EXCLUSIVE: ‘King Coal’ still reigns as one of the most affordable, reliable and transportable sources of energy – and the U.S. still has a lot of it, West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey told Fox News Digital in an interview at the National Governors Association's winter meeting.

Morrisey acknowledged America's ongoing race with China to be the most powerful nation in terms of both energy development and AI technology. West Virginia, he said Saturday, seeks to lead the way.

"I'm still very hopeful that there's a future for coal," Morrisey said. "Let me explain why: We're right now about to embark on an information technology arms race with China."

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"And we have to catch up to what they're doing in terms of the Chinese use of coal and many, many different types of fuel sources, because we can't let them get ahead of us as they're building capacity in AI, superintelligence, robotics and advanced manufacturing."

While both nations are likely to rely on advances in nuclear energy and hydraulic fracturing for natural gas, there remain the "resiliency, availability and affordability of coal," he said.

"I think there's an opportunity … to increase the capacity of some of the coal-fired power plants that have been slowed down in recent years. Because if we don't do that, we're not going to compete with the Chinese."

The governor said that one of his top priorities is to bring the Mountain State’s coal infrastructure and industry back to a higher capacity.

"I think that it's sorely needed from a national security perspective."

West Virginia produced 89 million tons of coal in 2021, according to the latest data recorded by the state miners’ office. That figure is down sharply from the 1940s through the late 1990s, when the state averaged upwards of 130 million tons per year.

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Wyoming remains tops in U.S. coal production, followed by West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Kentucky and Illinois.

"West Virginia is America's energy state. We're so rich in resources: coal and natural gas and water. And we have a lot of opportunities in front of us," Morrisey went on, adding that he was heartened by the substantive bipartisan discussions at the NGA in regard to speeding up the energy-permitting process at the state and federal levels.

"So when you're thinking about how to take advantage of those opportunities, you think of transmission, you think of permitting," he said, echoing Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro of neighboring energy powerhouse Pennsylvania, who pledged Friday to refund applicants if there are delays or if things go awry.

In terms of the Mountain State’s role in what Morrisey and other governors at the NGA called the "AI arms race" with China, the state is predicted to build on Morrisey's predecessor, now-Sen. Jim Justice’s efforts to grow the state’s tech industry.

"I’ve said over and over that we need to do everything possible to add these kinds of high-tech companies and jobs in West Virginia," Justice said in 2019. "We have so many people in this state who are gifted beyond belief and who will be able to fill these spots and do incredible work. It’s truly a pipeline of talent."

On Saturday, Morrisey also reflected on his group meeting with President Donald Trump, Cabinet secretaries and his fellow governors at the White House.

"They understand that you can't move energy at the speed of slow. And so we're eager to partner with them," he said, adding that Trump pledged to the governors that he would seek to eliminate 10 regulations for every one that his administration adds.

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"I think states like West Virginia and Pennsylvania and many other states have a chance to work closely with the Trump administration. It's going to be a lot easier, because they know how important it is to reassert American energy dominance – if you get the permitting right."

Morrisey also spoke about his response to the Trump administration's crackdown on illegal immigration and the flow of illegal drugs across the southern border.

Last month, Morrisey issued an executive order aimed at illegal immigrants in his state, which led to five dozen people being detained pending immigration status verification in the state's regional jail system.

The governor noted West Virginia's unfortunate spot as the state with the most drug overdose deaths per capita and said that both his and Trump's immigration policies are needed to fix that systemic crisis.

"We're working hand in hand with ice to identify illegal aliens and make sure that they can get deported. And this is really important to do, because, as President Trump said yesterday, when you actually remove a lot of these illegal aliens from the system, you're going to see a reduction in crime."

"It takes states working with the federal government to make sure that we're kind of reasserting our position and stopping all the horrific consequences of what happened with the illegal immigrants coming in. I know in West Virginia we really felt the impact of that through the massive amount of death that flowed from fentanyl flood[ing] in from China [via] the Mexican drug cartels."

Fox News Digital's Sophia Compton contributed to this report.

Trump administration Border Czar Tom Homan warned criminal aliens Saturday that they would all be arrested and said he would make good on his promise to immigrant terror groups to "wipe you off the face of the earth."

Homan, who previously served as the acting director of ICE and currently leads the Trump administration’s border efforts, told a rapt audience at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) that the number of illegal immigrant "gotaways" is down by 95%.  

"We had about 1,800 a day in 2023. You know how many we had yesterday? Forty-eight," he said. "You're talking about 2,000 miles of border, and only 48 people escaped. But that's 48 too many. I'm not going to be happy till that number’s zero."

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The border czar also announced that in Trump’s first month in the Oval Office, ICE arrested 21,000 illegal aliens.

"I'm happy with the numbers, but I'm not going to be satisfied until every criminal alien gang member, every criminal alien, every Tren de Aragua is eradicated from this country and [we've] sent their ass to Gitmo, where they belong," he said.

Addressing criminal migrant groups like Venezuela's Tren de Aragua and El Salvador's MS-13 – which the Trump administration just designated "foreign terrorist organizations" – Homan said the Trump administration is making good on its promise to stamp them out.

"He’s going to wipe you off the face of the earth," he said. "You have killed more Americans than every terrorist organization in the world combined. You are now a terrorist organization. So, word out to anybody that assists them, anybody that sells their drugs on a street, anybody assists these cartels in any way, you are helping a terrorist organization."

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"We're going to save lives, because when 95% less people [are] coming across the border, how many women aren't being raped? How many Americans aren’t dying from fentanyl overdoses? How many … terrorists aren't getting in the country? How many women and children aren’t sex-trafficked in this country? When you have a border lockdown, we're saving lives," he said.

Addressing criticism from Democrats and the media that ICE has arrested illegal aliens without criminal charges, along with criminal aliens, Homan said, "Yeah, damn right we did. Because you're in a country illegally, which happens to be a violation of our law."

"Entering this country illegally is a crime, and we're not going to forgive it," he said.

And addressing self-proclaimed "sanctuary" cities and states, where local and state governments refuse to cooperate with ICE, Homan said his now-familiar line: "Game on."

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"Sanctuary cities are a sanctuary for criminals," he said. "We're enforcing the laws enacted by Congress, and we're not going to apologize for it, not under this administration."

Homan singled out Boston Police Commissioner Michael Cox, who recently doubled down on the city’s sanctuary policies and said his officers would not assist ICE with deportation operations.

"You said you doubled down on not helping the law enforcement officers of ICE. I'm coming to Boston, and I'm bringing hell with me," he said. "I looked at the numbers this morning, I counted, I stopped counting at nine. Nine child rapists that were in jail in Massachusetts, but rather than honoring an ICE detainer, you released them back into the street. You're not a police commissioner. Take that badge off your chest. Put it in the desk drawer. Because you became a politician. You forgot what's it’s like to be a cop."

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Homan also took a few moments to express his gratitude to the men and women of federal law enforcement agencies like ICE and Border Patrol.

"God bless the men and women of ICE. God bless all the DOJ components, we’ve got the U.S. marshals, DEA, FBI, ATF, all these five agencies helping us," he said.

And to the men and women of Border Patrol, Homan said, "I love each and every one of you wearing that green uniform. You are the finest 1% of this country."

CPAC is an annual gathering of conservatives from across the country. This year, the conference took place in National Harbor, Maryland, and saw the participation of Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Elon Musk and several other top Trump Cabinet officials and Republican leaders.

The Kennedy Center will usher in the "Golden Age of the Arts" in Washington, D.C., as its new leadership under President Donald Trump plans to roll out productions that will "sell tickets" and appeal to the public, interim Executive Director Richard Grenell told Fox News Digital. 

"This will be the Golden Age of the Arts," Grenell told Fox News Digital in an exclusive comment on the matter. "The Kennedy Center has zero cash on hand and zero dollars in reserves - while taking tens of millions of dollars in public funds. We must have programs that sell tickets. We can’t afford to pay for content that doesn’t at least pay for itself right now. I wish we didn’t have to consider the costs of production, but we do." 

"The good news is that there are plenty of shows that are very popular, and therefore the ticket sales will pay for themselves," Grenell added. 

The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts serves as the national cultural center of the U.S. and is now led by President Donald Trump as its chairman, Grenell and its board of trustees. 

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The center came under scrutiny this week as the media and liberal critics spotlighted that a performance by the Gay Men's Chorus and National Symphony Orchestra slated for May as part of Washington, D.C.'s gay pride celebrations was canceled, with critics attempting to tie the cancelation to the Trump administration. The chorus and orchestra were scheduled to perform a show titled "A Peacock Among Pigeons," which is based on an LGBT-themed children's book. 

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The performance, however, was put on the chopping block weeks before the center's leadership change and was canceled due to lack of ticket sales, Fox News Digital learned. The center's new leadership has not canceled any shows since taking the reins of the cultural center, a source familiar with the Kennedy Center's operations told Fox Digital. 

"Artists who have pulled down their shows are only punishing themselves and the patrons. It shows the artists have an intolerance to engage with those of differing opinions. Republicans are patrons, too, they should remember that," the source said of recent left-leaning performers and celebrities who have pulled out of shows. 

Grenell, who also serves as special presidential envoy for special missions under the second Trump administration, joined the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Friday, where he pushed back that the production had been canceled over Trump. 

"Suddenly it was, the Gay Men’s Chorus was dropping out because of Trump. That wasn’t true," Grenell added. "It was replaced with with some other things, that happens all the time."

A production of "The Wizard of Oz" replaced the planned performance of "A Peacock Among Pigeons," the executive director of the National Symphony Orchestra said earlier this week, underscoring that the planned performance had been canceled before the leadership change and was due to financial issues. 

"Before the leadership transition at the Kennedy Center, we made the decision to postpone Peacock Among Pigeons due to financial and scheduling factors. We chose to replace it with ‘The Wizard of Oz,' another suitable program for World PRIDE participation," the orchestra's Executive Director, Jean Davidson, said in a statement earlier this week. 

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"Program changes are a common practice. We were unable to announce the replacement program until we had secured the rights to present it, but in the interest of transparency, we removed the original program from the website to prevent further ticket sales. The Gay Men's Chorus was to be contracted as a guest artist for Peacock Among Pigeons," Davidson added. 

Grenell previewed during his remarks at CPAC that the Kennedy Center will now focus on performances "the public want to see," such as Christmas-focused productions in December. 

"We have to do the big productions that the masses and the public want to see, we want to have really good programming," he said. "So the first thing that we’re doing … you’ve got to be at the Kennedy Center in December, because we are doing a big, huge celebration of the birth of Christ at Christmas. How crazy is it to think that we’re going to celebrate Christ at Christmas with a big traditional production to celebrate what we are all celebrating in the world during Christmastime, which is the birth of Christ."

Trump fired a handful of the center's previous board members earlier this month, arguing that they did "not share our Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture." He replaced the former members with 14 other members, including allies such as second lady Usha Vance and "God Bless the USA" singer lee Greenwood. 

"At my direction, we are going to make the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., GREAT AGAIN. I have decided to immediately terminate multiple individuals from the Board of Trustees, including the Chairman, who do not share our Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture," Trump posted to Truth Social on Feb. 7. 

Trump indicated that the motivation behind firing the former board members was due to the Kennedy Center's drag show performances under the Biden administration that targeted children.

"Just last year, the Kennedy Center featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth — THIS WILL STOP. The Kennedy Center is an American Jewel, and must reflect the brightest STARS on its stage from all across our Nation. For the Kennedy Center, THE BEST IS YET TO COME!" Trump said on Truth Social earlier this month. 

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"We will soon announce a new Board, with an amazing Chairman, DONALD J. TRUMP!" he added. 

The new board elected Trump as chairman on Feb. 12. Trump appointed Grenell – who became the U.S.'s first openly gay cabinet member under the first Trump administration when he served as acting director of national intelligence – as interim executive director amid the board shakeup. 

"I think the frustration that President Trump had is that the Kennedy Center has no cash on hand, no reserves, and they have been paying for the salaries with the debt reserves, while taking around $40 million of public money," Grenell said at CPAC on Friday. 

Maine Democratic Gov. Janet Mills’ public dust-up with President Donald Trump during a White House meeting with most of America's state leaders didn’t live up to governors’ collective goal of "disagree[ing] better," the National Governors Association chairman said Saturday.

Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis was asked about the exchange – in which Trump challenged Maine to comply with his executive order on transgender athletes in school sports, and Mills told Trump "see you in court." The president remarked that any state that does not align its scholastic athletics with biological sexes will not receive federal funding.

"As governors, we have our prior initiative that we continue to work on is to disagree better," Chairman Polis said.

"We always hope that people can disagree in a way that elevates the discourse and tries to come to a common solution around . . . what the issue is. I don't think that that disagreement is necessarily a model of that," he continued, adding that some governors may not have known the origins of the fiery exchange at the time.

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Polis said governors do have the right to sue the federal government but that there are also other ways to understand where respective parties are coming from.

"It was a little uncomfortable in the room," added NGA Vice Chairman Kevin Stitt, Oklahoma’s GOP governor.

"But like, like Governor Polis said, I wasn't sure exactly what the backstory was behind the conflict there. Apparently, there had been some things that both sides have said."

Stitt remarked that the exchange may have been "good politics" for both Mills and Trump with their respective bases.

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He added that he personally agrees with Trump’s stance and noted that he led a push in 2022 to ensure that scholastic athletes are competing against people of their own biological sex in Oklahoma.

"The NCAA has followed that, I think the Olympics have. And then you have a governor saying that they're not going to follow that. So, I don't know what legal background she has, but they talked about seeing each other in court. And we'll we'll see what happens on it."

Polis added that Mills maintained that she is following current federal law under her current stance.

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Later, Stitt said that Trump had invited all governors to give him a call, and had quipped that if a Democrat and a Republican call at the same time, he will take the Democrat’s call first.

"He is a businessman. He is not ideological. He wants to get things done," Stitt said.

At the White House meeting, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey successfully asked cabinet officials to share their direct lines, to better facilitate cooperation between states and the Trump administration. 

That nugget was revealed by South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, who quipped that ther president had also offered governors an open line – but did not explicitly publicize his number.

"I’ve got it, but I’m going to hold onto it," McMaster joked.

Conservative voters believe Vice President JD Vance will become the Republican Party's presidential nominee in the 2028 election cycle, a straw poll conducted at the 2025 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) found. 

"You guys are the conservative movement, you guys are the thought leaders, the opinion leaders. We asked folks who they thought would be the Republican nominee, who they preferred for the Republican for president in 2028. And who is it?," Jim McLaughlin, president of McLaughlin & Associates Polls, said Friday from the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Oxon Hill, Maryland, on Saturday. 

"JD Vance. And why? Because he's viewed as the closest thing to Donald Trump," McLaughlin added, he did not provide additional data on Vance's support among CPAC attendees. 

The straw poll was conducted among more than 1,000 attendees of the conservative conference, which kicked off on Wednesday and wraps up on Saturday following President Donald Trump's planned speech. 

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McLaughlin noted that the straw poll has accurately predicted conservatives' views and voting trends in previous years, including that Trump would win the 2024 primary and general election. 

"You know how I knew Donald Trump was going to win the people in this room? Because when we did the CPAC polls over the years, and you had the mainstream media saying, you know, 'Donald Trump couldn't win again.' Donald Trump was winning overwhelmingly, not by a little bit, overwhelmingly in every single CPAC poll. You guys knew he was going to win the primary. You all knew that he was going to win the general election, no matter what the Democrats threw at us," he said. 

This year's straw poll overwhelmingly focused on Trump's approval ratings since taking office, with a handful of results finding Trump's approval sitting at 99% on various issues. 

"The first few weeks of Donald Trump's presidency have been the best for the modern conservative movement in my lifetime. What do you think about that?" McLaughlin said of one of the poll questions. "Well, 99% agreed with that. Think about that. We don't see 99% numbers."

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"But 99% say this is the best … in modern conservative history," McLaughlin, who was joined on stage by CPAC chair Matt Schlapp on stage to announce the results, added. 

Ninety-nine percent of respondents also reported in the poll that Congress rapidly passing Trump's agenda is important to them, while another 99% reported that Trump is doing a better job now than his first administration. All in, Trump's job approval rating sits at 99%, according to the poll. 

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"It's amazing. I've been working as a pollster now … going on four decades. . . . We've never seen numbers like this. We've never seen anybody unite the conservative movement the way Donald Trump has done this," McLaughlin added of Trump's high marks. 

Trump also earned support for his comments regarding the U.S. potentially establishing a national security and an economic alliance with Greenland. 

"Ninety-three percent of you approve of that, because it just makes sense for economic reasons, for national security reasons," McLaughlin said of Trump's support for establishing an alliance with Greenland. "And by the way, we do a little bit of work over in Europe and whatnot. They also think it's a very good idea. Donald Trump again, being a visionary."

The straw poll comes just roughly one month into Trump's second administration, which has been working at a break-neck pace as administration officials work to gut the federal government over overspending, while also stamping out potential fraud and mismanagement. 

EXCLUSIVE: Former United Kingdom Prime Minister Liz Truss is ready to bring the "conservative revolution" home from the 2025 Conservative Political Action Conference, telling Fox News Digital her plan to "Make the West Great Again."

World leaders took center stage at CPAC this week, telling the crowd of American conservatives they’re ready to see President Donald Trump’s agenda on the world stage. Truss, the shortest-serving prime minister in British history, said world leaders are envious of Trump’s second term and his Department of Government Efficiency. 

"There's a lot of momentum, and people are very envious of what's happening in the U.S. We'd love to be able to get the truth from government departments about what's actually being spent," Truss told Fox News Digital. 

Truss praised Elon Musk’s DOGE as a "playbook for what needs to happen" in the United Kingdom, but she said that a DOGE UK would be unrealistic under Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s leadership. 

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"What Musk is doing, going straight to the payment system, is a fantastic idea that we need to adopt in Britain, but the reality is that is not going to happen under the current government, because the current government are part of the problem. They are defenders of the deep state. They're not going to be investigating themselves. I think this is something that has to happen when there's a change of government. We are watching very closely what Elon Musk is doing. It's a fantastic playbook for what needs to happen in the U.K."

DOGE’s revelations about America’s federal funding and the mass layoffs of government employees have shaken up Washington this past month. Truss said that Musk is even holding the British government accountable. 

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"Sometimes I say that Elon Musk is the leader of the opposition in Britain, because he's the one actually on X, challenging Keir Starmer's policies, talking about issues like the grooming gangs, the appalling gangs who have been raping girls as young as 12. It's Elon Musk that's been taking the fight to Keir Starmer," she said. 

Musk and Trump’s ability to seize the social media narrative and America’s growing independent media space inspired Truss to establish a "new free speech media network" in the United Kingdom. 

"We have a massive problem with free speech in Britain," Truss said. "People are being locked up for posts on Facebook and on X, which is extraordinary. We're the country that invented freedom of the press back in 1695. It was almost 100 years before the First Amendment. And now we are, as a country, locking people up for saying things online." 

"This needs to change. So, what I'm establishing is a new free speech media network, which will enable people in Britain to hear what is actually going on, and people across Europe to hear what's going on." she continued. "I think that's really important. If you look at the Trump revolution, independent media was a major part of that."

Trump leaned on new media during his 2024 presidential campaign, posting TikTok videos from the campaign trail, spending nearly three hours with the widely popular podcaster Joe Rogan and using Truth Social as a direct line to his core base. 

Truss said that Trump is leading a "conservative revolution" and attended CPAC this year to learn how she can model his American success back in the United Kingdom. 

"What we're seeing happening in America is a revolution. It's a conservative revolution. All of the problems we have in our societies in the West, the leftist ideology that's taken over, whether it's wokeism or extreme environmentalism or anti-capitalism, all of those are being taken on by President Trump. And I want to see a similar revolution in Britain, which is why I'm here to learn about how they're doing it, to talk about how we build that kind of movement in Britain," Truss said. 

The former prime minister said she agrees with Trump on "everything from deporting illegal migrants; to cutting taxes; to drill, baby, drill; to being clear that men can't be in women's bathrooms." She said Britain needs to implement these policies and fire the "permanent bureaucrats who are part of the problem."

"The big difference with Britain is our bureaucracy is more powerful than the American bureaucracy. Most people working in government are career bureaucrats, and that's what I think we need to learn from America. We need to change," Truss added. 

Truss said she has had productive conversations with European and world leaders this week, strategizing about how to broaden their conservative coalition and create policies to bring energy prices down and boost the economy. Truss even said she had plans for a British CPAC. 

Truss resigned as British prime minister after 49 days in office in 2022 after her large tax cut plan destabilized the economy. She was one of three prime ministers in the United Kingdom within a four-month period in 2022. 

"I recognize that, given the situation, I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party," Truss said in her resignation.

The United Kingdom’s current prime minister and leader of the Labour Party, Keir Starmer, ended 14 consecutive years of Conservative party rule when he was elected in 2024. 

There is a UK DOGE movement gaining traction on social media for revealing wasteful British spending. The Procurement Files is an X account that combs through more than 300,000 contracts on the United Kingdom’s public government database to reveal mismanagement of British taxpayer money, much like the official US DOGE account does.

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK party leader who initiated Britain’s departure from the European Union, has explicitly called for a UK DOGE. Despite the discontent from conservative leaders on British government efficiency, the prime minister’s office said that it has created initiatives to cut government waste.

"The Chancellor has asked all departments to deliver savings and efficiencies of 5% of their current budget as part of the first zero-based Spending Review in seventeen years," an HM Treasury spokesperson said in a statement to Fox News Digital. 

"Every pound of government spending is being interrogated, to root out waste and get the best value for taxpayers as we deliver on their priorities set out in the Plan for Change. We have also created an Office for Value for Money that is underpinning our work driving out waste and inefficiency, alongside cutting out hundreds of millions of pounds worth of consultancy spending in government over the next few years," the spokesperson added. 

Sacked United States Agency for International Development (USAID) staffers left their Washington, D.C., offices for the last time on Friday, with some carrying boxes scrawled with messages that seemed to be directed at President Donald Trump, who is slashing the agency's workforce.

Thousands of staffers were notified weeks ago of their pending dismissals, while a federal judge on Friday cleared the way for the Trump administration to follow through with the mass layoffs as it aims to eliminate waste throughout the federal bureaucracy.

"We are abandoning the world," read one message on a box being hauled out by a grinning staffer as she walked out of USAID's Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs office.

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Another smiling staffer’s box had a more upbeat tone, with her message reading: "You can take the humanitarians out of USAID but you can’t take the humanity out of the humanitarians."

The staffers were greeted outside the offices by a small group of well-wishing supporters and former USAID workers who carried signs reading, "We love USAID" and "Thank you for your service, USAID."

Other workers were seen leaving the offices in tears.

The Trump administration plans to gut the agency and intends to leave fewer than 300 staffers on the job out of the current 8,000 direct hires and contractors. 

They, along with an unknown number of 5,000 locally hired international staffers abroad, would run the few life-saving programs that the administration says it intends to keep going for the time being.

USAID has come in for particular criticism under the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) for alleged wasteful spending. 

For instance, Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, the Senate DOGE Caucus Chairwoman, recently published a list of projects and programs she says USAID has helped fund over the years, including $20 million to produce a Sesame Street show in Iraq. 

Several more examples of questionable spending have been uncovered at USAID, including more than $900,000 to a "Gaza-based terror charity" called Bayader Association for Environment and Development and a $1.5 million program slated to "advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in Serbia's workplaces and business communities."

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Trump has moved to gut the agency after imposing a 90-day pause on foreign aid. He also has appointed Secretary of State Marco Rubio as the acting director of USAID.

Government employee unions had sued to stop the mass layoffs, but U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols on Friday lifted a temporary restraining order he had issued at the outset of the case and declined to issue a longer-term order keeping the employees in their posts.

Nichols, who was appointed by President Trump during his first term, also wrote that because the affected employees had not gone through an administrative dispute process, he likely did not have jurisdiction to hear the unions' case or consider their broader arguments that the administration is violating the U.S. Constitution by shutting down an agency created and funded by Congress.

The judge said the issue was jurisdictional, that federal district courts should not be involved at this stage, and that the matter should be handled administratively under federal employment laws.

"The court concludes that plaintiffs have not demonstrated that they or their members will suffer irreparable injury absent an injunction; that their claims are likely to succeed on the merits; or that the balance of the hardships or the public interest strongly favors an injunction."

The unions can now go to the Washington, D.C., federal appeals court for emergency relief to have the TRO put back into place, or possibly a preliminary injunction.

Fox News’ Bill Mears, Andrew Mark Miller, Aubrie Spady, Deirdre Heavey, Morgan Phillips and Emma Colton as well as Reuters contributed to this report.

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, is facing backlash for introducing a budget recommendation that changes the word "mother" to "inseminated person," and "paternity" to "parentage" in certain parts of state law.

The Evers administration's budget recommendation for the 2025-2027 fiscal period advises several other gendered terms be changed, as well. References to "wife" or "husband" are changed to "spouse" in the proposal. In other places, the word "father" is changed to "parent," and "mother" is swapped out for the phrase "parent who gave birth to the child."

The budget was introduced by the state Senate's Joint Committe on Finance on Tuesday.

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Wisconsin radio host Dan O’Donnell noted the language change in a post on X, calling it "beyond parody." Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, commented on the post, writing simply "red flag!"

The Republican Governors Association (RGA) issued a statement in response to the language changes.

Evers' "latest left-wing push" is "offensive to mothers," RGA executive director Sara Craig said in a statement. "Being a mother is the greatest privilege I will have in my lifetime, and every mother I know feels the same. If Tony Evers can reduce motherhood to an ‘inseminated person’ then our society is lost."

When introducing the budget proposal, Evers said his plan would eliminate income tax on tips, prevent homeowners from seeing property tax increases and improve the state’s infrastructure, among other things. However, he made no mention of the language in the bill.

WISCONSIN BANS TRANS ATHLETES FROM GIRLS’ SPORTS, FOLLOWING TRUMP’S EXECUTIVE ORDER 

The cultural battle over gendered language has raged for the last few years with debates over the use of terms like "chestfeeding" instead of "breastfeeding" or "birthing person" instead of "mother."

On his first day back in the Oval Office, President Donald Trump attacked the issue head-on with an executive order called "Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government."

In the order, President Trump makes it official government policy "to recognize two sexes, male and female," saying they are "not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality." The order also explicitly states that "’sex’ is not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender ideology.’" 

Earlier this month, Trump issued another order on gender ideology called "Keeping Men out of Women's Sports." The order is designed to prevent transgender athletes from competing against women. 

On Friday, during an event at the White House, the president had a heated exchange with Gov. Janet Mills, D-Me., in which he threatened to pull federal funding if the state does not comply with his order. The exchange ended with both saying they would see the other in court over the issue.

READ THE BUDGET RECOMMENDATION – APP USERS, CLICK HERE:

Fox News Digital reached out to Evers' office for comment.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) spent another week slashing hundreds of millions in spending by the federal government, while dodging various legal attempts to block its cost-cutting efforts.

Here are some of DOGE's big wins this week:

On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, an Obama appointee, shot down a request from several federal labor unions, including the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), to pause the mass firings of federal workers by the Trump administration.

NTEU and four other labor unions representing federal employees filed a complaint Feb. 12 challenging the firing of probationary employees and the deferred resignation program, which gives workers the option to agree to work from an office or resign. 

EXPERT REVEALS MASSIVE LEVELS OF WASTE DOGE CAN SLASH FROM ENTITLEMENTS, PET PROJECTS: 'A LOT OF FAT'

Cooper denied the request to stop the firings, saying the court lacked jurisdiction over the unions’ claims.

Instead, Cooper ruled the unions must pursue their challenges through the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute, which provides for administrative review by the Federal Labor Relations Authority.

DOGE was handed another victory by U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, who denied a request to issue a temporary restraining order preventing Musk and DOGE from accessing data systems at the Department of Education, Office of Personnel Management (OPM), Department of Labor, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Energy, Department of Transportation and Department of Commerce. 

The agencies were asking Chutkan to forbid both Musk and DOGE from terminating, furloughing or putting on leave any of their employees. 

Chutkin ruled that DOGE can continue to operate as it is now.

The judge also issued a court briefing schedule for plaintiffs and defendants to file motions for discovery, preliminary injunctions and dismissals, which stretches through April 22.

DOGE scored a win in court after a federal judge declined a request to temporarily block Elon Musk's government efficiency team from accessing sensitive data from at least three federal agencies.

Unions and nonprofits attempted to stop Musk’s DOGE from accessing records at the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The efforts were blocked by District Judge John Bates, who wrote in an opinion that the government was likely correct in categorizing DOGE as an agency, thereby allowing it to detail its staff to other government departments. 

Musk praised the decision on X with the caption: "LFG," an abbreviation for "Let’s [expletive] go." 

DEFENSE SECRETARY HEGSETH WORKING WITH DOGE TO CUT THE 'BS'

Earlier this week, DOGE announced it had discovered an identification code linking U.S. Treasury payments to a budget line item, which accounts for nearly $4.7 trillion in payments, that was oftentimes left blank.

"The Treasury Access Symbol (TAS) is an identification code linking a Treasury payment to a budget line item (standard financial process)," DOGE wrote in a post on X. 

"In the Federal Government, the TAS field was optional for ~$4.7 Trillion in payments and was often left blank, making traceability almost impossible. As of Saturday, this is now a required field, increasing insight into where money is actually going."

The agency thanked the U.S. Treasury for its work in identifying the optional field.

According to the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, which is under the Treasury, TAS codes are used to describe any one of the account identification codes assigned by the Treasury and are also referred to as the "account."

Schools spent hundreds of billions of COVID relief funds on expenses that had "little" impact on students, such as Las Vegas hotel rooms and the purchase of an ice cream truck, according to the Trump administration's cost-cutting department.

DOGE revealed Thursday that schools have spent nearly $200 billion in COVID relief funds "with little oversight or impact on students."

WHITE HOUSE OUTLINES WHERE DOGE SAVINGS COULD GO AFTER TRUMP FLOATS RETURNING 20% TO AMERICANS

Granite Public Schools in Utah spent COVID relief funds on $86,000 in hotel rooms at Caesars Palace, a ritzy Las Vegas Casino, while Santa Ana Unified spent $393,000 to rent a Major League Baseball stadium, according to a report by Parents Defending Education and shared by DOGE.

The cost-cutting department also revealed that schools spent $60,000 in COVID relief funds on swimming pool passes, while a California district used its funds to purchase an ice cream truck.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is working with DOGE to make cuts within his department, saying he believes it will find waste "not core to our mission."

"They're here, and we're welcoming them," Hegseth said in a recent video released Thursday. "They're going to have broad access, obviously, with all the safeguards on classification.

"They care just like we do, to find the redundancies and identify the last vestiges of Biden priorities — the DEI, the woke, the climate change B.S., that's not core to our mission, and we're going to get rid of it all."

Hegseth, who said many DOGE workers are veterans, met with Musk's team and said they have already started their review of the Department of Defense.

DOGE revealed on Tuesday that the U.S. government has more than 4 million active credit cards on its books.

"The US government currently has ~4.6M active credit cards/accounts, which processed ~90M unique transactions for ~$40B of spend[ing] in FY24," DOGE said in a post on X.

The cost-cutting department broke down multiple federal agencies and their credit card use, with the DOD leading the way in both the number of transactions, about 27.2 million, and the number of individual accounts, roughly 2.4 million.

Musk delivered a speech to conservatives Thursday in which he touted the accomplishments of DOGE and, at one point, stood on the stage holding a golden chainsaw given to him by Argentina's President Javier Milei, symbolizing the cuts being made to government spending, to the delight of the crowd of conservatives at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland. 

"We’re fighting Matrix big time here," Musk said. "It has got to be done."

Fox News' Alex Nitzberg, Emma Woodhead, Michael Lee, Greg Wehner, and Michael Dorgan contributed to this report.

Democrats proved on Thursday during a press conference about protecting Medicaid that Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency has become an inevitable policy discussion under President Donald Trump's second term.  

Ahead of the National Governors Association’s winter meeting in Washington, D.C., this week, Democratic and Republican governors huddled within their respective parties to strategize and discuss policy. Democratic governors held a press conference on Tuesday, sounding the alarm on Trump’s threat to Medicaid and signaling a Democratic messaging priority. 

"This is a life-and-death situation for so many of our citizens in all of our states. I'm more worried about DOGE," Gov. Ned Lamont, D-Conn., said. "I find the Department of Government Efficiency is leaking its way into HHS and everyplace else."

DOGE headlines dominated Trump’s first month back in the White House as Democrats protested weekly and called his executive orders a "constitutional crisis." When asked by Fox News Digital whether there’s a consensus among Democratic governors that its a "constitutional crisis," Lamont said, "It’s a budgetary crisis."

WHITE HOUSE OUTLINES WHERE DOGE SAVINGS COULD GO AFTER TRUMP FLOATS RETURNING 20% TO AMERICANS

Lamont said it’s impossible to plan for unpredictable and last-minute budget cuts, adding that cutting Medicaid would cost $2 billion. 

"It's not DOGE. It ought to be called dodge, a way to just push the costs on to our people," Lamont said. 

The Connecticut governor said he supports rooting out fraud in the federal government, but he said that if DOGE expects states to pick up the costs on things like Medicare or Medicaid, then it would put people at risk. 

DOGE UNCOVERS OVER 4M GOVERNMENT CREDIT CARDS RESPONSIBLE FOR 90M TRANSACTIONS

"DOGE is pretty cruel. Let's be blunt about that," Gov. Josh Green, D-Hawaii, added. "These are people in our states that have worked long careers, very dedicated servants, and they're getting kicked out of their lives."

Green said he launched an initiative in Hawaii yesterday to hire employees who have been fired by the federal government. 

"We're hoping to bring good people into the fold and help them heal through this process, and we will hire them. But at the end of the day, if there are deep cuts in budgets, we will all suffer and struggle to do that. There's a lot of great human capital out there, and this is just not the right way to go about things," Green said. 

Fox News Digital asked the governors whether they had agreed on a messaging strategy to combat DOGE. 

"It’s just not American. Honestly, I don't know how they came up with the plan to slash trillions of dollars in order to pay for tax breaks. Most Americans are going to be really upset when they lose fundamental services. My message is, we can be caring about our country and not just play to bombastic news moments," Graham said. 

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, D-N.M., said that governors work to make government more efficient every day.

"I think another unified message is we all want efficient, effective government," Grisham said. "I predict it will spend more on itself than it actually saves or finds cost savings or fraud. You know who finds fraud in health care and any number of other things? Governors do! And then we work with the federal government to make sure that we stamp that out across the country. If they were really interested in that, they would be working with us."

The Democratic governors urged more Republicans to stand up against Trump’s agenda. In the meantime, Grisham said that Democratic governors will continue to hold them accountable. 

"They're not telling us the truth. They're using this effort to line the pockets of one or a few Americans and companies, and they have not found any significant waste or fraud. They have to keep correcting, or at least we're going to hold them accountable, and correcting those numbers. You want help making government meaningful and effective and efficient? You're looking at a team that delivers on that every single day," Grisham said. 

President Donald Trump unleashed an earthquake on the U.S. immigration system during his first full month in office, quickly overturning Biden-era policies and overhauling how authorities conduct enforcement in the interior and at the border.

An order late Wednesday, which was implemented a day ahead of the administration's one-month mark, directed all federal agencies to identify all federally funded programs currently providing any financial benefits to illegal immigrants and "take corrective action." The order is intended to ensure that any federal funds to states and localities "will not be used to support sanctuary policies or assist illegal immigration."

But it was just the latest in what has been a battery of overhauls to the U.S. immigration system.

TRUMP FREEZES APPLICATIONS FOR BIDEN-ERA MIGRANT PROGRAMS AMID FRAUD, NATIONAL SECURITY CONCERNS

Trump, who ran his campaign centered on border security and cracking down on illegal immigration, got to work on day one of his administration — signing executive orders that declared a national emergency at the border and deployed the U.S. military. He also signed orders ending birthright citizenship for children of illegal immigrants, suspending refugee admissions and also ending the use of the CBP One app at the southern border to admit migrants via humanitarian parole.

Other orders included moves to restart border wall construction, which had ended under the Biden administration.

It wouldn’t take long before the moves were followed up by additional decisions from Cabinet agencies. The Pentagon quickly deployed troops to the southern border and also opened up Guantánamo Bay to flights of migrants.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) also issued orders that ended limits on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) imposed by the Biden administration on "sensitive" places, and also took limits on the use of expedited removal, allowing the rapid-fire removal process to be used more broadly after being limited by the prior administration. Another order allowed ICE to review the parole status of migrants brought in under parole, opening them up to deportation.

DHS has also gone after federal funding to migrant causes. Most recently, four Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) employees were fired and tens of millions of dollars taken back from New York City designated for hotels where migrants are being housed.

"Secretary [Kristi] Noem has clawed back the full payment that FEMA deep state activists unilaterally gave to NYC migrant hotels," a DHS spokesperson told Fox News Digital. 

Meanwhile, the administration quickly moved to ramp up interior arrests and deportations. A number of high-profile raids were quickly launched across the U.S., particularly in "sanctuary" cities that do not cooperate with ICE agents. Daily arrests quickly moved above 1,000 a day, and officials pointed to a number of criminals and gang members that were picked up in the process.

According to DHS data, obtained by Fox News Digital, there were 11,791 interior ICE arrests from Jan. 20 to Feb. 8, compared to 4,969 during the same period in 2024. That’s a 137% increase.

Arrests of aliens with criminal histories have soared by nearly 100% from 4,526 in the same period in 2024 to 8,993 under Trump this year. Arrests of fugitive aliens at-large, meanwhile, have gone up from 2,164 to 5,538, a 156% increase. Arrests of criminal aliens in local jails have risen 59%.

DHS SAYS IT 'CAN, SHOULD AND WILL' ADMINISTER POLYGRAPH EXAMS AMID ICE RAID LOCATION LEAKS

The new Trump era has seen the rapid unwinding of a number of Biden-era programs. Fox News Digital confirmed on Wednesday that DHS has now paused pending applications for three Biden-era programs: Uniting for Ukraine; parole processes for Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela (CHNV); and family reunification programs.

Trump had already ordered an end to the use of some Biden-era parole programs on day one, including CHNV. He had also ordered the end to the practice of paroling migrants at ports of entry who had made appointments on the CBP One app. 

At the time, the Biden administration touted the expansion of "lawful pathways," claiming they were part of an effort to reduce illegal crossings, but Republicans accused the administration of abusing limited parole power and allowing in migrants who should not legally have entered. 

The Trump administration has also suspended refugee resettlement, which had expanded under the Biden administration. It has also frozen funding to foreign nations, which was a cornerstone of the "root causes" strategy championed by the prior administration.

Migration strategies often require foreign cooperation, and the Trump administration used diplomacy and tariff threats to secure additional cooperation with neighbors and other countries in the region. 

Both Canada and Mexico agreed to ramp up their border security efforts after Trump floated new tariffs on incoming goods from their countries. Meanwhile, both Venezuela and Colombia agreed to take back their immigrants being deported, with Colombia’s president backing down after a public clash with President Trump. 

Guatemala, separately, agreed to accept deportees from other countries as part of a deal hashed out with Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE IMMIGRATION COVERAGE

So far, there are indications that border numbers continue to trend lower with the new administration. 

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) apprehended just 29,116 illegal immigrants along the southern border during the month of January, down from 47,000 in December and hitting a low mark not seen since May 2020, when 32,349 arrests were made at ports of entry, according to a White House press release.

Meanwhile, border czar Tom Homan said this week that Border Patrol "has encountered a total of 229 aliens across the entire southwest border" in a single day and rallied around President Trump, saying, "He is delivering."

"That is down from a high of over 11,000 a day under Biden," he said. "I started as a Border Patrol Agent in 1984, and I don’t remember the numbers ever being that low."

Fox News' Michael Lee and Bill Melugin contributed to this report.

Elon Musk’s remarks at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Thursday drew praise from those who were pleased with the cuts being made by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

"I wasn't really that interested in being political. It’s just like there was at a certain point no choice," Musk said at the event in Maryland while wearing a black MAGA hat and sunglasses. "The actions that we’re taking, with the support of the president and the support of the agencies, is what will save Medicare, what will save Social Security."

"That's the reason I'm doing this," he added. "Because I was looking at the big picture here, and it's like, man, it's getting out of control." 

ELON MUSK MAKES SURPRISE APPEARANCE AT CPAC

"A country is no different from a person," he continued. "[A] country overspends, a country goes bankrupt in the same way as a person who overspends usually goes bankrupt. So, it's not optional to solve these things, it's essential."

Matthew Kochman, a New York Real Estate broker, said that DOGE cuts "probably saved the country from financial collapse." 

"I thought it was all just common sense," Kochman said of Musk’s comments.

When attendees were asked about the proposal to use 20% of the money from the cuts across the board to go toward a stimulus check for American taxpayers, some raised questions about whether the funds should help pay down over $36 trillion in national debt. 

DOGE STIMULUS CHECKS: JOHNSON SIDE-STEPS QUESTION ON TRUMP PLAN, SAYS US HAS 'GIANT DEFICIT'

"I’m not sure I agree with the sending money back. I would just assume money going to pay down our debt, because it is an existential threat," Angie Carrai, of Vienna, Virginia, said, adding that Musk's comments have "tapped into what a lot of people feel" about taxes being wasted on "ridiculous" programs.

However, Kochman said he believes that taxpayers should get some of their money back but thinks it should also help pay off the debt.

Speaker Mike Johnson has also raised concerns about the pitch from Musk and Trump, saying that the United States needs to "pay down the credit card" with the $2 trillion objective amount to be slashed through DOGE. 

Pat Dennis, President of the left-wing American Bridge 21st Century opposition research firm, told Fox News Digital after watching Musk’s remarks that he’s concerned about cuts to programs that benefit Americans.

"He was talking about cutting programs that everyday Americans rely on, things like Medicaid," Dennis said. "The implication that massive percentages of these programs just can be unilaterally cut because they’re fraud is not real."

"People rely on these, voters rely on these, families rely on these, people in Republican districts rely on these," he added.

DOGE made headlines in recent weeks for taking aim at spending through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) as well as grants doled out through various cabinet agencies. 

Fox News' Peter Pinedo and Liz Elkind contributed to this report. 

A climate group linked to high-profile Democrat Stacey Abrams was granted $2 billion by the Biden administration in a "scheme" of "wasteful" spending, the Trump administration's leading environmental agency has revealed.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently made a revelation that the Biden administration was allowing just eight entities to distribute $20 billion of taxpayer dollars "at their discretion." 

Included in the funds was a $2 billion grant to Power Forward Communities, a nonprofit with ties to former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams that seeks to "reduce our impact on the climate" by financing the replacement of household appliances in lower-income communities with green alternatives.

Abrams, who lost the Georgia gubernatorial race in the 2022 midterms, reportedly "played a pivotal role" in establishing the group, according to a LinkedIn post by Ian Magruder, who works at one of the coalition's partners, Rewiring America.

‘WASTEFUL AND DANGEROUS’: DOGE'S TOP FIVE MOST SHOCKING REVELATIONS

"If you care about clean air, land and water, if you think there are some communities that have been left behind, then why aren't you spending a dollar actually remediating that issue instead of paying off your friend," EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin told Fox News' Laura Ingraham.

The $2 billion was used for the "decarbonization of homes" in low-income communities and paid for new household appliances, such as water heaters, induction stoves, solar panels, EV chargers, and weatherization, according to an April 2024 press release from Power Forward Communities.

Zeldin told Fox News that in 2023, Power Forward Communities reported just $100 in revenue but was later granted $2 billion by the Biden-era EPA in 2024.

TRUMP TO SIGN EXECUTIVE ORDER INSTRUCTING AGENCIES TO HUNT DOWN REGULATIONS THAT VIOLATE CONSTITUTION

The climate group was given only 21 days to distribute the $2 billion, and another 90 days to complete a training session called "How to develop a budget," Zeldin said.

"I would say that if an organization needs to take a training on how to develop a budget, one, they should be taking the training before they are spending a dollar, but they definitely shouldn't be getting two billion [dollars]," the administrator told Fox News.

"The entire scheme as set up is fraud, it's wasteful, it's abuse," he said.

Zeldin also noted the EPA found a potential "conflict of interest" payment of $5 billion to the former director of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund under Biden.

"All this money was put up front," Zeldin said. "It was ‘here is $20 billion.’ And it was going to their friends on the left."

The news that the Biden administration gave $2 billion to a climate group linked to Abrams was first reported by the Washington Free Beacon.

Fox News Digital reached out to Rewiring America, Power Forward Communities and Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund for comment.

New York City filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on Friday seeking to wrestle back more than $80 million previously sent to the city via the Federal Emergency Management Agency to house migrants.  

The suit argues that the funds were previously approved and then paid out by FEMA, only to be removed from a city bank account on Feb. 11 without notice or administrative process.

The funding had been revoked after Elon Musk claimed that the Department of Government Efficiency found a $59 million FEMA payment to New York City that was being used on luxury hotels to house illegal migrants. Trump later repeated Musk's claim and argued that "massive fraud" was happening.

New York City was awarded two separate grants during the Biden administration – one for $58.6 million and another for $21.9 million – as the city attempted to pay to house migrants, many of whom were sent by Texas officials who were frustrated with the Biden administration's handling of the influx of migrants entering the U.S. through the southern border.

NEW YORK CITY MAYOR ERIC ADAMS SAYS HE WILL RUN FOR RE-ELECTION AS A DEMOCRAT

The payments were made under the Shelter and Services Program (SPP) that Congress appropriated $650 million for last year to help local governments respond to the migrant crisis. There are currently fewer than 45,000 migrants staying at taxpayer-funded shelters in New York City, up from a high of 69,000 more than a year ago.

Friday’s lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York by the city’s law department, which handles the city’s legal affairs, against President Donald Trump, the U.S. Treasury, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The lawsuit accuses the federal government of violating federal regulations and the terms of the SSP grant, as well as abusing the federal government’s authority and obligations to implement congressionally approved and funded programs. ­

The suit argues that on Feb. 19, the federal government belatedly provided the city with a "noncompliance" letter that did not identify any noncompliance by the city. 

"Rather, it announced ‘concerns,’ which are unfounded and do not comport with how the city has managed the unprecedented crisis brought to its doorstep," the law department said.

Citing the government’s actions as a "money grab," the law department said the letter was a "mere cover" to mask the federal government’s real purpose, which is to permanently withhold the funds because it opposes their use on migrants.

The city is looking to recoup the funds and is seeking a motion for a preliminary and permanent injunction, and motion for a temporary restraining order (TRO).

New York City Mayor Eric Adams defended and supported the lawsuit in a series of posts on X late Friday, writing that the $80 million was approved, paid for and then rescinded – all while the city spent more than $7 billion of its own taxpayer money to tackle the crisis over the last three years.

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT MOVES TO DROP CASE AGAINST NYC MAYOR ERIC ADAMS

"We are going to work to ensure our city’s residents get every dollar they are owed," Adams wrote in on post. 

"Without a doubt, our immigration system is broken, but the cost of managing an international humanitarian crisis should not overwhelmingly fall onto one city alone. We have skillfully shouldered the cost of this humanitarian crisis almost entirely on our own, with more than 231,000 people entering our city seeking shelter."

Meanwhile, New York City Comptroller Brad Lander claimed the suit came about after he forced Adams’ hand on the matter. Adams has come under fire from New York Democrats over his decision to be more cooperative with federal immigration agencies in apprehending criminal illegal migrants amid the Justice Department efforts to dismiss corruption charges against him.

"After my office discovered that Elon Musk and his DOGE goon squad stole $80 million out of the City’s coffers, we successfully pressured Mayor Adams to allow the City’s lawyers to sue the federal government to get our money back," Lander said in a statement. 

"The lawyers who are standing up to President Trump and Eric Adams’ collusion deserve praise and we look forward to Donald Trump returning the money he stole from New York."

Lander is running against Adams in the mayoral election later this year.

READ THE LAWSUIT BELOW: APP USERS CLICK HERE.

Fox News’ Landon Mion, Maria Paronich and Jennifer Johnson contributed to this report. 

Richard Grenell, President Donald Trump's special envoy for special missions, defended Trump's recent criticism of Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy as being a "dictator," saying that the president is focused on what is best for the American people.

While speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland, on Friday, Grenell said: "I'm so thankful that we have a president who's concentrating on peace. And that's what Donald Trump has just said: ‘You know, let's stop.'"

"Remember that we handed Joe Biden total peace in the Middle East and total peace in Europe. He handed us a war in the Middle East and a war in Europe," he added. 

GOP SENATORS BACK TRUMP'S DEMAND FOR UKRAINE ELECTIONS, BUT WON'T CALL ZELENSKYY 'DICTATOR'

Grenell is a former U.S. ambassador to Germany and previously served as Trump's Acting National Intelligence Director.

Pressed by a reporter on whether he stood by Trump recently calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a "dictator," Grenell said, "I think when you reject having elections, and you're not moving towards that way that people get angry about that."

"I think the American people are really frustrated with Zelenskyy. I think that there's a big frustration that he's not making great choices for peace," he added. "And again, when the American people are spending hundreds of billions of dollars, there is a frustration."

TRUMP'S FRUSTRATIONS WITH ZELENSKYY ESCALATE AS US TURNS UP PRESSURE ON UKRAINE TO REACH PEACE DEAL

"What President Trump is saying very clearly: ‘We have to stop this war,’" he explained. "He's somebody who is concentrating on saying to both sides: ‘Let's talk to both sides and figure out how we stop this.’"

"But I want to say that’s really important in this conversation is Donald Trump has done something different than Republican foreign policy leaders have done for 25 years," he emphasized. "We articulate very clearly under Donald Trump, we don't do regime change. We are going to deal with the countries that are in front of us. And our criteria is not how do we make that country better [but] how do we make America better, stronger and more prosperous for the people that live here." 

TRUMP AND ZELENSKYY WAR OF WORDS HEATS UP EVEN AS US LOOKS TO WIND DOWN WAR IN UKRAINE

Grenell, who is a resident of California, also shared that he "may not be able to resist" running against former Vice President Kamala Harris if she decides to run to be California’s next governor.

"Honestly, it's not in my plan unless Kamala Harris runs for governor," he said.

"I mean, here's the thing. We already know who she is. We've spent hundreds of millions of dollars to define who Kamala Harris is," he went on. "If she thinks that she's going to run for governor of California, but a Republican is going to win, and I may not be able to resist trying to run against her."

VP JD VANCE SPEAKS ON 'FUNDAMENTAL GOAL' OF TRUMP ADMINISTRATION AT CPAC ADDRESS

Grenell has previously floated running for California governor as a Republican. He expressed interest in running to replace current Governor Gavin Newsom during the recall vote against the Democrat in 2021.

Despite the state’s notoriously liberal and leftist policies, Grenell has said that California is a "magnificent state" and expressed: "We deserve better than the failed leadership and partisan politics of our elected officials."

Grenell also criticized California political leaders for botching the response to the recent Los Angeles wildfires.

LOS ANGELES MAYOR KAREN BASS SACKS FIRE CHIEF WHO SAID CITY FAILED RESIDENTS IN WILDFIRES

He said that the Trump administration will be attaching strings on future federal funding to California to ensure such a disaster does not happen again.  

"There are going to be conditions," he said. "As a Californian, I'm all for it because I don't have faith that if we went back and we just gave California hundreds of millions of dollars, they were going to go back to their same old ways of not giving us enough water [and] having dangerous situations on the ground when it comes to forestry. It's going to happen again."

President Donald Trump and his administration continued to advance negotiations with Ukraine and Russia his fifth week in office in an attempt to reach a peace deal to end the conflict between the two countries. 

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff and National Security Advisor Mike Waltz met with Russian officials in Riyadh Tuesday to discuss ways to end the war, while U.S. Special Envoy for Ukraine and Russia Keith Kellogg met with Ukrainian officials in Kyiv about a peace deal Wednesday. 

The meetings increased tension between the U.S. and Ukraine when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told reporters in Turkey that "nobody decides anything behind our back," claiming Ukraine wasn’t invited to the meeting between the U.S. and Russia. Zelenskyy has said that Ukraine won’t agree to a deal unless Ukraine is part of the talks. 

TRUMP'S FRUSTRATIONS WITH ZELENKSYY ESCALATE AS US TURNS UP PRESSURE ON UKRAINE TO REACH PEACE DEAL 

In response, both Trump and Zelenskyy exchanged barbs. Although Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Trump insinuated that Ukraine started the war and called Zelenskyy a "dictator." Meanwhile, Zelenskyy claimed Trump was dispersing Russian "disinformation." 

Even so, the Trump administration has defended its decision to meet with Russia, claiming it’s necessary to advance the negotiations. 

"How are you going to end the war unless you're talking to Russia?" Vice President JD Vance said at the Conservative Political Action Conference near the nation's capital Thursday. "You've got to talk to everybody involved in the fighting. If you actually want to bring the conflict to a close."

Here’s what also happened this week at the White House:

Trump signed an executive order Wednesday requiring federal agencies to assess regulations that could violate the Constitution as the administration seeks to cut red tape. 

Senior administration officials told Fox News Digital the order is first of its kind and an attempt to ensure the government isn't weaponized against the American people. It will require agencies to submit a list to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) within the next 60 days of all regulations that could be unconstitutional.

OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) and the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will oversee the effort and examine federal agencies’ regulations. 

TRUMP TO SIGN EXECUTIVE ORDER INSTRUCTING AGENCIES TO HUNT DOWN REGULATIONS THAT VIOLATE THE CONSTITUTION

DOGE officials at federal agencies will compose an inventory of regulations that could violate the Constitution and deliver the list to OMB. After the 60 days, the OIRA will go through the list of regulations and make individual decisions on which are unconstitutional and will launch the process of repealing the regulations on a case-by-case basis. 

OIRA oversees executive branch regulations, while the newly created DOGE aims to eliminate government waste, fraud and spending.

Trump signed an executive order Tuesday requesting the Domestic Policy Council to examine ways to make in vitro fertilization, known as IVF, more affordable and accessible for Americans. 

"Americans need reliable access to IVF and more affordable treatment options, as the cost per cycle can range from $12,000 to $25,000," the executive order said. "Providing support, awareness, and access to affordable fertility treatments can help these families navigate their path to parenthood with hope and confidence."

‘PROMISES KEPT’: TRUMP SIGNS EXECUTIVE ORDER TO ‘AGGRESSIVELY’ MAKE IVF MORE AFFORDABLE AND ACCESSIBLE 

The assistant to the president for domestic policy will provide policy recommendations with the goal of "protecting IVF access and aggressively reducing out-of-pocket and health plan costs for IVF treatment" within 90 days. 

Trump also signed an executive order that ensures taxpayer benefits do not go toward illegal immigrants, in an attempt to better protect the interests of American citizens. 

The directive requires federal agencies to determine if any federally funded programs are providing financial benefits to illegal immigrants and immediately take "corrective action" so that these federal funds don’t bolster illegal immigration. Likewise, the order instructs agencies to implement stricter eligibility verification to ensure that these benefits don’t go to those in the U.S. illegally. 

The order did not identify specific benefits, and notes that illegal immigrants are largely barred from qualifying for welfare programs. However, the order states without providing evidence that past administrations have "repeatedly undercut the goals of that law, resulting in the improper expenditure of significant taxpayer resources."

"My Administration will uphold the rule of law, defend against the waste of hard-earned taxpayer resources, and protect benefits for American citizens in need, including individuals with disabilities and veterans," the order states.

"President Trump is committed to safeguarding Federal public benefits for American citizens who are truly in need, including individuals with disabilities and veterans," a White House fact sheet on the executive order said.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Senate Democrats who spoke with Fox News Digital said they do support cutting some wasteful spending from the federal government, but not by Elon Musk.

"Of course there's some wasteful spending, but you don't use a meat ax and cut everything," Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Wednesday after Fox News Digital asked whether there was some waste worth cutting. 

"We need to look at each program. We need to go through Congress and see what's wasteful and move to eliminate it," he said.

Democrats have been critical of Elon Musk's efforts at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to slash "wasteful" federal spending, as the newly formed cost-cutting department rescinds hundreds of millions of dollars dished out by the previous administration.

Democratic lawmakers told Fox News Digital on Capitol Hill they are generally in favor of cuts to federal spending but aren't in support of how DOGE is conducting its sweep. 

VOCAL OPPOSITION TO ELON MUSK'S CUTS IS A ‘TERRIBLE’ STRATEGY, WARNS EX-DEMOCRAT ADVISOR

"DOGE is turning the country over to the billionaires. They're looking to make money for themselves," said Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn. "They're not interested in government efficiency."

Murphy told Fox "there's plenty of money to be cut," such as on prescription drugs, but "that's not what DOGE is doing."

"We spent way too much money on prescription drugs. We pad the pockets of the drug industry every single year. We should be negotiating all of our prescription drug costs. We waste a ton of money on overspending," Murphy said.

JUDGE DENIES DEMOCRAT-LED EFFORT TO BLOCK DOGE ACCESS, CITING LACK OF PROVEN HARM

Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., laughed, saying, "There's always things that can be improved."

Democratic Sen. Andy Kim of New Jersey said, "There's certainly waste and efficiencies that we can get better at," but "the way in which it's happening right now is not the right way to do it.

"I mean, you're having federal employees getting kicked out, and then we realize that we need them for bird flu or nuclear regulation and other things like that," Kim told Fox News Digital. "It's causing way too much chaos. But I would have been prepared to work in a bipartisan way. I still am."

Senators Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., told Fox they think there should be cuts to wasteful spending but did not elaborate on where that should be.

DOGE has spent the past month entering federal agencies and uncovering billions in spending from the federal government that the Trump administration considers wasteful.

The method sparked opposition from critics such as Schumer, who claimed DOGE "went after community health centers in Medicaid" and "many things that American families need, want and approve of."

Trump on Wednesday floated the idea of delivering 20% of the DOGE savings to taxpayers directly through personal checks to taxpaying households, while another 20% would be used to pay down the national debt. 

Call it Sen. Tim Scott's 55-seat strategy.

Scott, the conservative senator from South Carolina, told Fox News Digital soon after taking over late last year as chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) he aimed to expand the GOP's current 53-47 majority in the Senate.

And Scott, in a Fox News Digital interview this week on Capitol Hill, is standing by his goal.

"One hundred percent. It's my stretch goal," the senator reiterated. "The bottom line is, I believe that we can defend our current seats while adding at least two more seats to our numbers."

TOP POLITICAL HANDICAPPER REVEALS DEMOCRATS CHANCES OF WINNING BACK THE SENATE MAJORITY

Scott, who last month became the longest-serving Black senator in the nation's history, launched a campaign two years ago for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination before dropping out and endorsing Donald Trump.

The senator, who was a top Trump surrogate on the campaign trail last year, emphasized that "the good news is, with President Donald Trump leading this country, the field is wide open, which means that we have more places to play, and the game is on."

Scott added the NRSC needs "to focus on the mechanics of making sure that the Donald J. Trump brand is reflected in our candidates."

Senate Republicans enjoyed a favorable map in the 2024 cycle as they flipped four seats from blue to red to win back control of the chamber.

But the party in power — clearly the Republicans right now — traditionally faces political headwinds in the midterm elections. Nevertheless, an early read of the 2026 map indicates the GOP may be able to go on offense in some key states.

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Republicans will be targeting battleground Michigan, where Democratic Sen. Gary Peters recently announced he won't seek re-election next year, as well as Georgia, another key battleground state, where first-term Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff is considered vulnerable.

And in swing state New Hampshire, longtime Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen has yet to say whether she'll seek another term in the Senate when she's up for re-election next year.

Days before Scott was interviewed by Fox News Digital, Democratic Sen. Tina Smith in blue-leaning Minnesota announced she wouldn't run again in 2026.

"Minnesota is an open seat. That's a four-point state," Scott said as he pointed to Trump's better-than-expected performance in the state in November's presidential election.

"We can actually make gains there and bring home another red seat in Minnesota for the first time in a long time," Scott predicted.

Asked about GOP recruitment efforts in Minnesota, Scott responded, "I’m pleasantly surprised. We've already talked to two very highly qualified candidates and more to come."

Pointing to the current political landscape across the country, Scott touted that "we have a map that is wide open. All we need is time. Time is on our side right now. So, we're excited about what's going to happen over the next several weeks."

But Republicans are also playing defense in the 2026 cycle.

Democrats plan to go on offense in blue-leaning Maine, where GOP Sen. Susan Collins is up for re-election, as well as in battleground North Carolina, where Republican Sen. Thom Tillis is also up in 2026. 

Scott acknowledges that the GOP will have to spend big bucks to defend those two seats, as well as in Ohio, where Republican Lt. Gov. Jon Husted was appointed last month to succeed Vice President JD Vance in the Senate. Husted will run next year to finish out Vance's term.

SENATE REPUBLICANS JUMP OUT TO FAST START IN THIS KEY CAMPAIGN METRIC

Pointing to a likely price tag of well over $1 billion in those three races, Scott acknowledged that "we need to continue to have strong fundraising numbers and support our candidates as we defend our seats."

The NRSC recently announced a record $8.5 million in fundraising in January, which the committee says is its best ever off-year January haul.

Asked if the NRSC could keep up the pace, Scott said, "Absolutely we can. The good news is we're already on pace for February to have another record-breaking month."

And pointing to the president, Scott argued that "Trump brings a lot of enthusiasm. He made promises on the campaign trail, and now, as president, he's keeping those promises. What does that convert to? Cash is king. People love a man who says what he's going to do, he gets a job, he goes to work doing those things. It makes our job infinitely easier at the NRSC."

In the 2022 election cycle, when the Republicans blew a chance to win back the majority, NRSC Chair Rick Scott of Florida was criticized for a hands-off approach in the GOP Senate primaries. 

Last cycle, NRSC Chair Sen. Steve Daines of Montana got involved in Senate Republican nomination battles.

Asked what he'll do when it comes to contested GOP Senate primaries this cycle, Scott answered, "Whatever is in the best interest of the voters in each state, I will make a state-by-state decision on how we play and where we play."

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has sent a written complaint about U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, accusing her of potential bias and misconduct in a case between the Trump administration and two LGBTQ groups.

The letter, addressed to Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit Sri Srinivasan and signed by Attorney General Pam Bondi’s chief of staff, Chad Mizelle, concerns what the DOJ characterized as Reyes’ "misconduct" during the proceedings in Nicolas Talbott v. Donald J. Trump. The case was brought by two LGBTQ groups challenging the Trump Administration’s Executive Orders barring transgender individuals from serving in the U.S. military. 

According to the complaint, the transcript "reveals multiple instances where Judge Reyes’ misconduct compromised the dignity of the proceedings and demonstrated potential bias, raising serious concerns about her ability to preside impartially in this matter." In addition to appearing to take the plaintiffs' side on the issue of transgender service members, Reyes also went on a bizarre rant against graduates of University of Virginia School of Law.

JUDGE GRANTS 19 AGS PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION AGAINST DOGE ACCESS TO TREASURY PAYMENT SYSTEM

During the proceedings, Judge Reyes listed off executive orders signed by President Trump since taking office, including recognizing only two sexes, blocking school funding from promoting the idea that gender can be fluid, directing the State Department to stop issuing documents allowing a third gender marker, and revoking the ability of trans federal employees to receive a sex change. She also called out the Trump administration for revoking an earlier regulation concerning trans people having equal access to homeless shelters. 

OFFICIALS PUSH BACK ON CLAIMS ON ‘LIST’ OF GENERALS HEGSETH PLANS TO FIRE AT PENTAGON

The letter says Judge Reyes asked DOJ attorney Jason Lynch, "What do you think Jesus would say to telling a group of people that they are so worthless … that we’re not going to allow them into homeless shelters? Do you think Jesus would be, 'Sounds right to me?' Or do you think Jesus would say, 'WTF? Of course, let them in?'"

DOJ attorneys asserted that the line of questioning was "deeply problematic for several reasons" – including placing DOJ counsel in an untenable position of either appearing unresponsive or speculating about how an incoherent hypothetical aligns with Reyes’ personal religious beliefs.

The letter highlighted another incident in which Judge Reyes engaged in a rhetorical exercise to draw parallels to trans people being barred from military service. The judge instructed DOJ counsel, "My new standing order says that no one who graduated from UVA Law School can appear before me. So, I need you to sit down, please. I need you to sit down." 

TRUMP SAYS DEAL WITH UKRAINE FOR US ACCESS TO ITS RARE EARTH MINERALS IS ‘PRETTY CLOSE’

When counsel complied with this directive, the judge continued her hypothetical about UVA law graduates being banned from her courtroom because "they’re all liars and lack integrity." The letter alleged that only after Judge Reyes used counsel as a physical prop did she allow him to continue the proceedings. She then asked counsel if he saw how unfair the reasoning was. 

Still, the DOJ asserted in its complaint that such treatment "undermines the dignity of counsel and the decorum of the courtroom." 

There were times when Judge Reyes commended DOJ lawyer Jason Lynch, telling him and the gallery that he was doing a credible job arguing for the government in a difficult situation.

The letter closes by requesting that "appropriate action be taken to address these violations," saying that, at a "minimum, this matter warrants further investigation to determine whether these incidents represent a pattern of misconduct that requires more significant remedial measures."

U.S. District Court judges sit on the bench as a lifetime appointment. However, it is possible that Chief Judge Srinivasan could reprimand Judge Reyes, or possibly suggest she recuse herself from the case.

A federal judge on Friday granted a preliminary injunction over parts of the Trump administration’s executive orders on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI).

The injunction largely blocks the sections of President Donald Trump's orders that seek to end federal support for programs deemed to be DEI-related, and prevents the Trump administration from canceling contracts that they believe promote diversity, equity or inclusion. 

U.S. District Judge Adam Abelson in Baltimore, a Biden nominee, ruled that parts of the executive orders likely violate the Constitution and free speech.

"The harm arises from the issuance of it as a public, vague, threatening executive order," Abelson said in a hearing this week, adding that it would discourage businesses working with the government from openly supporting DEI. 

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The ruling comes after the city of Baltimore, the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education, the American Association of University Professors and the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United – which represents restaurant workers – sued the Trump administration over the executive orders, calling them presidential overreach and anti-free speech. 

"Ordinary citizens bear the brunt," attorneys for the plaintiffs wrote in the complaint. "Plaintiffs and their members receive federal funds to support educators, academics, students, workers, and communities across the country. As federal agencies make arbitrary decisions about whether grants are ‘equity-related,’ Plaintiffs are left in limbo."

They argued that Trump was encroaching on Congress’ powers in order to champion his personal beliefs. 

"But the President simply does not wield that power," they wrote in the complaint. "And contrary to his suggestions otherwise, his power is not limitless."

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Trump signed an order on his first day in office directing federal agencies to terminate all "equity-related" grants or contracts. He signed a follow-up order requiring federal contractors to certify that they don’t promote DEI. 

The Trump administration argued in a Wednesday hearing that the president was only banning DEI programs that violate federal civil rights laws. 

"What’s happening is an overcorrection and pulling back on DEI statements," attorney Aleshadye Getachew said in a hearing. 

A second federal lawsuit was also filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Wednesday targeting Trump's DEI executive orders. The new complaint was filed by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and Lambda Legal on behalf of nonprofit advocacy organizations. 

The lawsuit is aimed at Trump's executive orders: "Ending Radical and Wasteful DEI Programs and Preferencing," "Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government," and "Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity." 

White House spokesman Harrison Fields said both lawsuits represented "nothing more than an extension of the left’s resistance," adding in a statement to the New York Times that the administration was "ready to face them in court."

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"Radical leftists can either choose to swim against the tide and reject the overwhelming will of the people, or they can get on board and work with President Trump to advance his wildly popular agenda," Fields said.

Fox News' Danielle Wallace and The Associated Press contributed to this report.