Former Vice President Mike Pence revealed his brief exchange with President-elect Trump, which was caught on camera at former President Carter’s state funeral.
The pair have not been seen publicly together since leaving the White House in disagreement over the 2020 election results. At the service at the National Cathedral, Pence stood up to shake Trump's hand, and they appeared to exchange pleasantries.
Former second lady Karen Pence, who was seated next to her husband, did not stand up or acknowledge Trump.
In an interview with Christianity Today, Pence said he "welcomed" the opportunity to speak with Trump.
"He greeted me when he came down the aisle. I stood up, extended my hand. He shook my hand. I said, ‘Congratulations, Mr. President,’ and he said, ‘Thanks, Mike,’" Pence said.
Pence also recalled one of his final conversations with Trump in 2021, when he told Trump he would continue to pray for him. Trump responded, "Don't bother," the outlet reported.
"I said, ‘You know, there’s probably two things that we’re never going to agree on. … We’re probably never going to agree on what my duty was under the Constitution on Jan. 6.' And then I said, ‘And I’m never going to stop praying for you,'" Pence told Christianity Today. "And he said, 'That’s right, Mike, don’t ever change.'"
While the two appeared to remain cordial at the service for Carter, Pence told the outlet he doesn’t think Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is the right fit to manage Health and Human Services and was concerned about former U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard serving as national intelligence director.
Fox News Digital reached out to Trump and Advancing American Freedom, a public policy advocacy organization founded by Pence, for comment, but did not immediately receive a response.
Fox News Digital's Andrew Mark Miller contributed to this article.
Special counsel Jack Smith resigned from his position at the Department of Justice Friday, Fox News has learned.
The resignation, which had already been expected since President-elect Trump was elected in November, was quietly announced in the footnote of a court filing Saturday.
"The Special Counsel completed his work and submitted his final confidential report on January 7, 2025, and separated from the Department on January 10," the note said.
Smith was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland in November 2022 to investigate the 2020 election interference case against Trump related to Jan. 6 and the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case. In 2017, Smith served as acting U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee during the first Trump administration.
The news came as the country waits for Smith's report on the election interference case to be released. A recent court filing showed Garland plans to release the investigative report soon, possibly before Trump takes office Jan. 20.
On Friday, a judge from a federal appeals court ruled against blocking the release of Smith's report.
"As I have made clear regarding every Special Counsel who has served since I took office, I am committed to making as much of the Special Counsel's report public as possible, consistent with legal requirements and Department policy," Garland wrote in a recent letter to House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and ranking member Jamie Raskin, D-Md.
Once Trump won the 2024 presidential election, Smith filed motions to wind down his cases against the president-elect. At the end of November, Smith asked a judge to drop the charges against President-elect Trump in the D.C. case against him.
Before asking to drop the case, Smith filed a motion to vacate all deadlines in the 2020 election interference case against Trump in Washington, D.C., a decision that was widely expected after Trump's win. After the cases were dropped, Trump responded to the move by arguing the investigations "should never have been brought."
"These cases, like all of the other cases I have been forced to go through, are empty and lawless, and should never have been brought," Trump in a Truth Social post. "It was a political hijacking, and a low point in the History of our Country that such a thing could have happened, and yet, I persevered, against all odds, and WON. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!"
Fox News Digital's Brooke Singman and Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report.
President-elect Trump announced incoming deputies for several key Cabinet positions in a series of social media posts Saturday as his inauguration date gets closer.
Trump, who takes office in less than 10 days, made the announcement on Truth Social Saturday afternoon. He began by naming Katharine MacGregor as the next deputy secretary of the interior, a position she held in Trump's first administration.
"Katharine is currently Vice President of Environmental Services at NextEra Energy, Inc., and previously worked at the Department of the Interior during my first four years as President," Trump wrote. "She helped us in our quest to make our Nation Energy DOMINANT, and was also an integral part of the team that produced our Historic ‘Salute to America’ at the National Mall."
Next, Trump named David Fotouhi to serve as the next deputy administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
"David worked at the EPA for the entirety of my First Term, concluding his service as EPA’s Acting General Counsel," the announcement said. "He is currently a Partner at Gibson, Dunn, & Crutcher LLP. In our Second Term, David will work with our incredible EPA Administrator, Lee Zeldin, to advance pro Growth policies, unleash America’s Energy Dominance, and prioritize Clean Air, Clean Water, and Clean Soil for ALL Americans."
The president-elect then named James P. Danly as the next U.S. deputy secretary of energy, calling his nominee "a retired U.S. Army Officer, who served for two tours in Iraq, where he earned the Bronze Star and Purple Heart."
"He served in my First Term as General Counsel, Commissioner, and Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, where he won countless cases before the Federal Courts, and drove regulatory reform to ensure abundant and affordable energy for the American People," Trump wrote. "James earned his Bachelor’s Degree from Yale University, and his Juris Doctor from Vanderbilt University Law School."
In his final deputy announcement, Trump named Paul R. Lawrence as his next deputy secretary of veteran affairs.
"Paul was a great VA Under Secretary of Benefits in my First Term, implementing Legislation I signed to improve the GI Bill and Appeals Modernization," Trump wrote. "Paul also helped us drive the claims backlog to its LOWEST LEVEL in VA History. Paul was previously a Partner at Ernst & Young, and the Public Sector Vice President of Kaiser Associates.
"He will work with our next VA Secretary, Doug Collins, to ensure our Hero Vets are taken care of, and treated with the respect they deserve, with thanks for the incredible sacrifices they have made for our Country."
After announcing the incoming deputies, Trump also announced that University of Chicago professor Casey B. Mulligan would serve as the chief counsel for advocacy at the United States Small Business Administration.
Trump called Mulligan "a highly respected expert on the regulations that are crushing our Small Businesses."
"During my First Term, Casey was the Chief Economist of my Council of Economic Advisers where he helped craft the Economic policies that gave us the best Economy in American History," Trump wrote. "Casey will work with Kelly Loeffler, our Great Nominee for SBA Administrator, to make sure that we slash regulations, and empower Small Businesses to thrive like never before."
EXCLUSIVE: A wife desperate to bring her husband home from 2½ years of wrongful detainment in Afghanistan has flown to Mar-a-Lago in Florida to implore President-elect Trump to take up her case.
Ryan Corbett was captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan in August 2022 just as the U.S. was pulling out of the country, and Anna Corbett says she has been trying to get a meeting with the Biden administration ever since.
This week, Anna saw a glimmer of hope when reports broke that the Biden administration has been negotiating with the Taliban to swap three U.S. citizens being held in Afghanistan in exchange for a Guantanamo Bay prisoner alleged to have been a close associate of Usama bin Laden.
But that deal has seemingly stalled. A senior Taliban official told The Guardian the Taliban would rather wait to negotiate with the incoming Trump administration, shattering the hopes of the Corbett family.
"I am absolutely desperate to fight for my family," Anna Corbett told Fox News Digital Friday during a layover on her last-minute flight to Mar-a-Lago.
She isn’t sure whether the last-ditch attempt will work. The Trump team has not yet set up a meeting.
"Wouldn’t it be amazing if I got a meeting in one day, when, for 883 days, I tried to get a meeting with President Biden, and he didn’t have the time?" she said.
Trump told Fox News’ Peter Doocy he would consider a prisoner swap but seemed skeptical.
"I haven't looked at it," Trump said Thursday. "I have not been in favor of the trade, but I'll be taking a look tomorrow. We'll announce something tomorrow."
The talks, which have been ongoing since at least July 2024, involve exchanging suspected senior al Qaeda aide Muhammad Rahim al Afghani for U.S. citizens Ryan Corbett, George Glezmann and Mahmoud Habibi, who were detained in Afghanistan in 2022.
Some Republicans in Congress privately voiced national security concerns over returning Rahim to the Taliban and questioned whether the negotiations had resulted in a bad deal.
"Ryan is an amazing person, and he has done nothing wrong, and our family desperately needs him," Anna Corbett said, imploring the U.S. government to accept the deal. "He's a patriot. He was just trying to help the Afghan people, and this is a decision that the president needs to make. And we are just desperate for Ryan to come home alive as soon as possible."
Glezmann and Ryan Corbett have been declared by the State Department as wrongfully detained, and the Taliban denies holding Habibi.
Anna Corbett said she last spoke to her husband Christmas Day for about 15 minutes.
"He was obviously trying hard to be in good spirits for Christmas for the kids and I," she said. "But it was a difficult call, obviously, because this has been going on so long.
"He asked me where things were at, if there was progress. And there really was nothing that I could share with him."
In 2024, two released American detainees revealed Ryan Corbett was severely malnourished, was experiencing blackouts and fainting and was being held in a basement cell with almost no sunlight or exercise.
Anna Corbett said that since then her husband has gained some weight but still experiences constant headaches and ringing in his ears.
Ryan Corbett was abducted Aug. 10, 2022, after returning to Afghanistan, where he and his family had been living during the collapse of the U.S.-backed government there a year before.
He arrived in Afghanistan on a valid 12-month visa to pay and train staff as part of a business venture he led aimed at promoting Afghanistan's private sector through consulting services and lending.
The Taliban have long sought the release of Rahim, who has been held at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba since 2008 because the Pentagon believes he was a close associate of bin Laden.
In November 2023, the Guantánamo Bay prison review board cited Rahim’s work for senior al Qaeda members and his participation in attacks on U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan as reasons to keep him in custody.
Biden has long been intent on closing the Guantánamo Bay prison. On Monday, he announced the transfer of 11 Yemeni detainees, including two former bodyguards of bin Laden, from Guantanamo to Oman, which has agreed to help resettle them.
Fox News' Greg Norman and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
The Trump Organization announced its ethics plan for Donald Trump's second term.
The president-elect's private company said Trump would be walled off from day-to-day duties.
Unlike in 2017, the company is leaving the door more open to some foreign transactions.
The Trump Organization on Friday announced that President-elect Donald Trump will be walled off from the day-to-day management of his privately held company.
Unlike in 2017, Trump's company is not agreeing to a blanket stop on new foreign business transactions. Instead, a five-page ethics plan calls only for a limit on transactions with foreign governments.
"The Company will not enter into any new material transactions or contracts with a foreign government, except for Ordinary Course Transactions," says a copy of the plan, obtained by CNBC.
The language would seem to allow business dealings like the Trump Organization's work with LIV Golf, a competitor to the PGA financed by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund, to continue. LIV is set to return to Trump National Doral in Florida for an April tournament.
Noah Bookbinder, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said the company's plan was little more than a rehash of Trump's first-term ethics policies.
"We saw during the first four years of the Trump presidency, a tremendous of the mixing of the business of the presidency with all kinds of interests, companies, people bring business to business Donald Trump seemingly as a way to kind of curry favor with him," Bookbinder told Business Insider. "What we're seeing this time is Donald Trump potentially taking the same ethics guidelines that didn't work during his first presidency and then dialing them back some."
Many policies outlined in a five-page document mirror Trump's promises when he took office in 2016. One of the main similarities is that the Trump Organization has again appointed an outside ethics advisor. Bill Burck, co-managing Partner of Quinn Emanuel and a former George W. Bush DOJ official, will serve as the advisor.
According to the plan, Burck will review acquisitions over $10 million, leases involving more than 40,000 sq. ft., and new debts of more than $10 million. He will also review deals with the US government as well as with state and local governments.
The Wall Street Journal first reported on the ethics plan. The Journal also reported that the Trump Organization wants to reclaim its former Washington, DC, hotel. Congressional Democrats sued Trump when he was in office, alleging he was partly violating the US Constitution's emoluments clause by renting out hotel rooms to foreign governments. In 2021, the Supreme Court threw out the remaining emoluments-related lawsuits.
Trump has significant assets outside of his eponymous firm. He has a significant stake in Trump Media & Technology Group, the parent company of his social media platform Truth Social. Trump's shares are a large part of the reason why his net worth is now estimated to be over $6 billion.
Just like House members, senators, and congressional candidates, Trump's nominees are required to file personal financial disclosures before they assume office or are confirmed by the US Senate.
Those disclosure reports, along with their ethics agreements, include details of each person's assets, sources and amounts of recent income, and other details of their personal finances.
The documents are likely to reveal information like Defense Secretary nominee Pete Hegseth's salary at Fox News, Attorney General nominee Pam Bondi's compensation for lobbying, and the sprawling assets of the billionaires working for the administration.
As of Friday, January 10, only one of these disclosures has been made public. This story will be updated as more become available.
Russell Vought, Director of the Office of Management and Budget
Russell Vought is Trump's nominee to be the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, a role he served during the second half of Trump's first administration.
His financial disclosure shows that he brought in more than $542,000 in both salary and bonuses from the Center for Renewing America, a pro-Trump think tank, and its affiliated advocacy group, Citizens for Renewing America. Vought serves as the president for both organizations.
He's made thousands in extra income on the side, including $15,000 from the Republican National Committee for helping to prepare the policy platform for the party's convention.
He also received a $4,000 honorarium from Hillsdale College on September 19, the date that he appeared on a panel during the conservative institute's Constitution Day celebration in McLean, Virginia.
His assets include various mutual and index funds, along with between $1,000 and $15,000 in Bitcoin, which generated more than $1,000 in income last year. As part of his ethics agreement, Vought agreed to sell off that Bitcoin within 90 days of his confirmation.
President-elect Donald Trump's transition will be funded entirely by private donors. His unprecedented move to reject federal funds typically allocated to presidential transitions allows him to shield the identity of donors. We explore why this matters in a video collaboration between Politico and Business Insider.
President-elect Trump announced a series of Cabinet picks as his Jan. 20 inauguration nears and Senate confirmation begins.
Trump nominated former Fox News contributor Leo Terrell, a civil rights attorney, as senior counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights at the Department of Justice.
"He will work alongside Harmeet K. Dhillon, a fellow Californian, and our incredible Nominee for United States Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights in the Justice Department," Trump wrote. "Leo is a highly respected civil rights attorney and political analyst. He received his law degree from the University of California, Los Angeles, and has defended many high-profile cases throughout his incredibly successful career.
"Leo will be a fantastic advocate for the American People, and ensure we will, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!"
In an announcement Thursday evening, Trump revealed Christine Toretti as his pick for ambassador to Sweden. He said Toretti is an "incredible businesswoman, philanthropist, public servant, and RNC Committeewoman."
"She is Chairman of S&T Bancorp, and a former director of the Pittsburgh Federal Reserve Bank," Trump wrote. "Christine has been a tireless supporter of important causes as a Board Member of the International Medical Corps, former Chair of the Andy Warhol Museum, Director of the NCAA Foundation, founding Director of the Gettysburg Foundation, Trustee of the Sarah Scaife Foundation, and Chair of the Anne B. Anstine Excellence in Public Service Series in Pennsylvania, and the Dodie Londen Excellence in Public Service Series in Arizona.
"Christine is one of fewer than sixty women who have received the Athena International Global Award."
Trump also announced retired Army Capt. Sam Brown would serve as the next Under Secretary for Memorial Affairs at the Department of Veterans Affairs.
"Sam is an American HERO, a Purple Heart recipient, and successful businessman from Nevada, who has devoted his life to serving America," Trump said in the announcement. "He fearlessly proved his love for our Country in the Army, while leading Troops in battle in Afghanistan and, after being honorably retired as a Captain, helping our Veterans get access to emergency medications.
"Sam will now continue his service to our Great Nation at the VA, where he will work tirelessly to ensure we put America’s Veterans FIRST, and remember ALL who served."
The nominations come as Trump continues to round out picks for his Cabinet as Jan. 20 nears.
The Republican-controlled U.S. Senate will soon begin holding hearings for Trump's Cabinet nominees.
Republicans will control the Senate with 53 seats to the Democrats' 47 once Senator-elect Jim Justice of West Virginia is sworn in later in January and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine appoints a senator to fill Vice President-elect Vance’s seat.
The state funeral for former President Jimmy Carter on Thursday at the Washington National Cathedral included every living former president, as well as various dignitaries from around the world.
Also notable were some VIPs not in attendance.
Former Vice President Dick Cheney was not seen at the funeral inside Washington, D.C.'s National Cathedral. The 83-year-old, who has had health issues, was the only living vice president who did not make the trip, as former Vice Presidents Al Gore, Joe Biden, Mike Pence and Dan Quayle were in attendance.
Also missing from the ceremony was former first lady Michelle Obama, who was not seated alongside her husband, former President Barack Obama.
"Mrs. Obama sends her thoughts and prayers to the Carter family, and everyone who loved and learned from the remarkable former President," Crystal Carson, a spokesperson for Michelle Obama, told Politico.
The outlet reported that Michelle Obama, who would have sat next to Trump at the funeral, had a scheduling conflict and is in Hawaii.
Former first lady Hillary Clinton was in attendance alongside her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
Also spotted at the funeral were former first ladies Laura Bush and Melania Trump, who sat alongside their husbands. Former second lady Karen Pence was next to her husband and first lady Jill Biden was seated alongside President Biden.
All five living men who once occupied the White House — the so-called presidents’ club — President Biden and former presidents Clinton, George W. Bush, Obama and President-elect Trump came together for the first time since the 2018 funeral of former President George H.W. Bush.
Other notable attendees included Vice President-elect JD Vance, Pennsylvania GOP Sen. Dave McCormick, Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, first son Hunter Biden and Ted Mondale, the son of late Vice President Walter Mondale.
Following the funeral, Carter's remains will be flown to Georgia by the U.S. Air Force aboard Special Air Mission 39 for a private ceremony in his hometown of Plains.
Carter, the 39th president, died on Dec. 29 at the age of 100 after he was admitted to hospice care in 2023.
Fox News Digital's Morgan Phillips contributed to this report.
MAGA Republicans are offering an outpouring of support for TikTok ahead of a ban looming over the social media platform that is set to take effect later this month.
"Trump won the election because he listened to first-time voters like myself and joined TikTok to get his message to us directly," RNC Youth Advisory Council Chair Brilyn Hollyhand told Fox News Digital of the impending ban. "He didn’t need paid influencers or cringey trends like his failed opponent. All he had to do was go where Gen Z was, TikTok, and lay out his plan."
Representatives of TikTok, which is owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance, are set to deliver arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday to request the nation’s highest court to delay a ban on the app that is set to take effect a day ahead of the inauguration. President Biden signed legislation into law in April that gave TikTok's parent company until Jan. 19 to sell it or face a U.S. ban.
If the Supreme Court does not halt the ban, U.S. TikTok users will no longer be able to download the app, and internet providers will be prohibited from allowing access to the site.
The looming ban originated out of concern that American users’ data is gathered by the Chinese government, but MAGA Republicans and content creators who spoke with Fox Digital balked at the reasoning as insincere.
"I have done, if not, the deepest possible dive on all of the concerns associated with the platform, especially for my daily show when I share my opinions and commentary on what's going on in culture and politics," TikTok creator and TPUSA commentator Isabel Brown, who has more than 500,000 followers on TikTok, told Fox Digital in a phone interview. "And we've confronted this potential ban of the platform for at least nine months to a year now … the complaints that I'm hearing, from particularly politicians, largely center around national security."
"But I have a very hard time believing that the true argument to censor TikTok is based in a national security concern when we still have documented evidence of virtually every single American social media company. Meta, Twitter, YouTube, etc, selling your data under the table to your own government and/or the Chinese Communist Party and even the Russian government as well."
"Heck, we even have records of Airbnb selling American data to the Chinese Communist Party. So there doesn't seem to be a lot of willingness to truly protect the cyber and personal information security of American citizens from the government en masse, it seems to only be focused on TikTok as a platform itself," Brown continued.
President-elect Donald Trump's supporters praising TikTok comes after the former and upcoming president made big inroads with Gen Z, especially young male voters, in the last cycle. A Fox News Voter Survey published after the election found that men aged 18-44 supported Trump at 53% compared to Vice President Kamala Harris at 45%.
"We're talking about an app that nearly 200 million Americans, 75% of whom are Gen Z, use every single day as our primary source of news, and according to some studies, even as our primary web browser search tool, so more than Google … and I have found that the opportunity for virality – to have a conversation with as many people as possible – on Tiktok is unparalleled on any other social media platform," Brown said.
A Republican strategist told Fox News Digital that TikTok is by all intents and purposes a "conservative platform."
"By all means, TikTok is a conservative platform now - if you take a look at how Trump dominated his competition, there’s no argument against the value this platform has, and I don’t think there’s a world where Trump doesn’t fulfill his promise to save it," the strategist said.
The GOP insider added that "the fact that [Sen. Mitch] McConnell and [former Vice President Mike] Pence want to ban this thing means it needs to be saved."
Ahead of the new year, Sen. Mitch McConnell filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court, urging justices to reject ByteDance’s request to delay the ban.
"The topsy-turvy idea that TikTok has an expressive right to facilitate the CCP censorship regime is absurd," McConnell’s counsel Michael A. Fragoso wrote in the friend of the court brief. "Would Congress have needed to allow Nikita Khrushchev to buy CBS and replace The Bing Crosby Show with Alexander Nevsky?"
While former Vice President Mike Pence’s nonprofit, Advancing American Freedom, filed a similar amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court last month.
"The CCP does not respect free speech, either in China or in America. The First Amendment is not, and should not be read as, a means of granting the Chinese government the power to do what the American government could not: manipulate what Americans can say and hear," the group wrote.
Advancing American Freedom President Tim Chapman told Fox News Digital that Trump's first administration "had this right the first time" when Trump initially worked to ban TikTok before the former and upcoming president reversed his opinion on the app.
"The Trump administration had this right the first time when they planned to ban TikTok through executive authority for the very same concerns that exist today. Political strategists salivating over clicks and followers does not mean that the national security implications have changed," Chapman said.
Emily Wilson, political commentator and host of podcast "Emily Saves America," told Fox News Digital that she can see both sides of the argument surrounding the looming TikTok ban but that instituting a ban would be "hypocritical against free speech."
"The TikTok ban is controversial, I see two sides to it. I see it as an app that’s very left leaning and consumes way too much of people’s time but it is sometimes the only place I get info about stories that should be breaking world wide. At the same time it can be dangerous. It can radicalize young people. One day you wake up on TikTok and young Americans are saying they’re supportive of Osama bin Laden," Wilson told Fox Digital.
"It seems to be an app leaning towards being anti-American and brainwashing young kids. At the end of the day, if I say to ban it it’s hypocritical against free speech. I just don’t want it harming young people," she added.
Trump himself has made a 180-degree turn on TikTok. Under his first administration, in 2020, Trump tried to ban the app from the U.S. market over national security concerns. His executive order, however, was eventually blocked in federal court.
Fast-forward to 2024 amid the campaign cycle, and Trump joined the app in June during the campaign cycle and has since racked up nearly 15 million followers and 107 million likes as supporters flocked to his content on the platform. Trump also filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court last month, which supported neither party in the case, arguing the fate of the platform should be left up to his administration.
"Today, President Donald J. Trump has filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court asking the Court to extend the deadline that would cause TikTok’s imminent shutdown, and allow President Trump the opportunity to resolve the issue in a way that saves TikTok and preserves American national security once he resumes office as President of the United States on January 20, 2025," Trump spokesman and incoming White House Communications Director Steven Cheung told Fox News Digital last month.
"President Donald J. Trump (‘President Trump’) is the 45th and soon to be the 47th President of the United States of America," the brief states. "On January 20, 2025, President Trump will assume responsibility for the United States’ national security, foreign policy, and other vital executive functions."
Fox News Digital’s Brooke Singman, Paul Steinhauser and Morgan Phillips contributed to this report.
The Biden administration on Thursday announced an additional $500 million of military aid to Ukraine in a security package rushed out the door before President-elect Trump takes office.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the final time at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, where he made the announcement. Both officials used the occasion to urge the incoming Trump administration to continue to support Kyiv's fight against Russia.
"If Putin swallows Ukraine, his appetite will only grow," Austin warned at the 25th meeting of about 50 member nations who have joined forces to support Ukraine with an estimated $122 billion in weapons and support.
"If autocrats conclude that democracies will lose their nerve, surrender their interests, and forget their principles, we will only see more land grabs. If tyrants learn that aggression pays, we will only invite even more aggression, chaos, and war."
The latest U.S. security assistance to Ukraine includes missiles for fighter jets, support equipment for F-16s, armored bridging systems, small arms and ammunition and other spare parts and communications equipment.
The weapons package is funded by the presidential drawdown authority (PDA), meaning the weapons will come from U.S. stockpiles, expediting their delivery to Ukraine.
Officials noted this is the Biden administration's seventy-fourth tranche of equipment to be provided from Defense Department inventories for Ukraine since August 2021.
This latest package leaves about $3.85 billion in funding to provide future arms shipments to Ukraine; if the Biden administration makes no further announcements, that balance will be available to Trump to send if he chooses.
Zelensky pleaded for the next administration to continue U.S. support for his country's defensive war against Russian invaders.
"We’ve come such a long way that it would honestly be crazy to drop the ball now and not keep building on the defense coalitions we’ve created," Zelenskyy said. "No matter what’s going on in the world, everyone wants to feel sure that their country will not just be erased of the map."
Member nations of the coalition supporting Kyiv, including the U.S., have ramped up weapons production since the Ukraine war exposed that stockpiles were inadequate for a major conventional land war.
The U.S. has provided about $66 billion of the total aid since February 2022 and has been able to deliver most of that total — between 80% and 90% — already to Ukraine.
"Retreat will only provide incentives for more imperial aggression," Austin said Thursday. "And if we flinch, you can count on Putin to push further and punch harder. Ukraine’s survival is on the line. But so is the security of Europe, the United States, and the world."
The funeral service of the late President Carter on Thursday at Washington, D.C.’s National Cathedral brought together all five living presidents together in one location.
The service comes as President Biden declared Thursday a National Day of Mourning for the 39th president, who died Dec. 29 at the age of 100.
All five living men who once occupied the White House — the so-called presidents’ club — President Biden and former presidents Clinton, George W. Bush, Obama and President-elect Trump came together for the first time since the 2018 funeral of former President George H.W. Bush.
"Throughout his life, he showed us what it means to be a practitioner of good works and a good and faithful servant of God, and of the people," Biden said. "And today, many think he was from a bygone era, but in reality he saw well into the future. A White Southern Baptist, who led the civil rights, a decorated Navy veteran who brokered peace, was a brilliant nuclear engineer who led a nuclear nonproliferation, a hard-working farmer who championed conservation and clean energy, and the president who redefined the relationship with a vice president."
Biden praised the strength of character with which Carter lived his life, saying he showed the strength to understand "that everyone should be treated with dignity and respect."
"That's the definition of a good life, a life Jimmy Carter lived during his 100 years. To young people, to anyone in search of meaning and purpose, study the power of Jimmy Carter's example. I miss him, but I take solace in knowing that his beloved Rosalynn are reunited again. To the entire Carter family. Thank you, and I mean this sincerely, for sharing them both with America and the world."
Ahead of the service, Trump was seen shaking hands with his former vice president, Mike Pence. Obama was seated next to Trump and the pair were seen shaking hands and chatting cordially.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., also attended, along with their Democratic counterparts, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.
Also in attendance were Sen. Dave McCormick, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Vice President-elect JD Vance, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, former first son Hunter Biden and former Vice President Al Gore.
In addition to Biden, other speakers included Carter's grandsons, Joshua Carter and Jason Carter; Steven Ford, who read a eulogy written by his father, former President Gerald Ford; and Ted Mondale, the son of former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, who also read his father's tribute to Carter.
Jason Carter remembered his grandparents' humble lifestyle, though added that he knows "we are not here because he was just a regular guy."
"As you've heard from the other speakers, his political life and his presidency, for me, was not just ahead of its time. It was prophetic. He had the courage and strength to stick to his principles even when they were politically unpopular," the grandson said.
Tributes began Jan. 4, when a motorcade carried Carter’s body through his hometown of Plains, Georgia, before heading to Atlanta and the Carter Presidential Center, where family and loved ones paid tribute.
Carter then lay in repose at the Carter Center and then the Capitol.
Carter, the former governor of Georgia, won the presidency in 1976. He was guided by his devout Christian faith and determined to restore faith in government after Watergate and Vietnam. But after four years in office and impaired by stubborn, double-digit inflation and high unemployment, he was roundly defeated for re-election by Ronald Reagan.
While in the White House, Carter established full diplomatic relations with China and led the negotiation of a nuclear limitation treaty with the Soviet Union. Domestically, he led several conservation efforts, showing the same love of nature as president as he did as a young farmer in Plains.
Carter lived out the rest of his years in the unassuming ranch house he'd built with his wife in 1961, building homes with Habitat for Humanity and making forays back into foreign policy when he felt it was needed, a tendency that made his relationship with the presidents' club, at times, tense.
He earned a living in large part by writing books — 32 in all — but didn't cash in on seven-figure checks for giving speeches or take any cushy board jobs as other presidents have.
In his spare time, Carter, a deeply religious man who served as a deacon for the Maranatha Baptist Church of Plains, enjoyed fishing, running and woodworking.
Carter is survived by his four children, 11 grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren.
President Biden said he was still considering pre-emptive pardons for President-elect Donald Trump's political foes, such as former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Dr. Anthony Fauci, during his final interview with a print publication before leaving the White House.
The interview, conducted over the weekend in the Oval Office by USA Today's Washington Bureau chief Susan Page, was released Wednesday morning. Biden told Page during the discussion that he was still unsure whether to offer pre-emptive pardons to potential Trump targets, including Cheney, Fauci and others.
Biden added during the interview that when he met with Trump following his November election victory, he urged the president-elect not to "try to settle scores."
"He didn't say, 'No, I'm going to...' You know. He didn't reinforce it. He just basically listened," Biden told Page.
Reports of potential pre-emptive pardons for people who could face Trump's political wrath started to surface after Biden pardoned his son, Hunter, following his conviction on felony gun and tax charges. The pardon came after Biden said he was not considering such a move.
Biden continued handing out pardons and commutations during the waning days of his presidency. Last month, he set a record for the largest single-day act of clemency when he commuted the sentences of roughly 1,500 people in mid-December.
Some Democrats have warned the move to issue additional broad-based pardons for Trump's political targets – on Biden's way out the door – could set a dangerous precedent. Meanwhile, others have publicly advocated for the pardons over fear of what Trump might do.
One of the public officials who Biden has reportedly been considering for one of the pre-emptive pardons, Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., told CNN Monday that he did not want to see every president going forward handing out broad-based, blanket pardons. However, Schiff stopped short of saying whether he would decline such a pardon if it were offered to him.
Other lawmakers, such as Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., signaled support for Biden issuing pre-emptive pardons.
"I think that without question, Trump is going to try to act in a dictatorial way, in a fascistic way, in a revengeful [way his] first year … towards individuals who he believes harmed him," Markey told Boston Public Radio following Trump's November election victory. "If it’s clear by January 19th that [revenge] is his intention, then I would recommend to President Biden that he provide those preemptive pardons to people, because that’s really what our country is going to need next year."
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.
Former President Jimmy Carter's body was brought to the District of Columbia on Tuesday afternoon and will lie in state at the U.S. Capitol before a state funeral set for Thursday across town at the Washington National Cathedral.
Carter died Sunday, Dec. 29, at 100 years old. His death came just over a year after the death of his wife of 77 years, Rosalynn Carter.
Carter’s ceremonial arrival at the U.S. Capitol Rotunda came after the start of six days of funeral ceremonies that began Saturday morning in the 39th president's hometown of Plains, Georgia.
Carter's casket was greeted at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, D.C., on Tuesday by the U.S. Air Force Band playing "Abide with Me." From Andrews, a hearse took Carter's casket to the U.S. Navy Memorial for a brief ceremony. Carter, a Naval Academy alumnus, served as a submarine officer before leaving the Navy to take over his family's farm.
At the Navy Memorial, the casket was transferred to a horse-drawn caisson for a procession up Pennsylvania Avenue to the U.S. Capitol.
Vice President Harris delivered a eulogy at the Capitol's lying-in-state ceremony and was joined by second gentleman Doug Emhoff in presenting a memorial wreath on behalf of the executive branch of the government.
The U.S. Capitol ceremony on Tuesday featured remarks from both House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., representing their respective houses of Congress.
Johnson praised Carter in his speech as an "extraordinary man" and applauded both his service in the military and his work for charitable causes such as Habitat for Humanity and The Carter Center, the latter founded in 1982 by the former first couple.
"I'm reminded of his admonition to quote, 'Live our lives as though Christ were coming this afternoon,'" Johnson remarked on Tuesday. "And of his amazing personal reflection, 'If I have one life and one chance to make it count for something.'"
"We all agree that he certainly did," he concluded. "So today, in these hallowed halls of our republic, we honor President Carter, his family and his enduring legacy that he leaves not only upon this nation but upon the world."
Johnson announced last month that Carter would lie in state in a letter to Carter's second-eldest son, James Carter III.
"In recognition of President Carter’s long and distinguished service to the nation, it is our intention to ask the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate to permit his remains lie in state in the Rotunda of the United States Capitol," the leaders wrote.
Besides Carter, just 12 presidents have lain in state in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, the use of which requires approval by both the House and Senate. The last president to lie in state was George H.W. Bush in December 2018. Since 1865, nearly all services held in the Capitol Rotunda have used the catafalque that was constructed in 1865 for displaying President Lincoln's casket.
Members of the public can view Carter’s casket from early Wednesday through early Thursday, when his official state funeral service will be held at the Washington National Cathedral.
The former president will be honored and remembered through several days of funeral services before returning to his hometown for private funeral and interment ceremonies. He will be laid to rest by his wife.
The White House’s outgoing cyber czar, Harry Coker, called for three key things to meet the growing threat of digital attacks: more funding, deregulation and opening up cyber jobs to those without college degrees.
As adversaries like Iran, China and Russia lob near-constant attacks on the U.S. digital infrastructure, "we have to prioritize cybersecurity within federal budgets" President Joe Biden’s national cyber director said at an event with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C.
"I would love for the incoming administration, or any administration, to recognize the priority of cybersecurity," Coker said.
He added that he understands the U.S. is in a "tough budget situation."
"I get that, and I support making progress towards reducing the deficit, but we have to prioritize cybersecurity within our current budgets," he said.
At the same time, the Biden appointee railed against "duplicative federal regulation" and said he’d heard from those working to protect the nation’s online infrastructure that they spend "a staggering 30 to 50%" of their time working to comply with regulation, rather than ensuring protection from hacks.
"Armed with the industry's call to streamline, we worked with Congress to write bipartisan legislation that would bring all stakeholders, including independent regulators, to the table to advance the regulatory harmonization," he went on.
"Many of us were disappointed that this has not become law yet, but we have laid the groundwork for the next administration in Congress to do the right thing for our partners in the private sector."
His urging comes as the U.S. is grappling with the fallout of one of China’s biggest attacks on American infrastructure in history, dubbed Salt Typhoon.
A Chinese intelligence group infiltrated nine U.S. telecommunications giants and gained access to the private text messages and phone calls of Americans, including senior government officials and prominent political figures.
The Salt Typhoon hackers also gained access to an exhaustive list of phone numbers the Justice Department had wiretapped to monitor people suspected of espionage, granting them insight into which Chinese spies the U.S. had caught onto and which they had missed.
China was also behind a "major" hack of the Treasury Department in December, gaining access to unclassified documents and the workstations of government employees.
And earlier this year, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo’s communications were intercepted by Chinese intelligence, just as she was making determinations about new export controls on semiconductors and other key technologies. The same hacking group also targeted officials at the State Department and members of Congress.
Amid this onslaught of attacks, Coker said the cyber industry is suffering a recruitment issue.
"Today there are nearly 500,000 open cyber jobs in this great nation," he said.
"The federal government is leading by example… removing federal employee and contractor hiring from a focus on college degrees to a focus on what we're really after: skills.
"When we do away with the four-year college degree requirement, we expand our talent pool," Coker went on. "Many Americans don't have the time or the means to go to college for four years, but they can do it for two years or less."
Jimmy Carter, the centenarian former president who lived long enough to see Donald Trump elected again but died just before the start of the new year, has a foreign policy legacy that wasn't just defined by his four years in the White House.
Over the term of his presidency, the former Georgia governor could boast of helping to establish peace between Israel and Egypt and reestablishing relations with China. But by the time he suffered one of the nation's most decisive defeats by President Ronald Reagan in 1980, Carter still had ambitions that he was not ready to stop pursuing.
Carter is largely celebrated for the altruistic nature of his post-presidency, volunteering with Habitat for Humanity well into his 90s. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his peace negotiations, but some accused the former president of meddling in international affairs without any official title.
Here's a look Carter's forays on the world stage, both as president and beyond:
In 1994, Bill Clinton was in office in the midst of a standoff with North Korea over the communist country's nuclear program. The U.S. was floating the idea of sanctions – and even considered a preemptive strike on North Korea's nuclear facilities to destroy their capabilities.
Carter had received invitations from North Korea to visit, and was eager to try his hand at defusing the situation and hashing out an agreement to unify the north and the south. As Clinton weighed his options, Carter called. He had negotiated the framework of a peace agreement, without authorization.
Carter had flown to North Korea with a CNN crew and hashed out the deal. He called Clinton to warn him he was about to go on CNN to announce the deal, which infuriated the Clinton White House, according to Carter biographer Douglas Brinkley's book, "The Unfinished Presidency."
Carter also accepted a dinner invitation from Kim Il-Sung, where he stated the U.S. had stopped pursuing sanctions at the U.N., which was untrue. Backed into a corner, Clinton had to accept the peace deal and stop pursuing sanctions.
Carter’s discussions with leader Kim Il-Sung may have averted conflict with North Korea in the 1990s. The nation, of course, continued pursuing nuclear weapons and acquired them in 2006.
In the Middle East, Carter declared he could have resolved the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians in a second term, a prospect that has still not been achieved by any president.
"Had I been elected to a second term, with the prestige and authority and influence and reputation I had in the region, we could have moved to a final solution," he told The New York Times in 2003.
Throughout the 1990s, Carter befriended Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) leader Yasser Arafat and coached him on how to appear more moderate to the west, even as Arafat continued to lead attacks on Israel and led the Second Intifada in 2000.
When President George H.W. Bush decided to launch the Persian Gulf War after Iraq's Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, Carter was vehemently opposed to the idea. Five days before Bush's deadline for Hussein to withdraw, Carter wrote to leaders of nations on the U.N. Security Council and key Arab states – Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Syria – imploring them to abandon the U.S. and its war efforts.
"I urge you to call publicly for a delay in the use of force while Arab leaders seek a peaceful solution to the crisis. You may have to forego approval from the White House, but you will find the French, Soviets, and others fully supportive. Also, most Americans will welcome such a move."
The move prompted former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft to accuse Carter of violating the Logan Act, which says private citizens cannot negotiate with foreign governments.
In 2008, President George W. Bush's secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, publicly tore into Carter for meeting with Hamas, a designated terrorist group, after the administration explicitly told him not to.
Rice told reporters Carter's meeting could confuse the message that the U.S. would not work with Hamas.
"I just don't want there to be any confusion," Rice said. "The United States is not going to deal with Hamas and we had certainly told President Carter that we did not think meeting with Hamas was going to help" further a political settlement between Israel and the Palestinians.
Carter, a strong advocate of the Palestinians after his presidency, claimed that Israel's policies amounted to an apartheid worse than South Africa's.
In 1978, the groundbreaking possibility of Egypt and Israel normalizing relations had screeched to a halt. President Anwar Sadat of Egypt suggested ceasing contact with the Israelis.
In September of that year, Carter brought Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to Camp David, where Carter spent more than a week mediating negotiations on an agreement between the two sides. A framework of a treaty known as the Camp David Accords came out of that meeting, and six months later, Egypt became the first Arab state to establish relations with Israel.
The agreement included the return of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt and a "pathway" for Palestinian self-rule in Gaza. Sadat was assassinated in 1981 after Arab fury over the peace agreement.
In 1978, following months of secret negotiations, Carter established formal U.S. relations with China, breaking decades of hostility between the two nations. That meant rescinding a defense treaty with Taiwan, where Carter remains a controversial figure.
It also prompted Congress to pass the Taiwan Relations Act to continue to provide arms to Taiwan and "maintain the capacity to resist" any attempts to take it over.
In 1979, the Iranian regime’s shah, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, and Carter had a strategic relationship, with Carter quiet on his questionable human rights record even as the shah’s grip on power was slipping.
Protests had kicked up in Iran over the shah’s oppressive policies, but Carter continued to support him, fearing the alternative: Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Pahlavi fled into exile in January 1979, and Carter initially resisted requests to grant him refuge in the U.S. before allowing him to seek cancer treatment in New York City in October of that year. And on Nov. 4, Iranian students angry at the decision stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran, taking 52 hostages.
The hostage crisis spanned the rest of Carter’s term and, for many, defined his legacy on the world stage. Without any resolution, in April 1980, Carter moved to a military rescue.
The mission ended in tragic failure: several helicopters were grounded outside Tehran in a sandstorm, and eight special forces members were killed when their helicopter crashed. Iran then captured U.S. equipment and intelligence.
The hostages were not released until Jan. 20, 1981 – minutes after President Ronald Reagan was inaugurated.
President-elect Trump has brought Carter's Panama Canal treaties back into the spotlight, musing on Tuesday that offering control of the canal to Panama lost Carter the 1980 election.
Despite fierce opposition from the right, Carter believed returning the canal would improve U.S. relations in Latin America and ensure peace between U.S. shipping lanes, fearing that opposition to U.S. control could lead to violence on the waterway.
"It’s obvious that we cheated the Panamanians out of their canal," Carter wrote in a diary. But he'd also received intelligence that it could take up 100,000 troops to defend the canal in the event of an uprising.
In recent days, Trump has suggested taking the canal back – claiming the U.S. is paying too much to use it, and it is controlled by China.
"Giving the Panama Canal to Panama was a big reason why Jimmy Carter lost the election, even more so than the hostages," Trump said.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is moving forward with a regulatory rule in the final days of the Biden administration that would effectively ban cigarettes currently on the market in favor of products with lower nicotine levels, which could end up boosting business for cartels operating on the black market, an expert tells Fox News Digital.
"Biden's ban is a gift with a bow and balloons to organized crime cartels with it, whether it's cartels, Chinese organized crime, or Russian mafia. It's going to keep America smoking, and it's going to make the streets more violent," Rich Marianos, former assistant director of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the current chair of the Tobacco Law Enforcement Network, told Fox News Digital of the proposal.
The FDA confirmed to Fox Digital on Monday that as of Jan. 3, the Tobacco Product Standard for Nicotine Level of Certain Tobacco Products had completed a regulatory review, but that the proposed rule has not yet been finalized.
"The proposed rule, ‘Tobacco Product Standard for Nicotine Level of Certain Tobacco Products,’ is displaying in the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) ROCIS system as having completed regulatory review on January 3," an FDA spokesman told Fox Digital. "As the FDA has previously said, a proposed product standard to establish a maximum nicotine level to reduce the addictiveness of cigarettes and certain other combusted tobacco products, when finalized, is estimated to be among the most impactful population-level actions in the history of U.S. tobacco product regulation. At this time, the FDA cannot provide any further comment until it is published."
Fox New Digital reached out to the White House regarding concerns over the proposal if it were to take effect but did not receive a response.
Former President Barack Obama signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act in 2009, which granted the FDA the power to regulate tobacco products. In the years since, the agency has worked to lower nicotine levels, including in July 2017 under the Trump administration, when then-FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb announced it would seek to require tobacco companies to drastically cut nicotine in cigarettes in an effort to help adult smokers quit.
In 2022, the FDA under the Biden administration announced plans for the proposed rule that would lower levels of nicotine so they were less addictive or non-addictive.
"Lowering nicotine levels to minimally addictive or non-addictive levels would decrease the likelihood that future generations of young people become addicted to cigarettes and help more currently addicted smokers to quit," FDA Commissioner Robert Califf said at the time.
Lowering the levels of nicotine in commonly purchased cigarettes and other tobacco products would open the floodgates to the illicit trafficking of tobacco products into the U.S., Marianos told Fox News Digital.
"This decision is being thrown down the public's throat without one ounce of thought and preparation. Nobody sat down with law enforcement, nobody sat down with any doctors, No one sat down with any regulators to find out, ‘Hey, look, what are the unintended ramifications of such a poor choice,’ and that's what I'm going to call it, a poor choice," Marianos said.
He explained that Mexican cartels are well-positioned to bring illegal tobacco across the border, as they do with substances such as fentanyl that have devastated communities across the U.S., while Chinese criminal organizations have some of the best counterfeit operations stretching from baby formula to cigarettes, and Russian organized crime groups have their foot in the door in cities across the nation, including in bodegas and other stores that sell tobacco products.
Marianos said that criminal groups would likely quickly catch on to the proposal if it takes effect and subsequently amplify their tobacco operations – which he says will serve as an economic boon for the criminals.
Americans who want to purchase cigarettes with higher levels of nicotine would then need to go through the illicit channels to obtain them, similar to buying "loosie" cigarettes on the streets of New York, putting average Americans at further criminal risk while also offering them cigarettes that are not regulated and originating from foreign nations.
Both Democrat and Republican lawmakers have already warned that tobacco trafficking in the U.S. poses a grave national security threat and already has its foot in the door.
"In 2015, the State Department cited activity by terrorist groups, and criminal networks who have used tobacco trafficking operations to finance other crimes, including ‘money laundering, bulk cash smuggling, and the trafficking in humans, weapons, drugs, antiquities, diamonds, and counterfeit goods,’" Sens. Bill Cassidy, R-La.; Mark Warner, D-Va.; Marco Rubio, R-Fla.; Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn.; and then-Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., wrote in a 2023 letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
"Recently, public reporting has also noted these financial linkages between Mexican transnational criminal organizations (TCOs) involved in narcotics and fentanyl trafficking, and these tobacco smuggling activities. Mexican TCOs pose a grave threat to American national security and public health."
Marianos added that in addition to the criminal effect posed to America and its residents, lowering nicotine levels would also defeat the stated mission of weaning smokers off cigarettes and instead lead to an increase in smoking.
"You're going to create more smoking. And I thought that's what we're trying to get away from, right? Smoking is bad. I thought we're trying to do everything possible to get away from that and get the country safer. Well, if you take down the nicotine levels, people are going to smoke more. That is proven. All you have to do is just drive here in DC and see, you know workers on their smoke break," he said, saying work productivity will even be driven down as people take more smoke breaks in alleys to get their nicotine fix.
The Biden administration previously attempted to outright ban menthol cigarettes, in what was described as a "critical" piece of President Biden's Cancer Moonshot initiative, but announced last year it was abruptly delaying such regulations as the public decried the move. A handful of groups argued that banning menthol unfairly targeted minority communities, while others argued the ban would open the floodgates to illicit menthol sales.
Additional pardons, measures to prevent homegrown political extremism, and more military aid for Israel are among the plans that Biden and his administration have during their final days before passing the baton to President-elect Donald Trump and his team.
Biden will end his presidency with one more international trip, during which he will travel to Italy and Vatican City to meet with Pope Francis, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and President Sergio Mattarella. Biden's trip to the Vatican is aimed at discussing ways to advance peace around the world with Pope Francis, and his time with Italy's heads of state will serve to highlight the strength of the U.S.-Italy alliance, the White House said. Biden also plans to thank Meloni for her leadership of the G7 over the last year and discuss future challenges facing the globe's leading nations.
Upon Biden's return from overseas, the president will address the nation twice more before Trump's inauguration, sources in the Biden administration told NBC News. The first speech will focus on foreign policy, while the second will serve as a farewell address for Biden to be held during his final days in the Oval Office. Neither speech has been fully drafted, sources said Saturday.
Sources familiar also indicated that Biden is considering additional pardons for people deemed to have been given unusually harsh sentences, measures to combat domestic violent extremism in the U.S., and additional military funding – roughly $8 billion, the State Department said – to Israel amid its ongoing war with Hamas.
The pardons come after Biden set a record for the largest single-day act of clemency when he commuted the sentences of roughly 1,500 people in mid-December. Sources told NBC News that Biden was also still considering pre-emptive pardons for those who might face political retribution from Trump.
Meanwhile, the Department of Justice indicated Monday that it was still weighing whether to prosecute an additional 200 Jan. 6 cases in the final days before Trump takes office, during which he is expected to grant pardons to many of those who were convicted of crimes related to their participation in the events of that day.
In addition to the plans of action that Biden and his administration plan to take ahead of Trump's inauguration, it is also notable that Biden will not act on pressure to bolster protections for transgender student athletes or cancel any additional student loan debt, according to the Associated Press.
Biden's actions after Trump's election victory in November have garnered criticism from both sides of the aisle.
"This is one of the lamest of lame ducks we’ve seen with a Democratic administration," a spokesperson for progressive nonprofit Justice Democrats said last month. "There is no leadership coming from the White House," a Democrat close to senior lawmakers also said. "There is a total vacuum."
Some Democrat lawmakers, such as Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, were angry at Biden's lack of resistance to many of Trump's Cabinet picks.
Republicans, on the other hand, have challenged Biden's actions during the final weeks of his presidency as an affront to the American public who voted for Trump.
"On his way out the door, President Biden is governing as he has always wanted, as a far-left ideologue hellbent on pushing the country in a direction detached from the will of the voters," GOP campaign strategist Colin Reed said.
"While Trump can undo whatever Biden does, Biden is trying to create litigation traps for Trump that will discourage investors from projects on public lands," added American Energy Institute fellow Steve Milloy after news broke Monday that Biden was once again moving to restrict domestic energy production on certain land. This move is part of a series of actions Biden has taken in his final weeks to strengthen the country's defenses against Trump's plans to reverse many of his green energy initiatives.
Trump blasted Biden's last-minute policy decisions in an interview Monday, calling out the lame-duck president for making a "smooth transition" more difficult.
"I see it just came over that Biden has banned all oil and gas drilling across 625 million acres of U.S. coastal territory. It's just ridiculous. I'll un-ban it immediately. I have the right to un-ban it immediately. What's he doing? Why is he doing it?" Trump said during an interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt. "You know we have something that nobody else has. Nobody has to the extent we have it, and it'll be more by the time we finish, because I'll be able to expand."
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.
But the jockeying sheds light on a dilemma that Trump may face in a city that he controls, with both houses of Congress under Republican management (and Vice President Kamala Harris peacefully certifying the transfer of power yesterday, four years to the day after the Capitol riot).
The flip side of nearly unlimited clout is that when things go wrong, there’s no one else to blame.
And then there’s the black hole known as Congress. Having dragged Mike Johnson across the finish line in the election for speaker, by making calls even from his golf course, Trump now faces a dilemma after the Christmas debt ceiling battle that just delayed the budget fight until March.
Using a process known as reconciliation, which lowers the threshold from 60 Senate votes to 51 – both parties have used this for party-line dominance – Trump favors "one big beautiful bill." That would include budget cuts, energy deregulation, tax cuts, the border crackdown and other presidential priorities.
But many on the Hill support two separate bills, and some in Trump World believe Congress simply doesn’t have the bandwidth to take the kitchen-sink approach.
So the big beautiful bill might not get passed until June, depriving the 47th president of an early win.
Johnson will have just a 1-vote margin, making it hard for him to deliver the deep spending cuts that the hardliners want in an echo of the battle that toppled Kevin McCarthy.
In the meantime, the Homeland Security Department would have difficulty mounting a major initiative because, like other agencies, it’s operating on the stopgap spending budget that nearly shut down the government at Christmas.
The risk of pushing two bills is that once the first one passes, the momentum may dissipate for approving a second measure, even if it contains such Trump priorities as tax cuts.
Trump hedged his bets yesterday, telling radio host Hugh Hewitt, "I would prefer one, but…I’m open to either way, as long as we get something passed as quickly as possible."
Washington is a city obsessed with titles and perceived influence, and that will impact the way the White House is run.
Wiles has helped downgrade some jobs that have always been assistant to the president titles to deputy assistant to the president–something no sane outsider would care about, but which is a major deal for the insiders. That’s because after reaching the limit for assistant jobs, the only alternative was to create a bunch of deputy slots.
Wiles, for her part, has told Axios, "I don't welcome people who want to work solo or be a star… My team and I will not tolerate backbiting, second-guessing inappropriately, or drama. These are counterproductive to the mission."
Karoline Leavitt, the incoming press secretary, is also being deprived of the big office that has been used by her predecessors for at least three decades. That’s going to another communications aide.
I can remember being in that second-floor office when Mike McCurry was press secretary, and President Bill Clinton walking in and chatting while I was working on my book "Spin Cycle." The reason for the large office was the gaggles taking place with the press, and sometimes interviews, which could not be accommodated by most smallish West Wing offices.
Anyone in Wiles’ sensitive position would invariably upset some officials during a process that determines winners and losers. But Trump views her as a grandmother and doesn’t yell at her the way he might at other officials over a disagreement.
As for Elon Musk’s powerful role, Trump enjoys the company of wealthy people, and the X owner is the richest person on the planet. So he has influence until he doesn’t, if there is a future falling out.
Besides, it will be harder for Musk to hang around once Trump moves from Mar-a-Lago to the White House, unless he wants to give Elon the Lincoln Bedroom.
For now, the transition is organized chaos. But as Trump knows all too well, having done this job before, when there’s a terror attack or border incident or rising grocery prices on his watch, he owns it.
Meanwhile, with with Harris certifying her own defeat in routine fashion yesterday – drawing live coverage considering the history of Jan. 6 – President-elect Trump posted this:
"Biden is doing everything possible to make the TRANSITION as difficult as possible, from Lawfare such as has never been seen before, to costly and ridiculous Executive Orders on the Green New Scam and other money wasting Hoaxes. Fear not, these ‘Orders’ will all be terminated shortly, and we will become a Nation of Common Sense and Strength. MAGA!!!"
It’s true that the outgoing president has, among other things, issued orders to stop oil exploration along 625 million acres offshore, but there’s no reason the "drill, baby, drill" president can’t reverse that, although it could slow him down.
Harris gave a short talk yesterday about the peaceful transfer of power, and Biden made the case in a Washington Post op-ed that we must never forget what happened on that dark day.
No matter who you agree with, I think it’s fair to say that issue was litigated in the election, and Americans voted to put Trump back in the White House knowing full well what happened during the televised riot.
President Biden took a departing jab at Trump, saying that what the president-elect did was a "genuine threat to democracy."
Ahead of the anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, Biden was asked if he still thought Trump was a threat to democracy.
"We've got to get back to establishing basic democratic norms," Biden told reporters in the White House East Room on Sunday. "I think what he did was a genuine threat to democracy. I'm hopeful that we are beyond that."
Biden made the comments to the press after signing the Social Security Fairness Act.
Biden also discussed his plans to visit New Orleans on Monday to grieve with family members of victims and meet with officials after the terrorist attack in the city on New Year's Day.
"I've been there. There's nothing you can really say to somebody who has had such a tragic loss. And my message is going to be personal to them," he said. "They just have to hang on to each other and there will come a day when they think of their loved one, and they'll smile before a tear comes to their eye."
The visit comes after 14 people were killed and dozens injured after police said 42-year-old Shamsud-Din Jabbar rammed a rented pickup truck into pedestrians on bustling Bourbon Street early Wednesday morning. Police fatally shot Jabbar after he opened fire on officers.
"We established beyond any reasonable doubt that New Orleans was a single man who acted alone. All the talk about conspiracies with other people, no evidence of that, zero," Biden said.
"He had real problems in terms of his own, I think, mental health, going on. And he acted alone in the same way as what went on in Las Vegas," Biden said. "But there is no evidence, zero evidence of the idea that these are foreigners coming across the border, but they worked here, they remained here."