President Donald Trump blasted New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani after the New York State assemblyman from Queens refused to condemn the term "globalize the intifada."
"Frankly, I've heard he's a total nut job," Trump told reporters Tuesday morning. "I think the people in New York are crazy because they go this route. I think they're crazy. We will have a communist in the for the first time, really a pure, true communist. He wants to operate the grocery stores. The department stores. What about the people that are there? I think it's crazy."
Mamdani is a Ugandan-born Muslim who won the Democratic Party’s primary for New York City mayor in June and identifies as a Democratic socialist.
On Sunday, Mamdani said he didn’t want to condemn the term "globalize the intifada," a phrase used to back Palestinian resistance against Israel, because he didn’t want to "police language" in an interview with NBC News.
"I think he's terrible. He's a communist," Trump said Tuesday. "The last thing we need is a communist. I said, there will never be socialism in the United States. So even the communists, I think it's bad news. And I think you're going to have a lot of fun with him, watching him, because he has to break through this building to get his money. And don't worry, he's not going to run away with anything."
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough reportedly has advised that a provision prohibiting Medicaid funds from supporting Planned Parenthood and other clinics that provide abortions can stay in President Donald Trump’s "big, beautiful bill."
Senate Republicans revised the provision on Friday from blocking Medicaid funding to abortion providers for a full 10 years to just one year. The parliamentarian’s assessment that the provision could remain without jeopardizing the budget package from passing the upper chamber of Congress along party lines was championed by pro-life advocates.
"The One Big Beautiful Bill Act that stops forced taxpayer funding of the abortion industry has been retained in the Senate bill, as we were confident it would, though for one year. This is a huge win," Susan B. Anthony Pro-life America’s President, Marjorie Dannenfelser, said in a statement to Fox News Digital. "Taxpayers should never be forced to funnel their hard-earned dollars to Big Abortion. This funding currently hits almost $800 million annually."
The provision's inclusion, meanwhile, was condemned by Democrats as essentially clearing the defunding of Planned Parenthood.
"Republicans will stop at nothing in their crusade to take control of women’s bodies and deny them the right to make their own health care decisions," Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Senate Budget Committee Ranking Member Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., said in a statement. "Republicans are trampling the law to force their extremist ideology onto the American people."
The Hyde Amendment, introduced in the 1970s, has long prohibited federal dollars from paying for most abortions, with some exceptions. Planned Parenthood, which also provides other women’s health services, such as gynecological exams, contraception and STI testing, reported receiving approximately $792.2 million in taxpayer-funded grants, contracts and Medicaid reimbursements during the 2023-2024 fiscal year.
Republicans say the loophole essentially results in taxpayers subsidizing abortions. Planned Parenthood reported performing 402,000 abortions during that fiscal year.
Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, R-Miss., defended the provision during Monday’s vote-a-rama session as "establishing a commonsense protection of taxpayer dollars by prohibiting abortion providers from receiving Medicaid funds for one year."
"There was a time when protecting Americans’ tax dollars from supporting the abortion industry was an uncontroversial, nonpartisan effort that we could all get behind," Hyde-Smith said on the Senate floor. "Even if we had opposing views on protecting the dignity of human life, this provision does not target any one entity. If a medical provider wishes to stay within the Medicaid program, it should simply cut elective abortion procedures from its services."
Hyde-Smith, chair of the Senate Pro-Life Caucus, spoke out against an amendment introduced earlier Monday by Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., to strike the provision from the GOP’s $3.3 trillion budget package.
Murray's amendment ultimately failed by a 49-52 vote, according to the Washington Examiner.
Murray claimed the one-year ban on Medicaid funds for abortion providers would "cut millions of women off from birth control, cancer screenings, essential preventive health care – care that they will not be able to afford anywhere else, and it will shutter some 200 healthcare clinics in our country."
"This is a long-sought goal of anti-choice extremists—no surprise, it is overwhelmingly unpopular with the American people," Murray said. "But Republicans are bent on ripping away any access to abortion care, and happy to cut off this lifesaving care. No matter that women may not have another place to get the care that they can afford, or another place they can get any care at all!"
She pointed to a Congressional Budget Office assessment to argue that "defunding" Planned Parenthood would cost taxpayers $52 million over the next ten years. That was based on the 10-year Medicaid block in an earlier version of the bill passed by the House.
This budget provision comes after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled last week that states have the power to block Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood clinics in a major pro-life victory.
Many senators failed to get their amendments across the finish line during the chamber's vote-a-rama on Monday, leaving the future of President Donald Trump's "big, beautiful bill" uncertain.
Two key failures came from Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, with the former proposing a plan that would have boosted funding for rural hospitals and the latter calling for further cuts to Medicaid.
Collins and Cornyn were far from the only lawmakers who had amendments fail, however. Here are some details on some of the unsuccessful efforts, plus one that succeeded with nearly unanimous support.
Collins' amendment would have doubled funding for rural hospitals from $25 billion to $50 billion over the next 10 years, and it would have allowed a larger number of medical providers to access the funds.
"Rural providers, especially our rural hospitals and nursing homes, are under great financial strain right now, with many having recently closed and others being at risk of closing," Collins said prior to the vote. "This amendment would help keep them open and caring for those who live in rural communities."
Collins said the bill was something of an olive branch to Democrats, who had criticized the cuts to Medicaid involved in the megabill. Her amendment would also have raised tax rates for individuals who make more than $25 million per year and couples who make more than $50 million.
"They’ve complained repeatedly about the distribution in this bill, of Medicaid cuts hurting individuals, rural hospitals, and tax cuts being extended for people who are wealthy, and yet when I tried to fix both those problems, they took a very hypocritical approach," Collins said.
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., argued Collins' amendment was merely putting a "Band-Aid on an amputation."
Cornyn was joined by Sens. Rick Scott, R-Fla., and John Barrasso, R-Wyo., in pushing an amendment cutting an additional $313 billion in Medicaid funding on Monday.
The trio said they were pushing to limit the growth of Medicaid, and they had been confident the adjustment would pass. All three were seen entering Senate Majority Leader John Thune's office on Monday as it became clear the amendment lacked support.
The base bill already cuts some $930 billion in funding for Medicaid, leading many of the trio's colleagues to balk at further cuts.
"It just seems like we’ve taken it as far as I’m comfortable taking it," said Sen. Jim Justice, R-W.V., regarding trims to Medicaid.
Kennedy had proposed an amendment that would have allowed teachers to deduct $600 in school supplies that they pay for out of pocket each year.
Bennet proposed an amendment that would have increased both the amount and availability of the child tax credit included in the megabill, but it failed to garner enough support.
The Senate rejected Bennet's proposal in a 22-78 vote.
One amendment that did succeed was a measure that killed a provision in the bill that would have placed a 10-year moratorium on state AI regulations.
The original version of the bill would have forced states to choose between enforcing AI regulations or accepting federal funding to expand broadband internet access. Sens. Edward Markey, D-Ma., and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., joined Sen. Maria Cantwell in sponsoring the amendment.
"The Senate came together tonight to say that we can't just run over good state consumer protection laws," Cantwell said Monday. "States can fight robocalls, deepfakes and provide safe autonomous vehicle laws. This also allows us to work together nationally to provide a new federal framework on Artificial Intelligence that accelerates U.S. leadership in AI while still protecting consumers."
The Senate passed the amendment in an overwhelming 99-1 vote.
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., was the sole vote opposing the measure.
Socialist Zohran Mamdani, the presumptive Democratic nominee for New York City mayor, is facing criticism over a campaign policy document that explicitly calls for shifting the city’s tax burden onto "richer and whiter neighborhoods."
Mamdani caused a political earthquake in this week’s primary, trouncing former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo in a stunning upset, all but securing his place on the November ballot. Housing affordability has been a central pillar of his campaign.
A policy document titled "Stop the Squeeze on NYC Homeowners" from Mamdani’s mayoral campaign website argues that the city’s current property tax system disproportionately benefits wealthy, White homeowners, particularly in Manhattan and affluent areas of Brooklyn, by allowing them to pay far less in taxes due to outdated assessment caps.
In contrast, Black, Latino and immigrant homeowners in neighborhoods like Brownsville and Jamaica in the outer borough of Queens are overburdened and at higher risk of foreclosure.
His solution?
"Shift the tax burden from overtaxed homeowners in the outer boroughs to more expensive homes in richer and whiter neighborhoods," the proposal reads. "The property tax system is unbalanced because assessment levels are artificially capped, so homeowners in expensive neighborhoods pay less than their fair share."
The proposal would reduce the taxable portion of assessed property values citywide, and offset that by raising actual tax rates in wealthier areas. The result: lower tax bills for lower-income neighborhoods and higher ones for affluent areas — which the campaign describes as "richer and whiter."
The racial component of the policy position has come in for criticism online, with broadcaster Mark Levin sharing a New York Post story about the proposal and writing "Oh, and Mamdani is racist, too."
Political commentator Eric Daugherty also brandished it as explicitly "racist" on X, while the New York Post editorial board also slammed the proposal as "pure racism."
Fox News Digital reached out to Mamdani’s campaign for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
The campaign document also highlights racial disparities in deed theft and "tangled titles," which are situations where someone lives in a home they believe they own — often through inheritance — but their name is not on the deed, creating legal uncertainty about ownership.
The document states that predominantly Black neighborhoods face these challenges at much higher rates than White neighborhoods.
To address this, Mamdani is proposing a $10 million "Tangled Title Fund" to help city residents hire lawyers and clear legal titles so they can secure full homeownership rights and benefits.
Mamdani is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, whose preamble discusses a way to "end white supremacy and racial oppression because its destruction is in the interest of all workers, including white workers."
Overall, the housing document frames the city’s housing inequities as structurally racist and economically unjust.
The document also claims that the city’s tax lien sale system is exploitative and racist. When a homeowner falls behind on property taxes under the system, the city sells that debt to a private trust of Wall Street-backed investors, usually at a discount. instead of collecting the debt directly.
"The tax lien sale has been particularly harmful to Black, brown, and working-class homeowners, leading many homeowners to lose their home to foreclosure, or forcing them to sell below market value in order to pay off their accumulating debts," the document reads. "The city is six times more likely to sell a tax lien in a Black neighborhood than a white neighborhood. This policy is extracting wealth from Black, brown, and working-class communities and stripping New Yorkers of their homes."
Mamdani said he will end the system on his first day in office and create a new tax collection system that provides "additional opportunities" for homeowners to enter into payment plans, pay down their debt and stay in their homes.
The Queens assemblyman wants to build 200,000 new publicly-subsidized affordable homes and immediately freeze rents for the city’s 2.4 million stabilized tenants. His proposals call for multi-year rent freezes and massive investment in public housing. Critics argue his proposals could worsen existing problems in the rental market,
Fox News' Madison Colombo contributed to this report.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s tough Bronx persona is under fresh scrutiny with a resurfaced childhood nickname from her suburban upstate New York upbringing casting doubt on that publicly portrayed image.
The progressive champion’s latest spat with President Donald Trump over the Iran strikes again called into question her true upbringing when she declared on X that she was a "Bronx girl" to make a point against the president.
The 35-year-old "Squad" member wrote in part on X last week: "I’m a Bronx girl. You should know that we can eat Queens boys for breakfast. Respectfully," she said, referring to the president’s upbringing in Queens as she called for his impeachment over his decision to bypass Congress in authorizing U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.
Ocasio-Cortez was born in the Bronx but moved to Yorktown – which is nearly an hour outside New York City -- when she was 5 years old and went on to attend Yorktown High School, from where she graduated in 2007.
She was considered an accomplished student there and well-thought of by teacher Michael Blueglass, according to a 2018 report by local media outlet Halston Media News.
"There, known by students and staff as ‘Sandy,’ she was a member of the Science Research Program taught by Michael Blueglass," the report states.
"She was amazing," Blueglass said, per the report. "Aside from her winning one of the top spots and going to the [Intel International Science and Engineering Fair], she was just one of the most amazing presenters in all of the years I've been at Yorktown. Her ability to take complex information and explain it to all different levels of people was fantastic."
After high school, Ocasio-Cortez attended Boston University, where she majored in economics and international relations, per the report.
Ocasio-Cortez’s "Sandy" nickname — which carries a more suburban and preppy tone — appears to undercut her politically crafted image as a tough, inner-city fighter, one she has portrayed since her famous 2018 congressional campaign, where she eventually ousted former 10-term Congressman Joe Crowley.
New York GOP Assemblyman Matt Slater, who now represents Yorktown, added to the scrutiny of Ocasio-Cortez’s persona in the wake of her brush with Trump and released images of Ocasio-Cortez from his high school yearbook. He claimed he and the rising Democratic star attended Yorktown High School at the same time when she was a freshman and he was a senior.
"I saw the attacks on the president and her [Ocasio-Cortez] claims that she's a big, tough Bronx girl," said Slater. "To sit there and say that she’s a Bronx girl is just patently ridiculous."
"Everybody in our community knows this is just a bold-face lie," said Slater on "Fox & Friends First" last week. "She grew up in Yorktown, she was on my track team."
"She's lying about her background, she's lying about her upbringing," Slater claimed.
Slater’s post sent social media ablaze and prompted Ocasio-Cortez to respond after an image of her family’s home in Yorktown was posted online.
"I’m proud of how I grew up and talk about it all the time," Ocasio-Cortez wrote on X Friday, responding to the post. "My mom cleaned houses and I helped. We cleaned tutors’ homes in exchange for SAT prep."
"Growing up between the Bronx and Yorktown deeply shaped my views of inequality & it’s a big reason I believe the things I do today!"
Fox News' Madison Colombo contributed to this report.
Former Texas Rep. Colin Allred is making another run for the U.S. Senate after the Democrat lost to Republican Sen. Ted Cruz just eight months ago.
Allred is looking to challenge for the seat of Republican Sen. John Cornyn, who is facing his own challenge from within the Republican Party from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.
Allred announced his return to the political arena with a campaign video released Tuesday, in which he took shots at both Cornyn and Paxton, describing them as "too corrupt to care about us and too weak to fight for us."
A former NFL linebacker and attorney, Allred retold the story of how he went undrafted in the NFL but worked hard enough to eventually turn pro and buy his mom a house.
"The truth is you shouldn’t have to have a son in the NFL to own a home," Allred said.
"Everything is backwards," he continued. "Folks who play by the rules and keep the faith just can’t seem to get ahead. But the folks who cut corners and cut deals — well, they’re doing just fine."
Allred pledged to run on an "anti-corruption plan."
"I know Washington is broken," he said. "The system is rigged. But it doesn’t have to be this way. In six years in Congress, I never took a dime of corporate PAC money, never traded a single stock."
Allred's announcement comes just eight months after he lost by nearly 9 percentage points to Cruz. That race was one of the most expensive in the country last cycle, with Democrats spending more than $130 million trying to unseat Cruz.
Allred played four seasons in the NFL, all with the Tennessee Titans, after being undrafted out of Baylor University. He entered Congress by flipping a Republican district in Dallas in 2018.
Former astronaut Terry Virts also entered the U.S. Senate race as a Democratic candidate.
