,” Turner wrote. “Currently, HUD only serves one out of four eligible families due, in part, to the lack of enforcement of prohibition against federally funded assistance to illegal aliens,” he continued. If a program does not comply with the request, it could risk “examination” of its own federal funding. Turner told Fox News Channel’s Charles Hurt on “Jesse Watters Primetime” on Friday that the DC Housing Authority was the first one to be placed on notice, but over 3,000 other PHAs are being told the same requirements nationwide, stressing that “American citizens will be prioritized.” The move received praise from Republicans, but skepticism from others who said it could strain resources. “Anyone in this country illegally should be deported, not given publicly funded housing!” Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, posted to X. CLICK HERE FOR MORE IMMIGRATION COVERAGE “This is already the law – proof of citizenship is a requirement for any public housing or section 8 unit. Requiring a second, immediate accounting will not provide a massive correction or eviction. It will simply divert staff from serving American seniors, vets etc.,” former Housing and Urban Development employee Cat Vielma posted. In March, Turner and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem signed a Memorandum of Understanding to scrutinize public housing due to the surge of illegal immigration during the Biden administration. “The entire government will work together to identify abuse and exploitation of public benefits and make sure those in this country illegally are not receiving federal benefits or other financial incentives to stay illegally,” Noem said. “If you are an illegal immigrant, you should leave now. The gravy train is over.” Washington, D.C. has become a major focus of the Trump administration in recent weeks amid the surge in National Guard troops and federal law enforcement in the city to crack down on crime. Other blue cities, like Chicago, could soon see troops deployed and possible immigration enforcement operations. Fox News Digital reached out to the DC Housing Authority.
Boston whistleblower warns of migrant crime spillover as Trump’s crackdown looms
As Democratic leaders in Massachusetts triple down on resistance against federal intervention to clamp down on crime, a migrant shelter whistleblower is sounding the alarm about an increase in crime in neighborhoods across the state and especially in Boston. Jon Fetherston, who ran one of the state-funded migrant shelters in Marlborough, Massachusetts, and blew the whistle about rampant crime and sex abuse taking place in the hotel shelter system. He now says that since Democratic Gov. Maura Healey closed down the shelter system, there has been an uptick in domestic violence, sex trafficking, shoplifting and even auto accidents. “The Healey hotels were well known for having sex trafficking, domestic violence. We’ve reported cases of rape, unfortunately, in there,” Fetherston said. “Now, you’ve opened it up to all of the cities and towns in Massachusetts.” $30K IN MIGRANT HOUSING AID HAS DEM GOV ON HOT SEAT FOR ‘REVOLVING DOOR’ POLICY This comes as Healey has pushed back against the Trump administration’s federal crime crackdown in Washington, D.C., and preemptively criticized any intervention in Boston as “political theater.” “More political power grabs from Donald Trump,” Healey wrote in a statement posted to X, adding, “We don’t need or want his interference here.” In response, Fetherston said, “How the governor just wants the public to believe that all of these things will not happen is extremely naive and extremely dangerous.” “Governor Healey wants you to think she just snaps her fingers and closes all of the hotels and then disperses people into the communities that the thousand incidents that were reported back in 2024, and the state has refused to release the data for 2025, she just thinks that those serious instances aren’t going to happen in the communities that now she’s forced people into.” Referencing the high-profile case of illegal immigrant Harjinder Singh allegedly causing an auto accident in Florida that killed three, Fetherston said, “you’ve seen the national stories of unlicensed or illegals with driver’s licenses and CDLs. I haven’t seen that, but I’ve seen a tremendous uptick in car accidents.” BIKE-RIDING YOUTHS TERRORIZE DEM-RUN CITY AS MOBS SWARM ROADS, WHILE MAYOR STAYS SILENT ON CHAOS Fetherston said that Boston has been particularly impacted by the rise in crime. “Your eyes tell you all you need to know. Crime is on an uptick in Boston. Things are not good in Boston,” he said. “Boston was once a great city. It is no longer a great city. It is a city that with open drug use, the crime rates have spiked.” Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, also a Democrat, has rejected the Trump administration’s efforts to crack down on illegal immigrant crime or to send the National Guard to the city. Wu has said, “In Boston, we comply and follow all of the laws, city, state and federal. And we will not back down from communities that have made us the safest major city in the country.” Wu has also commented, “This is a beautiful, diverse, incredible city, and I have said it now very directly, this administration needs to stop attacking cities to hide their own failures.” In response, Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons has vowed to “flood” Boston with federal agents. MARYLAND GOVERNOR SAYS HE WOULD ‘ABSOLUTELY WELCOME’ FEDERAL SUPPORT IN CRIME CRACKDOWN To Fetherston, an increased ICE presence would be welcome, while Wu’s resistance is indefensible. “How any elected official could not put public safety as the biggest priority of any job that they do, it’s disgusting to me and it’s very concerning,” he said, adding, “Mayor Wu wants to tell you that Boston is one of the safest cities. No, your eyes tell you that Boston has in great decline.” Regarding threats by the Trump administration and Homeland Security to intervene in Boston and Massachusetts, Fetherston said he believes that “anybody who lives in a crime-ridden area, which there are a lot in Massachusetts, will appreciate the effect of it.” “I’ve talked to business owners, I’ve talk to local law enforcement, anybody who wants to have a sensible conversation about fixing crime in their community, they support what the president’s doing and wants to do,” he explained. “Yeah, some people probably don’t like the optics because maybe they don’t understand it. And the media is doing, in my opinion, doing a bad job of describing it. Tanks are not rolling down people’s streets. The National Guard‘s not walking with guns into your backyard and stuff like that. We’re just there to protect and serve, and that’s what your local police does.” “If you don’t want that as an elected official, I don’t want you as my elected official,” he said. PRITZKER SAYS ‘ACTION WILL BE MET WITH A RESPONSE’ AFTER TRUMP THREATENS TO SEND NATIONAL GUARD TO CHICAGO Fox News Digital reached out to the offices of Healey and Wu but did not immediately receive a response. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson commented on Healey and Wu’s resistance by saying, “If these Democrats focused on fixing crime in their own cities instead of doing publicity stunts to criticize the President, their communities would be much safer.” “Cracking down on crime should not be a partisan issue, but Democrats suffering from TDS [Trump Derangement Syndrome] are trying to make it one,” she went on, adding, “They should listen to fellow Democrat Mayor Muriel Bowser who recently celebrated the Trump Administration’s success in driving down violent crime in Washington DC.” Bowser’s office declined to comment further, referring Fox News Digital to the mayor’s prior statements.
‘Worst thing I’ve ever seen’: 4 years later, GOP veterans say Biden’s Afghanistan withdrawal still haunts them
It has been four years since the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan, ending a 20-year foreign entanglement and leaving the fates of hundreds of thousands of people in the hands of the Taliban. For House Republican lawmakers who served in the Armed Forces, in the Middle East in particular, the frustration and angst is still raw. “I thought the withdrawal was the worst thing I’ve ever seen from any president in my lifetime. It was the most bungled operation I’ve seen,” Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., told Fox News Digital. Bacon, a retired brigadier general with nearly 30 years’ experience in the Air Force, said the withdrawal left him and fellow veterans he spoke with feeling depressed. FAR-LEFT FIREBRAND SAYS SHE ‘NEVER HAD A CONCERN’ ABOUT BIDEN’S MENTAL STATE AS HOUSE PROBE HEATS UP “Why did our friends have to die there? Because all that [President Joe Biden] did, he pulled us out and it collapsed. We had 3,500 troops there when Biden came in. None of them were in combat. They were in support roles,” he said. “We could have sustained it at a low cost for a long time… And moms and dads wonder, why do we lose our son? I happen to know this to be true. I’ve talked to moms and dads. Why did I lose my son for something that Joe Biden just pulled the plug on and let it collapse?” The Nebraska Republican said he himself knew five people who died serving in Afghanistan. Rep. Pat Harrigan, R-N.C., a former Army Special Forces officer who served two tours in Afghanistan, said he cried when the chaos of the withdrawal dawned on him. LONGTIME BIDEN AIDE SAYS HE STOOD TO EARN UP TO $8M HAD PRESIDENT WON RE-ELECTION “I wept,” Harrigan told Fox News Digital. “I knew it was not about losing Afghanistan, right? It wasn’t about the 20 years’ worth of work that we put into that country. It wasn’t about the promises that we made that we didn’t keep. It wasn’t about even the 13 Americans that got killed. The reason I wept is because I believed that that display of strategic weakness on the world stage condemned the next generation of Americans to conflict.” This past Tuesday also marked four years since the deadly suicide attack on Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, which took the lives of dozens of Afghans and 13 U.S. service members. “I would say it was a very, very, you know, cutting morale situation for everyone,” said Rep. Tom Barrett, R-Mich., who served in the military for over 20 years. “I can’t speak for everyone, but personally, I felt like it was complete and total failure of our leadership…We could watch this happen in slow motion. I mean, such terrible decisions that set up the vulnerability that ultimately resulted in that loss of life. And to know that we had troops there who were infants at the time of the attack of 9/11. They couldn’t even, they weren’t even old enough to remember when 9/11 happened.” Bacon pointed out that the ISIS-K terrorist who committed the attack was released from prison at Bagram Air Base following the Taliban’s lightening-fast takeover of Afghanistan. “I cannot think of a more botched operation than that,” he said. Harrigan said, “We put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into that conflict, and to see it just effectively given away with no plan and absolutely no thought behind the withdrawal process, ultimately culminating in the deaths of 13 young Americans; none of that needed to happen. And I think that’s the most frustrating part of it.” All three veterans said the chaotic withdrawal operation left damaging consequences in its wake. “I think both the previous president and the current president could do better at helping the Afghan interpreters get out of Afghanistan and get into America,” Bacon said. “We have an obligation, in my view, to support these guys. I mean, they literally put their lives on the line to save Americans, and they’ve been hunted down in Afghanistan. They’ve been persecuted. And in some cases you hear stories of the current administration trying to return some of these folks. It’s just not right.” Harrigan said the federal government handled Afghanistan “terribly” after the U.S. exit. “I mean, President Joe Biden was sending $40 million a week to the Taliban, for God knows what reason. And now we have no relationship with them at all, which I also think is a problem,” he said. “I think that Afghanistan has, historically, and will always be a safe haven for terrorism…if we are not constantly keeping a pulse on what’s going on there.” Barrett pointed out that Afghanistan has since fallen under extremist control with Taliban rule and opened a “vacuum” for China and other adversaries to gain influence. “I think we have to have a far more discerning, very realistic and clear-eyed mindset of the challenges that we’re going to face, and what is the second and third order effects of the decisions we make?” he posed. “You go into a country to liberate them. Well, what’s gonna happen the next day and the day after that, the day following?”
CDC official who blasted Trump’s ‘weak science’ led politicized Biden-era monkeypox response
Demetre Daskalakis, an official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), resigned this week, claiming the Trump administration’s policies ignore science. However, his own leadership during the Biden-era monkeypox response was criticized for putting optics over public health. Amid the Trump administration’s efforts to push out CDC Director Susan Monarez, a handful of other top CDC officials, including Daskalakis, resigned in protest of the Trump administration’s policies. Daskalakis wrote in his resignation letter that was posted to social media that the health policies put forward by Secretary Robert F. Kennedy do not “reflect scientific reality.” He also accused the Trump administration of attempting to “erase transgender populations,” while also using the term “pregnant people” to describe women who are about to give birth. But flashback to 2022 and 2023, after the monkeypox virus had spread across several countries and made its way into the U.S., during which Daskalakis was among the Biden administration’s top advisers who spearheaded the national response to the disease outbreak. BIPARTISAN FURY AT CDC: SENATORS DEMAND PROBE, REJECT VACCINE GUIDANCE AS ILLEGITIMATE Government communications from that time period, uncovered by watchdog group the Oversight Project, show that officials were aware that the disease was spreading among the gay community. However, those communications, and other records, show the administration appeared to be more concerned with protecting the stigma targeting the gay community, than they were with implementing measures that would provide the best mitigation response. “A common theme was public health officials identifying locations where outbreaks occurred, to include bathhouses and saunas,” according to the Oversight Project. “Officials never broached consideration of shutting down these locations. This draws a stark contrast to the public health guidance and shutdowns of gathering places during COVID, to include gyms and skate parks.” In 2023, after the monkeypox outbreak had taken hold in the U.S., Daskalakis went on national television to let the country know that his team was “making sure [they] got the word out in a way that supports people’s joy, as opposed to calling them risky.” “You know, one person’s idea of risk, is another person’s idea of a great festival or Friday night, for that matter. So, we have to sort of embrace that with joy and make sure that folks know how to keep themselves safe,” the Biden monkeypox coordinator added. RFK JR. WARNS CDC ‘IN TROUBLE,’ PROMISES FIXES AS DIRECTOR REFUSES TO STEP DOWN Meanwhile, during the outbreak, Daskalkis posted a tweet from gay sex app Grindr that stated “Dr. Daskalakis could jab me any day,” with a sticker of a flattered cat. In other social media posts from around the same time, Daskalkis can be seen using male models wearing leather bondage straps to make an entrance at an HIV prevention summit. While in his role at the White House leading the monkeypox response, Daskalkis also reportedly ran an STD screening operation from an after-hours sex club in New York City. When asked about the operation in an interview, Daskalakis described it as “exciting” and added there was “not much sleep time.” Later in the interview, he added: “I’d already kind of been the bathhouse HIV testing doctor.” Fox News Digital reached out to Daskalakis about the juxtaposition between his criticism of Kennedy’s policies not reflecting “scientific reality,” and his role in the Biden administration’s approach to monkeypox, but did not receive an immediate response.
Fetterman defends Trump’s ‘tasteful’ $200M White House ballroom makeover amid Dem criticism
While some Democrats have railed against President Donald Trump’s $200 million plan to remodel the White House ballroom, Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., defended the investment in an interview with Fox News Digital. “The plans are going to be done in a tasteful and historical kind of way,” Fetterman said. “They’re not putting in a Dave & Buster’s kind of situation here, so I think upgrading some of these facilities seems pretty normal.” But Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., described Trump’s latest endeavor as anything but “normal.” “The project at the White House is a gigantic boondoggle,” Blumenthal said. “The important question is not only the damage that it could do to the architecture of the White House, but also what contributors would have over Trump if they are giving to this project.” TRUMP GAVE THE OVAL OFFICE A GILDED MAKEOVER – AND COVERED THE COST HIMSELF White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters last month that Trump and private donors will fund the estimated $200 million cost of the new ballroom. TRUMP APPEARS ON WHITE HOUSE ROOF AMID TALKS OF HISTORIC RENOVATIONS “Now, he is gonna be soliciting money from private contributors for this boondoggle, and the question is – what kind of influence and impact will those contributors have?” the Connecticut senator questioned. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said Democrats’ criticism is “not surprising to anyone.” “That is the essence of their party,” Cruz said. “They wake up animated by hatred for Trump and hatred for the American people that voted for him.” The Texas senator said he is grateful for the “phenomenal project,” and accused Democrats of hating anything Trump does. “A ballroom in the White House will be used by presidents, both Republicans and Democrats, and it’s being funded without a penny of taxpayer money,” Cruz said. Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., however, acknowledged that the White House needs event space. Leavitt said the president is unable to host major functions with world leaders without installing a “large and unsightly tent approximately 100 yards away from the main building’s entrance.” But Coons said that he doesn’t “know whether he actually has the authority to fundamentally alter the shape and scale of the White House without some White House Historical Association or some architect approving it.” “The last time I checked there’s nothing in the law that says that,” Cruz fired back. Coons also raised an issue with the project’s timeline. Leavitt said the renovations will begin in September and will be “completed long before the end of President Trump’s term.” “My concern, given what I’ve heard so far, is that it wouldn’t be completed on his timeline, so that he will be the former president and whoever succeeds him will be stuck with what could be a white elephant,” Coons said. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., added that the ballroom is very “Trumponian,” but affirmed that “he’s gonna do it right.” “I’m glad they’re doing it with private dollars,” Marshall added. “I think it’ll be a great thing to add and put that Trump stamp on the White House.” And Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., agreed, telling Fox News Digital that the new ballroom would be a great addition to the White House and celebrated that there would be “no cost to the taxpayer.” Fox News Digital’s Amanda Macias contributed to this report.
Parents: Virginia boys suspended after questioning transgender locker room policy were ignored by school
A pair of parents from Virginia say their sons, who were suspended and found responsible for sexual harassment after questioning why a biological female was using the boys locker room, were provided no formal way to express discomfort with their school’s transgender locker room policy. Parents Renae Smith and Seth Wolfe say unclear policies and poor communication on the part of the Loudoun County Public Schools District led to the Title IX ruling and 10-day suspension for the boys. They say their kids were never instructed on how to communicate any potential concerns about the district’s transgender locker room or pronoun policy, nor did parents ever get notified about how to help their kids understand them. Earlier this year, the Loudoun County school district launched a sexual harassment investigation into the two boys after they were videotaped by a biological female who identified as transgender inside the boys locker room. The video caught them outwardly complaining to each other about the fact that there was a girl using their facilities. VIRGINIA SCHOOL DISTRICT VOTES TO KEEP GENDER BATHROOM POLICY, DEFYING DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION DIRECTIVE Smith, Wolfe and their attorney, Josh Hetzler, said the boys tried to speak to alert administrators about their discomfort with a biological female using their locker room. However, the concerns fell on deaf ears, they recounted. “There was an incident earlier in the year where one of the students involved with this went to another administration and was uncomfortable with it. They were pretty much just told, ‘This is how it is and to accept it,’ and they’re not supposed to say anything about it,” Wolfe relayed to Fox News Digital. “The more we look into it, no adult ever actually told these boys how to communicate with this individual. How to use the pronouns that are appropriate. They never gave us as parents opportunities to even talk to our children about this.” “I specifically asked my son what they did to prepare them for this type of situation and the answer was absolutely nothing,” Smith added. “If you’re going to implement this policy on paper, you better have a strategy for it in the classroom.” In response to accusations that the boys’ complaints fell on deaf ears, the district contested that it has never suspended a student “simply because they expressed some kind of discomfort.” “At no time would LCPS suspend a student simply because they expressed some kind of discomfort,” district spokesperson Dan Adams told Fox News Digital. “A reading of our Title IX resources should make it clear that there is a high bar to launch a Title IX investigation and an even higher bar to determine a student is in violation of Title IX.” Fox News Digital responded with questions about what the district was accusing the boys of beyond expressing discomfort but did not hear back. VIRGINIA SCHOOL DISTRICT ACCUSED OF RELIGIOUS DISCRIMINATION IN TRANSGENDER LOCKER ROOM CASE In addition to the confusing nature of the ongoing school controversy, Smith told Fox News Digital she thought the allegations themselves were also confusing. “I think the allegations themselves lend a lot of confusion,” Smith said. “Like, how do we get to sexual harassment based off of somebody asking why there’s a girl in their locker room?” Smith also questioned why the other student, who filmed the boys, was not similarly disciplined. Smith and Wolfe, along with their attorney, are appealing the Loudoun County Public Schools Title IX ruling, which found their kids responsible for sexual harassment and suspended them for 10 days. While Smith has taken her child out-of-state, Wolfe’s son has been able to attend the first several days of school because the appeal put a hold on the boys’ suspensions. The boys’ attorney with the Founding Freedoms Law Center said they are now partnering with another law group, America First Legal,, to take legal action. The families and their attorneys intend to exhaust all avenues in an attempt to overturn the district’s Title IX ruling finding their sons responsible for sexual harassment, which they fear will have long-term impacts on their kids, particularly when it comes to getting into college. However, Hetzler said he is not hopeful their appeal will overturn anything. “I don’t know who the exact person is who’s making the appeal decision. I get the sense that it’s a pretty tight-knit group overall in Loudoun County Public Schools, so I don’t expect a different result,” Hetzler said. “Ultimately, I think we’re going to have to sue them. I think we’re going to have to go into federal court. And if we go into a federal court, then the Department of Justice will have an opportunity to intervene in the case.” Hetzler noted that they would like to avoid going to court but said “the reality is that at every point along the way, when Loudoun County has had the opportunity to do the right thing, they always seem to do the wrong thing.” “We’d love for Loudoun to do the right thing and avoid [court], but we’ve got to stop these boys from being suspended, because once they’re suspended and they miss school, you can’t unring that bell,” Hetzler continued. “So, we’re gonna prevent that, and then we’re trying to make sure that this is scrubbed from their record because they should never have a Title IX sexual harassment on their record for simply complaining about a girl being in their locker room.”
Top Senate Republican ready to ‘roll over’ Democrats with rule change to confirm Trump nominees
FIRST ON FOX: Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso is ready to go nuclear on Senate Democrats and their blockade of President Donald Trump’s nominees. Before leaving Washington, D.C., to their respective home states, Senate Republicans were on the verge of a deal with their colleagues across the aisle to hammer out a deal to ram through dozens of Trump’s picks for non-controversial positions. But those talks fell apart when Trump nuked any further negotiations over funding demands from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. Currently, there are 145 pending nominations on the Senate’s executive calendar, with that number expected to balloon when the upper chamber reopens for business. SENATE GOP READY TO GO NUCLEAR AFTER SCHUMER’S ‘POLITICAL EXTORTION’ OF NOMINEES Lawmakers are set to return on Tuesday, and Barrasso, R-Wyo., wants to immediately tackle the nomination quandary. He’s engaged in a public pressure campaign, writing an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal directly calling out Schumer. Meanwhile, he’s facilitated talks among Senate Republicans on the best path forward, and told Fox News Digital in an interview that, at this point, he’s willing to do anything necessary to see the president’s picks confirmed. “We need to either get a lot of cooperation from the Democrats, or we’re going to have to roll over them with changes of the rules that we’re going to be able to do in a unilateral way, as well as President Trump making recess appointments,” he said. Senate Democrats, under Schumer’s direction, are unlikely to play ball, however. Schumer, in response to Barrasso’s public jab against him and Senate Democrats, contended in a statement that “historically bad nominees deserve a historic level of scrutiny by Senate Democrats.” TRUMP TELLS SCHUMER TO ‘GO TO HELL’ OVER SENATE NOMINEE DEAL FUNDING DEMANDS AFTER NEGOTIATIONS COLLAPSE “Anybody nominated by President Trump is, in Schumer’s words, ‘historically bad.’ Why? Because they were nominated by President Trump,” Barrasso shot back. “That is his sole criteria for which these people are being gone after and filibustered, each and every one of them, even those that are coming out of committee, many, many of whom are with bipartisan support.” Unilaterally changing the rules, or the nuclear option, would allow Republicans to make tweaks to the confirmation process without help from Democrats, but it could also kneecap further negotiations on key items that would require their support to advance beyond the Senate filibuster. Barrasso was not worried about taking that route, however, and noted that the nominees that he and other Republicans were specifically considering would be “sub-Cabinet level positions” and ambassadors. Up for discussion are changes to the debate time, what kind of nominee could qualify for a speedier process and whether to give the president runway to make recess appointments, which would require the Senate to go into recess and allow Trump to make appointments on a temporary basis. DEMS DIG IN, TRUMP DEMANDS ALL: NOMINEE FIGHT BOILS OVER IN SENATE AS GOP LOOKS FOR A DEAL “When you take a look at this right now, it takes a 30-minute roll-call vote to get on cloture, and then two hours of debate time, and then another 30-minute roll-call vote,” Barrasso said. “Well, that’s three hours, and it’s time when you can’t do legislation, you can’t do any of the other things.” But there is a menu of key items that Congress will have to deal with when they return, particularly the deadline to fund the government by Sept. 30. Barrasso acknowledged that reality, and noted that it was because of the hefty schedule that he wanted a rules change to be put front and center. “There’s not going to be any time to — or there’s going to be limited time, I should say, to actually get people through the nominations process, which is just going to drag on further, and you’ll have more people having hearings and coming out of committees,” he said. “This backlog is going to worsen this traffic jam at the Schumer toll booth. So, we are going to do something, because this cannot stand.”
DOJ staffer fired after flipping off, cursing National Guard in Washington, DC: report
Attorney General Pam Bondi fired another Department of Justice paralegal on Friday, this time for flipping off a member of the National Guard in Washington, D.C., on her way to work earlier this month. Elizabeth Baxter of the department’s environmental division arrived for work just after 8:20 a.m. on Aug. 18 at the DOJ’s “4CON” building in the NoMa district, where she bragged to a security guard that she had just made the gesture at Metro Center Metro Stop and told the guardsman, “F–k the National Guard,” Bondi said, according to the New York Post. “Today, I took action to terminate a DOJ employee for inappropriate conduct towards National Guard service members in DC,” Bondi told the outlet. FORMER DOJ WORKER WHO HURLED SANDWICH AT FEDERAL OFFICER CHARGED WITH MISDEMEANOR “This DOJ remains committed to defending President Trump’s agenda and fighting to make America safe again,” she continued. “If you oppose our mission and disrespect law enforcement — you will NO LONGER work at DOJ.” Later that day, Baxter was seen on DOJ security footage sticking up her middle finger at the National Guard and exclaiming, “F–k you!” the outlet reported. She was also allegedly seen demonstrating to a department security guard how she held up her middle finger. On Aug. 25, she allegedly arrived at work and again boasted to the security guard that she hated the National Guard and that she told them to “F–k off!” BONDI ANNOUNCES NEARLY 200 ARRESTS ‘AND COUNTING’ AS FEDERAL AGENTS SWARM NATION’S CAPITAL “You are removed from your position of Paralegal Specialist, GS-0950-11, Environmental Defense Section, Environment and Natural Resources Division, and from the federal service, effective immediately,” Bondi wrote in a termination letter to Baxter on Friday following an investigation into her conduct, according to the outlet. The Trump administration moved in recent weeks to boost the presence of federal law enforcement in D.C. in an attempt to reduce crime. Hundreds of federal agents and National Guard troops have been deployed to the city’s streets as part of the federal takeover of the district. Baxter’s termination comes after Sean Charles Dunn, another DOJ paralegal, was fired after he was accused of throwing a sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection agent earlier this month in Washington, D.C. Dunn, who worked in the criminal division’s international affairs section in the 4CON building, was initially charged with a felony, but a grand jury declined to hand down an indictment. He was subsequently charged with a misdemeanor, which could result in up to one year in jail.