Washington, D.C.-area restaurants once again will not be free from politics as the Trump team prepares to settle into the nation's capital for a second term.
Food workers inside the Beltway are prepared to refuse service and cause other inconveniences for members of the incoming Trump administration, but this is not the first time the administration and allies will have to deal with harassment while sitting down to dinner.
In September 2018, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and his wife were harassed at Fiola, an upscale Italian restaurant in Washington, D.C. Protesters confronted them over Cruz’s support for then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh during his contentious confirmation hearings. Videos circulated online showing demonstrators shouting at the couple, chanting, "We believe survivors." Cruz and his wife eventually left the restaurant due to the altercation.
This incident was part of a broader wave of confrontations involving Trump administration officials and allies over the summer that year.
As such, in June 2018, then-Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen was confronted by protesters at MXDC Cocina Mexicana, a Mexican restaurant in Washington, D.C., over the Trump administration's family separation policy at the U.S.-Mexico border. Protesters chanted, "Shame!" and called her a "villain," forcing her to leave.
Senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller, known for his role in shaping immigration policy, recounted an incident when he went to pick up an $80 sushi order from a restaurant near his apartment that same month. As he left, the bartender followed him outside, called out his name and, when Miller turned around, gave him a double middle finger. He threw away the sushi out of fear someone in the restaurant had tampered with the food, the New York Post reported at the time.
Also in June 2018, the owner of The Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Virginia, asked then-White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders to leave, citing opposition to the Trump administration's tough immigration policies.
Industry veterans, bartenders and servers in the nation's capital told the Washingtonian this week that resistance to the Republican figures in the progressive city was inevitable and a matter of conscience.
"You expect the masses to just ignore RFK eating at Le Diplomate on a Sunday morning after a few mimosas and not to throw a drink in his face?," said Zac Hoffman, a Washington, D.C., restaurant veteran who is now a manager at the National Democratic Club.
Not every liberal hospitality sector worker in the report planned to protest the incoming administration while doing their job, however.
A bartender named Joseph said while he was disappointed by the election results, he was looking forward to higher tips with more Republicans in Washington.
Fox News Digital's Kristine Parks contributed to this report.
FIRST ON FOX: A controversial judicial advocacy organization funded by left-wing nonprofits continues to work with judges and experts involved in climate change litigation despite publicly downplaying the extent of those connections.
"CJP doesn’t participate in litigation, support or coordinate with any parties in litigation, or advise judges on how they should rule in any case," the Environmental Law Institute Climate Judiciary Project President Jordan Diamond wrote in a recent letter to The Wall Street Journal in response to criticism of the project.
The Washington, D.C.-based Environmental Law Institute (ELI) created the Climate Judiciary Project (CJP) in 2018, establishing a first-of-its-kind resource to provide "reliable, up-to-date information" about climate change litigation, according to the group. The project's reach has extended to various state and federal courts, including powerful appellate courts, and comes as various cities and states pursue high-profile litigation against the oil industry.
A Fox News Digital review shows that several CJP expert lawyers and judges have close ties to the curriculum and are deeply involved in climate litigation.
Princeton University professor Michael Oppenheimer contributed to the CJP curriculum and presented "Evidence of Change: Judging Climate Litigation" with CJP’s Sandra Nichols Thiam at the 2022 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference July 20, 2022.
Oppenheimer has a long history of filing climate-related amicus briefs from 2019-2022 in litigation across several states.
Robin Kundis Craig, a professor at the University of Utah's Law School, wrote a module for CJP in 2022 and has also filed several amicus briefs showing she is active in court cases.
One example occurred in 2023, when Craig is listed on an order granting legal scholars' request to file amicus, which was signed by Justice Mark Recktenwald, who, Fox News Digital previously reported, quietly disclosed last year that he presented for an April course in collaboration with the Environmental Law Institute Climate Judiciary Project.
Recktenwald co-presented at a December 2022 National Judicial College webinar sponsored by CJP, "Hurricanes in a Changing Climate and Related Litigation." In 2023, he co-presented with Professor Robert DeConto at a National Judicial College seminar, "Rising Seas and Litigation: What Judges Need to Know about Warming-Driven Sea-Level Rise."
In October 2023, Recktenwald’s Hawaii Supreme Court denied an appeal from oil companies to toss a Honolulu climate misinformation suit.
Craig also filed an amicus in Hawaii state court in July 2022, where an order was signed by Judge Jeffrey Crabtree allowing the brief to be filed. Crabtree is a member of the National Judicial College Curriculum Development Committee, which creates curricula for "Environmental Law Essential for the Judiciary."
"Don’t underestimate the importance of the role of state court judges in environmental law," the curriculum's website states.
Ann Carlson, who joined the Biden administration in 2021, served on ELI's board of directors for years while also "providing pro bono consulting" for Sher Edling, an eco law firm representing a number of jurisdictions, on litigation against oil companies, financial disclosures showed. Sher Edling counsel Michael Burger has also participated in multiple ELI events, and former Sher Edling lawyer Meredith Wilensky was previously an ELI Public Interest Law Fellow.
Burger is the executive director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law and an ELI presenter who has filed amicus briefs in support of plaintiffs in climate cases across the United States.
UCLA’s Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment hosted a talk in October 2017 with Sher Edling’s Vic Sher, "Suing Over Climate Change Damages: The First Wave of Climate Lawsuits." Ann Carlson was the moderator for that discussion.
John Dernbach, listed as an expert on CJP’s website, filed an amicus brief in 2019 as part of a brief of legal scholars in support of plaintiffs in City of Oakland v BP.
"Judges attending Climate Judiciary Project events are advised that they are walking into a left-wing lobbying shop," American Energy Institute President Jason Isaac told Fox News Digital. "Under the guise of ‘judicial education,’ CJP uses activist academics to give a pro-plaintiff sneak peek at climate change lawsuits. This kind of politicking underlines that the climate change lawsuits themselves are a left-wing attack on our quality of life.
"The Supreme Court will have an opportunity early next year to hear a case asking whether blue states and far-left mayors like Brandon Johnson can sue energy providers for climate change. Let us hope the court takes the case and ends Green New Deal lawfare."
Fox News Digital previously reported that since it was founded more than five years ago, the project has crafted 13 curriculum modules and hosted 42 events, and more than 1,700 judges have participated in its activities. And multiple judges serve as advisers at CJP, potentially having an impact on its curriculum and modules.
"So-called ‘climate change lawsuits,' lawsuits claiming that private companies should be monetarily liable for damage to public infrastructure allegedly caused by climate change, have exploded in the past five years," GOP Sen. Ted Cruz wrote in a letter to Environmental Law Institute earlier this year.
"In tandem with this unprecedented litigation, the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) launched a ‘first-of-its-kind effort’ to provide judges with ‘education on climate science, the impacts of climate change, and the ways climate science is arising in the law.’ It appears that ELI’s goal in providing this ‘education,’ however, may be to influence judges to side with plaintiffs in climate change cases."
The letter went on to label Carlson as "one of the program’s architects" and requested "information to allow the Committee to evaluate the efforts of both Ms. Carlson and ELI to influence the federal judiciary in its adjudication of climate litigation."
Cruz alleged that "ELI intends to accomplish via the courts what it cannot get enacted into law: a radical environmental agenda."
"To help judges reach those ‘appropriate’ decisions, the Project developed the ‘Climate Science and Law for Judges Curriculum’ (the Curriculum). While ELI claims the Project is ‘neutral' and ‘objective,’ the Curriculum reads like a playbook for judges to find in favor of plaintiffs in artificial climate change cases against traditional energy companies: it includes courses that ‘show how climate science is built on long-established scientific disciplines' and 'explore the human-caused component of [global] warming,’ such as the ‘causal connections between emissions’ and ‘changes in the climate.’"
An American Energy Institute report earlier this year alleges CJP "hides its partnership with the plaintiffs because they know these ties create judicial ethics problems."
AEI says Sandra Nichols Thiam, an ELI vice president and director of judicial education, acknowledged as much in a 2023 press statement, saying, "If we even appeared biased or if there was a whiff of bias, we wouldn’t be able to do what we’re doing."
"Taken together, it appears CJP made the thinnest possible disclosures to create the appearance of rectitude," AEI states. "But their admissions confirm that CJP exists to facilitate informal, ex parte contacts between judges and climate activists under the guise of judicial education. And secrecy remains essential to their operation, whose goal, as Thiam has said, is to develop ‘a body of law that supports climate action.'"
AEI, a group self-described as "dedicated to promoting policies that ensure America’s energy security and economic prosperity," says CJP’s work is "an attack on the rule of law."
"In America, the powerful aren’t allowed to coax and manipulate judges before their cases are heard," the report states.
In a statement to Fox News Digital, an ELI spokesperson said, "CJP doesn’t participate in litigation, support or coordinate with any parties in litigation, or advise judges on how they should rule in any case. Our courses provide judges with access to evidence-based information about climate science and trends in the law.
"Of course, experts in the field are welcome to provide their expertise to CJP programs while separately and independently providing that same expertise in another setting that is unrelated to the CJP program. It is routine and encouraged for judges to participate in continuing education that exposes them to expertise in a wide variety of disciplines."
Fox News Digital’s Thomas Catenacci contributed to this report
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in July said the odds of President Biden pardoning his son, Hunter Biden, sit at "100%" – a prediction that came to pass on Sunday when the White House announced the president was giving his son a pass.
While many Republicans speculated that Biden would break his pledge to Americans about ruling out a pardon for 54-year-old Hunter, who was convicted in two separate federal cases earlier this year, Cruz seemed to foretell that the first son would get a pass sometime after Election Day.
"I'm going to place the odds that Joe Biden pardons Hunter Biden at 100%. Hunter Biden will get a pardon as a result of this decision," Cruz said during his podcast, "Verdict with Ted Cruz," in July, referring to Biden’s decision this week to drop out of the presidential race.
"It will not happen till after Election Day. He's not going to do it before Election Day. But he's going to stick around. And after Election Day, I believe it is now 100% that Joe Biden will pardon Hunter," he added.
Cruz first predicted Biden would pardon Hunter in January during an episode of his podcast, putting the odds at that time at "95%."
Biden and his staffers had repeatedly said the first son would not get a pardon amid his federal felony gun and tax convictions.
Biden flip-flopped on Sunday, granting a sweeping pardon that not only covers the gun and tax offenses, but also any other offenses against the U.S. that Hunter "has committed or may have committed or taken part in" from Jan. 1, 2014, through Dec. 1, 2024.
"Today, I signed a pardon for my son Hunter," Biden wrote in a statement. "From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department’s decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted."
On Sunday night, Cruz retweeted a May 31 post from Biden that read, "No one is above the law," and responded, "This aged like fine milk."
The Democrat president blamed "raw politics" for the unraveling of his son’s plea deal and claimed that Hunter was "treated differently" by prosecutors.
When the jury in the gun case found Hunter guilty of the three felony firearm offenses in June, Biden vowed to respect the rule of law.
"I am not going to do anything," Biden said after Hunter was convicted. "I will abide by the jury’s decision."
On the heels of President Joe Biden's move to pardon his son Hunter Biden, several Republican lawmakers highlighted a post on X from earlier this year in which the president had asserted, "No one is above the law."
Reps. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., and Eli Crane, R-Ariz., both shared Biden's post and commented, "Unless your last name is Biden."
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Tx., tweeted, "This aged like fine milk."
"You've been lied to every step of the way by this Administration and the corrupt Biden family. This is just the latest in their long coverup scheme. They never play by the same rules they force on everyone else. Disgraceful," Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., declared in response to the old Biden tweet.
In a statement on Sunday, President Biden noted that he had signed the pardon.
"From the day I took office, I said I would not interfere with the Justice Department’s decision-making, and I kept my word even as I have watched my son being selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted," the president said in the statement.
The "Full and Unconditional Pardon" the president granted to Hunter covers "… offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 1, 2014 through December 1, 2024 … " the pardon declares.
President-elect Trump sounded off in a post on Truth Social.
"Does the Pardon given by Joe to Hunter include the J-6 Hostages, who have now been imprisoned for years? Such an abuse and miscarriage of Justice!" Trump declared.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, predicted that illegal immigration will begin to "plummet" immediately after President-elect Trump is inaugurated early next year.
Cruz made the statement during a Sunday morning appearance on CBS' "Face the Nation" with host Margaret Brennan. Cruz argued that the decrease will begin in the weeks after Trump takes office, citing Trump's plan to reinstate the "remain in Mexico" policy.
"I expect we will once again enter into ‘remain in Mexico,’ and we are going to see – I'm going to make a prediction right now: We will see the numbers plummet of illegal immigration coming into this country," Cruz said. "Not in a year, not in six months, but in January and February, because we will have a president who will vigorously enforce the law."
Cruz also addressed Trump's efforts to use tariffs as leverage to encourage Mexico's government to assist in halting border traffic. Trump spoke with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum last month and said she proved willing to assist his administration.
"I’ll tell you what hasn't changed is the importance of leverage. And I got to say, you look at the threat of tariffs against Mexico and Canada. [It] immediately has produced action. We've seen the president of Mexico stand up and promise that she is going to work hand in hand with the President of the United States, President Trump, to secure the border," Cruz said.
Trump says he also had a "very productive meeting" with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at his Mar-a-Lago club in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Trudeau jetted into Mar-a-Lago unannounced on Friday just days after Trump threatened to impose sweeping tariffs on Canadian products. Trump is threatening to impose 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico over failures by both nations to curb the flow of illegal immigrants and illicit drugs from those countries into the U.S.
"We discussed many important topics that will require both countries to work together to address, like the fentanyl and drug crisis that has decimated so many lives as a result of illegal immigration, fair trade deals that do not jeopardize American workers and the massive trade deficit the U.S. has with Canada," Trump wrote on Truth Social Saturday.
"I made it very clear that the United States will no longer sit idly by as our citizens become victims to the scourge of this drug epidemic, caused mainly by the drug cartels, and fentanyl pouring in from China. Too much death and hardship!"
Trump wrote that Trudeau, who has been serving as prime minister of Canada since 2015, made a commitment to work with the U.S. to "end this terrible devastation of U.S. families."
Fox News' Michael Dorgan contributed to this report
FIRST ON FOX:Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, is urging the Biden administration to halt a $1.25 billion "Digital Equity" program, calling it unconstitutional for using race-based criteria to expand broadband access.
"I urge you to withdraw the unlawful [Notice of Funding Opportunity] NOFO and halt issuing Program grants before you cause real harm," Cruz wrote to Alan Davidson, the assistant secretary of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) Thursday morning. "NTIA’s use of racial classifications, as set forth in the NOFO, does not serve a compelling governmental interest."
The letter comes as Republicans push back against diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives as they gear up for the incoming Trump administration. Under the soon-to-be Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), headed by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, such programs like the Digital Equity Competitive Grant Program could be examined as government waste.
"Any source of government waste is in scope for DOGE," a Ramaswamy spokesperson told Fox News Digital.
The letter criticizes NTIA's guidance for the Digital Equity Competitive Grant Program, asCruz claims it violates the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause, lacking evidence of racial discrimination in internet access and failing to provide clear metrics for its race-based criteria.
The program was a key initiative under the Digital Equity Act, which was authorized by President Biden's Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021. It is the third of three digital equity programs established by the act.
Cruz asserts that the program requires grant applicants to prioritize "Covered Populations," a category that explicitly includes racial and ethnic minorities in the program. He argued the approach includes impermissible racial discrimination, arguing that the federal government cannot use racial classifications without demonstrating a compelling interest and "narrowly tailored" measures.
"The NOFO provides no evidence racial minorities face discrimination in accessing the internet, let alone specific instances of discrimination that NTIA is seeking to address," Cruz wrote. "And it does not attempt to make any claim that this discrimination is necessary to avoid a prison race riot."
Cruz added that "the NOFO does not define 'minority,' making it impossible to determine whether it is underinclusive, but in any event, it is overinclusive because it includes anyone who falls into some racial group, without any determination that that specific group has faced discrimination in access to broadband."
Cruz, the ranking member of the Senate Commerce, Science & Transportation Committee, urged the NTIA to respond by Dec. 12, either by confirming the withdrawal of the guidance or by providing a detailed explanation of how it complies with constitutional requirements.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the NTIA for comment.
