FBI Director Christopher Wray is expected to announce his resignation any moment, to step down from his post.
Fox News learned Wray will make the announcement during an FBI town hall in Washington, D.C., during which thousands of FBI employees are expected to join virtually across the country.
Wray was 7 years into his 10-year term.
GRASSLEY RIPS WRAY’S ‘FAILED’ LEADERSHIP AT FBI WITH 11 PAGES OF EXAMPLES IN BLISTERING ‘NO CONFIDENCE’ LETTER
WASHINGTON, DC – JUNE 4: FBI Director Christopher Wray arrives to testify during a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing on the FBI’s proposed budget for the 2025 fiscal year on June 4, 2024 in Washington, DC. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
The Republican lawyer in D.C. was hired by then President Trump in 2017 after he fired former Director James Comey.
Since being re-elected to a second term in the Oval Office, Trump has nominated Kash Patel to succeed Wray, giving the current director two options: leave on his own or be fired.
While Wray’s last day is still undecided, it is expected to be in January before Trump’s inauguration.
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The moment Wray officially leaves, Deputy Director Paul Abbate will become acting director until a new director – Patel if confirmed – is in place. Abbate is a career official who is eligible to retire from the bureau very soon. He planned months ago to retire in the new year.
Greg Wehner is a breaking news reporter for Fox News Digital.
Story tips and ideas can be sent to [email protected] and on Twitter @GregWehner.
New Jersey Rep. Jeff Van Drew said Wednesday that “very qualified” and “reliable” sources believe the mystery drones populating the Garden State’s skies are originating from an Iranian “mothership” parked off the U.S. East Coast.
“Here is the real deal,” the GOP lawmaker told Fox News’ Harris Faulkner.
“I’m on the Transportation Committee, on the Aviation Subcommittee, and I’ve gotten to know people. And from very high sources, very qualified sources, very responsible sources. I’m going to tell you… Iran launched a mothership probably about a month ago that contains these drones. That mothership is off the east coast of the United States of America.”
Van Drew did not provide the names of sources responsible for the information, citing confidentiality.
NEW JERSEY LEADERS SPEAK TO DHS AS UNUSUAL DRONE SIGHTINGS NOW ALSO REPORTED OVER NEW YORK
U.S. Representative Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey, who has announced he is switching from the Democratic to Republican Party, speaks to the press as he meets with U.S. President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House on December 19, 2019 in Washington, DC.(Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
“You know that Iran made a deal with China to purchase drones, motherships and technology in order to go forward…” he added later.
“…These drones should be shot down. Whether it was some crazy hobbyist that we can’t imagine, or whether it is Iran – and I think it very possibly could be – they should be shot down. We are not getting the full deal and the military is on alert with this.”
Van Drew’s claims come as officials and state residents demand answers on the mysterious development, yet major agencies remain puzzled by the ordeal, including the FBI. The agency is investigating the sightings and have urged the public to report any drones they see.
DRONE SIGHTING REPORTED OVER NEW JERSEY’S LARGEST RESERVOIR AS FEDS INVESTIGATE UNNERVING PHENOMENON
New Jersey drone sighting map.(Fox & Friends/Screengrab)
Recordings of drones soaring over homes at night, with flashing lights and no apparent purpose, have circulated in the news. Some have been seen nightly in some areas, and have been spotted traveling in groups at times. Some are even said to be SUV-sized.
Drone sightings were also previously reported on Staten Island in New York.
Democratic New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy posted to X last Thursday that “there is no known threat to the public at this time.” State officials have said they are taking the mystery drone sightings “seriously.”
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Fox News’ Landon Mion contributed to this report.
Taylor Penley is an associate editor with Fox News.
Hundreds of tractors blocked streets in central London on Wednesday, the latest protest by farmers against the government after it ended an exemption from inheritance tax for agricultural families.
The measure, dubbed the “tractor tax” by critics, was introduced by the government to boost funds to pay for strained public services, but farmers say it will destroy family farms and reduce food production.
Farmers lined their tractors up close to the Houses of Parliament on Wednesday, hoping to convince the government to change course, or face escalating protests.
BELARUSIAN JOURNALIST FACES TRIAL FOR COVERING PROTESTS AS GOVERNMENT INTENSIFIES CRACKDOWN ON DISSENT
Farmers in tractors demonstrate Britain’s tax policy change in London, Britain, on Dec. 11, 2024.(Mina Kim)
“It’s the final nail in our agricultural coffin,” farmer Gareth Wyn Jones told Sky News, standing in front of rows of stationary tractors as protesters held up signs saying “No Farmers, No Food, No Future”.
Farmers say their income has been squeezed over the years by Britain’s competitive supermarket sector, cheap imports from abroad and subsidy cuts following Brexit.
The passing down of farms through generations was previously tax-free but in October the government said farmers would be subject to a tax from 2026. Protests in different parts of the country swiftly followed.
FARMERS BLOCK SPANISH HIGHWAYS IN PROTEST OF EUROPEAN UNION BUREAUCRACY
Demonstrators block streets of London with sign saying “We can’t afford to feed you anymore” in London, on Dec. 11, 2024.(Mina Kim)
The biggest was in mid-November when 13,000 people gathered in Westminster, including Britain’s most high profile farmer Jeremy Clarkson, the former Top Gear presenter whose programme Clarkson’s Farm is one of Amazon’s top UK shows.
The government has repeatedly said there will be no u-turn on the inheritance tax policy.
Environment minister Steve Reed said the government was working to help farmers via rural support schemes.
Tractors block the streets of central London, Britain, on Dec. 11, 2024(Mina Kim)
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“We are focused on supporting our farmers, supporting rural economics growth and boosting Britain’s food security,” he said in a statement on Wednesday.
Under the new inheritance tax rules, from 2026 a 20% tax will be paid on the value of a farm above 1 million pounds. Existing personal allowances, which a married couple can combine, takes the threshold for a farm and associated property up to 3 million pounds.
President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming press secretary Karoline Leavitt vowed that the incoming administration will offer more press access than their predecessor.
It’s typically White House tradition for the sitting president to offer a year-end press conference. Yet when asked if President Biden planned to do one, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters this week she “didn’t have anything to share.”
“He’s been spending a lot of time in Delaware as he did throughout his entire term,” Leavitt told Dana Perino on Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom” Wednesday, concerning President Biden. “We haven’t seen or heard much from the leader of the free world over the past several weeks since the November 5 election. It’s clear that he realizes this is over for him. But I think it’s a dereliction of duty on his behalf. And he owes it to the American people to speak directly to them.”
TRUMP PICKS KAROLINE LEAVITT TO SERVE AS WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY
Karoline Leavitt will serve as President-elect Donald Trump’s White House press secretary.(Karoline Leavitt congressional campaign)
“But that’s not what we’ve seen from this White House over the past four years,” she continued. “Talk to reporters who sit inside that briefing room. They have been incredibly frustrated with the lack of access and transparency from the Biden White House. I can assure them of one thing: their access to the president and the transparency will increase when President Trump is back in the Oval Office. We saw that in his first term. He often brought the press into the Oval Office when he was signing bills. I can expect that is going to continue when he returns in January.”
Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House for comment.
WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENTS’ ASSOCIATION PROTESTS ‘UNACCEPTABLE’ LACK OF PRESS ACCESS AT BIDEN’S QUAD SUMMIT
President Donald Trump hangs up a phone call with the leaders of Sudan and Israel, as Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, left, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, White House senior adviser Jared Kushner, National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien, and others applaud in the Oval Office of the White House, Friday, Oct. 23, 2020.((AP Photo/Alex Brandon))
The Biden administration has been criticized for a lack of transparency both at home and abroad. When the White House didn’t allow press access at the Quad Summit in September, when Biden spoke with leaders from Australia, India and Japan at his Wilmington, Delaware home, the White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) called it “unacceptable.”
“My understanding is that the current posture of the administration is for the press to only see the leaders drive in with no eyes, or cameras on POTUS in this historic moment,” WHCA president and Politico correspondent Eugene Daniels said in a message to the White House at the time. “I can’t remember a time where this president has had a bilateral meeting on US soil and the press and therefore the American people were blocked from seeing it.”
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre speaks at a press briefing at the White House on June 18, 2024, in Washington, D.C. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENTS’ ASSOCIATION SLAMS BIDEN ADMIN FOR NOT HOLDING BRIEFINGS AS DEFAULT DEADLINE LOOMS
Again, Jean-Pierre was confronted about the White House’s decision.
“There’s going to be plenty of opportunities,” Jean-Pierre said. “It’s not like we’re not allowing all of you to see many other things that are going to develop throughout the day. I just went through them. A quick family photo. He’s going to take them to his high school. You all are going to be there. There’s going to be some really important announcement about cancer moonshot. You all are going to be there. There’s going to be an opportunity to see them when they leave on Saturday as well. You’ll see him saying goodbye to the leaders on Saturday. I hear you all, but can you also appreciate that we have created other opportunities?”
The WHCA also took issue with Biden snapping at a reporter for asking an off-topic question at the G-7 Summit in Italy in June.
“The White House Correspondents’ Association believes it is in the public interest to make clear that at a presidential press conference, at home or abroad, there are no preconditions regarding question topics,” the statement read. “While the White House does determine the number of reporters the president will recognize, it is up to professional journalists to decide what to ask.”
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When Leavitt assumes her role, the 27-year-old will be the youngest White House press secretary in history.
Fox News Digital’s Lindsay Kornick contributed to this report.
Cortney O’Brien is an Editor at Fox News. Twitter: @obrienc2
The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the country’s largest labor union for federal employees, is fighting back against GOP criticisms that government employees are abusing the use of remote work.
With the incoming Trump administration, Republicans have gone on the offensive when it comes to challenging remote-work and work-from-home policies that came out of the COVID-19 pandemic and have been maintained for years later.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., unveiled a package of bills last week that she plans to introduce, aimed at holding the federal government more accountable for its use of taxpayer dollars. One of the bills seeks to require federal agencies to submit a report on the impacts of expanded teleworking since the pandemic, as well as details about how they plan to implement remote-work policies going forward.
Blackburn’s bills coincide with a report penned recently by Sen. Joni Ernst, R–Iowa, chair of the new Department of Government Efficiency caucus, which posits ways to reduce the level of government employees working remotely, such as by tracking their individual productivity and tying it to their ability to work-from-home.
TO BE REMOTE OR NOT TO BE? THAT IS THE BURNING FEDERAL WORKPLACE QUESTION
Meanwhile, AFGE, which represents roughly 800,000 civil servants, is rebuking these efforts, deriding them as “a deliberate attempt to demean the federal workforce and justify the wholesale privatization of public-sector jobs.”
Republicans are challenging remote-work and work-from-home policies that came out of the COVID-19 pandemic.(iStock)
AFGE put out a press release Friday to “set the record straight” on what the group described as an exaggeration from GOP politicians about the misuse of telework. “AFGE believes that facts matter, and that lawmakers should be guided by the facts when making decisions that affect the lives of their constituents,” the press statement said.
The document laid out a handful of “myths” about federal employee telework. Several they named came from Ernst’s report that she presented to President-elect Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) last week, including one that claims “nearly one-third” of the federal workforce is “entirely remote.”
According to AFGE, only 10% of federal civilian workers “were in remote positions where there was no expectation that they worked in-person,” citing an August 2024 report to Congress from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).
SENATE DOGE LEADER ERNST TO TAKE ON GOVERNMENT TELEWORK ABUSE AT FIRST MEETING WITH MUSK, RAMASWAMY
The labor group also challenged Ernst’s claims from her report that “most federal workers are eligible to telework and 90% of [them] are,” as well as her claim that only 6% of the federal workforce goes into the office every single day. Citing the same OMB report to Congress, AFGE argued that actually fewer than half – roughly 46% – of federal workers are eligible for telework, while adding that 54% of the federal workforce have jobs that require them to be in-person every single day.
In response to AFGE’s challenge of her claims, Ernst said “the real myth” was that bureaucrats are showing up to work.
“Federal employees are already squealing, and the unions representing them are shamelessly fighting tooth and nail against returning to the office,” the Iowa senator told Fox News Digital. “I invite public sector unions to support my legislation to track their productivity during the workday. This will show how hard they are working for the American people and settle this debate once and for all. In the coming days, I will be highlighting more profiles of ‘working’ from home. The tips from whistleblowers just keep coming into my office.”
Sen. Joni Ernst speaks to reporters following a closed-door lunch meeting with Senate Republicans at the U.S. Capitol on Oct. 17, 2023.( Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Other “myths” the labor union sought to debunk included claims from Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, both tapped by Trump to lead DOGE, and Russell Vought, Trump’s nominee to lead the Office of Management and Budget. One claim AFGE focused on from Musk argued that when you exclude federal personnel who cannot work remotely due to their day-to-day responsibilities, such as “security guards and maintenance personnel,” the number of federal workers going into the office for at least 40 hours per week is around 1%.
A similar claim was also backed up by a source familiar with the data used in Ernst’s report, who said the numbers used by AFGE are cherry-picked because they rely on federal workers who could not work remotely if they wanted to, such as Border Patrol officers and Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents.
TSA agent checks a passenger’s ticket.(AP)
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Last week, AFGE secured a deal with the Biden administration’s Social Security Administration to set current levels of telework at the agency through 2029. The move will impact roughly 42,000 federal workers, according to Bloomberg News, and will serve to protect the ability to do remote work until the agreed upon contract expires in five years.
Fox News Digital reached out to AFGE for comment, but did not receive a response by publication time.
Former President Bill Clinton said Wednesday that President-elect Donald Trump had won the 2024 race “fair and square,” in contrast to what he still feels was an illegitimate result in 2016.
“This time, Donald Trump won the race, fair and square,” Clinton told “The View,” adding, “I think.”
In an appearance on the ABC talk show, the ex-president was reminded by co-host Joy Behar that he wrote in his memoir he was so outraged over his wife Hillary Clinton’s loss in 2016 that he couldn’t sleep.
“How are you sleeping now?” Behar asked, referring to Trump’s defeat of Vice President Kamala Harris. “What’s going to happen now?”
Bill Clinton appears on “The View” on Dec. 11, 2024.
BLACK HARRIS STAFFERS SAY THEY WERE MISTREATED ON THE CAMPAIGN, BLAME LEADERSHIP FOR TAKING BASE FOR GRANTED
“I’m sleeping better now because I did everything I could for the alternative,” he said. “But I also think it’s important for everybody to just take a deep breath and say, unlike in 2016, there was no outside influence like the FBI Director interfering at the last moment in violation of 70 years of policy, and it changed 5% [in polling] overnight.”
The Clintons have repeatedly assigned blame to then-FBI Director James Comey’s late October 2016 letter re-opening the investigation into her use of a private email server as a critical factor in her narrow loss to Trump.
President Clinton said Wednesday that in his lifetime, he’d never seen such a rapid polling shift. Nevertheless, Hillary Clinton was widely favored by experts going into the election that year to defeat Trump, in spite of Comey’s letter to Congress about the investigation.
“Anybody that says that he didn’t give Trump the election needs to –” he said Monday, trailing off.
A side-by-side of Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.(AP Images)
‘THE VIEW’ CO-HOST BLAMES CHATGPT AFTER MAKING PANTS ON FIRE CLAIM ABOUT BIDEN PARDON
In this year’s election, though, Clinton said Trump had won fairly, or so he thought.
“I’m not like [Trump]. I have to have some evidence to make a charge, so as far as I know, he won it, and there’re a lot of reasons why,” he said.
The former president called on the party to observe a peaceful transfer of power and work with Trump and Republicans when possible.
“I do not think we should just be jamming them, even though they do that to us a lot,” he said. “I think it’s a mistake.”
WHOOPI GOLDBERG BRISTLES AT DANIEL PENNY CELEBRATING ACQUITTAL: ‘YOU KILLED A GUY’
Clinton was governor of Arkansas before his successful run for the presidency in 1992, building a coalition of both rural and urban voters. A generation later, rural, working-class voters have fled the Democratic Party in droves.
Former US President Bill Clinton speaks during a Get-Out-The-Vote rally for Vice President Kamala Harris on the first day of North Carolina early voting in Durham, North Carolina, October 17, 2024. Harris went on to lose the election. (Photo by Logan Cyrus / AFP) (Photo by LOGAN CYRUS/AFP via Getty Images)
Asked about winning back that section of the voting base on the show, Clinton said Democrats had a tendency to write off certain groups based on demographics and likelihood of support.
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“We need to quit screaming at each other and listen to each other,” he said.
David Rutz is a senior editor at Fox News. Follow him on Twitter at @davidrutz.
The Fulton County District Attorney’s Office declined this week to turn over any new communications between District Attorney Fani Willis and outgoing Trump Special Counsel Jack Smith, asserting in a new court filing that the documents either do not exist or are exempt from disclosure under Georgia law.
The update was shared Tuesday by Judicial Watch, a conservative legal group that sued Willis in March after her office denied having any records of communication between Willis and Smith or between Willis and the House January 6th Committee.
HOUSE JUDICIARY INVESTIGATING WHETHER FULTON COUNTY DA FANI WILLIS ‘COORDINATED’ WITH JAN 6 COMMITTEE
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis looks on during a hearing on the Georgia election interference case in March 2024. (Alex Slitz/USA Today)
Both Smith and the House Select Committee had been investigating alleged efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election—putting their investigations directly in the crosshairs of Judicial Watch and other conservative activists.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ordered Willis last Monday to produce any records of communication with either Smith or the House Select Committee on Jan. 6 within five business days, siding with Judicial Watch in determining that Willis had indeed violated the state’s open records act by failing to respond to the lawsuit.
(Willis, for her part, claimed she was not properly served by the group.)
The Fulton County Open Records Department appears to disagree. In a new court filing this week, they said that their staff conducted a “diligent search” but had not uncovered any records of documents or communications between Willis and Smith, the special counsel tapped by Attorney General Merrick Garland in 2022 to oversee two investigations into the alleged actions of former president Donald Trump.
Attorney General Merrick Garland testifies during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on the Department of Justice, on Tuesday, June 4, 2024, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP/Jacquelyn Martin)
Further, staff for the Open Records Department asserted, any records or documents between Willis and the House Select Committee on Jan. 6 are still “legally exempt” or “exempted from disclosure” to Judicial Watch under the Georgia Open Records Law, which itself protects against the release of documents or records that arose from an investigation, subsequent indictment, or prosecution in the ongoing case against Trump and his allies.
The filing comes as Willis’s actions have come under scrutiny by Republican lawmakers and conservative nonprofit groups.
Members of the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee have said Willis asked the House Select Committee on January 6th to share information with her office, prompting additional scrutiny into those communications.
TRUMP BOOKED AT FULTON COUNTY JAIL AFTER CHARGES STEMMING FROM 2020 ELECTION PROBE
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, strikes the gavel to start a hearing on Capitol Hill. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)(Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Trump and 18 others pleaded not guilty in Fulton County last year to all charges stemming from a sweeping racketeering indictment brought by the D.A.’s office, which accused them of attempting to overturn the results of the presidential election.
The charges against Trump in Georgia had been on hold after his attorneys filed an appeal to have Willis disqualified from the case, citing alleged conflicts of interest.
Importantly, the charges against Trump in the state have not yet been officially dropped, despite his status as president-elect.
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The case’s status comes as Smith has wound down all federal court proceedings against Trump following his victory in the 2024 election and longstanding Justice Department policy that prevents U.S. prosecutors from bringing federal criminal charges against a sitting president.
Fox News Digital’s Haley Chi-Sing contributed to this report.
Breanne Deppisch is a politics reporter for Fox News Digital covering the 2024 election and other national news.
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By now you may have seen the headlines, “Trump assassination attempt hearing devolves into screaming match.” I encourage you to watch the full exchange between myself and acting Secret Service Director Rowe.
Heated back and forths are nothing new when it comes to Congress. But last week’s exchange had nothing to do with partisanship and everything to do with his agency’s competency, or rather the lack thereof. At its core, the sparks flew because the current head of the US Secret Service (USSS) seemingly learned no lessons from the historic failures in Butler, Pennsylvania.
We’re just under five months removed from the tragic events of July 13, 2024, that left Corey Comperatore, a volunteer firefighter and father of two, dead, the leading Republican presidential candidate wounded, and the nation in shock.
History could have, and should have played out much differently at President Trump’s Butler rally. Those shots would never have been fired had the leadership within the USSS simply lived up to its zero-fail mission.
TRUMP ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT HEARING DEVOLVES INTO SCREAMING MATCH
This week, the bipartisan House Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump issued its final report that details the failures of the USSS at the Butler rally and recommended measures the agency should implement going forward.
This report underscores why the exchange between acting Director Rowe and I was in fact so heated. The head of the Secret Service deflected and refused to answer direct questions about his actions while at the helm of what should be the world’s premier protection agency.
If the USSS can’t be fully transparent months after the Butler rally, can we trust that high-profile protectees, regardless of their politics, are safe?
Our Task Force has heard from former USSC agents, and whistleblowers themselves that the agency is in need of systemic culture change. This is reflected in the USSS’s failure to secure the perimeter and the high ground at the venue with the right equipment in the proper manner. Here are three failures that must be addressed based on our report.
Failures in Planning
It’s well known now that the location from which would-be assassin Thomas Crooks fired from, the AGR complex, was left unsecured prior to and during the July 13 rally, despite concerns from local law enforcement on the ground. The local law enforcement present at the rally displayed true courage and deserve our thanks, but the simple fact is that USSS leadership bears ultimate responsibility for the safety of its protectees. If the USSS feels it does not have the necessary personnel to secure a potential site, it needs to stick to a consistent, streamlined process to secure additional resources, rather than the ad hoc approach it employed in Butler.
Moving forward, the USSS needs to ensure it is on the same page as every partner agency involved in securing the perimeter. This means open communication between everyone involved, in advance, and disseminating that information so that all parties know who is in charge and where.
TRUMP ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT SUSPECT RYAN ROUTH TO FACE COURT HEARING AFTER MOVING TO DELAY TRIAL
USSS must also plan for coverage both inside, as well as outside the perimeter, which was not the case when it came to the AGR complex. The failure to do so on July 13 meant that Crooks was left with a clear line of sight to the rally stage, and rally goers nearby impeded USSS and partner agencies’ ability to locate him. These line of sight vulnerabilities must be determined and considered ahead of time.
Failures in Execution
When it comes to communications, USSS missed opportunities to apprehend Crooks before he opened fire. Faltering radio communications led to confusion. Some USSS countersnipers and local sniper teams had to instead communicate via text message. Critical information was not sent wide to USSS personnel, which meant the agents stationed closest to President Trump were not made immediately aware of the threat posed by Crooks until he opened fire. The existence of two, rather than one unified command post further impaired USSS’s ability to react quickly and decisively.
Communications failures on the ground could have been fixed if the USSS ensured there was a hierarchy in place to alert not only all of its own agents, but local law enforcement as well. There needs to be a definite plan of action and communication that can be accessed afterwards for any potential reviews and investigations.
Failures in Leadership
The lack of uniform training standards meant that agents involved in operational planning and execution ahead of the Butler rally were simply not experienced for the task at hand. Personnel is policy, and the lack of consistent training for all USSS agents at Butler, PA falls at the feet of the agency’s higher-ups.
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We also know that Crooks used a drone to survey the Butler rally location ahead of time, while the USSS had technical issues with its own counter drone system and didn’t have an operational backup on site. When it comes to technology like drones, it’s imperative that personnel are properly trained on the systems in use and a backup system is readily available. Should something go wrong, the USSS needs to ensure redundancy.
It would shock most Americans to learn that the USSS still can’t tell us who exactly was in charge in Butler that day. Countersniper teams did not have clearly defined roles, compounding the problems they already faced due to inefficient communications. The fact that USSS had to rely on inexperienced Homeland Security Investigation (HSI) agents becomes more absurd when you consider testimony that states they received “1-hour PowerPoint” trainings in addition to a single morning briefing on the day of the rally.
The American people deserve assurances that agents are adequately trained and kept current on how protective operations are conducted, regardless of the agency’s workload. Similar to how USSS should have worked more cooperatively with local partners, the agency needs to integrate HSI personnel into USSS’s own trainings when it’s clear they’ll be needed.
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Above all, a major cultural problem exists within the USSS. This truth is undeniable given the tragic fact that an untrained 20-year-old with two weeks’ notice was able to outsmart and outmaneuver the very agency whose number one job is to protect our most important elected officials.
While now-former USSS Director Cheatle resigned after her testimony before the House Oversight Committee in July, the overtly combative testimony I received from acting Director Rowe is alarming. Combined with our Task Force’s findings, it’s clear the Secret Service needs comprehensive changes, starting at the top.
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‘OUR HOLIDAY GIFT’: OpenAI released its text-to-video artificial intelligence model, Sora, this week after the completion of its testing phase.
The OpenAI logo is being displayed on a smartphone with the Sora text-to-video generator visible in the background in this photo illustration, taken in Brussels, Belgium, on February 16, 2024. (Jonathan Raa/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
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Recording artist will.i.am speaks onstage during Day 2 of the 2024 Invest Fest at Georgia World Congress Center on Aug. 24, 2024, in Atlanta, Georgia.(Paras Griffin/Getty Images)
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Attorneys for lawyer-turned-convict Alex Murdaugh filed to appeal his sentence on Tuesday, saying improper testimony and court clerk Becky Hill’s alleged jury tampering “infected the trial with unfairness.”
Murdaugh, 56, is serving a life sentence for fatally shooting his wife, Maggie, and youngest son, Paul, in June 2021 on their family’s hunting estate in Colleton County, South Carolina. Prosecutors argued that their murders were an attempt to distract from Murdaugh’s mounting financial crimes, which were beginning to come to light around that time.
This April, the disgraced legal scion was sentenced to an additional 480 months, on top of his two life sentences, for conspiracy to commit wire and bank fraud, bank fraud, five counts of wire fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud and 14 counts of money laundering.
WATCH ‘THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF MURDAUGH’ ON FOX NATION
Disgraced South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh was convicted of murdering his wife, Maggie, and youngest son, Paul, on his hunting estate in June 2021.(Andrew J. Whitaker/The Post And Courier via AP, Pool, File)
Prosecutors allege that Murdaugh used his power and family influence in the Lowcountry to take on clients’ cases, win them “significant funds” and then keep a decent portion of the earnings for himself.
ALEX MURDAUGH SENTENCED TO 40 YEARS FOR FINANCIAL CRIMES AFTER POLYGRAPH CONTROVERSY
But in their 132-page appeal, filed on Tuesday, Murdaugh’s attorneys argue that their client’s financial crimes should not have been included in his earlier murder trial, stating they were irrelevant and could have painted him in a bad light that negatively influenced jurors.
ALEX MURDAUGH’S LAWYERS WANT TO MAKE PUBLIC STATEMENTS ABOUT STOLEN MONEY. FBI SAYS MURDAUGH LIED
Clerk of Court Becky Hill has been accused of tampering with the jury in the Alex Murdaugh double murder trial.(Fox Nation)
The appeal also alleges that former Colleton County Clerk Becky Hill, who resigned over allegations of jury tampering in Murdaugh’s case, swayed jurors to find him guilty.
ALEX MURDAUGH COURT CLERK BECKY HILL RESIGNS AFTER ALLEGATIONS OF JURY TAMPERING
Of 12 jurors who found Murdaugh guilty of murder in March 2023, 11 said Hill did not influence their decisions. One said he heard the clerk make comments about watching Murdaugh’s body language, but said her words did not influence his verdict.
SOUTH CAROLINA JUDGE DENIES ALEX MURDAUGH’S REQUEST FOR A NEW MURDER TRIAL
Alex Murdaugh sits during a hearing on a motion for a retrial, Jan. 16, 2024, at the Richland County Judicial Center in Columbia, South Carolina.(Tracy Glantz/The State via AP, Pool)
Judge Jean Toal ruled in January that the allegations against Hill were not enough to grant the defendant a new trial in the murder case. Murdaugh’s attorneys argued against that ruling in their appeal.
ALEX MURDAUGH’S PUSH FOR NEW TRIAL COULD DEPEND ON ONE JUROR, ATTORNEY SAYS
Hill, who is accused of 76 ethics violations, was expected to face the State’s Ethics Commission on Dec. 19. But that hearing is on hold in light of a pending criminal investigation by the Attorney General’s Office, the State newspaper reported.
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The appeal also alleges that prosecutors introduced multiple guns as evidence that had no evidence linking them to the murders, and that gunshot residue on a raincoat shown as evidence in court were not linked to their client by any evidence.
Fox News Digital’s Audrey Conklin contributed to this report.
