Republican Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst, who chairs the Senate Small Business Committee, is urging 24 federal agencies to halt funding for a Biden-expanded program for ‘socially and economically disadvantaged’ business owners now under fire for alleged fraud and corruption, Fox News Digital has learned.

‘Despite concerns with the 8(a) program, Joe Biden opened the floodgates to fraud,’Ernst told Fox News Digital about the program. ‘I have found evidence of alarming, potentially fraudulent 8(a) awards made across government that need to be investigated. The program must be halted at every agency while a thorough review is conducted to ensure taxpayers are not being ripped off by con artists. Tax dollars designed to help small businesses must actually benefit all small businesses.’

The federal government’s 8(a) program is an initiative under the Small Business Administration (SBA) to assist ‘socially and economically disadvantaged’ small businesses, according to the agency’s website, including training and counseling, and exclusive access to federal contracting opportunities.

Ernst sent letters to the chiefs of 24 federal agencies that have established 8(a) programs — stretching from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem — calling on them to halt funding amid fraud concerns. 

‘The SBA’s 8(a) program is the largest set-aside program at the agency, which dished out $40+ billion in contract awards during fiscal year 2024 (FY 24) alone,’ Ernst wrote in the letters. ‘Yet decades of Government Accountability Office (GAO), SBA’s Office of Inspector General, and DOJ probes expose the same rot. Sloppy oversight and weak enforcement measures allow 8(a) participants to act as pass-through entities, snagging unlimited no-bid deals with little transparency.4 Every loophole guts public trust and rigs the system against honest competitors.’

Ernst said the Biden administration tripled the initiative’s contracting goals from an original aim of awarding 5% of federal contracts to 8(a) companies, up to 15% during his tenure. Ernst pointed to a recent Department of Justice bust in her push to halt funding, as well as an October guerrilla-style sting interview conducted by James O’Keefe that allegedly uncovered an 8(a) firm admitting ‘to Violating Federal Law, Using Minority-Owned Status as a Front to Obtain $100M+ No-Bid Government Contracts While Outsourcing 80% of the Work.’

The Department of Justice in June arrested four individuals in Maryland and Florida for running an alleged decade-long bribery scheme involving at least 14 8(a) contracts worth over $550 million in U.S. taxpayer dollars. One of the four men arrested was a government contractor for the United States Agency for International Development, according to the Department of Justice. The men pleaded guilty in the scheme. 

The scheme involved bribes such as cash, NBA tickets and a country club wedding, Fox News chief Washington correspondent Mike Emanuel reported in June. 

SBA Chief Kelly Loeffler ordered a full audit of all government contracting officers who have exercised grant-awarding authority under the agency’s business development program over the past 15 years back in June. She said the agency’s audit would begin with high-dollar and limited competition contracts within SBA’s 8(a) business development program. 

Loeffler, following O’Keefe’s investigation, opened an investigation related to that contract, she reported on X in October. 

The 8(a) program is facing intensifying heat after Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent announced ‘a comprehensive audit of all contracts and task orders awarded under preference-based contracting, totaling approximately $9 billion in contract value across Treasury and its bureaus’ in November. 

The audit is focused on the ‘Small Business Administration’s 8(a) Business Development Program, and other initiatives that provide federal contracting preferences to certain eligible businesses,’ the department reported at the time. 

That same month, Ernst introduced legislation, ‘Stop 8(a) Contracting Fraud Act,’ to halt funding to all new no-bid awards until a thorough audit and report of the program is conducted. 

Loeffler additionally sent letters to all 4,300 8(a) contractors across the federal government, which ordered ‘them to produce financial records as part of a comprehensive effort to root out fraud, waste, and abuse,’ she posted to X Friday. 

‘Evidence indicates that the 8(a) Program, initially designed for ‘socially and economically disadvantaged’ businesses, has become a pass-through vehicle for rampant abuse — especially during the Biden Administration, which aggressively prioritized DEI over merit in federal contracting,’ Loeffler added. 

‘While there’s no doubt that the Biden Administration’s indifference toward 8(a) program integrity enabled swindlers and fraudsters to treat federal contracting programs like personal piggy banks, 8(a) program flaws have raised alarm bells for decades,’ Ernst continued in her letters. 

Ernst is calling on the chiefs of the 24 agencies to pause contracting, audit current contracts, review set-aside contracts awarded by the respective agencies since fiscal year 2020 and to report to the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship with any findings by Dec. 22. 

Fox News Digital reached out to Biden’s office regarding his administration’s expansion of the program and recent investigations into alleged fraud schemes, but did not immediately receive a reply.

Fox News Digital’s Andrew Mark Miller and Peter Pinedo contributed to this report. 

A sweeping new report warns that America’s top universities, including MIT, Stanford, Harvard and Princeton, have been quietly partnering with Chinese artificial intelligence labs deeply embedded in Beijing’s surveillance and security state and in some cases co-authoring thousands of papers with entities tied to oppressive efforts against Uyghur Muslims.

The report, released by Strategy Risks and the Human Rights Foundation on Monday morning, shows that two major Chinese state-backed labs, Zhejiang Lab and the Shanghai Artificial Intelligence Research Institute (SAIRI), have co-authored roughly 3,000 papers with Western researchers since 2020. 

The labs have direct ties to CETC, the CCP’s defense conglomerate that has sanctioned building the Xinjiang surveillance platform used to target Uyghur Muslims as part of an overall campaign against the group that the Biden and Trump administrations have labeled a ‘genocide.’

‘With Western support and U.S.government funding, the labs have developed technologies in multi-object tracking, gait recognition, and infrared detection,’ Strategy Risks said in a press release. ‘These collaborations facilitated human rights abuses, mass surveillance, and the transfer of sensitive U.S. technology to Chinese companies linked to the Chinese Communist Party.’

The authors stress that the core problem is not covert espionage, but the ‘shocking normalization’ of Western institutions treating Chinese security-linked labs as ordinary research partners, even though Chinese law requires all such entities to support state surveillance and intelligence efforts.

Inside China, no research entities are independent of the CCP, the study emphasizes, while explaining that China’s national security, intelligence, cybersecurity and data security laws compel all organizations, including supposedly civilian research labs, to share information with state security services, meaning Western research can be absorbed directly into systems of repression.

‘The findings show a staggering lack of interest among top Western AI ethics organizations and academic departments with respect to how the CCP weaponizes AI against its own citizens,’ Alex Gladstein, chief strategy officer of the Human Rights Foundation, told Fox News Digital.

‘Often, these organizations simply refuse to address AI and Chinese human rights issues. As the report reveals, there are often financial incentives and ties that prevent anyone from speaking up. HRF’s AI program exists to call out this hypocrisy and drive new investigative research into dictators and how they abuse AI to repress their citizens, while at the same time investing in open-source privacy protecting AI tools to expand individual freedom.’

The report also criticizes leading Western AI ethics institutes, including those at Oxford, Cambridge, MIT and Berkeley, for largely remaining silent on China’s use of AI for repression from 2020 to 2025, even as their universities continued collaborations. Only two organizations publicly condemned Beijing’s practices during that period.

Over the past decade, China has built the world’s most expansive digital police state in Xinjiang, where more than 1 million Uyghur Muslims have been subjected to mass detention, forced labor, coercive ‘re-education’ and blanket surveillance that tracks faces, voices, movements and even biometric data. 

‘The Chinese government systematically deploys surveillance technologies to target rights advocates, ethnic minorities — particularly Uyghurs and other Muslim populations in Xinjiang — and political dissidents,’ the study says.

The report concludes that without new guardrails, Western universities and public research agencies will continue supplying technical breakthroughs that ‘flow seamlessly into China’s apparatus of repression.’

 The authors call for mandatory human-rights due diligence for international research partnerships, greater transparency on foreign co-authorships, and limits on collaboration with Chinese state-linked labs tied to surveillance and defense.

Fox News Digital reached out to MIT, Harvard and Princeton for comment.

The Supreme Court will weigh the legality of President Donald Trump’s attempt to fire a member of the Federal Trade Commission without cause on Monday — a blockbuster legal fight that could fundamentally reshape the balance of powers across the federal government, and formally topple a 90-year-old court precedent.  

Justices agreed earlier this year to take up the case, which centers on Trump’s firing of Federal Trade Commission member Rebecca Slaughter, a Democrat, without cause and well before her term was slated to expire in 2029. 

Slaughter sued immediately to challenge her removal, arguing that it violated protections the Supreme Court enshrined in Humphrey’s Executor, a 1935 ruling that restricted a president’s ability to remove the heads of independent agencies, such as the FTC, without cause. 

Slaughter also argued her removal violates the Federal Trade Commission Act, or a 1914 law passed by Congress that shields FTC members from being removed by a president except in circumstances of ‘inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.’

A federal judge sided with Slaughter’s lawyers in July, agreeing that her firing unlawfully exceeded Trump’s executive branch powers and ordered her reinstated. The Supreme Court in September stayed that decision temporarily, allowing Trump’s firing to remain in effect pending their review.

The Supreme Court’s willingness to review the case is a sign that justices might be ready to do away completely with Humphrey’s protections, which have already been weakened significantly over the last 20 years. Allowing Humphey’s to be watered down further, or overturned completely, could allow sitting presidents to wield more authority in ordering the at-will firing of members of other federal regulatory agencies, including the National Labor Relations Board and the Securities and Exchange Commission, among others, and replacing them with persons of their choosing.

The six conservative justices on the high court signaled as much when they agreed to review the case earlier this year. (Justices split along ideological lines in agreeing to take up the case, with Justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissenting.)

.

They asked both parties to come prepared to address two key questions in oral arguments: First, whether the removal protections for FTC members ‘violates the separation of powers and, if so, whether Humphrey’s Executor, should be overruled,’ and whether a federal court may prevent a person’s removal from public office, ‘either through relief at equity or at law.’

U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer has asked the high court to overrule Humphrey’s. He argued in a filing that the FTC authorities of today vastly exceed the authorities granted to the commission in 1935. ‘The notion that some agencies that exercise executive power can be sequestered from presidential control seriously offends the Constitution’s structure and the liberties that the separation of powers protects,’ he said.

A decision is expected to be handed down by the end of June.

The case, Trump v. Slaughter, is one of four cases the Supreme Court’s conservative majority has agreed to review this term that centers on key separation of powers issues, and questions involving the so-called unitary executive theory. 

Critics have cited concerns that the court’s decision to take up the cases could eliminate lasting bulwarks in place to protect against the whims of a sitting president, regardless of political party.

It also comes as justices for the Supreme Court’s 6-3 conservative majority have grappled with a flurry of similar lawsuits filed this year by other Trump-fired Democratic board members, including Gwynne Wilcox of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and Cathy Harris of the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB).

The arguments in Trump v. Slaughter will be closely watched and are expected to inform how the court will consider a similar case in January, centered on Trump’s attempted ouster of Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook.

Since taking office, Trump has signed hundreds of executive orders and ordered sweeping personnel actions that have restructured federal agencies and led to mass layoffs across federal agencies, including leaders that were believed to be insulated from the whims of a sitting president.

House Republicans are expected to reveal a roadmap sometime this month that they say will lower sky-high healthcare costs.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., have both said they are speaking to various GOP factions to build consensus on what that plan should look like.

In the meantime, Fox News Digital spoke with several GOP lawmakers about what they believe should be in such a package and found several commonalities on what they expect.

‘Health savings accounts (HSAs) need to be expanded to as many individual healthcare recipients or premium payers in our country. Like right now, it’s the people that can access a health savings account, usually high-deductible, catastrophic coverage, those types of plans,’ said House GOP Conference Vice Chair Blake Moore, R-Utah. ‘They’re really well-used, but they need to be extended so basically all Americans on some type of health insurance policy can use health savings accounts.’

HSAs are accounts that allow people to set aside money pre-tax to pay for certain health expenses, but they are currently only available to people with high-deductible health insurance plans.

Expanding HSA use proved a common theme among House Republicans who spoke with Fox News Digital about what they want to see in their party’s health plan.

Another topic that came up frequently was reforming the pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) system, an issue that’s gotten bipartisan support in the past.

PBMs are third parties that act as intermediaries between pharmaceutical companies and those responsible for insurance coverage, often responsible for administrative tasks and negotiating drug prices.

PBMs have also been the subject of bipartisan ire in Congress, with both Republicans and Democrats accusing them of being part of a broken system to inflate health costs.

‘I had my own pharmacies for over 32 years, and I can tell you, bringing prescription drug prices down is as simple as is addressing the middleman, the PBMs that are causing increases and causing prices to stay high for drugs,’ Rep. Buddy Carter, R-Ga., said. ‘That is one of the quickest and the easiest ways to bring prescription drug prices down, by reeling them in.’

Republican lawmakers also more broadly called for a competitive marketplace of health insurance plans.

While few said they had any appetite for actually repealing and replacing the Obamacare system, most said they wanted Americans to have more options than just the federal program when choosing their own healthcare.

‘We see that Obamacare has now been around for almost 14 years, and it’s more expensive, and we have less choices than ever before. So Obamacare is not working, and I think that’s what we need to focus on,’ said Rep. Marlin Stutzman, R-Ind. ‘There’s plans already being put in place by the administration, by groups in the Republican Party, that want to focus on making sure healthcare is affordable, and it’s available and that people can make choices rather than being told who which doctor they have to go to.’

Democrats have warned that healthcare costs are set to spike for millions of Americans if the subsidies are not extended. But House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, R-Minn., said costs are poised to rise either way if Congress does not act soon.

‘All Americans are getting a health insurance premium increase this coming year of 20 to 30%. Even if we did what they wanted us to do — and I’m not saying that we won’t, because the White House might have a plan to continue it, the Senate might have a plan. Mike Johnson might do something, but even if we do that, you realize that it’s only gonna cover about 4% of that 20 to 30% increase. It’s not solving the problem,’ Emmer said.

Rep. Austin Scott, R-Ga., told Fox News Digital he wanted to see a healthcare package that focuses on doctors in rural areas, as well as reforms for hospital care.

‘I’ve got to make sure that what we do is right for that independent practicing physician, that small-town pharmacist. And so we have to make sure we’re taking care of rural America with what we do, as well as the hospitals that we would all go to if we had, you know, cancer treatment or something like that,’ he said.

None of the conservatives who spoke with Fox News Digital expressed support for extending Obamacare tax credits that were enhanced during the COVID-19 pandemic, but which are set to expire at the end of this year.

It’s a push led by Democrats and some Republicans, however, who have introduced a range of options, from a one-year extension with certain reforms to House Democratic leaders’ push for a clean, three-year extension.

But whatever lawmakers come up with will likely have to get 60 votes to advance in the Senate, meaning some support from the left will be needed.

‘There’s a lot of good bipartisan healthcare policy legislation that can pass imminently and very soon, unless Democrats play the game of, ‘Oh, I don’t want it to look like the Republicans are being productive on healthcare, so we’re gonna stymie this, even though I agree with the policy,’’ Moore said.

For Social Security it has been a miserable year. 

After President Donald Trump unleashed Elon Musk and DOGE on the Social Security Administration, the agency lost more staff in a shorter period of time than ever before in its 90-year history. Fortunately, public outcry and pushback from congressional Democrats saved Social Security from a 50% cut to staffing and the closure of scores of field offices as Trump and his administration had announced back in March. So, somehow, those dedicated workers remaining at the Social Security Administration have still managed to keep the agency running — without missing a single monthly benefit payment. 

There are not many public or private insurers in the world who can claim to never have missed a monthly benefit payment in 90 years. 

This is good news for 71 million Americans — many of whom depend on their earned benefit every month as a lifeline. But we are not out of the woods yet. The agency has been gutted. Enormous damage has been done to customer service and to the agency’s ability to process claims.

Just as many are demanding that Trump’s deep cuts to healthcare be restored, so too must Trump’s deep cuts to Social Security be restored, as the two are inextricably linked. Sixty-four million Medicare recipients will see a reduction in their Social Security benefits in 2026 due to Trump’s Medicare price hikes that will cut into their Social Security cost-of-living adjustment (COLA), making life more expensive for seniors. This is the greatest erosion of the Social Security COLA in nearly a decade, and the first time that Medicare premiums exceeded $200 per month. 

With the Social Security Administration’s staffing now reduced to a 60-year low and baby boomers swelling the number of active beneficiaries to an all-time high, the agency is struggling badly, and the American people are paying the price. Wait times to get to a person in a field office or to talk to a person on the 1-800 line have become longer and longer.  

As the Trump administration claims that things have never been better, millions of Americans are having a very different experience. In fact, more people today now die waiting in line for their initial disability determination than at any time since President Dwight Eisenhower signed the disability portion of the act into law in 1956. Even just recently, Trump and DOGE risked 300 million Americans’ personal data from the Social Security Administration. They have robbed Americans of customer service and peace of mind.

Conditions have grown so bad – Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, has called for Social Security Commissioner Frank Bisignano’s resignation. It proves to be a telling illustration of the deep concern experts have for the damage done to the agency. 

None of this had to happen. It was made to happen. As a candidate, Trump vowed all through the campaign that he would protect Social Security. Instead, he wrecked the program’s customer service, took a chainsaw to its functions and maligned its reputation with false claims of waste, fraud and abuse.

In a time of great political division, Social Security remains the most strongly supported program in America. In fact, 80% of Americans are concerned whether Social Security will be available when they retire and want it to be strengthened, made better — not hacked to pieces, privatized or liquidated. 

This is a democracy moment. Social Security should be a bipartisan issue. All lawmakers — Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike — need to come together to deliver on its promise of a secure retirement after a lifetime of hard work. 

Congress released a $900 billion defense bill that reshapes U.S. economic and military competition with China by imposing new investment restrictions, banning a range of Chinese-made technologies from Pentagon supply chains, and expanding diplomatic and intelligence efforts to track Beijing’s global footprint. 

The legislation, which authorizes War Department spending at $8 billion above the White House’s request, includes a 4% pay raise for enlisted service members, expands counter-drone authorities, and directs new investments in the Golden Dome missile defense shield and nuclear modernization programs. 

It also extends Pentagon support to law enforcement operations at the southwest border and strengthens U.S. posture in the Indo-Pacific, including funding for Taiwan’s security cooperation program.

In a victory for conservative privacy hawks like House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, the legislation includes a non-defense provision that would mandate FBI disclosure when the bureau was investigating presidential candidates and other candidates for federal office.

That measure was the subject of party in-fighting last week when Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., whom Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., had appointed chairwoman of House GOP leadership, publicly accused the speaker of kowtowing to Democrats and allowing that provision to be removed.

Johnson said he was blindsided by Stefanik’s anger and was unaware of her concerns when she had made them public.

Stefanik later claimed victory on X, stating the provision had been reinstated after a conversation between herself, Johnson and President Donald Trump. 

Coverage of in vitro fertilization (IVF) for military families, which became a flashpoint in recent days, is not included in the final NDAA. Neither are provisions preempting states from regulating AI or banning a U.S. central bank digital currency (CBDC). 

Republicans have pushed the CBDC prohibition as a privacy and civil-liberties measure, arguing that a government-issued digital dollar could give federal agencies the ability to monitor or restrict individual transactions. 

House aides said the anti-CBDC language became tied to a separate housing-policy package known as ‘Road to Housing,’ and the concessions required to keep both items together were unacceptable.

The bill also establishes a new ‘Artificial Intelligence Futures Steering Committee’ charged with producing long-range forecasts and policy recommendations for advanced AI systems, including artificial general intelligence.

The legislation takes aim at long-standing bottlenecks in the defense industrial base by authorizing new investment tools, expanding multi-year procurement for high-demand munitions and platforms, and overhauling portions of the acquisition system to speed the fielding of commercial and emerging technologies. 

Alongside those reforms, lawmakers approved new ‘right-to-repair’ style requirements that force contractors to provide the technical data the Pentagon needs to maintain and sustain major weapons systems—a change intended to reduce vendor lock-in and ease chronic maintenance delays across the fleet.

One major section of the bill establishes a far-reaching outbound investment screening system, requiring U.S. companies and investors to alert the Treasury Department when they back certain high-risk technologies in China or other ‘countries of concern.’ The measure gives Treasury the ability to block deals outright, forces detailed annual reporting to Congress, and grants new authorities to sanction foreign firms tied to China’s military or surveillance networks. Lawmakers cast the effort as a long-overdue step to keep U.S. capital from fueling Beijing’s development of dual-use technologies.

The bill also includes a procurement ban targeting biotechnology providers that would bar the Pentagon from contracting with Chinese genetic sequencing and biotech firms linked to the People’s Liberation Army or China’s security services. 

Additional sourcing prohibitions restrict the War Department from purchasing items such as advanced batteries, photovoltaic components, computer displays, and critical minerals originating from foreign entities of concern, further tightening U.S. supply chains away from China. They also require the department to phase out the use of Chinese-made computers, printers and other tech equipment.

Beyond economic measures, the NDAA directs the State Department to deploy a new cadre of Regional China Officers at U.S. diplomatic posts around the world, responsible for monitoring Chinese commercial, technological, and infrastructure activities across every major geographic region, including Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative.

The NDAA contains several Israel-related provisions, including a directive for the Pentagon to avoid participating in international defense exhibitions that bar Israeli involvement. It authorizes funding for  Iron Dome, David’s Sling, and Arrow – the missile defense programs the U.S. operates with Isra

The bill also requires biennial reports comparing China’s global diplomatic presence to that of the United States. The Pentagon is separately directed to strengthen U.S. posture in the Indo-Pacific by extending the Pacific Deterrence Initiative and expanding cooperative training and industrial-base initiatives with regional allies, including Taiwan and the Philippines.

The legislation reauthorizes the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative at $400 million per year for fiscal years 2026 and 2027. Congress will also require more frequent reporting on allied contributions to Ukraine to track how European partners support Kyiv.

The bill repeals two long-dormant war authorizations tied to earlier phases of U.S. military involvement in Iraq, while leaving the primary post-9/11 counterterrorism authority untouched. Lawmakers said the final text includes repeals of the 1991 Gulf War AUMF and the 2002 Iraq War AUMF, both of which successive administrations have said are no longer operationally necessary. The 1991 authorization approved the U.S.-led effort to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait, and the 2002 authority permitted the invasion of Iraq under President George W. Bush.

Both parties have debated winding down these authorizations for years, arguing they no longer reflect current U.S. missions in the Middle East. Presidents from both parties, including Trump, have maintained that modern military operations in the region do not rely on either statute and that the commander in chief already holds sufficient Article II authority to defend U.S. personnel when required. Repeal also answers long-running concerns in Congress about outdated war authorities being used as secondary legal justifications for actions far from their original intent, such as the 2020 strike on Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani.

The NDAA does not touch the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, which remains the central legal basis for U.S. counter-terror operations against al-Qaeda, ISIS, and associated groups. That post-9/11 statute continues to underpin nearly all active U.S. counter-terror missions worldwide.

House aides said leaders in their chamber hoped to consider the bill as soon as this week. It will first need to go through the House Rules Committee, the final gatekeepers before legislation gets a chamber-wide vote. It could hit that panel as early as Tuesday afternoon.

Then it will head for a vote in the Senate before reaching Trump’s desk for his signature.

Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov’s threats against Ukraine following a drone strike echo a 2022 plot to infiltrate Kyiv and target President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a former Ukrainian government official has said.

The leader’s latest threat came after a Ukrainian drone reportedly struck a high-rise building near Kadyrov’s home in Grozny on Nov. 5.

The strike prompted the Chechen strongman to vow retaliation in an online video post, according to Reuters.

‘This new threat would just be another assassination threat for Zelenskyy. The Chechens are really serious about revenge,’ a former government official told Fox News Digital.

‘But in Kyiv they are not panicking about this like they were in 2022,’ the former official said under condition of anonymity.

‘Zelenskyy is now better protected, feels more powerful and is less fragile,’ they said.

The recent Ukrainian strike, reported by Reuters, hit the 28-story Grozny-City tower that sits roughly 830 meters from Kadyrov’s home.

Kadyrov, who is loyal to Russia, later allegedly confirmed the attack in a Telegram post, stating there were no casualties, but he condemned the strike as making ‘no tactical sense.’ 

He also warned that retaliation was imminent.

‘Starting tomorrow and in the course of the week, the Ukrainian fascists will be feeling a stern response,’ he threatened.

Unlike Ukraine’s strike, he added, ‘we will not be making a cowardly strike on peaceful targets,’ per Reuters.

Ukrainian attacks have hit sites in Chechnya before now, including a police barracks and a training academy. Chechen units were also deployed during Russia’s 2022 invasion and were among the Kremlin’s most loyal forces.

At the time of the 2022 invasion, the official said there was intense anxiety in Kyiv.

‘At the beginning of the large-scale invasion in 2022, Chechens were sent to Kyiv to murder top politicians,’ the former official said.

‘This included Volodymyr Zelenskyy and top politicians from the government and security services and Parliament, and many other agencies.

‘Zelenskyy and Yermak were very scared,’ they claimed. ‘They were calling from the office, asking some people in the military and security service to secure the metro station in Kyiv.’

The source said one metro station in Kyiv was a potential infiltration route for the Chechens into Zelenskyy’s presidential bunker.

At the time, the station in Kyiv that was deep underground and near the presidential bunker, was viewed as the most vulnerable entry route, the source said.

‘They were afraid that Chechens would get to the bunker through this metro station, but in the end the Chechens were killed before they reached Kyiv.

‘They tried to reach Kyiv, somehow downtown, somehow via the river, but it’s quite a complicated way to get there,’ the former official said.

Meanwhile, with the Nov. 5. Grozny strike landing so close to his home, Kadyrov, already one of Putin’s most aggressive enforcers, is signaling a harsher stance as attacks reach inside Russian territory.

The Moscow Times reported that the drone struck a building that houses regional government offices, including the Chechen Security Council and agencies connected to tourism and religious affairs.

Despite the rhetoric, the former Ukrainian official claimed Zelenskyy is unfazed this time around.

‘These days, Zelenskyy isn’t afraid of Kadyrov’s actions against him or the Ukrainian people. Zelenskyy is feeling very powerful right now,’ they added.

Fox News Digital has reached out to Zelenskyy’s office for comment.

President Donald Trump spearheaded major changes to the Kennedy Center Honors ahead of the highly anticipated awards ceremony. 

Founded in 1978, the Kennedy Center Honors recognize a handful of performing artists every year for their lifetime contributions to culture. The Kennedy Center Honors, which are presented by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., are considered the nation’s top lifetime achievement award for the performing arts.

After returning to the White House in January, Trump, 79, became chairman of the Kennedy Center board and has since undertaken efforts to reshape the honors program — pushing for a glitzier, star-studded celebration. 

In August, Trump announced this year’s lineup of honorees, which included country legend George Strait, Hollywood star Sylvester Stallone, rock band KISS, Broadway icon Michael Crawford and Grammy Award-winning singer Gloria Gaynor.

‘The 48th Kennedy Center Honorees are outstanding people, incredible, we can’t wait… in a few short months since I became chairman of the board, the Kennedy Center, we’ve completely reversed the decline of this cherished national institution,’ he said in his speech.

From overhauling the honoree selection process to unveiling a new medallion, here’s a breakdown of how the Kennedy Center Honors have been revamped under Trump. 

Trump-led selection process 

Since the Kennedy Honors’ inception, the honorees were chosen by a bipartisan committee that worked with the Kennedy Center’s artistic staff, the Board of Trustees, external arts advisors, and the Center’s president and Honors team. 

While U.S. presidents have historically participated in the ceremonial aspects of the Honors including hosting a White House reception and attending the gala, they typically have not been directly involved in the selection process. 

However, Trump said he played a major role in choosing the 2025 honorees during an August event at the Kennedy Center to announce the recipients. 

Though there was a Special Honors Advisory Committee that made recommendations, Trump appeared to confirm that he made the final choices.

When reporters asked Trump how involved he was in selecting the 2025 honorees, he responded, ‘I was about 98% involved… they all came through me.’

‘I turned down plenty, they were too woke,’ he continued. ‘I had a couple of wokesters. No, we have great people. This is very different than it used to be.’

While taking aim at the state of Hollywood awards shows, Trump took a swipe at the Oscars.

‘Look at the Academy Awards — it gets lousy ratings now, it’s all woke,’ he said. ‘All they do is talk about how much they hate Trump, but nobody likes that. They don’t watch anymore…’

Trump concluded his ‘very long answer’ by saying he ‘was very involved’ in the selection of the Kennedy Center Honorees.

New medallion

For 47 years, the medallion received by the honorees had remained unchanged. The Honors medal hung from wide satin ribbon in five bright rainbow colors that formed a V-shape around the honoree’s neck. 

The gold circular medallion was shaped like a starburst and featured an abstract representation of the Kennedy Center building and was handmade by the same family for nearly five decades. Throughout the awards show’s history, the medallions were handmade by the Baturin’s, a Washington D.C.- based family of artisans and metalworkers. 

In a press release issued on Tuesday, the Kennedy Center announced that the medallions ‘have been re-imagined and donated by Tiffany & Co.’

‘As the first American high jewelry house, Tiffany & Co. has played a defining role in American luxury culture for nearly two centuries – making them the ideal collaborator to design the Honors medallion,’ the press release continued. 

‘The brand-new medallion features a gold disc etched on one side with a depiction of the Kennedy Center. The building is flanked by rainbow colors representing the breadth of the arts celebrated when receiving the Honor. The reverse side bears the Honorees’ names in script above the date of the Medallion Ceremony, December 6, 2025. The medallion hangs from a navy-blue ribbon, a color associated with dignity and tradition.’

Massive governance shake-up ahead of the Honors

n February, Trump announced a major shakeup of the Kennedy Center leadership. He revealed that he had decided to immediately fire multiple Kennedy Center board members appointed by former President Joe Biden and other prior trustees, including the chairman, and fill that role himself.

Trump claimed he and the former chair David Rubenstein along with the ousted board members ‘do not share [the same] vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture,’ according to his announcement on Truth Social.

‘We will soon announce a new Board, with an amazing Chairman, DONALD J. TRUMP!’ he added. 

Trump also criticized Kennedy Center programming, including drag shows, under the prior administration.

‘Just last year, the Kennedy Center featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth — THIS WILL STOP. The Kennedy Center is an American Jewel, and must reflect the brightest STARS on its stage from all across our Nation. For the Kennedy Center, THE BEST IS YET TO COME!’ Trump said on Truth Social. 

He later replaced the former members with 14 other members, including allies including second lady Usha Vance and ‘God Bless the USA’ singer Lee Greenwood. 

The new board elected Trump as chairman on Feb. 12. Trump dismissed long-serving Kennedy Center president Deborah Rutter and appointed his ally Ric Grenell – who became the U.S.’s first openly gay cabinet member under the first Trump administration when he served as acting director of national intelligence – as interim executive director amid the board overhaul. 

More mainstream-pop culture class of nominees 

The 2025 honorees including KISS, Gloria Gaynor, George Strait, Sylvester Stallone and Michael Crawford indicated a shift toward recognizing artists from more mainstream, pop culture fields rather than the cross-disciplinary lineups of prior years. 

During the first two decades after the Honors were founded, the recipients were mainly from the world of classical arts with some notable exceptions including actor James Cagney, actress Lucille Ball and film director Elia Kazan. 

In the mid-1990s, the Honors began expanding toward mainstream entertainment, honoring more pop musicians, rock artists, film and television actors and Broadway stars. The expansion accelerated through the 2000s and 2010s and into the 2020s.

In addition to mainstream artists, past honoree classes have always included representation from classical music, jazz, dance, opera or composition.  However, 2025’s lineup features no honoree from those disciplines, marking a first in modern program history.

The 2025 honorees chosen under Trump’s direction are entirely from rock, disco, country, film and Broadway.

In the Kennedy Honors Center’s August press release announcing the honorees, Grenell said, ‘For nearly half a century, this tradition has celebrated those whose voices and visions tell our nation’s story and share it with the world.’ ‘This year’s Honorees have left an indelible mark on our history, reminding us that the arts are for everyone.’

Trump will host the Honors 

At the August event to announce the honorees, Trump announced that he will host the Kennedy Center Honors gala, becoming the first president in history to host the event. 

‘I’ve been asked to host. I said, I’m the President of the United States. Are you fools asking me to do that? ‘Sir, you’ll get much higher ratings.’ I said ‘I don’t care. I’m President of the United States, I won’t do it.’ They said, ‘Please,” Trump told reporters.

Trump went on to say that his Chief of Staff Susie Wiles also asked him to host the Honors. 

‘I said, ‘OK, Susie, I’ll do it.’ That’s the power she’s got,’ he said. ‘So I have agreed to host. Do you believe what I have to do? And I didn’t want to do it, OK? They’re going to say, ‘He insisted.’ I did not insist, but I think it will be quite successful, actually.’ 

‘It’s been a long time. I used to host ‘The Apprentice’ finales and we did rather well with that,’ Trump added, referring to his long-running NBC reality competition show.

‘So I think we’re going to do very well, because we have some great honorees, some really great ones.’

During Trump’s first term, he and First Lady Melania Trump did not attend the Honors or host the traditional White House reception for the honorees.

In 2017, honorees including Norman Lear and dancer Carmen de Lavallade announced that they would not attend a White House reception hosted by Trump in protest.

The White House subsequently issued a statement that read: ‘The president and first lady have decided not to participate in this year’s activities to allow the honorees to celebrate without any political distraction.’

Trump and Melania also did not attend in 2018 and 2019. In 2020, the Honors were postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and instead took place in May 2021, with a revamped format including smaller, socially-distanced and virtual tributes.

The 48th Annual Kennedy Center Honors will take place on Dec. 7 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. and will air Dec. 23 on the CBS Television Network and on Paramount+

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled that certain evidence linked to an ally of former FBI Director James Comey is off limits to the Justice Department in its efforts to prosecute the ex-director.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said the DOJ may not use information pertaining to Daniel Richman.

‘Upon consideration of Petitioner Daniel Richman’s Motion for Temporary Restraining Order, the relevant legal authority, and the entire present record, the Court concludes that Petitioner Richman is entitled to a narrow temporary restraining order to preserve the status quo while the Court evaluates his Motion for Return of Property and awaits full briefing and argument from the parties,’ the ruling reads.

The facts ‘weigh in favor of entering a prompt, temporary order to preserve the status quo now, before the Government has filed a response,’ it added.

Kelsey Grammer thinks President Donald Trump is ‘one of the greatest presidents we’ve ever had.’

Earlier Saturday, Trump awarded the 2025 Kennedy Center honorees with their medals in the Oval Office. After the ceremony, the State Department Kennedy Center Honors medal presentation dinner was held.

This year’s recipients include Sylvester Stallone, Gloria Gaynor and George Strait, Michael Crawford and the members of KISS.

Speaking to Fox News Digital ahead of the dinner, Grammer, who was accompanied by his daughter Faith, called Trump ‘extraordinary.’

‘I think he’s extraordinary. He’s one of the greatest presidents we’ve ever had. Maybe the greatest. There are some things he still wants to get done, and I think that’s terrific, but there was a big hill to climb,’ Grammer said.

‘I think he’s extraordinary. He’s one of the greatest presidents we’ve ever had. Maybe the greatest.’

— Kelsey Grammer

‘And we were left with some very interesting things going on,’ he concluded.

The ‘Cheers’ star also touched on Stallone being honored during this year’s ceremony and said he’s ‘over the moon’ about it.

‘I was on the selection committee, so I knew about it,’ he added. ‘He’s a force of nature. Sylvester Stallone has captured our imagination in several different roles and performed them beautifully.’

Grammer said it was ‘about time’ that Stallone was honored.

Strait spoke to Fox News Digital on the red carpet and said, ‘It’s a great honor’ to be recognized by the Kennedy Center Honors.

During the Oval Office ceremony, Trump called the honorees ‘incredible people’ who represent the ‘very best in American arts and culture.’

‘I know most of them, and I’ve been a fan of all of them,’ Trump said, according to the Associated Press.

‘This is a group of icons whose work and accomplishments have inspired, uplifted and unified millions and millions of Americans. This is perhaps the most accomplished and renowned class of Kennedy Center Honorees ever assembled,’ Trump continued.

During the ceremony, Trump appointed each honoree with a newly designed medal, donated and created by jeweler Tiffany & Co.

It’s a gold disc etched on one side with the Kennedy Center’s image and signature rainbow colors. The honoree’s name and the ceremony date appear on the reverse. 

The medallion hangs from a navy-blue ribbon, replacing the original large rainbow ribbon – adorned with three gold plates – that rested on the honoree’s shoulders and chest and had been used since the first Honors program in 1978.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.