President Donald Trump on Monday said the U.S. will engage ‘directly’ with Iran in a high-level meeting set to occur this coming Saturday. 

‘We have a very big meeting on Saturday, and we’re dealing with them directly,’ Trump told reporters from the Oval Office while sitting next to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 

The announced meeting is the first known time the U.S. will directly engage with Iran since the previous Trump administration, when it withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018. 

‘We’ll see what can happen. I think everybody agrees that doing a deal would be preferable to doing the obvious,’ Trump said in reference to his threat last week in which he said he would ‘bomb’ Iran if it didn’t enter talks to end its nuclear program.

‘[That’s] not something that I want to be involved with, or frankly, that Israel wants to be involved with, if they can avoid it,’ Trump continued. ‘We’re going to see if we can avoid it. 

‘It’s getting to be very dangerous territory,’ Trump warned. ‘And hopefully those talks will be successful.’

The president refused to detail where the talks would take place or how they would differ from the JCPOA, saying only that they will be ‘different’ and ‘stronger.’

Following the U.S. withdrawal from the agreement, the nuclear deal essentially collapsed despite the remaining signatories – which included the U.K., China, France, Russia and Germany – and Iran began rapidly developing its nuclear program. 

Earlier this year, the U.N. nuclear watchdog warned that Tehran had amassed enough near-weapons-grade enriched uranium to build five nuclear weapons if the uranium were further enriched. 

‘I think if the talks aren’t successful with Iran… Iran is going to be in great danger,’ Trump said Monday.

It is unclear if Israel, or any other nations, will be involved in the talks, though Netanyahu made clear Jerusalem is aligned with the U.S. in securing a deal to end Iran’s nuclear program.

‘We’re both united in the goal that Iran does not ever get nuclear weapons, that it can be done diplomatically in a full way, the way it was done in Libya,’ Netanyahu told reporters. ‘I think that would be a good thing. 

‘But whatever happens, we have to make sure that Iran does not have nuclear weapons,’ he added. 

Vice President JD Vance honored his mother, Beverly Aikins, at the White House Monday to commemorate her reaching 10 years of sobriety. 

‘I remember when I gave my (Republican National Committee) convention speech, which was the craziest thing, and I even said during the speech that we would have your 10-year medallion ceremony at the White House,’ Vance said in the White House’s Roosevelt Room, according to the Washington Examiner. 

‘Well, here we are,’ Vance said. ‘And you made it, and we made it. And most importantly, you’re celebrating a very, very big milestone. And I’m just very proud of you.’ 

At the Republican National Convention in July, Vance said that Aikins would hit 10 years of sobriety in January and promised to bring her to the White House ‘if President Trump is okay with it.’ Vance presented Aikins with a medallion on Monday to celebrate the major milestone. 

Vance outlined his mother’s battle with sobriety and substance abuse in his book, ‘Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis,’ published in 2016. Specifically, the book chronicles Aikins’ struggle with opioid addiction. 

According to Vance’s office, Aikins’ advice to those struggling with substance abuse issues is ‘to reach out, to try to get help, and that recovery is hard, but it’s so worth it.’

Aikins, who also attended the inauguration ceremony for Vance and President Donald Trump in January, is a nurse at an addiction recovery center in Ohio. ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ details how Aikins first obtained access to prescription medications. 

As a result of Aikins struggle with addiction, Vance eventually was raised by both his grandparents. 

Vance previously told Fox News in an interview in July 2024 that had his mother had access to drugs coming through the Mexican border, he doesn’t believe she would have survived. 

‘If the poison that is coming across the border now had been coming across 20 years ago, I don’t think that my mom would be here,’ Vance told Fox News’ Jesse Watters. 

Those who joined Vance at the White House on Monday include his wife, Usha Vance, as well as the couple’s three children, according to the Examiner. 

This is a breaking news story and will be updated. 

A communications director for former Vice President Kamala Harris created a so-called ‘death-pool roster’ of federal judges appointed by a Republican that could swear in Harris as president – in the event that President Joe Biden suddenly died, according to a new book.

The book, ‘Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House,’ published Tuesday by William Morrow and Company, claims that Harris’ White House communications director Jamal Simmons crafted an entire communications strategy to employ in the event of Biden’s death. 

The book, authored by political journalists Jonathan Allen of NBC News and Amie Parnes of the Hill, said Simmons imagined that losing Biden unexpectedly would be akin to when Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in on Air Force One following John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1963. 

But he worried people would question her legitimacy as president, and was specifically concerned that ‘Trump people’ would go ‘apes—‘ if Harris became president, the book claims. 

‘Simmons believed Harris would be strengthened by an institutional stamp of approval if she were sworn in hurriedly because Biden had died unexpectedly,’ Allen and Parnes wrote. ‘Her legitimacy might be questioned, he worried, recalling the January 6 effort to stop Biden from being certified as president.’

As a result, Simmons created a spreadsheet of various judges nominated by a Republican who might be equipped to help bolster her legitimacy. 

‘The strongest validator, he believed, would be a federal judge who had been appointed by a Republican other than Trump,’ Allen and Parnes wrote. ‘He compiled a spreadsheet of those jurists across the country, down to a city-by-city breakdown, and carried it with him when he traveled with Harris.’ 

Simmons said he never told Harris about the so-called ‘death-pool roster’ before his departure with her communications team in January 2023, however he instructed colleagues to notify him immediately if something did happen to Biden so he could implement the communications strategy. Ultimately, Simmons left the spreadsheet with another Harris staffer, according to the book. 

The book did not specify which judges were included on the list. 

Harris, who previously served as a senator from California, is now a speaker with CAA Speakers, which represents high-profile celebrities. CAA did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.

The book also includes details revealing how former President Barack Obama remained hesitant to back Harris in the 2024 election to replace Biden, amid concerns about his mental fitness, while also doubting Biden and Harris’ political abilities. 

According to the book, Obama didn’t believe Harris could beat now-President Donald Trump in the November 2024 race – an issue that frustrated Harris.

‘Fight’ chronicles how Trump secured the White House for a second term and the ramifications of his victory on the Democratic Party. Allen and Parnes conducted interviews with more than 150 political insiders for the book, according to the book’s description.

The Department of Homeland Security is ‘unapologetic’ about using lie-detector tests on staffers as it aims to snuff out ‘leakers’ who feed internal agency information to the public, Fox News Digital learned. 

‘Under Secretary Noem’s leadership, DHS is unapologetic about its efforts to root out leakers that undermine national security,’ Tricia McLaughlin, DHS’ assistant secretary for public affairs, told Fox News Digital Monday. ‘We are agnostic about your standing, tenure, political appointment or status as a career civil servant – we will track down leakers and prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law.’ 

McLaughlin’s response follows Politico’s Friday reporting that the department had administered a lie detector test in March to Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Chief Cameron Hamilton following a meeting between DHS and an advisor to President Donald Trump, Corey Lewandowski. 

The test ultimately cleared Hamilton, according to the outlet, as officials worked to determine if information from the meeting had been leaked. The meeting reportedly focused on Trump administration efforts to ‘eliminate’ FEMA – an agency Trump repeatedly has railed against for not doing its job in effectively aiding citizens during disasters. 

The use of polygraph tests at intelligence and national security agencies is not new, with the FBI, CIA and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives all using polygraph tests as part of background and security checks for potential agents or investigators, respective agency websites show. 

The FBI reported that in addition to a long history of using polygraph machines to screen potential hires, the bureau has increasingly used lie-detector tests on staffers who handle sensitive information since 2001, when the FBI arrested one of its own, former agent Robert Hanssen, for spying for Russia. 

The Pentagon additionally announced in March that it was launching an investigation into alleged leaks of information concerning national security, which could include polygraph tests for employees in the Defense Department, Fox Digital previously reported. 

DHS had previously vowed it would use polygraph tests to weed out staffers who leaked information on immigration raids, citing that the department is a ‘national security agency.’

‘The Department of Homeland Security is a national security agency,’ McLaughlin posted to X in response to a message from February that DHS planned to polygraph staffers who may have leaked information. ‘We can, should, and will polygraph personnel.’ 

Secretary Kristi Noem issued an internal directive in February explaining polygraphs administered by DHS must include a question about unauthorized communication with media outlets and nonprofits, according to a report by Bloomberg Government.

Border czar Tom Homan speculated in February that an internal leak tipped off illegal immigrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in Colorado and California. The leaked intel allegedly allowed Tren de Aragua gang members to evade arrest at the time.

The department already uses polygraph exams during the hiring process of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers and agents in order to determine ‘suitability for employment’ and ‘in support of internal and counterintelligence investigations,’ according to the agency’s website.

‘The federal government uses the polygraph exam to understand an applicants’ past behavior, personal connections and personal integrity,’ DHS said on a web page explaining why it administers polygraph exams to CBP applicants. ‘Almost every Border Patrol Agent, Customs and Border Protection Officer, and Air and Marine Operations Agent who has joined CBP has taken, and passed, a Polygraph Exam.’  

Fox News Digital’s Elizabeth Pritchett contributed to this article. 

House GOP leaders’ aim to sync up with the Senate on a massive bill advancing President Donald Trump’s agenda is on the rocks as of Monday morning, with fiscal hawks worried the upper chamber’s version will not go far enough to reduce the national deficit.

House Republican skeptics are worried specifically about the Senate plan requiring a baseline of $4 billion in spending cuts, while the House plan calls for a $1.5 trillion minimum. 

Two conservatives told Fox News Digital they would oppose the bill if it came to a House vote this week, while two others suggested they were leaning strongly against it. 

‘The Senate proposal is not serious and is an insult to the American people,’ Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., who said he is leaning ‘against’ the measure, told Fox News Digital.

That is coupled with at least three GOP lawmakers declaring on social media this weekend that they are against the legislation – while even more have aired public concerns.

‘It’s dead on arrival,’ Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., told Fox News Digital last week. ‘We have to stay with what we worked so hard to put over there, which is a bare minimum. When they talk about changes and talk about putting, basically, a teardrop in the ocean as far as cuts – we’re not going to go along with that.’

When asked on Monday morning about whether he felt the same, Norman replied emphatically via text message, ‘YES.’

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., shared similar concerns about the gap in the House and Senate’s minimum for spending cuts.

‘At this point, I would vote against it,’ he said.

Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., another critic of excessive government spending, told Fox News Digital he had not made his mind up on the bill but said there were ‘not enough cuts’ in the Senate version.

House GOP leaders are arguing that passing the Senate version does not impede the House in moving forward with its own more fiscally conservative version in any way. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has pitched House passage of the Senate bill as a necessary step to allow Republicans to enact Trump’s agenda.

However, doubts over spending cuts are even extending beyond the House GOP’s right-most flank. House Budget Committee Vice Chair Rep. Lloyd Smucker, R-Pa., voiced his own issues with the bill in a private call with House Republicans on Sunday, two people familiar with discussions told Fox News Digital.

Smucker’s office said it would not comment on internal deliberations, but pointed Fox News Digital to the lawmaker’s statement on Saturday. ‘The Senate’s passage of the amended House resolution is a critical step forward. However, with $5.8 trillion in costs and only $4 billion required savings in their instructions, I cannot vote for it. We can and must do better.’

Committee Chair Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, called it ‘unserious,’ but added he was open to working with House and Senate leaders and the White House to ease those concerns.

Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, who sources said also raised concerns on the Sunday call, posted on X of the bill, ‘If the Senate’s ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ budget is put on the House floor, I will vote no.’

In addition to opposing the gap in baseline spending cuts, some conservatives who oppose the bill are also wary of the Senate, signaling it would use the current policy baseline method to factor in the cost of extending Trump’s 2017 tax cuts.

The scoring tool essentially means the cost of making Trump’s tax cuts permanent would be factored at $0, because it extends current policy rather than counting it as new dollars being added to the federal deficit.

‘I’m very wary of this budget gimmick, especially paired with a measly $4 billion floor in spending cuts,’ Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., told Fox News Digital. ‘The fiscally responsible way to extend and pay for tax cuts is through significant spending cuts, which is exactly what House Republicans instruct in our budget resolution.’

Congressional Republicans are working on a massive piece of legislation that Trump has dubbed ‘one big, beautiful bill’ to advance his agenda on border security, defense, energy and taxes.

Such a measure is largely only possible via the budget reconciliation process. Traditionally used when one party controls all three branches of government, reconciliation lowers the Senate’s threshold for passage of certain fiscal measures from 60 votes to 51.

As a result, it has been used to pass broad policy changes in one or two massive pieces of legislation.

The House’s framework passed in late February and included some new funding for defense and border security, along with $4.5 trillion for extending Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and implementing newer Trump proposals like no taxes on tipped wages.

The framework also called for between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion in spending cuts, dependent on how much Trump’s tax policies would add to the national deficit – something that was key to winning support from deficit hawks.

It also raised the debt limit, something Trump has specifically asked Republicans to deal with, by $4 trillion. The Senate’s version, which passed in the early hours of Saturday, would raise the debt limit by $5 trillion.

Trump himself has endorsed both the House and Senate versions of the bill.

Passing a framework then allows lawmakers to craft actual policy to match the framework’s federal spending guidelines, led by the respective committees of jurisdiction.

Those policy plans are all brought back together into another massive bill. The Senate and House must pass identical versions before it gets to Trump’s desk for a signature – something the House speaker said would be done by Memorial Day.

In a letter to House GOP colleagues on Sunday, Johnson said lawmakers would vote on the Senate’s amended version this week. 

However, Johnson insisted that the Senate’s passage of its framework simply allows the House to begin working on its version of the bill passed in February – and that it does not impede their process in any way.

‘The Senate amendment as passed makes NO CHANGES to the House reconciliation instructions that we voted for just weeks ago. Although the Senate chose to take a different approach on its instructions, the amended resolution in NO WAY prevents us from achieving our goals in the final reconciliation bill,’ the letter said.

‘We have and will continue to make it clear in all discussions with the Senate and the White House that—in order to secure House passage—the final reconciliation bill must include historic spending reductions while protecting essential programs.’

Johnson’s office pointed back to the letter when reached for comment on Monday.

Republicans will have slightly more wiggle room to pass the measure than they have for much of the year so far, with the special election victories of Reps. Randy Fine, R-Fla., and Jimmy Patronis, R-Fla.

Even with those additions, however, Johnson can only lose three GOP votes with full House attendance to pass anything along party lines.

A federal appeals court voted en banc Monday to block President Donald Trump’s firings of two federal board members, reversing an appellate court ruling and clearing the way for the Trump administration to appeal the case to the Supreme Court.

Judges for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit voted 7-4 Monday to restore the positions of National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) member Gwynne Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) member Cathy Harris – two Democratic appointees who were abruptly terminated by the Trump administration earlier this year. 

The majority cited Supreme Court precedent in Humphrey’s Executor and Wiener v. United States as the backing for their decision, noting that the Supreme Court had never overturned or reversed the decades-old precedent regarding removal restrictions for government officials of ‘multimember adjudicatory boards’ – including the NLRB and MSPB.

They noted that the Supreme Court has not yet overturned these precedents, or instructed lower courts to act otherwise.

‘The Supreme Court has repeatedly told the courts of appeals to follow extant Supreme Court precedent unless and until that Court itself changes it or overturns it,’ judges noted in their opinion. 

Monday’s ruling from the full panel means that both Wilcox and Harris can return to their positions, at least for now. It is likely to spark intense backlash from the Trump administration, which has lobbed accusations of so-called ‘activist judges’ that have slowed or halted some of Trump’s executive orders and actions.

Also on Monday, the appeals court rejected the Trump administration’s request for an administrative stay, which would have allowed their removals to remain in place while the challenge continued to play out in federal court. 

The panel found that the administration had not demonstrated a strong likelihood of success on the merits of its appeals, nor did it show irreparable injury if they did not grant the stay – the legal requirements needed to satisfy an emergency court intervention. 

The en banc ruling reverses a decision reached just 10 days earlier by a three-judge panel for the same appeals court. That panel ruled 2-1 in favor of the Trump administration and allowed the firings to proceed, prompting plaintiffs to file a request for the appeals court to hear the case again en banc, or with all appellate court judges present.

The appellate court’s decision to hear the case again, even after a three-judge appellate panel from the same court ruled on the issue late last month, is likely to be met with intense scrutiny by Trump and his allies. 

It also all but ensures that the Trump administration will move quickly to appeal the matter to the Supreme Court for emergency review.

Since taking office, Trump has signed more than 300 executive orders and actions, including sweeping personnel moves, the restructuring of federal agencies, and the creation of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE – a temporary agency that has drawn scrutiny for its broad oversight powers and access to sensitive government data.

Critics argue that the flurry of early executive actions warrants an additional level of legal scrutiny, and judges have raced to review a crushing wave of cases and lawsuits filed by terminated employees or brought on behalf of agency employees. 

The Trump administration has appealed its early losses to the Supreme Court – a strategy it appears poised to continue in the NLRB and MSPB terminations.

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., said he would oppose the Senate’s version of sweeping legislation to advance President Donald Trump’s agenda if it was voted on in his chamber this week.

‘At this point, I would vote against it,’ Harris told Fox News Digital in an interview on Monday morning.

He is also calling for the House and Senate to get to work on their own versions of the plan, after the latter passed an amended version of the former’s legislation in the early hours of Saturday morning.

The Maryland Republican, who leads the House GOP’s most conservative group, is the highest-ranking GOP lawmaker to come out against the legislation so far.

It comes as other fiscal hawks voice concerns about the Senate’s version of the legislation – specifically, that it mandates at least $4 billion in spending cuts, compared to $1.5 trillion to $2 trillion in the House.

‘I mean, if the Senate actually is able to deliver on meaningful deficit reduction, we could just pass the Senate amendments to the House budget resolution,’ Harris said.

‘But again, I’m not willing to do that until I see what the deficit reduction, the actual deficit reduction that the Senate has in mind, is.’

Congressional Republicans are working on a massive piece of legislation that Trump has dubbed ‘one big, beautiful bill’ to advance his agenda on border security, defense, energy and taxes.

They can pass such a measure via the budget reconciliation process. Traditionally used when one party controls all three branches of government, reconciliation lowers the Senate’s threshold for passage of certain fiscal measures from 60 votes to 51.

As a result, it has been used to pass broad policy changes in one or two massive pieces of legislation.

The House’s framework passed in late February, and included some new funding for defense and border security, along with $4.5 trillion for extending Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and implementing newer Trump proposals like no taxes on tipped wages.

The framework also called for between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion in spending cuts, dependent on how much Trump’s tax policies would add to the national deficit – something that was key to winning support from deficit hawks.

It also raised the debt limit, something Trump has specifically asked Republicans to deal with, by $4 trillion. The Senate’s version would raise the debt limit by $5 trillion.

In a letter to House GOP colleagues on Sunday, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said lawmakers would vote on the Senate’s amended version this week. 

However, Johnson insisted that the Senate’s passage of its framework simply allows the House to begin working on its version of the bill passed in February – and that it does not impede their process in any way.

‘The Senate amendment as passed makes NO CHANGES to the House reconciliation instructions that we voted for just weeks ago. Although the Senate chose to take a different approach on its instructions, the amended resolution in NO WAY prevents us from achieving our goals in the final reconciliation bill,’ the letter said.

‘We have and will continue to make it clear in all discussions with the Senate and the White House that—in order to secure House passage—the final reconciliation bill must include historic spending reductions while protecting essential programs.’

Johnson’s office pointed back to the letter when reached for comment on Monday.

Passing a reconciliation framework, which merely outlines top-line spending figures, allows Congress to move on to the next step of actually crafting policy to accompany those top-lines.

However, conservatives like Harris have countered that they see no need to vote on the Senate’s version of the bill to begin work in the House.

‘They just think that we have to keep the train moving forward. But again, if we just begin to craft the actual reconciliation packages, that keeps the train moving forward as well,’ Harris said.

He left the door open to supporting the Senate’s work, despite ruling out support for its immediate offering.

‘I still think that we should just ask the Senate to begin crafting their reconciliation bill, and then if they deliver on their promise of deficit reduction, then I’m fine with their budget resolution,’ Harris said.