The Trump administration’s Department of Transportation is raising standards for applicants seeking to become air traffic controllers, a move officials say will reduce the profession’s high washout rate.

Meanwhile, the department argued that the Biden administration’s decision during his first term to lower standards for applicants contributed to the higher attrition rate, while inflating the numbers of candidates entering the profession.

‘By eliminating the Best Qualified category and lowering the standard for how top scorers were defined, Biden and Buttigieg juiced the numbers to make it seem like they were making a dent in the air traffic controller shortage,’ a Department of Transportation spokesperson told Fox News Digital. 

According to the DOT source, the Biden administration scrapped the ‘Best Qualified’ tier for candidates who scored 85% or better on their Air Traffic Skills Assessment (ATSA) exam. That standard was replaced with a broader ‘Well Qualified’ category that included candidates who scored at least 80%, according to an internal agency PowerPoint from 2023, shared with Fox News Digital.

‘They lowered the standard from 85% to 80% to be best qualified … to get these young people into the academy,’ Trump Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told the New York Post’s Miranda Devine, referring to the Federal Aviation Training Center located in Oklahoma City. 

Under the second Trump administration, air traffic controller academy standards reverted to the four-tier system that includes ‘Best Qualified’ for scores of 90% or above, ‘Well-Qualified’ for scores between 85% and 89%, ‘Qualified’ for scores between 70% and 84% and ‘Not Referred’ for scores below 70%.

A DOT official said distinguishing top performers and allowing those with the highest scores to get first pick at training assignments makes it more likely candidates will complete the academy. Different airspaces require different training regimens, the source noted.

The official cited a Transportation Department report from before Trump’s return to office that warned, ‘Although the lower score selection may assist with increasing the number of applicable candidates to support the FAA’s hiring goals, there is a possibility that it may not contribute to better graduation and program success rates.

‘[The Biden administration] made it harder to identify the best and brightest and exacerbated the washout rate,’ the spokesperson said. ‘Secretary Duffy’s No. 1 priority is safety, which is why he’s restored the proper standards and prioritized the best and brightest for placement at the academy as part of his supercharge initiative.’

Earlier this year, Pete Buttigieg, the former transportation secretary under Biden, said on social media that ‘we did not change the rigorous standard for becoming a certified air traffic controller,’ calling those who were saying as much ‘mistaken or lying.’ 

‘We did increase funding & training, and grew the ATC workforce after years of declining numbers, including under Trump,’ Buttigieg added.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Buttigieg said in response to criticism about weaker standards that the pre-admission Air Traffic Skills Assessment (ATSA) exam ‘has nothing to do with the standards of becoming a certified ATC.’

‘There is still a minimum standard of qualification, and that line hasn’t changed. And you still have to take a test. And that test hasn’t changed,’ the spokesperson said. 

Buttigieg’s spokesperson also described the accusations from the Trump administration as ‘a desperate attempt to deflect’ questions about whether the air traffic controller shortage is getting worse under Trump.  

‘The fact is, certified controller staffing fell during Trump’s first term,’ the spokesperson said. ‘But under Secretary Buttigieg’s watch, the FAA reversed years of staffing declines, meeting an aggressive hiring goal last year and creating the momentum to meet an even more aggressive hiring goal for this year.’

The thousands of Ukrainian children abducted since Russia’s invasion began three-and-a-half-years-ago are once again at the forefront of international discussions as NATO leaders convened to discuss the war.

Following Russia’s deadly 2022 invasion, Ukrainian children have been among the war’s chief victims, with Kyiv confirming that there have been at least 19,546 cases of unlawful deportation and forced transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia, Belarus, or Russian-occupied territory, by Russian authorities.

Some reports have suggested the number of forcibly transported Ukrainian children could be significantly higher, ranging closer to 35,000 abductions – many of whom are feared to have been illegally adopted. 

Fox News Digital could not confirm if NATO leaders, who convened on Wednesday for a debrief by U.S. military leaders, will include how to remedy the immense human rights violations targeting Ukrainian children as they look to establish security guarantees, possibly as soon as this week.

But President Donald Trump, who met with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday followed by a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and NATO leaders on Monday, said the issue of forcibly deported Ukrainian children ‘is a subject at the top of all lists.’

The issue was reignited after First Lady Melania Trump sent a letter to Putin, which Trump hand-delivered during his meeting on Friday, in which she said, ‘it is time’ to restore children’s ‘dream of love, possibility, and safety from danger.’

‘A simple yet profound concept, Mr. Putin, as I am sure you agree, is that each generation’s descendants begin their lives with a purity—an innocence which stands above geography, government, and ideology,’ she wrote. 

The first lady did not specifically mention the war in Ukraine, though her letter, first obtained by Fox News Digital, was championed by Kyiv. 

Zelenskyy appeared to surprise Trump by in turn handing him a letter written by his wife, Olena Zelenska, intended for the first lady. 

The contents of the second letter have not been disclosed, but Trump noted his wife’s compassion when it comes to the issue of children – a topic Zelenska has also worked to address. 

‘She sees the heartbreak, the parents, the funerals that you see on television, always funerals,’ Trump said. 

Some children have been returned to Ukraine incrementally through the help of third-party mediators, like Qatar and the Vatican, though reporting suggests only some 1,500 have been released by Russian authorities. 

Ukrainian negotiators have been pushing for the return of the Ukrainian children for months as they meet with Russian counterparts in Turkey.

While prisoner-of-war swaps have been agreed to, Zelenskyy said Russian officials have refused to hand over any Ukrainian children directly to Kyiv. 

‘We cannot reach an agreement with them on the return of the children,’ Zelenskyy told reporters last week, adding that despite attempts it remains ‘impossible’ without the help of other parties involved. 

‘That is why we wanted to get certain matters settled in this trilateral track: ceasefire, an all-for-all exchange, and the return of children,’ he added. ‘This is something everyone benefits from: President Trump benefits, the Russians lose nothing, the Ukrainians lose nothing. It’s a fair compromise.’

Less than three months after its launch, Elon Musk’s ‘America Party’ appears to have been shelved.

Musk allegedly told associates that he wants to focus on his companies and avoid starting a party that could siphon voters from the GOP, the The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with his plans.

Musk has also allegedly worked to maintain ties with Vice President JD Vance, considered the heir apparent to the MAGA movement, according to WSJ. The outlet added that the tech billionaire reportedly told associates he was concerned that forming a new political party would damage his relationship with the vice president.

While the plan is paused at the moment, Musk’s allies told WSJ that he has not formally ruled out launching the America Party and could revisit the idea as the 2026 midterms approach.

After spending months working with the Department of Government Efficiency, Musk’s time at the Trump White House came to an end on May 30. Though they appeared on good terms, President Donald Trump and the tech billionaire began trading barbs almost immediately.

A few days after leaving the administration, Musk posted on X — the social media platform he owns — criticizing legislation the Trump White House was promoting.

‘I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand it anymore. This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it,’ Musk wrote.

His criticism continued, including memes and jabs aimed at the administration. Musk stayed firm in his opposition to the bill, citing the amount of spending as his reason for objecting to it.

On June 5, Musk posed a question — and a poll — to his followers: Should there be a new political party? The next day, he announced that ‘the people have spoken. A new political party is needed in America to represent the 80% in the middle!’

Musk asked a similar question nearly a month later, on July 4, the day Trump signed the ‘big, beautiful bill.’

‘Independence Day is the perfect time to ask if you want independence from the two-party (some would say uniparty) system! Should we create the America Party?’ Musk included another poll with his post. In the end, 65.4% of respondents voted ‘yes,’ while 34.6% voted ‘no,’ showing a drastic change from his June poll in which 80.4% voted ‘yes.’

Musk announced the next day that ‘the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom.’

‘I am saddened to watch Elon Musk go completely ‘off the rails,’ essentially becoming a TRAIN WRECK over the past five weeks,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social on July 6. ‘He even wants to start a third political party, despite the fact that they have never succeeded in the United States – The system seems not designed for them.’

However, the feud between the two appears to have cooled. The social media spats have stopped, and in late July Trump appeared to wish Musk well, writing on Truth Social that he wanted to see the tech billionaire’s businesses ‘thrive like never before.’

‘Everyone is stating that I will destroy Elon’s companies by taking away some, if not all, of the large-scale subsidies he receives from the U.S. government. This is not so! I want Elon, and all businesses within our country, to THRIVE, in fact, THRIVE like never before! The better they do, the better the USA does, and that’s good for all of us,’ Trump wrote.

A spokesperson for Musk did not respond to a request for comment.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has firmly rejected proposals to concede land to Russian President Vladimir Putin, particularly the hotly-contested Donbas region.

The Donbas, which includes Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, is Ukraine’s industrial heartland where coal mining and steel production are the main drivers of economic growth. Ultimately, control of the region’s mines and factories would hand Moscow powerful leverage over Kyiv’s post-war economic survival.

‘Donbas offers both a military advantage and significant economic resources, making it a high-value target for the Kremlin,’ explained Elina Beketova, a fellow with the Democratic Resilience Program at the Center for European Policy Analysis.

‘The Donbas alone holds vast reserves of coal – especially anthracite, crucial for energy and metallurgy,’ Beketova said. ‘Of 114 mines in Donetsk region, only 15 remain functional,’ she pointed out, as many have been flooded, destroyed, or left inoperable by the war.

Coal tells only half the story. 

Perhaps the crown jewel is salt: the Soledar salt mines, with an estimated 4.5 billion tons of rock salt – making it the largest reserve in Europe. These mines and the Artyomsol plant, Europe’s largest salt producer, fell to Russian forces in 2022.

Beketova underscored that, in the long term, natural gas could be the most strategically important resource in the region.

‘The region includes the Yuzivka gas field in Donetsk and Kharkiv oblasts, with potential reserves of up to 4 trillion cubic meters – a direct challenge to Russian energy dominance, and likely another reason why Moscow wants full control of the area.’

‘Beyond coal, salt, and gas, the occupied territories of Donbas – as well as neighboring Zaporizhzhia and Kherson – are also rich in gypsum, chalk, marble, granite, sand and clay,’ Beketova said.

Russian forces currently occupy approximately one-fifth of Ukraine’s territory, primarily in the eastern and southeastern regions, including large swaths of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. These areas have been under partial or full Russian control at various points over the course of the Kremlin’s war. 

For Kyiv, the Donbas is more than contested ground – it is an economic lifeline, whose coal, salt and gas reserves could help bankroll recovery in a country already burdened with enormous post-war debts.

The most recent joint assessment by the United Nations, World Bank, European Commission, and Ukrainian government estimates that Kyiv faces $524 billion in postwar reconstruction over the next decade. 

Of the total long-term reconstruction and recovery needs, housing accounts for the largest share at nearly $84 billion, followed by $78 billion needed for the transportation industry and $68 billion for the energy sector.

Zelenskyy told reporters at the European Commission on Sunday that Putin has repeatedly tried and failed to seize the entirety of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine for a period of 12 years. 

Grace Mappes, an analyst at the Institute for the Study of War, noted that conceding the region would also mean relinquishing Ukraine’s ‘fortress belt,’ the fortified defensive line in Donetsk Oblast since 2014.

‘After trying and failing to occupy this strategically vital terrain for over a decade, Putin is now demanding that Ukraine concede this critical defensive position, which Russian forces currently have no means of rapidly enveloping or penetrating, apparently in exchange for nothing and with no guarantee that fighting will not resume.’

Mappes added that Ukraine’s substantial investment in reinforcing its ‘fortress belt’ with defensive structures, logistics hubs, and defense industrial facilities, underscores its central role in the country’s military resilience.

‘Putin’s proposal is not a compromise, rather a ploy to avoid the years-long, bloody campaign that would be necessary to seize the fortress belt and the rest of Donetsk militarily,’ she added.

Longtime Trump political foe Democrat Sen. Adam Schiff for years has been accused of leaking classified documents — long before the release of a ‘bombshell’ whistleblower testimony claiming the California lawmaker approved leaking classified information in order to discredit the president during the Russiagate probe, Fox News Digital found. 

Schiff, who served in the U.S. House for more than two decades before securing his spot in the U.S. Senate in 2024, is facing heightened scrutiny following FBI Director Kash Patel declassifying claims from a Democrat whistleblower that Schiff approved the release of classified information on Trump that allegedly ‘would be used to indict President TRUMP,’ according to the report. 

The whistleblower, who reportedly had worked for Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee for more than 10 years, made the claims to the FBI in 2017. Schiff had access to classified information while serving on the House Intelligence Committee during his tenure in the lower chamber, including serving as its chair from 2019 to 2023. 

‘In this meeting, SCHIFF stated the group would leak classified information which was derogatory to President of the United States DONALD J. TRUMP. SCHIFF stated the information would be used to indict President TRUMP,’ according to the whistleblower documents.

The whistleblower ‘stated this would be illegal and, upon hearing his concerns, unnamed members of the meeting reassured that they would not be caught leaking classified information,’ the report added.

Schiff has denied the allegations, with his office telling Fox News Digital Aug. 12 that the allegations were ‘absolutely and categorically false.’

But this isn’t the first time Schiff has been accused of leaking classified information to the public, with accusations following him since at least the first Trump administration. Fox News Digital took a look back at Schiff’s political history in recent years and gathered the times he previously had been accused of leaking classified materials. 

The August declassified whistleblower accusations are ‘just the latest in a series of defamatory attacks from the President and his allies meant to distract from their plummeting poll numbers and the Epstein files scandal,’ a Schiff spokesperson told Fox Digital when approached for comment on the allegations, after White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the whistleblower’s account a ‘bombshell.’ 

‘These baseless smears are based on allegations that were found to be not reliable, not credible, and unsubstantiated from a disgruntled former staffer who was fired by the House Intelligence Committee for cause in early 2017, including for harassment and potentially compromising activity on official travel for the Committee,’ the spokesperson continued. ‘Even Trump’s own Justice Department and an independent inspector general found this individual to not be credible, have ‘little support for their contentions’ and was of ‘unknown reliability,’ and concluded that his accusations against Members of Congress and congressional staff ‘were not ultimately substantiated.’’ 

‘Leaked classified information that had been provided to him’ 

Just days after former President Joe Biden was sworn in as president in January 2021, Trump’s former acting director of national intelligence and U.S. ambassador from his first administration, Ric Grenell, took to X to list out ‘facts’ regarding Schiff. 

‘Facts,’ a Jan. 22, 2021, post on X that is no longer available on the social media site read. The X post received media attention and was preserved in reports at the time, such as the Washington Examiner. 

He listed off: ‘Schiff wouldn’t return my call to coordinate on DNI reforms.– the reforms were asked for by career officials for years. – Schiff complained when I appointed the 1st female head of counterterrorism (a career person). – Schiff & team regularly leaked classified information.’

Grenell’s message was in response to Schiff claiming in an interview with The Hill that Grennell and former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe under the first Trump administration ‘bent intelligence work products to the president’s will.’

‘The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, probably the most devastated of all of the agencies by terrible leadership of people like Rick Grenell and John Ratcliffe,’ Schiff said during a video interview at the time. 

Fast-forward to 2023, former Secretary of State and CIA Director Mike Pompeo, who served under the first Trump administration, also accused Schiff of leaking classified docs. 

‘Adam Schiff lied to the American people, and during my time as CIA director and secretary of State, I know that he leaked classified information that had been provided to him,’ Pompeo said in January 2023 during a Fox News interview.

Pompeo continued that he ‘held back’ sharing information with the House Intelligence Committee due to not feeling ‘comfortable’ when Schiff led the panel. 

A representative for Pompeo told Fox Digital in August that the former Trump official stands by his 2023 comments on Schiff. 

Schiff’s office slammed Pompeo’s remarks at the time as ‘another patently false and defamatory statement.’ 

Trump had also accused Schiff of leaking classified documents under his first administration, claiming in 2018, he was the ‘one of the biggest liars and leakers in Washington.’

‘Adam leaves closed committee hearings to illegally leak confidential information. Must be stopped!’ Trump wrote in one X thread at the time. 

Schiff shot back at the time that Trump’s X post was a ‘false smear.’

‘Mr. President, I see you’ve had a busy morning of ‘Executive Time.’ Instead of tweeting false smears, the American people would appreciate it if you turned off the TV and helped solve the funding crisis, protected Dreamers or… really anything else,’ Schiff responded to Trump in February 2018. 

As Trump railed against the alleged leaks during his first term, reports spread that the Department of Justice subpoenaed Apple for account data of House Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee, including Schiff, between 2017 and 2018. The DOJ, which was led by Jeff Sessions at the time, was searching for individuals who leaked to the media about Trump’s alleged ties to Russia. 

The investigation dragged, including after Bill Barr was tapped as Trump’s attorney general in 2019 through the end of Trump’s first term, the New York Times reported in 2021, citing sources familiar with the investigation. 

The Justice Department’s internal watchdog, under the Biden administration, opened an investigation into the subpoenas and published a report in 2024 that found the Trump DOJ did not comply with established procedures when it sought the records.

‘We are glad that the Department of Justice Inspector General conducted a thorough investigation, and that the Inspector General has recommended safeguards to further protect the media, and to safeguard the separation of powers,’ a spokesperson for Schiff said following the release of the report, according to Reuters in 2024. 

As the 2020 campaign heated up, Trump continued accusing Schiff and other House Democrats of leaking, with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence at the time scaling back its security briefings with Congress that year as high-profile Democrats promoted concerns that Russia was interfering in that election. 

‘Director Ratcliffe brought information into the committee, and the information leaked,’ Trump said in August 2020. ‘Whether it was Shifty Schiff or somebody else, they leaked the information.… And what’s even worse, they leaked the wrong information. And he got tired of it. So he wants to do it in a different forum, because you have leakers on the committee.’

Schiff denied leaking any classified intelligence in 2020, but said he could not confirm the same for other House Democrats.  

‘I haven’t. My staff hasn’t. I can’t speak for what all the members of the committee have done or not done, including a lot of the Republican members,’ Schiff told CNN’s Dana Bash in 2020, following Trump claiming ‘Shifty Schiff’ may have been behind another leak of intelligence given to the House Intelligence Committee at the time. 

The Trump administration continued its laser-focused hunt to identify and suss out internal federal government leakers during the second administration, with a White House official telling Axios in June, ‘We are declaring a war on leakers.’ 

The comment came in response to a leak of an internal assessment of the Trump administration’s bombing of a trio of Iranian nuclear facilities that claimed the strikes were not as effective as the president said. 

Federal agencies such as the FBI, Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security have leveraged using polygraph tests on staffers suspected of leaking information under the second Trump administration. 

Alleged mortgage fraud, ‘Russiagate’ 

Trump and Schiff have long been political foes. 

This was underscored during Trump’s first administration when Schiff served as the lead House manager during the first impeachment trial against Trump in 2020. It also was highlighted when Schiff repeatedly promoted claims that Trump’s 2016 campaign colluded with Russia. 

Schiff landed in hot water earlier this spring, when the U.S. Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) sent a letter to the Department of Justice in May sounding the alarm that in ‘multiple instances,’ Schiff allegedly ‘falsified bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms, impacting payments from 2003-2019 for a Potomac, Maryland-based property.’

He is currently under criminal investigation for mortgage fraud, Fox Digital previously reported. The California Democrat has denied any wrongdoing, claiming the matter is a ‘baseless attempt at political retribution.’

Days after Trump first posted about Schiff’s mortgages in Maryland and California in July, the president’s director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, declassified documents that reportedly show ‘overwhelming evidence’ that then-President Barack Obama and his national security team allegedly laid the groundwork for what would be the yearslong Trump–Russia collusion probe after Trump’s election win against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2016. 

‘It lays out, these over 100 documents that you’re referencing, that I declassified and released, spells out in great detail exactly what happens when you have some of the most powerful people in our country directly leading at the helm, President Obama and his senior-most national security cabinet, James Comey, John Brennan, James Clapper and Susan Rice and others, essentially making a very intentional decision to create this manufactured, politicized piece of intelligence with the objective of subverting the will of the American people,’ Gabbard told Fox News’ Sean Hannity in July following the release. 

Schiff was an incredibly vocal lawmaker amid the Russian collusion claims, most notably when the House censured him in 2023 over his promotion that Trump’s 2016 campaign colluded with Russia. Schiff served in the House representing California from 2001 to 2024, when he was sworn in as a senator after his successful 2024 campaign to serve in the nation’s upper chamber.

Schiff also served on the Jan. 6 select committee, which investigated the breach of the Capitol building in 2021 by Trump supporters following then-President Joe Biden’s election win. 

At the 11th hour of Biden’s tenure on Jan. 20, Schiff was among lawmakers who served on the committee who were granted preemptive pardons. The subcommittee concluded Trump’s actions played a key role in promoting the breach of the Capitol and recommended Trump be criminally prosecuted. 

Biden specifically granted preemptive pardons to ‘Members of Congress and staff who served on the Select Committee, and the U.S. Capitol and D.C. Metropolitan police officers who testified before the Select Committee.’

Schiff, however, had publicly railed against the prospect of Biden doling out preemptive pardons, saying it would set a poor precedent. 

‘First, those of us on the committee are very proud of the work we did. We were doing vital quintessential oversight of a violent attack on the Capitol,’ Schiff said during an interview on ABC News in December 2024. ‘So I think it’s unnecessary.’

‘But second, the precedent of giving blanket pardons, preemptive blanket pardons on the way out of an administration, I think is a precedent we don’t want to set,’ he added.

Charges stemming from the Jan. 6 case were dismissed following Trump’s decisive win in the 2024 presidential election against then-Vice President Kamala Harris. 

The White House responded to the whistleblower’s declassified testimony claiming Schiff approved the release of classified information to damage Trump, and doubled down on Trump’s stance that Schiff be ‘held accountable for the countless lies he told the American people in relation to the Russiagate scandal.’

‘This is obviously a bombshell whistleblower report,’ Leavitt said at a Tuesday White House press briefing. ‘Hopefully more people in this room will cover it as such.’

‘I understand Kash Patel, last night, declassified a 302 FBI document showing that a whistleblower, who is a Democrat, a career intelligence officer who worked for Democrats on the House Intel Committee for more than a decade, repeatedly warned the FBI in 2017 that then-Rep. Adam Schiff had approved leaking classified information to smear then-President Donald Trump over the Russiagate scandal,’ Leavitt said. 

In August, a representative for Schiff confirmed a legal defense fund was established for the senator in response to Trump and his allies. 

‘It’s clear that Donald Trump and his MAGA allies will continue weaponizing the justice process to attack Sen. Schiff for holding this corrupt administration accountable,’ Marisol Samayoa, a spokesperson for Schiff, told Fox News Digital Tuesday evening of the legal fund. ‘This fund will ensure he can fight back against these baseless smears while continuing to do his job.’

Titled ‘Senator Schiff Legal Defense Fund,’ the fund was filed with the Internal Revenue Service Thursday, The New York Times first reported. 

White House spokesman Harrison Fields called Schiff a ‘fraud’ and ‘corrupt politician’ when approached for comment Tuesday regarding the legal fund.

‘Adam Schiff is a sleazy and corrupt politician who betrayed his oath to the Constitution by prioritizing his selfish and personal animosity toward the president over the interests of the American people,’ Fields told Fox News Digital. ‘No amount of money can shield Adam from the truth that he is a fraud.’ 

Fox News Digital reached out to Schiff for additional comment on the matter but did not immediately receive a reply. 

Fox News Digital’s Andrea Margolis contributed to this report.  

A moderate House Democrat’s town hall devolved into chaos minutes after it began on Tuesday night, with pro-Palestinian activists clashing with both the congressman and fellow attendees in what became a near-constant torrent of interruptions and protests.

Rep. Wesley Bell, D-Mo., who defeated far-left ‘Squad’ member Cori Bush in the Democratic primary last year, repeatedly pleaded with protesters to allow him to speak while defending his position on Israel and Hamas.

‘Stop talking. This is not your town hall. You can leave,’ Bell told protesters roughly 20 minutes after he began speaking. He said soon after, ‘While we’re sitting here being divided and fighting one another, we’ve got other folks out there who are taking our democracy from us.’

At another point, his assertions that Hamas’ initial attack on Israel ‘was not just a terror attack, October 7 was an invasion’ was met with boos and jeers from the crowd.

Even calls to ‘surge aid’ to Gaza were drowned out by demonstrators, prompting Bell to respond, ‘You disagree with that?’

Despite repeated pleas for calm from both Bell and his moderator, protesters continued to call him a ‘war criminal’ and accuse him of supporting genocide.

The event grew more heated as the hour went on, reaching a fever pitch toward the end when Bell disputed a questioner labeling Israel’s invasion of Gaza a ‘genocide.’

‘You don’t get to set the genocide definition,’ an activist yelled.

Bell responded, ‘No, I don’t… and here’s the thing, people can disagree, that’s what makes our country great.’

‘When it comes to the word genocide, I kind of disagree with you… because Israel was attacked by an openly genocidal terrorist group,’ he said while protesters attempted to drown him out.

‘Hamas said openly that they want to destroy Israel… and so you’re accusing somebody of genocide, you’re standing with an organization that says they want to commit genocide. You don’t see that?’

He continued over boos, ‘We need to see a surge in humanitarian aid into Gaza, we need to see an end to the war. We need to see every single hostage returned, and we need to see a viable future for Gaza without Hamas.’

And while pro-Palestinian protesters took up a majority of the attention, there did appear to be a significant number of attendees who were supportive of Bell, particularly when he attempted to bring the conversation back to local issues.

‘The number one killer of kids in St. Louis between [ages] 1 and 17 is gun violence, and there’s people who want to talk about that too,’ he said, earning applause.

At one point, a woman attempted to confront the demonstrators directly.

‘Shut up with your White privilege,’ the woman could be heard yelling. ‘You’ve never been hungry, you’ve never had a child be hungry, and yet you want to stand here and diminish the work he’s doing?’ 

It’s not clear how or if the activists responded.

The town hall’s moderator tried to deescalate the situation early on, calling security to escort an unruly demonstrator out minutes after it began.

‘Let’s do this the Democratic way, the democracy way. You can’t hear anyone yelling. I hear you. As a mixed-race person, I hear you,’ she told activists. ‘We can’t get through this if you are yelling and barking and acting like you want to get physical.’

At the end of the night, however, Bell released a statement thanking all attendees for coming.

‘I want to thank everyone that came out to our town hall this evening – yes the conversations were passionate at times, but Democracy is messy and we have to passionately defend it,’ Bell wrote on X. ‘At the end of the day we’re going to continue to fight for the ST. LOUIS region and for our country.’

Fox News Digital reached out to Bell’s office for further comment.