HHS ends Biden-era COVID-19 testing program that bled taxpayers years after pandemic
FIRST ON FOX: The Department of Health and Human Services announced it is shuttering a nationwide program that offered free COVID-19 tests to community organizations, citing it bled taxpayer funds despite the pandemic’s end. “With COVID-19 behaving more like the seasonal flu — rising and falling through the year — and tests widely available at retail stores nationwide, continued federal distribution is a significant waste of taxpayers’ dollars,” HHS told Fox News Digital Tuesday. “The COVID-19 pandemic is over and HHS is prioritizing funding projects that will deliver on President Trump’s mandate to address the chronic disease epidemic and Make America Healthy Again.” The government had spent more than $1 billion on the program since it was established in 2021 under the Biden administration, Fox News Digital learned. The program deployed government-purchased COVID-19 tests to community partners across the country to deliver tests at no cost to the patient. HHS cited that testing for COVID-19 now mimics seasonal flu cases, with retail shops across the country stocking their shelves with COVID tests, meaning “continued federal distribution is a significant waste of taxpayers’ dollars.” DOCTORS WARN OF ‘TRIFECTA’ OF CHRONIC ILLNESSES PLAGUING AMERICANS AFTER MAHA REPORT Americans who ordered tests through community partnership by 5 p.m. May 30 will still receive their order, according to HHS. HHS is in the midst of purchasing one million newer tests that are able to differentiate between the COVID-19 virus versus the flu, which will be deployed if there are any shortfalls or emergencies with the COVID testing, Fox Digital learned. State or local health departments, as well as community organizations that have a stockpile of tests and various local health centers may still provide free tests to Americans as the program shutters, according to HHS. The COVID-19 pandemic, which tore across the country in 2020, officially ended years ago. Then-President Joe Biden declared the pandemic was “over” back in 2022, while the World Health Organization determined the pandemic officially ended by 2023. The announcement comes as the Trump administration’s top health department re-focuses its direction to addressing the nation’s spiraling chronic health issues, which come in the form of health issues such as rampant obesity, spikes in autism diagnoses and teenage depression. RFK JR’S HIGHLY ANTICIPATED MAHA REPORT PAINTS DISMAL STATE OF CHILD HEALTH, NATIONAL SECURITY CONCERNS President Donald Trump‘s Make America Healthy Again Commission, which is chaired by HHS chief Robert F. Kennedy Jr, released its anticipated report assessing chronic diseases that have gripped U.S. youth in recent years May 22. The report’s findings include teenage depression nearly doubling from 2009 to 2019, more than one-in-five children over the age of six being considered obese, one-in-31 children diagnosed with autism by age 8 and childhood cancer spiking by 40% since 1975. TRUMP AND A HEALTHIER AMERICA WELCOMED BY DOCTORS: ‘NEW GOLDEN AGE’ “Over 40% of the roughly 73 million children (aged 0-17) in the United States have at least one chronic health condition, according to the CDC, such as asthma, allergies, obesity, autoimmune diseases, or behavioral disorders,” the report stated. “Although estimates vary depending on the conditions included, all studies show an alarming increase over time.” Chronic diseases have a chilling effect on national security, commission members said in a Thursday morning phone call with the media. Roughly 75% of America’s youth aged 17–24 do not qualify to serve in the military due to obesity, asthma, allergies, autoimmune diseases or behavioral disorders, they said. “We now have the most obese, depressed, disabled, medicated population in the history of the world, and we cannot keep going down the same road,” Food and Drug Commissioner Marty Makary said in the phone call with the media. “So this is an amazing day. I hope this marks the grand pivot from a system that is entirely reactionary to a system that will now be proactive.” The MAHA report will be followed by a policy recommendation report for the federal government later this summer.
Election investigation uncovers alleged noncitizen voter registration, double voters in multiple states
FIRST ON FOX: Ohio’s secretary of state referred dozens of registered noncitizens and double voters for potential prosecution in eight states and Washington, D.C., on Tuesday. The official, Frank LaRose, says his office uncovered evidence of 30 non-U.S. citizens who were registered to vote in Ohio. Likewise, the investigation uncovered eleven individuals from Virginia, Arizona, Colorado, District of Columbia, Illinois, Kentucky, Maryland, and South Carolina who appeared to have voted in multiple jurisdictions. “We must send a clear message that election fraud won’t be tolerated,” LaRose said in a statement provided to Fox News Digital. “The only way to maintain Ohio’s high standard of election integrity is to enforce the law whenever it’s broken.” Ohio’s Election Integrity Unit conducted the investigation by reviewing Ohio’s voter registry and comparing it with federal and state data. LaRose sent letters to the attorneys general of all states involved in the investigation and referred the individuals for prosecution. FEDERAL JUDGE ORDERS NC TO CERTIFY SUPREME COURT ELECTION RESULTS WITH DEMOCRAT LEADING “Critics of Ohio’s election integrity efforts may try to minimize the significance of these referrals, as though some small amount of election crime is acceptable,” LaRose wrote to Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost. “Even one illegal vote can spoil the outcome of an election for the citizenry at large, whether it be a school levy, majority control of a legislative chamber, or even a statewide election contest.” “Just this last election, a single vote in Licking County decided the outcome of a local levy after the final certified count,” LaRose noted. Yost’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital. FEDERAL JUDGE KICKS BATTLE OVER NC SUPREME COURT ELECTION BACK TO STATE COURT Ohio’s move comes just days after President Donald Trump’s Justice Department sued the State of North Carolina and the North Carolina State Board of Elections last week for allegedly failing to maintain an accurate voter list. The Trump administration claims the Tar Heel State is in violation of the 2002 Help America Vote Act (HAVA) after board officials provided a statewide voter registration form that did not make clear whether an applicant must provide a driver’s license number, or if the applicant does not have a driver’s license, the last four digits of the applicant’s social security number. If an applicant has neither, the law says the state must assign a special identifying number. The lawsuit claims that a “significant number” of North Carolina voters who did not fill out voter registration forms in compliance with HAVA were “nonetheless registered by their election officials.” A previous edition of the state elections board, which had a Democratic majority, acknowledged the problem in late 2023 after a voter complained. The board updated the voter registration form but declined to contact people who had registered to vote since 2004 in time for the 2024 elections so they could fill in the missing numbers. Fox News’ Danielle Wallace contributed to this report.
AK lawmakers claim ‘victory’ as feds begin reversal of ‘illegal’ Biden rule restricting ANWR oil and gas
Alaska’s congressional delegation praised President Donald Trump and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum for starting the process of rescinding a Biden-era rule that restricted oil and gas exploration in the resource-rich Section 1002 of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). Sen. Dan Sullivan said Burgum announced the move at a town hall in Utqiagvik (formerly Barrow) at the northern tip of the vast state, where local natives applauded because they “understand better than anyone” why responsible oil production is key to their communities’ livelihood. Sullivan called the Biden-era rule “illegal” and said it turned vast swaths of an area originally intended for domestic energy production into “de facto wilderness.” “Responsible resource development has transformed the lives of the Iñupiat people, supporting the construction of clinics, gymnasiums, water infrastructure—basic amenities most Americans take for granted,” Sullivan said. ALASKA SENATOR LITERALLY TEARS UP BIDEN’S ENERGY ORDERS, BOOSTS WH EFFORTS TO LEVERAGE ARCTIC LNG ASIA TRADE Burgum said his agency determined the 2024 rule exceeded the federal government’s bounds under a 1976 petroleum reserve law and also creates “unnecessary barriers to responsible energy development in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska.” “Congress was clear: the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska was set aside to support America’s energy security through responsible development,” he said, adding the prior rule “prioritized obstruction over production.” Rep. Nick Begich III called the decision a “major victory” and said that he will work with Trump to ensure responsible resource development. ALASKA OUTRAGED AT FEDERAL OIL LEASE SALE SETUP AS A ‘FITTING FINALE’ FOR FOSSIL FUEL-AVERSE BIDEN PRESIDENCY “This is a victory not only for those who support responsible development, but also those who believe in the rule of law,” added Sen. Lisa Murkowski. “The 2024 management rule clearly violated the law, establishing restrictions and a presumption against development as part of the last administration’s effort to turn the North Slope into one giant tract of federal wilderness,” she continued. “Repealing the rule will not weaken our world-class environmental standards, but it will enable Alaska to produce more energy as Congress intended. The result will be good jobs for Alaskans, more affordable energy for America, and significant new revenues for government.” In January, Gov. Mike Dunleavy told Fox News Digital that a final, congressionally-mandated sale of land for development in ANWR was set up to fail – characterizing it as a parting shot by the last administration toward the Last Frontier. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP “These leases should be executed in good faith along the established historical processes. And obviously, the Biden administration in the past four years has just been brutal on Alaska,” he said at the time, envisioning that the Trump administration would do just as Burgum announced this week. At the time, Murkowski also said that a now-former Interior official “openly admitted” during a working group that the process with which the restrictions were set upon ANWR was done in a way to intentionally circumvent the Congressional Review Act. That law was what allowed other Senate Republicans to undo several Biden-era EPA actions last month with a simple floor vote.
SCOOP: Liberal city mayor hit with ethics complaint over alleged lavish gifts
FIRST ON FOX: A nonpartisan government watchdog filed an ethics complaint against Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser on Tuesday morning. The complaint by the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT) requests the Board of Ethics and Government Accountability investigate Bowser for allegedly accepting illegal travel and hospitality gifts on high-profile trips to Doha, Qatar, for the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, the Masters Golf Tournament in Augusta, Georgia, and trips to Dubai, Las Vegas, Miami and Mar-a-Lago. “The basic standard for elected officials is honest transparency, which means following all disclosure laws and willingly answering the public’s questions. The mayor’s unwillingness to provide basic information about numerous high-profile trips is unacceptable,” Kendra Arnold, executive director of FACT, shared first with Fox News Digital. FACT cited WJLA’s investigation into missing records from Bowser’s prominent trips, in which they discovered Qatar paid Bowser and four staff members $61,930 to fly to the Middle East in 2023. SCHUMER MOVES TO BLOCK TRUMP DOJ NOMINEES AS HE SEEKS ANSWERS ON QATARI JET TO DEFENSE DEPARTMENT “It is not simply the Qatar trip, but a troubling pattern from Mar-A-Lago to Doha to Augusta National – the District has no record of who paid for these trips or what public purpose they served, if there was one at all,” Arnold said. “The ethics rules exist to protect against corruption, and when they are ignored, the public’s trust erodes. I urge the Board to investigate and enforce the law without delay.” SANCTUARY CITY MAYORS TO TESTIFY AT HOUSE OVERSIGHT AFTER AG BONDI CUTS THEM OFF FROM FEDERAL FUNDS While the Middle East trip should have been disclosed in order to be accepted as a legal donation to the District of Columbia, FACT said in the complaint that there is no record of who paid for the trip. “When questioned by the press, initially the mayor’s office said the trip was paid for by the D.C. Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber said that was not true. Then, the mayor’s office said the trip was paid for by the U.S. Conference of Mayors. That was also false,” FACT claimed. Then, in February 2025, the mayor’s office requested the trip’s expense breakdown, labeled it an “in-kind donation” and sought a “retroactive donation agreement,” despite the two years that passed, according to FACT. “Yet, unbelievably, it wasn’t until a reporter’s Freedom of Information Act request in March 2025 that this information was publicly revealed—more specifically that Qatar paid more than $61,930 for the trip the mayor’s office was now attempting to retroactively describe as an ‘in-kind donation.’ As of May 2025, the District still does not have a record of Qatar paying for Bowser’s 2023 trip,” according to the complaint. Again, citing WJLA’s investigative reporting, FACT said the District of Columbia has no expense records for several more trips, including to the Masters Golf Tournament in Augusta, Georgia, and trips to Las Vegas, Miami and Mar-a-Lago. FACT accused Bowser of violating a “fundamental ethics principle” that prevents corruption and discourages elected officials from accepting bribes and donations. Under Washington, D.C., law, government officials cannot accept certain gifts, including trips, lodging and transportation. The law allows donations to the district itself if the government entity “uses the gift or donation to carry out its authorized functions or duties.” In that case, detailed and accurate records must be available for “audit and public inspection.” Those donations to the district must be “recorded and approved before the donation is used.” “Clearly Mayor Bowser’s trip to Qatar qualifies as a gift, and one that elected officials are personally prohibited from accepting. Additionally, this gift would not qualify as a donation made to the District because the donation was not recorded and approved before the donation was used. The District still does not even have a record of it,” FACT concluded in the complaint.
Trump DOJ investigating Biden-era pardons amid concerns over state of mind
President Donald Trump’s Justice Department is reviewing the list of people that were granted pardons by former President Joe Biden, amid new concerns about his use of an AutoPen to automatically sign documents, as well as concerns about his state of mind in his final months in office. Fox News was told Tuesday that Justice Department Pardon Attorney Ed Martin is reviewing a list of Biden-era pardons granted by the president during his final weeks in office. It is unclear what individual pardons are being reviewed by Martin’s office, though Reuters reported this week that the office is planning to look at the preemptive pardons that Biden granted to his son, Hunter Biden, as well as more than 35 death row inmates whose sentences were changed to life in prison during Biden’s final days in office. DOJ officials did not respond to Fox News’s requests for comments on the email or the exact nature of the review BIDEN CLEMENCY ANNOUNCEMENT GETS MIXED REVIEWS ON CAPITOL HILL: ‘WHERE’S THE BAR?’ Former President Joe Biden used his final weeks as commander-in-chief to grant clemency and pardon more than 1,500 individuals, in what the White House described at the time as the largest single-day act of clemency by a U.S. president. But critics took umbrage at the long list of names, noting that it included persons convicted of defrauding U.S. taxpayers of tens of millions of dollars. Many took aim at his use of preemptive pardons to family members and others in Biden’s inner circle. This is a developing news story. Check back for updates.
FLASHBACK: US lawmakers, officials warned about terrorist attacks from foreign nationals long before Boulder
Lawmakers and intelligence experts have been sounding the alarm about potential terrorism threats stemming from those in the U.S. illegally long before Sunday’s terrorist attack injured eight people in Boulder, Colorado. Fox News first reported that the suspect involved in the attack originally entered the U.S. under the Biden administration and had overstayed his visa. But various officials have long cautioned about the risk of terrorism due to lax border security. For example, then-chair of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chair Mike Turner, R-Ohio, and House Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green, R-Tenn., raised concerns in August 2024 after a report from House Judiciary Committee Republicans found that the Biden administration released nearly 100 illegal immigrants into the U.S. SHOOTING AT CAPITAL JEWISH MUSEUM HIGHLIGHTS RISING WAVE OF ANTI-JEWISH HATE CRIMES “Since the Biden-Harris Administration’s failed open border policies have welcomed potential terrorists into our nation, we’re working to combat these threats and safeguard Americans in their own backyards,” Turner and Green said in a joint statement in August 2024 in response to the report. Meanwhile, the FBI has previously issued similar concerns about foreign terrorists entering the U.S. and conducting attacks against American citizens. “I have warned for some time now about the threat that foreign terrorists may seek to exploit our southwest border or some other port of entry to advance a plot against Americans,” former FBI Director Christopher Wray told the House Judiciary Committee in April 2024. “Just last month, for instance, the Bureau and our joint terrorism task forces worked with ICE in multiple cities across the country as several individuals with suspected international terrorist ties were arrested using ICE’s immigration authorities.” Wray said in 2024 that those arrests involved hundreds of FBI employees to properly identify dangerous individuals. But the use of false documents from those crossing the border amplifies concerns related terrorism threats, and makes it even more challenging for FBI employees to track down, Wray said. BIDEN DHS REVEALS 50 MIGRANTS STILL AT LARGE AS ISIS-AFFILIATED SMUGGLING NETWORK BRINGS HUNDREDS TO US “As concerning as the known or suspected terrorists encountered at the border are, perhaps even more concerning are those we do not yet know about because they provided fake documents or because we didn’t have information connecting them to terrorism at the time they arrived in the United States,” Wray said. Meanwhile, Democrats have claimed that U.S. citizens are primarily responsible for conducting terrorist activity in the U.S. For example, House Border Security and Enforcement Subcommittee ranking member Rep. Lou Correa, D-Calif., pointed to a study from the Cato Institute that found that no people were murdered by a foreign-born terrorist who entered the U.S. illegally between 1975 and 2022. “Most terrorist activity is conducted by U.S. citizens,” Correa said in September 2024. “Again, zero Americans have been injured or killed by terrorist attacks perpetrated by undocumented immigrants who entered through the southwest border. However, DHS and the FBI regularly tell us that one of the greatest terrorist threats to our homeland is domestic terrorism.” Law enforcement officials said that Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, yelled “Free Palestine” and used a makeshift flamethrower to attack those attending an event in Boulder, Colorado, organized by “Run for Their Lives,” a grassroots group that holds events urging the release of Israeli hostages. Soliman was in the U.S. illegally after his visa expired, three Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement sources told Fox News. Soliman entered the U.S. in 2022 on a nonimmigrant visa, and eventually obtained work authorization — but that expired in March. FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino said FBI officials are coordinating with local law enforcement to investigate the attack. “We are investigating this incident as an act of terror, and targeted violence,” Bongino said in a post on X on Sunday. COLORADO TERROR ATTACK TOOK PLACE AT ‘RUN FOR THEIR LIVES’ EVENT CALLING FOR RELEASE OF ALL HOSTAGES IN GAZA Meanwhile, the Trump administration has chastised the Biden administration for its immigration policies that facilitated Soliman’s entry to the U.S. “A terror attack was committed in Boulder, Colorado by an illegal alien,” White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller wrote on X. “He was granted a tourist visa by the Biden Administration and then he illegally overstayed that visa. In response, the Biden Administration gave him a work permit. Suicidal migration must be fully reversed.” Meanwhile, Green described the attack as a “wake-up call” regarding growing terror threats jeopardizing safety in the U.S. “This is another wake-up call to the heightened terror threat facing the United States — and to the fact that the enemies of freedom are persistent,” Green said in a statement Sunday. “I am requesting a briefing from DHS for House Homeland Security Committee members as soon as department officials are available to provide one.” The Associated Press contributed to this report.
DeSantis punches back at Hope Florida controversy, likens ‘lawfare’ to attacks on Trump and nominees
The office of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis punched back at allegations linking the governor and his wife, Casey DeSantis, to $10 million given to the Hope Florida Foundation after the state settled with a government-sponsored healthcare provider. “Governor DeSantis and Florida First Lady Casey DeSantis have been subject to politically motivated lawfare in the state of Florida, and now the same lawfare is being perpetrated against President Trump and his nominees,” Communications Director Bryan Griffin told Fox News Digital. “It’s ridiculous and especially shameful coming from Republicans who hate to see others delivering results.” DESANTIS GOADS CONGRESS TO FOLLOW FL’S DOGE BLUEPRINT AS MUSK’S CUTS STILL WAIT FOR VOTE Centene, a large medical insurance provider that specializes in government-sponsored programs like Medicaid and Medicare, returned $67 million in a settlement with the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration over claims that Centene was overbilling Medicaid payments. Following the settlement in September 2024, $10 million of the funds were sent to the Hope Florida Foundation. The $10 million given to the Hope Florida Foundation was then split into two separate $5 million grants to 501(c)(4) organizations. One went to Save Our Society from Drugs and the other to Secure Florida’s Future, Inc. Subsequently, $8.5 million of those funds were dispersed to Keep Florida Clean, a political action committee that previously targeted Florida Amendment 3, a constitutional amendment to recreationally legalize marijuana. Casey DeSantis has been outspoken against the legalization of marijuana. A senior official from DeSantis’s office told Fox News Digital that the Hope Florida Foundation is a separate entity from the Hope Florida initiative that has been spearheaded by Casey DeSantis. GOP RAILS AGAINST ‘BLATANTLY FALSE’ DEM CLAIMS ABOUT MEDICAID REFORM IN TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ A senior official from DeSantis’ office also told Fox News Digital that there is no official investigation being conducted by the Leon County State Attorney’s office, despite reports that a record custodian in the state attorney’s office referred to the matter as “an open, ongoing investigation.” In a May 21 email exchange obtained by Fox News Digital, the New York Times corrected a headline stating that “Casey DeSantis [Is] Under Investigation” after a DeSantis official clarified to the publication that there is no official investigation taking place. Florida state Republican Rep. Alex Andrade, chairman of the healthcare appropriations subcommittee, originally unearthed the funds. Andrade told Fox he was unaware if there was an actual ongoing investigation, but added that he had a “long conversation with the [Department of Justice]” about documents and communications related to the movement of funds. He noted he does nOt “see how Casey or [Ron] DeSantis are involved.” DR. OZ SAYS TAXPAYERS FOOTING $14 BILLION BILL FOR MEDICAID FRAUD WHILE ELIGIBLE PATIENTS STRUGGLE FOR CARE Andrade went on to explain that he believes DeSantis’s chief of staff at the time was involved in brokering the grants between the Hope Florida Foundation and the two entities which received $5 million each. He also slammed the Hope Florida initiative itself, saying “they can’t back up any of the claims about what state employees are doing.” “The concept of Hope Florida is telling existing employees to do a better job of helping people,” Andrede added. “That’s it.” DeSantis previously addressed Andrade’s claims at a May 21 press conference in Westin, Florida. DESANTIS EXCORIATES FL HOUSE LEADERSHIP AMID REPUBLICAN CIVIL WAR, ACCUSING THEM OF ‘REVOLT AGAINST’ VOTERS “You had one state representative with a political agenda, and he has a political agenda to try to smear Hope Florida—to try to smear people associated with the administration,” DeSantis explained. “My wife, who’s done a great job for this state by the way, not just on Hope Florida, saving taxpayers $100 million, getting 30,000 people off means-tested welfare. Show me someone else in this country that has been able to do that?” The Hope Florida Foundation controversy has shaken up political implications for the upcoming governor’s race. Gov. DeSantis is termed out, but his wife, Casey, is widely rumored to enter the field. Republican Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida is the only GOP candidate declared so far, and he received an endorsement from President Donald Trump shortly after his announcement. Fox News Digital reached out to the Leon County State Attorney’s office but did not receive a response in time for publication.
Still a no: Rand Paul says $5T debt increase in ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ a deal-breaker
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said the debt limit increase included in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act is still a deal-breaker for him, saying it goes against conservative values, despite discussions with President Donald Trump about his concerns. Paul told reporters on Monday that the bill will increase the debt ceiling by $5 trillion, the largest debt increase in the U.S. “We have never raised the debt ceiling without actually meeting that target,” he said. “So you can say it doesn’t directly add to the debt, but if you increase the ceiling $5 trillion, you’ll meet that. And what it does is it puts it off the back-burner. And then we won’t discuss it for a year or two.” SEN. RON JOHNSON PROPOSES ‘LINE-BY-LINE’ CUTS TO PASS TRUMP’S ‘BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL’ “So I think it’s a terrible idea to do this,” he added. Paul said he spoke with Trump about his concerns over the legislation during a “lengthy discussion,” but that Trump “did most of the talking.” “I’ve told him I can’t support the bill if they’re together,” Paul said. “If they were to separate out and take the, debt ceiling off that I very much could consider the rest of the bill.” Paul noted that Congress voted to continue spending to avert a government shutdown. “During the campaign, Republicans said they were against Bidennomics and Bidenflation and Biden spending. When March, we renewed the Biden’s spending levels,” Paul said. “So the spending levels we live under now are Biden-GOP spending levels. They’ve all come into agreement.” “But come the end of September, when our fiscal year ends, the deficit is going to be $2.2 trillion. That’s just not conservative,” he added. “They’re borrowing 5 trillion. That means they’re anticipating the following year being over 2 trillion as well. So it’s just not a conservative thing to do.” SPEAKER JOHNSON CLASHES WITH RAND PAUL OVER ‘WIMPY’ SPENDING CUTS IN TRUMP’S BILL Over the weekend, Trump warned Paul would be “playing right into the hands of the Democrats” if he votes against the bill. “If Senator Rand Paul votes against our Great, Big, Beautiful Bill, he is voting for, along with the Radical Left Democrats, a 68% Tax Increase and, perhaps even more importantly, a first time ever default on U.S. Debt,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform. “Rand will be playing right into the hands of the Democrats, and the GREAT people of Kentucky will never forgive him! The GROWTH we are experiencing, plus some cost-cutting later on, will solve ALL problems. America will be greater than ever before!” he added. Next week, Senate Republicans will get their turn to go through the bill and are eying changes that could be a hard sell for House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La.
Trump front-and-center in Republican primary for governor as early voting kicks off
PINE HILL, NEW JERSEY – One week to go until primary day in New Jersey, and Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli was getting a shoutout from the most powerful and influential politician in the GOP. “I’m asking you to get out and vote for a true champion for the people of your state – Jack Ciattarelli. He’s been a friend of mine, and he’s been a real success story,” President Donald Trump told supporters as he dialed into a tele-rally on the eve of Tuesday’s kickoff of early voting in New Jersey. Trump’s praise came two weeks after he endorsed Ciattarelli for the Republican nomination in a primary race that turned into a battle for the president’s support. “It’s a really big deal,” Ciattarelli said in a Monday interview with Fox News Digital after meeting with local GOP politicians and leaders at the Trump National Golf Club-Philadelphia in this South Jersey borough, when asked about the significance of Trump’s endorsement. “The president’s doing very, very well in New Jersey.” NEW YORK GOV. KATHY HOCHUL FACING DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY CHALLENGE FROM HER OWN LT. GOVERNOR Ciattarelli, a former state lawmaker, is making his third bid for governor. He ran unsuccessfully for the GOP nomination in 2017. Four years later, in 2021, as the Republican nominee, Ciattarelli overperformed and came close to ousting Democratic incumbent Gov. Phil Murphy, losing by just three points. In the showdown to succeed Murphy, who is term-limited and prevented from running for re-election, polls suggest that Ciattarelli is the front-runner in a Republican nomination race that includes two other prominent candidates – former businessman and popular conservative talk radio host Bill Spadea and state Sen. Jon Bramnick, a lawyer who served for a decade as state Assembly GOP leader. NEW JERSEY PRIMARY AN EARLY TEST OF TRUMP’S SECOND ADMINISTRATION And Ciattarelli and Spadea spent months trading fire over which of them was a bigger Trump supporter. “It was certainly disappointing,” Spadea said of Trump’s endorsement of Ciattarelli. “I mean, we made no bones about this. We absolutely wanted the President’s endorsement. Unfortunately, the President endorsed a poll and not a plan.” And in a Fox News Digital interview, Spadea emphasized that “I have been a supporter of President Trump since he came down the escalator,” as he referenced Trump’s announcement in 2015 of his first presidential campaign. “There is no question that I am the common-sense conservative. I am the actual Republican in this primary,” Spadea claimed. And Spadea questioned Ciattarelli’s support for Trump, claiming that his rival “has disrespected him for the better part of the last eight years…We thought that that endorsement would have been better served with me.” Four years ago, after he won the GOP gubernatorial nomination, Ciattarelli, when asked if he was seeking the then-former president’s endorsement, told Fox News Digital “there’s only one endorsement I seek, and that’s the endorsement of the voters of New Jersey. That’s the only one that matters.” Fast forward to 2025, and Ciattarelli emphasized that “people really appreciate what he [Trump] is doing for New Jerseyans. He’s put a temporary hold on the wind farms off the Jersey Shore. He’s beating up on the New York Democrats over congestion pricing. He supports a quadrupling of the SALT [state and local tax] deduction on our federal tax returns. Those are big deals to New Jersey, and that’s why he’s got so much great support here. And I’m honored to have his endorsement.” REPUBLICAN GOVERNORS CHAIR, POINTING TO CAMPAIGN BATTLES AHEAD, TOUTS ‘OUR POLICIES ARE BETTER’ While he lost out on Trump’s endorsement, Spadea said there’s been a silver lining. “Our supporters are galvanized. Matter of fact, the Tuesday and Wednesday after Trump endorsed Jack, we had a surge, our two best days ever in low-dollar fundraising,” Spadea said. “So it actually has had the opposite effect, our low-dollar surge, our volunteer surge, we’re now knocking on more than 3,000 doors a week, and we’re getting an unbelievable response from the grassroots.” Spadea said that “almost every Trump supporter that we’ve talked to face-to-face on the ground thinks that Donald Trump made a huge mistake” in endorsing Ciattarelli. And Spadea, who was interviewed in downtown Princeton, New Jersey, added that “Trump supporters believe in common-sense policies, populism, patriotism. It’s not about being told who to vote for.” Asked why Trump endorsed him rather than Spadea, Ciattarelli said that “the president wants to win. He knows that I provide the best opportunity to win in November.” “He knows we’re going to raise the necessary money. We’ve raised more money than the other five Republican gubernatorial candidates combined,” added Ciattarelli, a certified public accountant who started a medical publishing company before getting into politics. The fundraising advantage has allowed Ciattarelli to dominate the ad wars, although Spadea said that “in the last couple of weeks we’ve actually outspent my opponent on the air” and predicted that “we’re going to win.” And Spadea, pointing to his media career, touted that “I built the largest audience in the state, a third Democrat, a third independent, a third Republican. So my appeal is not just that conservative base in the Republican Party. I’m the only candidate running for the Republican nomination that can pull in Democrats and independents.” New Jersey has long been a blue-leaning state, but Republicans have had success in gubernatorial elections. “It’s not a blue state when it comes to Governor races, Republicans have won six of the last 11. That’s better than 50%,” Ciattarelli said. And Trump, who spends summer weekends at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, held a very large rally last year in Wildwood, N.J. And he improved from a 16-point loss in the state in the 2020 election to a 6-point deficit last November. “The president’s doing very, very well in New Jersey. He performed well here last election day,” Ciattarelli said. And Ciattarelli, looking ahead to the general election campaign, said he’s “really looking forward” to Trump’s “active participation…I think New Jerseyans are
The politics of shamelessness: a survival tactic from Trump to party loyalty
Every politician operates with a certain degree of shamelessness. It’s practically in the job description. As they try to navigate in howling political winds, they regularly have to justify changing their positions. Maybe the country’s mood has shifted. Maybe it’s a matter of party loyalty. Maybe they’re bowing to pressure from big donors. And maybe they’re being hypocritical because something they opposed during the Biden administration is now perfectly fine in the Trump administration. WE ARE STILL NOT GETTING THE ‘STRAIGHT STORY’ ABOUT ALLEGED BIDEN DECLINE: KURTZ Whatever the circumstances, it’s shameless to offer an explanation that everyone knows is garbage. And they have to do it with a straight face. They can’t very well say, Donald Trump is going to make sure I’m primaried if I don’t go along on this one. So they offer the transparently bogus explanation. That, you could argue, is the nature of politics. You need to have some flexibility, some wiggle room. In one of my two interviews with President Trump last year, he tried to explain why he had totally flipped on TikTok. After all, he had spent his first term trying to ban the Chinese-owned company on national security grounds, only to be blocked by the courts. Now, suddenly, he had done a 180 and was trying to save the app, despite a congressional ban. Trump told me he changed his mind because outlawing TikTok would help Facebook, which he considered a greater threat. I didn’t buy it. He had concluded that TikTok was incredibly popular, especially with younger people, and wanted to position himself as its savior. This, of course, was before Mark Zuckerberg began cozying up to Trump, such as by making a million-dollar donation to his inaugural. Trump may have the biggest shameless gene of them all–and that’s part of why he’s successful. TRUMP RATTLED BY ‘NASTY’ ‘TACO’ QUESTION FROM REPORTER He doesn’t get hung up on what he said the day before or an hour before. He can go from expressing sympathy for Joe Biden’s prostate cancer diagnosis to saying he doesn’t feel sorry for Biden at all. He can go from blaming the Ukraine war impasse on Volodomyr Zelenskyy to finally condemning Vladimir Putin to calling it Biden’s war. Ross Douthat has a smart take on this in his New York Times column: “The willingness to swerve and backpedal and contradict himself is a big part of what keeps the president viable, and the promise of chickening out is part of Trump’s implicit pitch to swing voters — reassuring them that anything extreme is also provisional, that he’s always testing limits (on policy, on power) but also generally willing to pull back.” So MAGA voters trust Trump to go pretty far–but not too far? That brings them into John Kerry territory: “I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it,” referring to military aid to our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Republican ads immediately portrayed the 2004 presidential nominee as a flip-flopper. Kerry later allowed that he had been “inarticulate.” It’s useful to think about flipping the script. In the media furor over Trump’s spate of pardons, the president gave one to the leader of a violent Chicago gang, Larry Hoover, a drug dealer who’s been serving six consecutive life sentences for killing a man. Largely symbolic? Sure, because Hoover will remain in prison on state charges. Doesn’t matter. If Biden had done that, conservative voters would have gone haywire. How dare he side with a murderer? Does Biden have no regard for human life? The man who was killed doesn’t get a second chance. DEMOCRATS ABANDON TRADITION AS 2028 PRESIDENTIAL HOPEFULS OPENLY DECLARE WHITE HOUSE AMBITIONS The MAGA-driven story would have been on television every 10 minutes. With Trump, it was a blip, barely a story at all. Naturally, Biden’s hands aren’t exactly clean on the pardon front. He repeatedly promised not to pardon Hunter, then did exactly that after the election. It was a blatant lie and a big story. The other day Trump got angry when a CNBC reporter asked him about his TACO nickname, Trump Always Chickens Out, based on the chatter on Wall Street. He called the question “nasty,” this from the king of bestowing derogatory nicknames (see Joe, Sleepy). Poultry metaphor aside, the president does frequently delay draconian tariffs, conduct quick negotiations and declare victory. His supporters like that because the markets usually shoot up, though the turmoil clearly shakes up the global economy. One reason Trump gets away with all this is that the Democrats don’t have a national spokesman. Tim Walz, the VP flop, toying with running for president? People like Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer aren’t breaking through. AOC gets some good jabs in on social media, but she’s not even a member of the leadership. You also have to credit Trump’s political skills. He doesn’t have the slightest fear of being shameless.