Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear signed a bill Tuesday to expand an address confidentiality program aimed at protecting domestic violence victims from their abusers.

It builds on a program shielding victims’ home addresses from voter rolls. The new law expands the program to mask their addresses on other publicly available government records.

The new law also removes the requirement that survivors have an emergency protective order to hide their addresses on public records. Instead, it will allow victims who sign a sworn statement to have their addresses shielded from the broader list of records.

The bill’s supporters include Kentucky’s Republican secretary of state, Michael Adams, who said the program will ‘help ensure survivors of domestic violence get the protection they deserve.’

It was among several bills signed by the Democratic governor to bolster public safety by supporting law enforcement and better protecting crime victims and children at school.

Another bill signed by Beshear gives law enforcement agencies the ability to create their own wellness programs to support the mental health and wellbeing of sworn and civilian personnel. All sessions and information discussed within wellness programs remain confidential under counselor-client privilege.

The governor said that officers ‘are interacting with Kentuckians on their worst day, so it’s essential that we ensure they are mentally healthy and have addressed any trauma they’ve experienced.’

The bill’s lead sponsor, Republican Rep. Kevin Bratcher, said: ‘With wellness concerns increasing within police departments, we must ensure programs are in place for them when they need help.’

The governor also signed a bill allocating $13 million to improve Jenny Wiley State Resort Park and Lake Barkley State Resort Park. The bill designates $5.5 million to Jenny Wiley park and $7.5 million to Lake Barkley park to deal with structural, exterior, mechanical and interior deficiencies.

First lady Jill Biden’s office on Tuesday attempted to lower the temperature after she received backlash on social media, including accusations of racism, for floating the idea of inviting the University of Iowa women’s basketball team to the White House, despite them losing to Louisiana State University (LSU) in the national championship game over the weekend.

‘I know we’ll have the champions come to the White House, we always do. So, we hope LSU will come,’ Biden said Monday. ‘But, you know, I’m going to tell Joe I think Iowa should come, too, because they played such a good game.’

The first lady’s idea backfired immediately as thousands of quote tweets rolled in over the course of just hours.

Bishop Talbert Swan wrote, ‘Jill Biden is a white woman,’ and suggested the first lady’s race was why she invited the Iowa women’s team.

‘Of course she wants the president to invite the team of predominantly white women that lost when the winning team of Black woman come to the White House,’ Swan wrote. ‘She wants to give white women the same privilege that Black women earned.’

‘This is America,’ he added.

‘Jill Biden inviting Iowa to the WH has Angel Reese and Black people everywhere HEATED,’ journalist Touré tweeted. ‘The WH has a crisis on its hands…’

Another user slammed ‘people defending Jill Biden saying ‘it was such a good game and it brought awareness.’’

‘AWARENESS OF WHAT,’ the user wrote. ‘B—-ES BEEN PLAYING BASKETBALL FOR YEARS. Jesus Christ.’

Keith Boykin, who worked for former President Bill Clinton and frequently appeared on CNN, tweeted, ‘No Ma’am!’ and added, ‘When Black women win a national championship, they should not be forced to share the stage with the losing team.’

NFL Hall of Fame tight end Shannon Sharpe slammed the first lady on ‘Skip and Shannon: Undisputed’ while discussing the championship and said an invitation to the White House ‘isn’t a participation award,’ adding, ‘Winners get a trophy. That’s what life is about.’

‘Come on, Dr. Biden. You know better than this,’ Sharpe said. ‘Did you forget who helped put your husband in the White House? You gonna find out a very serious, hard lesson in ’24. [Joe] will be like a Kentucky or Duke freshman. You’ll be one-and-done.’

Other users, including progressive sitting members of Congress, also slammed the first lady for her White House invitation to Iowa.

‘Very respectfully Madame First Lady, that’s not how it works,’ ‘Squad’ Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., wrote on Tuesday. ‘LSU won. LSU comes to the White House.’

‘Iowa understands this and would most definitely respectfully decline the invitation,’ Bowman continued.

The first lady’s remarks also drew a response from Rep. Julia Letlow, R-La., who gave props to LSU coach Kim Mulkey and the team and invited them to the Capitol.

‘In #LA05, we’re proud of Tangipahoa Parish’s own, Coach [Mulkey], and all that [LSU’s women’s team] accomplished,’ Letlow tweeted. ‘Coach — if the [White House] insists on making you share the championship visit, we would be honored to celebrate your team at the Capitol!’

‘DEI for the win!’ Washington Free Beacon journalist Chuck Ross tweeted on Monday.

Fox News Digital reached out to the first lady’s office but received no response.

Biden’s spokesperson, Vanessa Valdivia, attempted to walk back the first lady’s comments, tweeting that she ‘loved watching the NCAA women’s basketball championship game alongside young student athletes and admires how far women have advanced in sports since the passing of Title IX.’

‘Her comments in Colorado were intended to applaud the historic game and all women athletes,’ Valdivia wrote. ‘She looks forward to celebrating the LSU Tigers on their championship win at the White House.’

Under Mulkey, LSU beat Iowa on Sunday, 102-85, to take the NCAA women’s basketball national championship home to Baton Rouge for the first time in school history.

The participation trophy-esque remarks drew strong rebukes from people from all walks.

LSU star Angel Reese led the charge, quote-tweeting the ESPN write-up with three laughing emojis and two words: ‘A JOKE.’

Fox News Digital’s Ryan Gaydos contributed reporting.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., applauded what she called ‘social consequences’ for Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., Tuesday, after the GOP congresswoman led a New York City rally protesting the indictment of former President Donald Trump. 

Trump was indicted by a grand jury Thursday over alleged hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal during the 2016 campaign cycle. The former president arrived in New York Monday ahead of his court appearance, prompting political protests to break out in the streets outside the courthouse.

With a megaphone in hand, Greene led a rally outside the New York City courthouse to protest the indictment and support Trump before his arraignment Tuesday, but progressive representative AOC blasted her efforts as ‘shameless bigotry.’

‘Welcome to NYC! Where there are still social consequences for shameless bigotry,’ AOC wrote in a Twitter post fired at Greene, upon reports that the Republican congresswoman was being heckled at by anti-Trump protestors during the rally.

The comment came after reports that people were shouting and blowing whistles over Greene in an effort to prevent her from being heard during the protest.

‘We are here to peacefully protest against the persecution of an innocent man. Not just any innocent man, this is the former President of the United States of America,’ Greene told the crowd.

Greene also hit back at Mayor Eric Adams, after he urged her to be on her ‘best behavior’ ahead of Tuesday’s protest.

‘Also, to the Mayor Adams, as you can see, I am here peacefully protesting. He called me out by name,’ Greene said.

Trump appeared in court Tuesday, where he pleaded not guilty to all charges brought against him.

Fox News’ Brooke Singman contributed to this report.

Maine lawmakers are preparing to take up several proposals in the coming weeks to expand abortion access, including one by Democratic Gov. Janet Mills to allow women in Maine to get abortions later in pregnancy if deemed necessary by a medical provider.

Current state law bans abortions after a fetus becomes viable outside the womb, at roughly 24 weeks. The governor’s bill would allow later abortions with a doctor’s approval.

Other bills would prevent municipalities from restricting abortions; strengthen protections for those who treat out-of-staters traveling to Maine for an abortion; and address affordability of abortions through private insurance.

Several hundred anti-abortion activists traveled to the State House Tuesday to make their views known. The event’s organizer, Maine Right to Life, said that it’s important for people to raise their voices in Augusta because that’s where abortion laws are determined now that U.S. Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to an abortion. Abortions already have been banned in 13 states.

Planned Parenthood of Northern New England tweeted that Mainers showed they support abortion access by electing ‘pro-reproductive rights champions to protect our reproductive rights.’

There are several Republican-backed proposals that would reduce abortion access but those face long odds with Democrats controlling both chambers.

President Biden’s former executive assistant from his time as vice president testified before Congress on Tuesday that classified documents were spread out across three different locations in the nation’s capital, then ‘remained accessible’ to Penn Biden center employees when they were transported there, according to House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer. 

Kathy Chung, who joined Biden’s staff in 2012 and stayed in the role through the end of the Obama administration, sat down for a transcribed interview with the committee about classified documents that the president’s attorney say were first found at the Penn Biden Center on Nov. 2, 2022. Another tranche of classified documents were later located at the president’s home in Wilmington, Delaware. 

Rep. Comer, R-Ky., said that Chung ‘provided startling information that undermines the Biden White House’s narrative on the matter.’

‘Today we learned that when Joe Biden left the vice presidency, boxes containing classified documents, vice presidential records, and other items were stored in three different locations around the Washington, D.C. area, including an office near the White House, an office in Chinatown, and eventually the Penn Biden Center,’ Rep. Comer said in a statement. 

‘At some point, the boxes containing classified materials were transported by personal vehicles to an office location. The boxes were not in a ‘locked closet’ at the Penn Biden Center and remained accessible to Penn Biden employees as well as potentially others with access to the office space. We need to find out who had access to these documents.’

Comer went on to dispute the White House’s timeline, claiming that ‘then-White House Counsel Dana Remus tasked Kathy Chung with retrieving these boxes from the Penn Biden Center as early as May 2022.’

‘This story does not begin in November 2022, as represented by President Biden’s attorney,’ Comer said. 

Remus did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday. 

Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, appeared to dispute Comer’s characterization of Chung’s testimony, saying that she wasn’t aware of classified documents at the Penn Biden Center until the president’s attorneys found them there last November. 

‘Ms. Chung has cooperated with Committee Republicans every step of the way—providing materials to investigators, voluntarily sitting for an interview, and working in good faith with Congress,’ Rep. Raskin said in a statement. 

‘She repeatedly explained that she was unaware that there were alleged classified documents at the Penn Biden Center until November 2022, when the documents were first discovered by counsel for President Biden.’

Chung – who was recommended to the president in 2012 by his son, Hunter Biden – now works as the Pentagon’s deputy director of protocol. 

Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Robert Hur, a veteran federal prosecutor, as a special counsel to investigate Biden’s handling of classified documents. 

Separately, a federal investigation is underway into former President Trump’s handling of classified documents after an FBI raid at his Mar-a-Lago home last August. Secret Service agents connected to the former president are expected to testify before a Washington, D.C., grand jury later this week. 

Comer said that Republicans will follow up with other ‘persons of interest’ in their investigation, while Raskin accused Republicans of turning a ‘blind eye to Trump’s egregious misconduct’ and creating a ‘mirage of fake evidence for their empty attacks’ on Biden. 

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday about Chung’s testimony. 

Ronald Sarasin, a three-term Republican congressman from Connecticut in the 1970s who later went on to lead the U.S. Capitol Historical Society, has died. He was 88.

Sarasin died at his home in McLean, Virginia, on March 27, according to an obituary prepared by his family that did not disclose a cause of death.

Sarasin, who was born in Fall River, Massachusetts and grew up in Beacon Falls, Connecticut, was first elected to the U.S. House in 1972 and was re-elected in 1974 and 1976, representing the 5th District in western Connecticut.

In 1978, he won the Republican nomination for governor but lost the election to Democrat Ella Grasso.

Sarasin previously served in the Connecticut House of Representatives from 1969 to 1973. After serving in the Navy in the 1950s, he went on to graduate from the University of Connecticut and its law school.

After leaving politics, Sarasin was the chief lobbyist for the National Restaurant Association and later president and CEO of the National Beer Wholesalers Association.

From 2000 to 2018, he was president and CEO of the U.S. Capitol Historical Society, which is chartered by Congress to educate the public about the Capitol, its history and its people.

In a Facebook post mourning his death, the historical society credited Sarasin for establishing educational programs including a traveling exhibit on the role enslaved people had in building the Capitol.

‘Ron met every challenge with tremendous strength to help us grow in our work and service to reach new audiences,’ the post said. ‘We are grateful for his life, his friendship, and the legacy Ron left us all.’

Sarasin is survived by his wife, Leslie, and two sons. A funeral service will be held May 20 at Gonzaga College High School’s St. Aloysius Church in Washington.