A federal judge Wednesday ordered Texas to remove floating buoys from the Rio Grande no later than Sept. 15.  

Gov. Greg Abbott deployed the buoys in July to curb the flow of illegal immigrants to the state. The plan was part of the Republican governor’s broader Operation Lone Star. 

Texas installed the buoy barrier near the border town of Eagle Pass, with anchors in the riverbed. Eagle Pass is part of a Border Patrol sector that has seen the second-highest number of migrant crossings this fiscal year with about 270,000 encounters — though that is lower than it was at this time last year.

The buoys brought a swift legal challenge from the U.S. Justice Department, which accused Texas of putting a barrier on the international boundary without permission. President Joe Biden’s administration also said the water barrier raised humanitarian and environmental concerns.

The bright-orange, wrecking ball-sized buoys have created a water barrier longer than a soccer field on a stretch of river where migrants often try crossing from Mexico. Texas also has installed razor wire and steel fencing on the border, while also empowering armed officers to arrest migrants on trespassing charges.

Abbott said his administration planned to appeal Wednesday’s decision by U.S. District Judge David Ezra. 

‘Today’s court decision merely prolongs President Biden’s willful refusal to acknowledge that Texas is rightfully stepping up to do the job that he should have been doing all along. This ruling is incorrect and will be overturned on appeal,’ Abbott said in a statement. ‘We will continue to utilize every strategy to secure the border, including deploying Texas National Guard soldiers and Department of Public Safety troopers and installing strategic barriers. 

‘Our battle to defend Texas’ sovereign authority to protect lives from the chaos caused by President Biden’s open border policies has only begun. Texas is prepared to take this fight all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.’

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

The House Oversight Committee is launching a probe into a ‘series of aviation and rail safety failures’ on Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s watch.

‘These failures indicate a recent and disturbing pattern of failures at the Department placing…the safety of Americans at risk,’ the committee’s Republican majority wrote to Buttigieg Tuesday. 

‘Therefore, we request a briefing, documents, and communications related to the Department’s efforts to investigate and remediate these issues to protect the safety of all Americans.’

Committee Chair James Comer, R-Ky., cited nine specific train derailments involving hazardous or flammable materials that occurred between November 2022 and June 2023. 

The letter also named nine aviation issues, including several near-collisions and incidents at Alabama’s Montgomery Regional Airport and San Antonio International Airport that caused the deaths of ground crew members there. 

‘Data collected by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and DOT Federal Railroad Administration indicates that there were 1,730 runway incursions in 2022 and approximately 2,000 rail incidents reported nationwide, including approximately 1,310 derailments and 146 collisions,’ the committee said in a press release

Lawmakers are urging Buttigieg and his Transportation officials to hand over information on all incidents that have resulted in death, injury or financial damage, including any such communications between the department and President Biden’s White House.

‘The safety failures have eroded the public’s confidence in air and rail safety and necessitates thorough investigation,’ the Republicans wrote. 

They are urging Buttigieg and his Transportation officials to hand over information on all incidents that have resulted in death, injury or financial damage, including any such communications between the department and President Biden’s White House. 

Comer also called on the department to provide the Oversight committee with a staff-level briefing by Sept. 19. 

The scrutiny came on the same day that chaos briefly broke out in airports across the country as United Airlines flights were forced to issue a ground stop over computer server issues.

‘We are experiencing a systemwide technology issue and are holding all aircraft at their departure airports. Flights that are already airborne are continuing to their destination as planned,’ United said in a statement on Tuesday before the issues were resolved hours later.

I have a parliamentary crystal ball for how September may go on Capitol Hill.

That doesn’t mean I have many answers.

Like most crystal balls, they are limited in their accuracy. They won’t give you the full story. But they will absolutely nail some aspects.

No. The crystal ball cannot definitively predict whether the government will shut down Oct. 1, the start of the federal fiscal year. In fact, information from the crystal ball surrounding that very question is especially cloudy.

THE HITCHHIKER’S GUIDE TO MCCONNELL’S HEALTH AND A POTENTIAL GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN

Impeachment of President Biden? Or Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas? Or Attorney General Merrick Garland?

Just as hazy.

But the crystal ball does forecast the following:

The Senate will advance a few individual appropriations bills in the coming weeks. And House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., will try to advance a fig leaf, interim spending package that appeases the right. The House Freedom Caucus and other conservative members will demand various provisions that either trim spending, address the border or wrestle with potential impeachment. 

McCarthy’s bill won’t actually be what Congress settles on to fund the government. In fact, one can’t even technically call it a ‘Continuing Resolution’ or ‘CR’ if it cuts funding or addresses ancillary issues important to Republicans. By its nature, a CR sustains funding at present levels so the government doesn’t shutter. But McCarthy will have made his point.

However, what’s murky in the crystal ball is whether McCarthy and House Republicans can later digest a CR from the Senate that doesn’t address any of their priorities just to keep the government funded.

However, the crystal ball is crystal clear about one thing: If the House doesn’t eventually swallow a bipartisan CR from the Senate, there will be a government shutdown.

That’s as definitive as anything we’ve drawn from the crystal ball.

So, here are some of the machinations surrounding a potential government shutdown and possible funding measures over the next four weeks.

The Senate is back from its summer recess a full week ahead of the House. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., notes that the Senate cleared 12 appropriations bills in committee before the recess. So, he’ll deposit three of those on the floor soon.

‘All 12 appropriations … have been reported out of the committee with bipartisan support. Some of them, many of them, were with unanimous, bipartisan support,’ said Schumer. ‘Now, that doesn’t mean everyone agreed on everything. It sometimes means something more important. It means that disagreements haven’t paralyzed the process.’

Schumer scored backup from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

‘Congress needs to address our nation’s most pressing needs with timely appropriations. And we need to keep the lights on come Oct. 1,’ McConnell said.

Before the recess, the full House OK’d only one of its 12 spending measures. So, this is a chance for the Senate to get ahead of the House and inoculate it from criticism it hasn’t passed any appropriations bills.

But Schumer understands the stark reality. No matter what, the solution to averting a government shutdown is for the House and Senate to pass some sort of interim spending bill that keeps the federal lights on for a few weeks, if not a couple months. And the only tangible recipe to make that work? A Band-Aid bill can only pass with a coalition of Democrats and Republicans.

McCarthy doesn’t need a crystal ball to understand that a bipartisan, temporary bill is the route too. He’s indicated to House Republicans a stopgap bill is necessary right away, asserting that the GOP will fight for deep spending cuts with the ‘real’ bills later.

But McCarthy hasn’t addressed something else that is clear in the crystal ball. It remains unsaid because it’s politically radioactive: A clean CR likely requires a substantial chunk of Democratic votes in the House. In fact, it may score far more Democratic votes than GOP votes.

‘We all agreed a CR is the best way to go,’ Schumer said of a meeting he had with McCarthy about government funding. ‘He’s going to have a rough time implementing it.’

That’s why a clean CR with substantial Democratic support is politically the most malignant bill to McCarthy.

House conservatives will bray if McCarthy defaults to that position – even if he goes through the proper motions to appeal to the right on impeachment, spending cuts or border policy. However, McCarthy likely needs to embrace some of these appeals by the right if he wants to stay in good graces with the House Freedom Caucus.

But the second McCarthy dials back from those positions …

If he dials back from those positions …

That’s why the crystal ball can’t predict if there might be a government shutdown.

This boils down to the math.

The current breakdown in the House features 222 Republicans to 212 Democrats with one vacancy. In other words, Republicans can only lose four votes from their side and still pass a bill without Democratic assistance. More Democrats voted for the debt ceiling pact with President Biden in the spring than Republicans. And conservatives haven’t let McCarthy forget it.

But it gets worse for the GOP.

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., could miss some time for his cancer treatments. And Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah., resigns effective Sept. 15. So, that could mean Republicans are effectively operating with only 220 members. That drops the GOP margin to three votes.

The biggest roadblock for putting any piece of legislation on the House floor is what’s known as the ‘rule.’ The House Rules Committee is the gateway for most bills to get to the floor. The Rules Committee and the entire House must first adopt a ‘rule’ before considering legislation. The rule determines the parameters for debate on a given bill. But if the Rules Committee or entire House fails to approve a rule, the bill can’t come up for debate.

This could be nettlesome for McCarthy with Ralph Norman, R-S.C., Chip Roy, R-Texas, and Thomas Massie, R-Ky., serving on the Rules Committee.

That said, there is a way to skate around the Rules Committee on a CR that simply renews all old funding on a temporary basis.

The House can bypass the Rules Committee by putting a ‘privileged’ Continuing Resolution on the floor after Sept. 15. ‘Privileged’ means the resolution is written in a manner that whisks it to the front of the legislative line. 

Granted, such a ‘privileged’ CR is subject to multiple points of order on the floor. That could be messy enough. But such an option to skip a step does exist in the House quiver.

Will that scenario unfold?

The crystal ball has not even considered the ‘privileged’ CR option because it is obscure.

So, what’s going to happen? I have no idea. And frankly, neither does the crystal ball.

I asked the crystal ball about its future in congressional soothsaying.

The response? Foggy at best.

A judge ruled on Tuesday that Georgia may resume enforcing its ban on hormone replacement therapy for transgender youth, putting the judge’s previous order blocking the ban on hold.

The ruling comes after a federal appeals court granted neighboring Alabama the ability to enforce a similar restriction last month and as GOP-led states across the country seek to prohibit gender transition treatment for people under 18-years-old. At least 22 states have enacted laws restricting or banning transgender treatment for minors and most of these states have been sued.

Attorneys for the state of Georgia had asked Judge Sarah Geraghty to vacate the preliminary injunction after the ruling in Alabama’s case, which came a day after Geraghty issued her initial ruling.

Geraghty did not go as far as to vacate her earlier decision but said that keeping her injunction in place was not possible after the ruling on Alabama’s law by a three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes Georgia. The judge instead issued a stay on her injunction ahead of a possible rehearing of the Alabama case before a larger panel of the court’s judges.

The Georgia attorney general’s office spokesperson Kara Richardson said in a statement that the office applauds the ruling and ‘will continue fighting to protect the health and well-being of Georgia’s children.’

Attorneys for the plaintiffs said they were disappointed ‘primarily for the families who are unable to get the care they need in Georgia or make medical decisions based on the best interest of their children.’ They also emphasized that their legal fight was not finished.

The ruling last month in Alabama’s case said the state may impose a ban on puberty blockers and hormones for transgender minors.

Georgia’s Senate Bill 140 allows doctors to prescribe puberty-blocking medication, and children who are already receiving hormone therapy can continue. However, new patients under 18 are prohibited from beginning hormone therapy. The law, which went into effect on July 1, also bans most gender-affirming surgeries for transgender children.

Geraghty granted a preliminary injunction blocking Georgia’s law on August 20 after parents of transgender children and a community organization filed a lawsuit challenging the ban.

The judge said In her decision last month that the transgender children who sought the injunction faced ‘imminent risks’ from the ban, including depression, anxiety, eating disorders, self-harm and suicidal thoughts. Geraghty said the risks outweighed any harm an injunction would pose to the state.

The 11th Circuit judges who ruled on Alabama’s law said states have ‘a compelling interest in protecting children from drugs, particularly those for which there is uncertainty regarding benefits, recent surges in use, and irreversible effects.’

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

–>

Florida state Sen. Tom Wright, a Republican, allegedly ‘aggressively’ put his hand on a domestic violence shelter worker, according to an incident report from the Daytona Beach Police Department, but the lawmaker recalls the incident differently.

Women domestic violence survivors and their children were boarding a school bus for a field trip Saturday afternoon as counselors from the Department of Children and Families and other domestic violence state employees were on a tour with Wright.

The bus driver was preparing to depart when a woman observed Wright approaching the bus, the incident report said, according to Fox 35. 

‘Excuse me, sir. You may not board the bus full of survivors and children,’ the woman told him, adding that they deserve safety and anonymity and that it is her job to protect them.

Wright informed her that he was not going to get on the bus and was not attempting to speak with the survivors, according to the report. He said he wanted to speak with the bus driver.

The woman told police that Wright spoke to her in ‘an aggressive manner’ and placed his hand on her shoulder. 

‘Do not put your hands on me,’ she told him, and he backed away from her, according to the report. She also accused him of lunging at her multiple times and getting in her face in an effort to intimidate her.

Another worker attempted to intervene, but the woman told police she still felt threatened.

A request to have Wright trespassed from the property was later granted, as police officers issued a warning prohibiting the senator the property until further notice.

Another witness told police she saw Wright approach the bus but did not see him physically touch the woman. This witness also recalled seeing Wright with his arm extended, but could not remember what happened afterward. The witness said Wright aggressively approached the woman and refused to de-escalate the situation, according to the report.

Wright left the property before police were able to talk to him, but officers found him at a nearby store. He told officers he approached the bus to speak with the driver when the woman began to yell at him that he was not allowed on the bus, the report said. He said the woman continued to scream at him as he attempted to explain that he was not getting on the bus.

The woman was getting in his face, the senator said, so he put a hand on her shoulder to tell her that he was not about to get on the bus. He said she told him not to touch her and she walked away.

Another witness said they observed Wright placing his hand on the woman’s shoulder to tell her he was not going to get on the bus.

The woman who accused Wright of ‘aggressively’ putting his hands on her refused medical treatment and would not allow officers to take a photo of her shoulder because there were no visible injuries, according to the report.

The incident remains under investigation.

–>

ROCHESTER, N.H. – Former Vice President Mike Pence argues that former President Donald Trump ‘and some of his imitators in the Republican primary’ are walking away from core conservative values.

It’s a charge the former vice president made in an interview with Fox News Digital on the eve of a highly-billed speech Pence will deliver on Wednesday titled ‘Populism vs. Conservatism: Republicans’ Time for Choosing.’

Pence will give his address at Saint Anselm College’s New Hampshire Institute of Politics, a must-stop for White House hopefuls in the state that holds the first primary and second overall contest in the GOP presidential nominating calendar.

‘I think we have a very clear choice that’s emerging, not just between candidates but between a philosophy of governance, and Republicans are facing a Republican time for choosing,’ Pence emphasized during his Fox News interview at a campaign stop in New Hampshire.

‘Time for choosing’ is a clear nod to the late President Ronald Reagan, who famously used the line in a 1964 speech in support of conservative Barry Goldwater’s presidential bid. That address has long been seen as a key moment in Reagan’s transformation from Hollywood actor to politician, and eventually president and conservative icon.

Pence’s speech in New Hampshire comes three weeks ahead of the second GOP presidential nomination debate, a Fox Business hosted showdown that will be held at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California

‘I really do believe that we’re in the midst of a healthy debate in the Republican Party today – whether or not we’re going to continue to hue towards that time honored conservative agenda of a strong national defense, American leadership in the world, limited government, fiscal responsibility, traditional values, and the right to life, or whether we’re going to follow the siren song of populism away from many of those same timeless conservative principles,’ Pence argued.

Pence said he aims to use his address ‘to frame that for people. I want people to know that I’m not only offering what I believe is a campaign that brings my experience and my record in the Congress and as governor and as Vice President to bare, but also I want people to see me as the most proven, consistent, conservative in this race and I’ll lead this party and I’ll this country back to those principles that have always made our country strong and free.’

It’s a message Pence first spotlighted during a speech at conservative Heritage Foundation last October in which he warned of the rise of populism in the GOP.

As he launched his 2024 White House campaign during a speech in June in Iowa, Pence highlighted the competing visions for the future of the Republican Party, and emphasized that the GOP must be the party of the Constitution.

The former vice president is currently polling in the single digits — along with most of the rest of the large field of contenders — in the latest GOP nomination polls, far behind his former running mate. Trump, who’s making his third straight White House run, is the commanding front-runner right now in the Republican nomination race.

Pence, a former representative and Indiana governor whom Trump picked as his running mate seven years ago, highlighted that ‘when Donald Trump ran in 2016, he ran on a promise that we would governor as conservatives. And we did. For four years we rebuilt our military, we cut taxes, we rolled back regulations, unleashed American energy, and appointed conservatives to our courts at every level.’

‘But now, the former president and some of his imitators in the Republican primary make no such promise,’ Pence said, as he pointed to Trump and some of the other 2024 GOP presidential contenders.

One of his rivals Pence was likely referring to is Vivek Ramaswamy, a 38-year-old multimillionaire biotech entrepreneur and first-time candidate who’s seen his standing in the polls rise as he runs as an outsider and leading Trump defender.

Since the two candidates repeatedly clashed at last month’s first GOP presidential nomination debate, the 64-year-old Pence has taken aim at Ramaswamy’s apparent fluidity on a number of issues, from his tax proposal to Russian’s war on Ukraine, to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. 

But top Pence campaign aides, speaking with reporters on the eve of the former vice president’s address, emphasized that Wednesday’s speech isn’t about targeting any single candidate and is much broader in scope.

‘Mike is trying to take a stand to remind our party of the value of conservatism,’ an aide said.

Trump, thanks to his dominance over the GOP the past eight years, has dramatically reshaped the party, fueling the base with working class support, and to a degree replacing conservative dogma with a more populist and nationalist agenda.

But Pence campaign aides argued it’s not too late to make the case for conservatism. 

And the former vice president, in his Fox News Digital interview, highlighted that ‘I believe that the majority of Republican primary voters, I believe the majority of Americans, know that the commitment to a strong national defense, American leadership, fiscal responsibility, and traditional values is an American agenda that will make our country more prosperous and more secure and more free.’

Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.