Rep. Thomas Massie is accusing President Donald Trump of falling short of his campaign pledges with his Saturday-night strikes on Iran.

‘I feel a bit misled,’ Massie told Fox News Digital in a Sunday afternoon interview. ‘I didn’t think he would let neocons determine his foreign policy and drag us into another war.’ 

‘Other people feel the same way, who supported Trump — I think the political danger to him is he induces a degree of apathy in the Republican base, and they fail to show up to keep us in the majority in the midterms.’

Massie, a conservative libertarian who has long been wary of foreign intervention by the U.S., has been one of the most vocal critics of the Trump administration’s recent operation.

U.S. stealth bombers struck three major nuclear enrichment facilities in Iran Saturday night. 

Trump and other GOP leaders hailed the operation as a victory, while even pro-Israel Democrats also offered rare praise.

‘Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated,’ Trump said Saturday night. ‘And Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace. If they do not, future attacks would be far greater and a lot easier.’ 

But progressives and the growing isolationist wing of the GOP blasted it as a needless escalation of tensions in the Middle East, at a time when Israel has been engaged in a weeklong conflict with Iran as well.

Top officials up to Trump himself have said the U.S. is not seeking war with Iran. 

Vice President JD Vance told NBC News’ ‘Meet The Press’ Sunday, ‘We’re not at war with Iran. We’re at war with Iran’s nuclear program.’

Massie told Fox News Digital those assurances were ‘ludicrous.’

‘He’s engaged in war. We are now a co-belligerent in a hot war between two countries,’ the Kentucky Republican said, arguing that conflict separates this action from Trump’s strikes that killed deceased Iranian General Qassem Soleimani.

‘You can’t say this isn’t an act of war, that it’s a strike outside of a war,’ he said. ‘This is inside, geographically and temporally, of a war.’

The Kentucky Republican notably has broken from Trump on several other occasions and has been one of the few GOP officials to openly clash with the president — particularly on government spending and foreign intervention.

He’s co-leading a resolution to prevent the ‘United States Armed Forces from unauthorized hostilities in the Islamic Republic of Iran’ alongside Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., which they introduced days before the strikes. Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., is leading a Senate counterpart.

Massie noted that his team was looking at ways to get the resolution on the House floor — while conceding likely opposition from pro-Israel groups and congressional leaders.

‘We’re going to try to use the privileges of the House to get this to the floor,’ he said. 

‘People were saying, ‘Why did you introduce this resolution? The president’s not going to strike Iran.’ He has struck Iran. And now the naysayers said, ‘Oh, well, you don’t need this resolution.’

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said during a Sunday morning press conference that the administration had properly notified Congress about the strikes within existing statute — even as progressives and some conservatives accuse him of bypassing a co-equal branch of government.

‘They were notified after the planes were safely out,’ Hegseth said. ‘We complied with the notification requirements of the War Powers Act.’ 

But Massie noted that that law also requires Congress to vote on U.S. military intervention in foreign countries within 60 days, if the conflict continues.

‘Even if they’re able to circumvent a vote on the resolution that Ro Khanna and I have introduced, we’re going to have to vote at some point if this becomes a protracted engagement,’ he said.

War powers resolutions can be called up for a House vote after 15 days of inaction by the relevant committee, after the legislation is referred to that committee.

When reached for comment, the White House pointed Fox News Digital to Trump’s most recent Truth Social post calling Massie a ‘grandstander’ and threatening to recruit a primary challenger against him.

‘Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky is not MAGA, even though he likes to say he is,’ Trump wrote. ‘Actually, MAGA doesn’t want him, doesn’t know him, and doesn’t respect him. He is a negative force who almost always Votes ‘NO,’ no matter how good something may be.’ 

‘MAGA should drop this pathetic LOSER, Tom Massie, like the plague! The good news is that we will have a wonderful American Patriot running against him in the Republican Primary, and I’ll be out in Kentucky campaigning really hard. MAGA is not about lazy, grandstanding, nonproductive politicians, of which Thomas Massie is definitely one. Thank you to our incredible military for the AMAZING job they did last night. It was really SPECIAL!!!’

Fox News Digital also reached out to Speaker Mike Johnson’s office for comment.

President Donald Trump reported to the West Wing’s Situation Room multiple times across the past week as the conflict in Iran came to a rolling boil and the president ordered strikes on a trio of Iranian nuclear facilities Saturday evening in a surprise operation that took the world by surprise. 

Trump returned to the Situation Room Saturday as the U.S. targeted Iran’s nuclear facilities, and was flanked by key officials such as Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, according to photos from inside the room published late Saturday. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was also in the Situation Room, the White House confirmed to Fox Digital. 

Trump publicly announced the strikes in a Truth Social post Saturday evening, which came as a surprise to the world, as there were no media leaks or speculation such an attack was imminent. He then delivered an address to the nation on the strikes, lauding them as a ‘spectacular military success.’

‘A short time ago, the U.S. military carried out massive precision strikes on the three key nuclear facilities in the Iranian regime: Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan,’ he said. ‘Everybody heard those names for years as they built this horribly destructive enterprise. Our objective was the destruction of Iran’s nuclear enrichment capacity, and a stop to the nuclear threat posed by the world’s number one state sponsor of terror. Tonight, I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success.’ 

‘For 40 years, Iran has been saying, ‘Death to America. Death to Israel.’ They have been killing our people, blowing off their arms, blowing off their legs with roadside bombs,’ Trump continued. ‘That was their specialty. We lost over a thousand people, and hundreds of thousands throughout the Middle East and around the world have died as a direct result of their hate in particular.’

Ahead of the strikes, Trump floated Wednesday he might order an attack on Iran as negotiations on its nuclear program fell apart and the president made repeated trips to the Situation Room.

‘Yes, I may do it. I may not do it. I mean, nobody knows what I’m going to do. I can tell you this that Iran’s got a lot of trouble, and they want to negotiate,’ Trump told reporters Wednesday on the U.S. potentially striking Iran as it continues trading deadly strikes with Israel. ‘And I said, why didn’t you negotiate with me before all this death and destruction? Why didn’t you go? I said to people, why didn’t you negotiate with me two weeks ago? You could have done fine. You would have had a country. It’s very sad to watch this.’

Fox News Digital spoke to previous presidential administration officials — Fox News host and former Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, who served under the first Trump administration, and former National Security Advisor under the first Trump administration John Bolton, who also served as ambassador to the U.N. under President George W. Bush’s administration. They both conveyed the serious and historic tone the room and its meetings typically hold. 

The Situation Room is a high-tech 5,000-square-foot complex in the West Wing of the White House that includes multiple conference rooms. President John F. Kennedy commissioned the complex in 1961 following the failed Bay of Pigs invasion to overthrow the Castro regime in Cuba that same year, according to the National Archives. The complex was built in order to provide future presidents a dedicated area for crisis management, and was revamped in 2006 and renovated again in 2023. 

‘I often would sit there and think about the Osama bin Laden raid,’ McEnany told Fox News Digital in a phone interview Thursday morning. ‘This is where we saw our heroic Special Forces take out Osama bin Laden during the Obama administration. And I think we’re at another point where similar decisions are being made, and even bigger decisions that may change the course of history are happening right now in that room.’

Trump had spent hours in the Situation Room since June 16, including on Thursday morning, when he received an intelligence briefing with national security advisers, which followed a Situation Room meeting on Wednesday afternoon, another meeting on Tuesday afternoon with national security advisers and a Monday evening meeting upon his abrupt return from the G7 summit in Canada this week. 

Top national security officials, including  Hegseth, Gabbard, Vance, Rubio and Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, were among officials who joined Trump in the meetings as the administration weighs the spiraling conflict. 

Bolton explained to Fox Digital in a Thursday morning phone interview that two types of top-level meetings are held in the Situation Room. 

The first is known as a ‘principals meeting,’ he said, which includes Cabinet secretaries, such as the secretary of state and secretary of defense, and is chaired by the national security advisor — a role currently filled by Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

‘The principals committee usually meets to try and get everything sorted out so that they know what decisions the president is going to be confronted with,’ Bolton said. ‘They try and make sure all the information is pulled together so we can make an informed decision, set out the options they see, what the pros and cons are, and then have (the president) briefed.’ 

The second type of Situation Room meeting at the top level are official National Security Council meetings, which the president chairs. 

‘He chairs a full NSC meeting, and people review the information, update the situation, and the president can go back and forth with the advisors about asking questions, probing about the analysis, asking for more detail on something, kind of picking and choosing among the options, or suggesting new options,’ said Bolton, who served as Trump’s national security advisor between April 2018 and September 2019. 

‘And out of that could well come decisions,’ he added. 

McEnany served as the first Trump administration’s top spokeswoman at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when the Coronavirus Task Force operated out of the Situation Room as COVID-19 swept across the nation. 

‘A lot of critical decisions were made during the pandemic,’ she said. ‘It’s a humbling encounter. Every time you go in, you leave your phone at the door. You go in, I think it’s like 5,000 square feet, you’re sitting there, there’s clocks up from every country around the world, the different time zones. And you’re just sitting there as critical decisions are made. And, in my case, it was regarding the pandemic, and there’s back and forth, there’s deliberation, and these decisions are made with the president there, obviously.’ 

She continued that during the pandemic, the task force would spend hours in the Situation Room on a daily basis as the team fielded an onslaught of updates from across the country. Trump frequently received the top lines from the meetings and joined the Situation Room during key decisions amid the spread of the virus. 

‘When he was in there, absolutely, there’s a deference,’ she said, referring to how the tone of the room would change upon Trump’s arrival. ‘Yet, you had key officials who spoke up, who were not afraid to give their point of view to him. But I think there’s a recognition he’s the commander in chief.’

Press secretaries typically do not attend high-profile National Security Council meetings in the Situation Room, but have security clearances and can call into the room if needed, and are given updates from senior officials. 

McEnany added that press secretaries wouldn’t typically want to be in the room for high-stakes talks because ‘you don’t want your head filled with these sensitive deliberations of classified information’ when speaking with the media.

Bolton explained that for an issue such as Iran, the Situation Room meetings were likely restrictive and included top national security officials, such as the secretary of defense, director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. 

‘Sometimes it includes many more people, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Commerce Secretary, things like that,’ he said. ‘But in with this kind of decision, it could be very restrictive, so maybe just – well, there is no national security advisor – but, Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Director of National Intelligence, CIA Director, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, maybe the attorney general.’

Trump’s first national security advisor under the second administration, Mike Waltz, was removed from the role and nominated as the next U.S. ambassador to the UN in May, with Rubio taking on the additional role. The White House has also slashed NSC staffing since Trump took office, including after Rubio took the helm. 

Ahead of the surprise strikes on Saturday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt held a press conference on Thursday — the first since Israel launched preemptive strikes on Iran June 12 — and said the next two weeks would be a critical time period as U.S. officials map out next steps. 

‘I have a message directly from the president, and I quote: ‘Based on the fact that there’s a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future. I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks.’ That’s a quote directly from the president,’ she said Thursday. 

Israel launched pre-emptive strikes on Iran June 12 after months of attempted and stalled nuclear negotiations and subsequent heightened concern that Iran was advancing its nuclear program. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared soon afterward that the strikes were necessary to ‘roll back the Iranian threat to Israel’s very survival.’

He added that if Israel had not acted, ‘Iran could produce a nuclear weapon in a very short time.’ 

Dubbed ‘Operation Rising Lion,’ the strikes targeted Iran’s nuclear and missile infrastructure and killed a handful of senior Iranian military leaders.

Trump had repeatedly urged Iran to make a deal on its nuclear program, but the country pulled out of ongoing talks with the U.S. scheduled for Sunday in Oman. 

‘Iran should have signed the ‘deal’ I told them to sign,’ Trump posted to Truth Social Monday evening, when he abruptly left an ongoing G7 summit in Canada to better focus on the Israel–Iran conflict. ‘What a shame, and waste of human life. Simply stated, IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON. I said it over and over again! Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran!’ 

Trump said during his address to the nation on Saturday evening following the strikes that Iran’s nuclear facilities had been ‘obliterated’ and that the country has been backed into a corner and ‘must now make peace.’

‘Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated,’ Trump said. ‘And Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace. If they do not. future attacks would be far greater and a lot easier.’ 

Leavitt added during Thursday’s briefing that Trump is the ‘peacemaker-in-chief,’ while noting that he is also not one to shy from flexing America’s strength. 

‘The president is always interested in a diplomatic solution to the problems in the global conflicts in this world. Again, he is a peacemaker in chief. He is the peace-through-strength president. And so, if there’s a chance for diplomacy, the president’s always going to grab it. But he’s not afraid to use strength as well,’ she said. 

Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for additional comment on the high-level talks but did not immediately receive a reply. 

The chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee said the future of the ongoing conflict involving Iran, Israel and now the United States is ‘really up to Iran to decide.’

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., appeared on ABC’s ‘This Week’ to discuss American strikes against Iran that he said had ‘severely damaged Iran’s critical nuclear infrastructure.’

‘The supreme leader and the ayatollahs in Iran need to understand that President Trump means business,’ Cotton said. 

‘They have a chance to sue for peace here, to dismantle whatever remnants of their nuclear program remain, and to continue to actually survive, because we haven’t targeted the supreme leader, we haven’t targeted their energy infrastructure, we haven’t targeted other critical infrastructure,’ he continued.

‘That’s an implicit message that Iran still has things that they hold dear, that neither the United States nor Israel has struck. Iran needs to heed President Trump’s warning.’

When asked by ABC’s Jonathan Karl whether the U.S. would target Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Cotton said he would not ‘rule any single target in or out,’ but made clear that President Donald Trump ‘does not bluff.’

‘And there are still numerous targets that Iran holds very dear,’ Cotton warned. ‘My message to the supreme leader is: Look at the lessons of history. Do not — do not tempt fate. Do not target Americans. Heed Donald Trump’s warning,’ Cotton said. 

The United States inserted itself into Israel’s war against Iran by dropping multiple ‘bunker-buster’ bombs and firing dozens of missiles at Iranian nuclear facilities Sunday morning local time.

Iran lashed out at the U.S. for crossing ‘a very big red line’ with its strikes.

‘The warmongering and lawless administration in Washington is solely and fully responsible for the dangerous consequences and far-reaching implications of its act of aggression,’ Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said, according to the Associated Press, adding that he would immediately fly to Moscow to coordinate positions with close ally Russia.

Fox News’ Laura Garrison and the Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Russia’s former president said that multiple countries are poised to provide Iran with nuclear warheads after the U.S. launched strikes against three Iranian nuclear facilities.

‘The enrichment of nuclear material — and, now we can say it outright, the future production of nuclear weapons — will continue,’ Dmitry Medvedev, now the deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia, said in a Sunday X post. 

‘A number of countries are ready to directly supply Iran with their own nuclear warheads,’ Medvedev said. 

Medvedev did not list specific countries that might pitch in and support Iran. However, Russia historically has backed Iran’s nuclear program. Russian President Vladimir Putin also offered to mediate peace talks between Iran and Israel on Wednesday. 

Moscow also has offered to intervene and help negotiate a nuclear deal between the U.S. and Iran. 

Moscow was involved in the 2015 Iran deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. The agreement lifted sanctions on Iran in exchange for limits on Iran’s nuclear program, but Trump withdrew from the deal in 2018. 

Medvedev’s comments came after the U.S. launched strikes late Saturday targeting key Iranian nuclear facilities: Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. The mission involved more than 125 U.S. aircraft, including B-2 stealth bombers, according to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine. 

President Donald Trump had said for days that he was deliberating whether he would conduct strikes against those sites. 

The White House and the State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital regarding Medvedev’s statements. 

Meanwhile, Russia’s Foreign Ministry claimed the strikes violated international law and called for an ‘end to aggression.’ 

‘The irresponsible decision to subject the territory of a sovereign state to missile and bomb attacks, whatever the arguments it may be presented with, flagrantly violates international law, the Charter of the United Nations and the resolutions of the United Nations Security Council,’ Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement Sunday. 

Prior to the strikes, Iran cautioned that the U.S. will suffer if it chooses to become involved in the conflict, and previously issued retaliatory strikes against bases where U.S. troops were housed after the U.S. killed a top Iranian general in 2020. 

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told reporters Sunday that the U.S. would work with allies in the region to aid in force protection in the aftermath of the strikes. 

‘We certainly understand the challenges of allies in the region,’ Hegseth said. ‘And, we have been respectful and in working in collaboration with them as it pertains to basing and sensitivities there.’ 

‘Ultimately, they’ve got a lot of assets and people in those locations also where American troops are co-located. So, that’s a consideration of ours.’ 

Nearly two-thirds of Americans support increased engagement in international affairs, according to a newly released annual summer survey from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation & Institute. 

The survey, conducted by polling firms Beacon Research and Shaw & Company Research, marks the third year the Ronald Reagan Institute has conducted a summer survey asking Americans about their attitudes towards foreign policy. It found 64% of Americans overall favor the United States taking a leadership role in international affairs, which is up more than 20% since 2023.

The trend of Americans leaning towards international engagement, as opposed to isolationism, has seen growing support across both parties – even the America-first MAGA wing of the Republican Party, which leads the way with 73% support for greater international involvement, according to the new survey. Meanwhile, 69% of Republicans support the idea, as well as 65% of Democrats, the survey found.

The survey was released less than a day after the Trump administration ordered a massive surprise strike on Iranian nuclear sites in a move designed to cripple Iran’s nuclear weapons infrastructure. Approximately 73% of registered voters questioned in a recent Fox News national survey said they think Iran poses a real security threat to the U.S.

‘Americans are not retreating from the world,’ the survey’s introduction stated. ‘They are rallying around a foreign policy grounded in peace through strength, strong alliances, and morality in foreign policy.’

According to the summer survey, which was conducted before the recent Israeli airstrikes on Iran, 45% of those questioned said they would support Israel conducting targeted airstrikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities if diplomatic efforts between the U.S. and Iran faltered. Meanwhile, 37% said they opposed Israeli airstrikes, while 18% said they were unsure. 

Partisan affiliation, while less of a factor when survey respondents were asked generally whether the United States should lead on the international stage, appeared to play a larger role in opinions about engagement pertaining to Iran. Sixty percent of Republicans said they support Israeli airstrikes, but that support dropped to 35% among Independents and 32% for Democrats.

In addition to attitudes about U.S. leadership in global affairs across the world, the annual summer survey from the Ronald Reagan Institute also covers other foreign policy-related questions pertaining to human rights, trade, defense spending and more.

One question sought to gauge an appetite for ‘territorial expansion.’ President Donald Trump has repeatedly signaled interest in acquiring strategic assets like Greenland and the Panama Canal, while he even floated potentially garnering control of the Gaza Strip amid the area’s ongoing issues with terrorism.

The survey found that 55% of Americans supported pursuing acquisition of the Panama Canal, while 47% supported the move to acquire Greenland. 

However, there is also a severe distinction between Republicans and Democrats on this issue, with most Democrats opposed and a majority of Republicans in favor of territorial expansion. When it comes to the Gaza Strip, only 33% of the survey respondents overall indicated they were in favor of such a move, including 24% of Democrats and 47% of Republicans. 

This year’s summer survey from the Reagan Institute sampled 1,257 adults across the United States between May 27 and June 2. You can see

Senate Majority Leader John Thune is weathering headwinds in his own conference over outstanding concerns in President Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ that threaten to derail the legislation, but he’s taking it in stride and standing firm that the megabill will make it to the president’s desk by July 4.

‘We have to hit it, and you know whether that means it’s the end of next week, or whether we roll into that Fourth of July week,’ the South Dakota Republican told Fox News Digital during an interview from his leadership suite.

‘But if we have to go into that week, we will,’ he continued. ‘I think it’s that important. And you know what I’ve seen around here, at least in the past, my experience, if there’s no deadline, things tend to drag on endlessly.’

Senate Republicans have been working on their version of Trump’s mammoth bill, which includes priorities to make his 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act permanent, sweeping changes to healthcare, Biden-era energy credits and deep spending cuts, among others, since the beginning of June.

Now that each portion of the bill has been released, Thune is eyeing having the bill on the floor by the middle of next week. But, he still has to wrangle disparate factions within the Senate GOP to get on board with the bill.

‘It is a work in progress,’ Thune said. ‘It’s, you know, sometimes it’s kind of incremental baby steps.’

A cohort of fiscal hawks, led by Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., are unhappy with the level of spending cuts in the bill. Some Senate Republicans want to achieve at least $2 trillion in spending cuts over the next decade, but Johnson has remained firm in his belief that the bill should go deeper and return to pre-COVID-19 pandemic spending levels.

Others, including Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, Josh Hawley, R-Mo., and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, are upset with tweaks to Medicaid, and the impact those changes could have on rural hospitals and working people on the healthcare program’s benefit rolls.

Thune has to strike a precarious balancing act to sate the concerns of his conference, given that he can only afford to lose three votes. It’s a reality he acknowledged and described as trying to find ‘the sweet spot’ where he can advance the bill back to the House.

He’s been meeting with the factions individually, communicating with the White House and working to ‘make sure everybody’s rolling in the same direction.’

‘Everybody has different views about how to do that, but in the end, it’s cobbling together the necessary 51 votes, so we’re working with anybody who is offering feedback,’ he said.

Collins and others are working on the side to create a provider relief fund that could offer a salve to the lingering issues about the crackdown on the Medicaid provider rate tax in the bill.

The Senate Finance Committee went further than the House’s freeze of the provider tax rate, or the amount that state Medicaid programs pay to healthcare providers on behalf of Medicaid beneficiaries, for non-Affordable Care Act expansion states, and included a provision that lowers the rate in expansion states annually until it hits 3.5%.

‘We’re going to do everything we can to make sure that, for example, rural hospitals have some additional assistance to sort of smooth that transition,’ Thune said.

Thune, who is a member of the Finance panel, noted that ‘we all agree that the provider tax has been gamed’ and ‘abused’ by blue states like New York and California, and argued that the changes were done to help ‘right the ship’ in the program.

‘I think that’s why the sort of off-ramp, soft-landing approach [from] the Finance committee makes sense, but these are substantial changes,’ he said. ‘But on the other hand, if we don’t start doing some things to reform and strengthen these programs, these programs aren’t going to be around forever, because we’re not going to be able to afford them.’

The Senate’s product won’t be the end of the reconciliation process, however. The changes in the bill will have to be green-lit by the House, and one change in particular to the state and local tax (SALT) deduction cap already has a cohort of blue state House Republicans furious and threatening to kill the bill.

The Senate’s bill, for now, left the cap unchanged at $10,000 from the policy ushered in by Trump’s first-term tax cuts, a figure that Senate Republicans view as a placeholder while negotiations continue.

Indeed, Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., is working with members of the SALT caucus in the House to find a compromise on the cap. But the appetite to keep the House-passed $40,000 cap isn’t strong in the Senate.  

‘The passion in the Senate is as strong as it is in the House against changing the current policy and law in a way that… favors high-tax states to the detriment and disadvantage of low tax states,’ he said. ‘And so it’s the emotion that you see in the House side on that particular issue is matched in the Senate in a different direction.’

Meanwhile, as negotiations continue behind the scenes on ways to address issues among Senate Republicans, the Senate Parliamentarian is currently chunking through each section of the greater ‘big, beautiful bill.’ 

The parliamentarian’s role is to determine whether policies within each section of the bill comport with the Byrd Rule, which is the arcane set of parameters that govern the budget reconciliation process.

Thune has made clear that he would not overrule that parliamentarian on Trump’s megabill, and re-upped that position once more. The reconciliation process gives either party in power the opportunity to pass legislation on party lines and skirt the Senate filibuster, but it has to adhere to the Byrd Rule’s requirements that policy deals with spending and revenue.

However, he countered that Senate Republicans planned to take a page from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., when Democrats rammed former President Joe Biden’s agenda through Congress.

‘The Democrats with the [Inflation Reduction Act] and [American Rescue Plan Act], for that matter, they dramatically expanded the scope of reconciliation and what’s eligible for consideration,’ he said.

‘So, we’ve used that template, and we’re pushing as hard as we can to make sure that it allows us to accomplish our agenda, or at least as much of our agenda as possible, and fit within the parameters of what’s allowed,’ he continued. 

A 50-year fight to put abortion back in the hands of states ended three years ago with the Supreme Court’s landmark Dobbs decision, but the pro-life movement is now grappling with a new reality — abortion remains prevalent.

Since securing the legal victory, abortion opponents’ concentration has become more fragmented as they contend with evidence that abortions have not decreased and could even be on the rise.

Their next big challenges, they say, include neutering the nation’s largest abortion vendor, Planned Parenthood, by targeting its funding. Restricting access to pills that terminate pregnancies is another top priority, as is investing in their preferred political candidates and ballot measures. 

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of SBA Pro-Life America, told Fox News Digital in an interview that Dobbs prompted a ‘revolution,’ but she acknowledged that ‘there is a lot of work to do.’ She noted the Charlotte Lozier Institute found that abortions increased in the year after Dobbs and that at least 1.1 million occurred from July 2023 to June 2024.

‘People can sort of assume or just forget how big a moment [Dobbs] is. . . . It is shaking up and realigning public opinion based on where they really stand, so building consensus,’ Dannenfelser said. ‘It would be false to think that it could happen overnight, and we’re still right in the middle of it.’

She said she feels the prospect of defunding Planned Parenthood through a broader reconciliation bill in Congress is ‘strong.’ The measure would prohibit Medicaid funds for entities that perform abortions outside of rape, incest, and a threat to a mother’s life.

Planned Parenthood said in a statement in May, after the bill passed the Republican-led House, that the provision would eliminate other services besides abortion and could cause about 200 of its roughly 600 locations to shutter.

‘If this bill passes, people will lose access to essential, often lifesaving care — cancer screenings, birth control, STI testing, and yes, abortion,’ the organization said in a statement at the time.

In 2021, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) eliminated a requirement that a customer must appear in person to receive mifepristone, the pill used to end a pregnancy. The pills became available by mail, and they are now being shipped all over the country from various organizations, including to most of the states that have abortion bans in place.

‘The abortion drugs that are being proliferated by big abortion and Planned Parenthood is a direct assault on the sovereignty of states,’ Dannenfelser said, noting that ‘the people of half the states have said this is the pro-life law that we want, so in order to undermine that and press their agenda, the abortion lobby is promoting abortion tourism across state lines.’

Dannenfelser also said her group, which, alongside its campaign fundraising arm, poured $92 million into the 2024 election cycle, is focused on next year’s midterm races. She noted she wants to maintain a ‘trifecta of pro-life administration, House and Senate.’ 

But some of those hoping to eliminate abortion say the current administration could do more to help their bottom line.

President Donald Trump granted clemency when he took office to nearly two dozen activists who were convicted of blocking abortion clinic entrances, and the president often touts that he appointed three justices who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade.

But in terms of the abortion pill, the Trump administration recently moved to dismiss a case in court aiming to tighten FDA restrictions on mifepristone. Trump has vowed to have Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who is openly supportive of abortion access, conduct a study of the pill.

Katie Xavios, the national director of the American Life League, told Fox News Digital that she believes Trump ‘really hasn’t been the staunchest pro-life advocate.’

She said mifepristone distribution has ‘no guardrails.’ Dozens of organizations now offer easy access to the pill. Xavios said abortions-by-mail have become the ‘wild west,’ and that the government would have to work aggressively to contain it at this point.

‘I don’t think we’ll ever see anybody take that away unless we can really get a very truly pro-life person in office,’ Xavios said.

American Life League is a Catholic grassroots organization, and Xavios said one of her group’s efforts is to instill values in children that would lead them to opt against abortion if they were faced with the decision in adulthood.

Dobbs was not the win for her side that people have framed it to be, she said.

‘I think we’re still kind of seeing the reverberations of that a little bit in the movement, where a lot of people are struggling to find a new legal fight,’ Xavios said. ‘But I think the real issue that we’re left with is it doesn’t matter if it’s legal or not if people don’t really respect and value the dignity of the pre-born.’

Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa, backed President Donald Trump’s decision to have the United States attack three of Iran’s most fortified underground nuclear sites amid rapidly escalating tensions in the Middle East and intensifying Israeli and U.S. military operations against Iranian targets. 

Fetterman called the move ‘correct’ in a post on X just minutes after Trump shared the news on Truth Social. 

‘As I’ve long maintained, this was the correct move by @POTUS,’ Fetterman said. ‘Iran is the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism and cannot have nuclear capabilities. I’m grateful for and salute the finest military in the world.’ 

Trump declared the operation a ‘very successful attack’ targeting Iran’s key nuclear sites at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan.

‘We have completed our very successful attack on the three Nuclear sites in Iran, incluidng Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan,’ Trump wrote in the announcement. ‘All planes are now outside of Iran air space. A full payload of BOMBS was dropped on the primary site, Fordow. All planes are safely on their way home. Congratulations to our great American Warriors. There is not another military in the World that could have done this.’

He concluded his statement with a call for de-escalation: ‘NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE! Thank you for your attention to this matter.’

The overnight strike against Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility involved six bunker buster bombs, Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity Saturday night. Additionally, 30 Tomahawk missiles were launched from U.S. submarines in the attacks on Natanz and Isfahan facilities. 

The strike, marking a major escalation in an already volatile landscape, comes after more than a week of strikes by Israel to eradicate Iran’s offensive missile capabilities. 

The extent of the damage caused to Iran’s nuclear infrastructure so far remains unclear. 

Fox News’ Jasmine Baehr contributed to this report.

A top expert on the Iran nuclear program believes the regime’s atomic program has been obliterated by Saturday night’s strikes by the United States.

‘The nuclear program is no longer,’ Jonathan Schanzer, Executive Director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a ‘national security and foreign policy’ think tank, told Fox News Digital.

‘Sources in Israel report with high confidence that this chapter is over. Responsible parties must still remove nuclear materials from the facility in Isfahan. But that appears to be the final page to turn,’ he continued. 

President Donald Trump said during his address on Saturday night that ‘Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.’ 

Fox News reported earlier on that Isfahan was ‘the hardest target,’ according to a senior U.S. official.

‘Everyone was talking about and focused on Fordow, but Isfahan was actually the hardest target,’ the official said on background. The U.S. used B-2 bombers to carry out the mission.

A senior U.S. official also told Fox News that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu communicated after the strikes and that Israel had been informed ahead of time.

Lisa Daftari, Iran expert and Editor-in-Chief of The Foreign Desk, told Fox News Digital, ‘Both Israeli and U.S. officials understand that anything less than total destruction of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure will only result in a temporary pause, not a permanent end. But to truly end Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the U.S. and its allies must commit to a campaign—beyond these targeted strikes—backed by sustained pressure, intelligence, and the credible threat of further action if Iran attempts to rebuild.

‘To ensure the eradication of the regime’s nuclear weapons capability, the U.S. must maintain persistent intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance to detect any attempts by Iran’s regime to disperse, hide or rebuild its nuclear infrastructure. This would be coupled with continued diplomatic isolation and strict multilateral sanctions blocking the regime’s access to nuclear technology, materials and financing,’ she said.

Trump announced that the U.S. had struck nuclear sites in Iran – a major development amid rising tensions in the region, as Israel and Iran continued to launch airstrikes against each other.

‘We have completed our very successful attack on the three Nuclear sites in Iran, including Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan. All planes are now outside of Iran air space. A full payload of BOMBS was dropped on the primary site, Fordow,’ Trump posted to Truth Social on Saturday night.

‘All planes are safely on their way home. Congratulations to our great American Warriors. There is not another military in the World that could have done this. NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE! Thank you for your attention to this matter,’ he continued.

Fox News’ Sean Hannity said on Saturday night that President Donald Trump had given him details on the U.S. strikes in Iran. According to the ‘Hannity’ host, the U.S. used six bunker-buster bombs — each of which weighs 15 tons — in its strikes on Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility. The bombs were dropped from American B-2 stealth bombers.

During a press conference on Sunday morning, the number of bunker busters used was updated to 14 by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan Caine.

‘President Trump took decisive leadership and action to eliminate the last vestiges of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, after Israel’s sustained strikes, which seriously damaged the atomic weapons supply chain from uranium conversion to enrichment, and all the way to weaponization,’ Andrea Stricker, FDD’s Director of Nonproliferation and Biological Weapons told Fox News Digital. 

‘While Tehran’s program is likely set back by years, the United States and Israel need to ensure the regime’s highly enriched uranium stockpiles and all secret advanced centrifuges are fully recovered and destroyed — which means more work ahead,’ she added.

Fordow had two entrances and one ventilation shaft, which likely served as the entrance points for the Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPs).

Additionally, 30 Tomahawk missiles launched from U.S. submarines were used in the attacks on the Nanatz and Isfahan facilities. There is speculation that the missiles were shot from an Ohio Class Submarine, but there has been no confirmation.

Fox News’ Jennifer Griffin contributed to this report.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., was delivering remarks at a ‘Fighting Oligarchy’ rally in Tusla, Okla., on Saturday night when President Donald Trump announced the United States had successfully attacked three nuclear sites in Iran. 

An aide interrupted Sanders’ remarks to deliver the message Trump had just blasted off on Truth Social. 

‘We have completed our very successful attack on the three Nuclear sites in Iran, including Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan,’ Trump said in the post. 

Sanders read the piece of paper with Trump’s Truth Social post to his supporters, shaking his head as the socialist senator processed what the president had just announced. ‘No more wars!’ the crowd chanted. 

Trump added in the post: ‘All planes are now outside of Iran air space. A full payload of BOMBS was dropped on the primary site, Fordow. All planes are safely on their way home. Congratulations to our great American Warriors. There is not another military in the World that could have done this. NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE! Thank you for your attention to this matter.’

Sanders nodded along as the crowd continued to chant, ‘No more wars!’ before responding to the news in real time. 

He said the news was not only ‘alarming,’ but ‘so grossly unconstitutional.’

‘All of you know that the only entity that can take this country to war is the U.S. Congress. The president does not have the right,’ Sanders shouted. 

Sanders joins the bipartisan coalition in Congress who have called out the ‘unconstitutionality’ of Trump striking Iran without congressional approval. 

A bipartisan War Powers Resolution was introduced in the House of Representatives this week as strikes between Israel and Iran raged on, and the world stood by to see if Trump would strike. Congress has the sole power to declare war under Article I of the Constitution. 

The War Powers Resolution seeks to ‘remove United States Armed Forces from unauthorized hostilities in the Islamic State of Iran’ and directs Trump to ‘terminate’ the deployment of American troops against Iran without an ‘authorized declaration of war or specific authorization for use of military forces against Iran.’

‘The American people do not want more war, more death!’ Sanders said. ‘It might be a good idea if we concentrated on the problems that exist in Oklahoma and Vermont rather than getting involved in another war that the American people do not want.’

But Sanders told the crowd not to give up on their vision for America’s future. 

‘In this moment in American history, what we have got to do in Vermont and Oklahoma, in Texas, all over this country, is stand up and fight back, and tell them this is our country!’ Sanders said. 

Sanders has been a vocal opponent of the United States joining Israel in its war against Iran as Trump weighed striking its nuclear facilities. 

‘Netanyahu is not the President of the United States,’ Sanders said on social media earlier this week. 

‘He should not be determining U.S. foreign and military policy. If the people of Israel support his decision to start a war with Iran, that is their business and their war. The United States must not be a part of it,’ he added. 

The democratic socialist has been a vocal opponent of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war against Gaza since Israel retaliated following Hamas’ terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023. 

After Israel launched preemptive strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities last week, Sanders said it was ‘just his latest violation of international law,’ likening Netanyahu to a ‘war criminal.’

The Vermont senator was speaking at his second rally of the day, part of his southern swing of the ‘Fighting Oligarchy’ tour that Sanders started in response to Trump’s sweeping second-term agenda. 

Rep. Greg Casar, D-Tx., and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Tx., are slated to join the Vermont senator at his rallies in Texas on Sunday. 

And Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., joined Sanders on his Western swing of the tour earlier this year. 

The tour targets deep red districts currently held by Republicans, a strategy picked up by Gov. Tim Walz, D-Minn., who hosted town halls in Republican congressional districts, and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) through their ‘People’s Town Halls’ across the United States. 

Sanders also held a rally in House Speaker Mike Johnson’s hometown of Shreveport, La., on Saturday.