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Rep. Andy Barr, R-Ky., is officially entering the race to replace longtime retiring Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

Barr, who has served in the House for over a decade, is expected to kick off his campaign in Richmond, Kentucky this evening.

He’s also releasing a video to launch the campaign that paints him as a staunch ally of President Donald Trump and a fierce opponent of ‘woke’ trends on diversity, transgender inclusion, and U.S. energy dominance.

‘The United States is the greatest country on Earth, and it’s not even close. But here’s the problem. The woke left wants to neuter America – literally,’ the Kentucky Republican said in the video. 

‘They hate our values. They hate our history. And goodness knows they hate President Trump. But here in Kentucky, that’s why we love him. I’m Andy Barr, and I’m running for Senate to help our President save this great country.’

His candidacy sets up a high-profile primary race against former Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron.

In the video, Barr promised to ‘deport illegal aliens, instead of putting them up in luxury hotels,’ and ‘get rid of this anti-coal, do-gooder ESG garbage once and for all.’

‘Working with President Trump, I’ll fight to create jobs for hardworking Kentuckians, instead of warm and fuzzies for hardcore liberals,’ Barr said in the video. ‘And as a dad, let me be clear. I’ll fight to lock up the sickos who allow biological men to share locker rooms with our daughters.’

His Senate campaign has also been blessed by House GOP leaders, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., and House Republican Leadership Chair Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y.

‘There is no bigger supporter of President Donald J. Trump and our MAGA movement than my dear friend Andy Barr,’ Scalise told Fox News Digital. ‘I am all-in for Andy in his campaign for the US Senate — proud to support him.’

Stefanik said, ‘I am proud to call Andy a friend and I wholeheartedly endorse his campaign for US Senate. Kentucky needs a Senator who stands 100% with President Trump — that my friend, Andy Barr.’

Barr said their support ‘is a strong signal to all Kentuckians that there is only one America First candidate in this race — and only one candidate with a proven record of getting our America First agenda across the finish line.’

The conservative lawmaker has been known as a reliable leadership ally in the House and serves as chair of the House Financial Services Committee’s subcommittee on financial institutions.

He’s also a leader of several groups in the House, including the Congressional Taiwan Caucus, the Congressional Bourbon Caucus, and the American Worker Task Force.

McConnell is the longest-serving senator in Kentucky history and the longest-serving party leader in the upper chamber, only stepping down from leading the Senate GOP conference at the end of last year.

His final years in office have been marked by his rocky relationship with Trump, who has called for an end to McConnell’s political career on multiple occasions.

Trump and McConnell have also broken on matters of foreign policy and defense. McConnell opposed two major Trump nominees in the national security sphere, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and Pentagon Secretary Pete Hegseth.

McConnell also opposed Trump’s Health and Human Services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Barr and Cameron’s campaigns are a stark departure from that – both have painted themselves as staunch Trump allies.

Kentucky businessman Nate Morris is also expected to announce a Republican bid for the seat.

And in Kentucky, where Trump outran former Vice President Kamala Harris by roughly 30%, the president’s endorsement will likely prove decisive.

When reached for comment on Barr’s campaign, Cameron’s campaign general consultant Brandon Moody hammered the House lawmaker.

‘The great Andy Barr re-brand is on as he now will try and convince Kentucky he’s actually conservative and MAGA. He’s not. Voters know he went Washington and sold out Kentucky long ago,’ Moody said.

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Counsel representing a coalition of parents fighting for the choice to opt their children out of LGBTQ-related curriculum says the case is about letting parents ‘be the parents.’

‘We’re just saying if the school board is going to make that decision, let us have the chance to leave the classroom,’ Colten Stanberry, counsel at Becket and attorney for the parents bringing the suit, told Fox News Digital. ‘And so I think for my parent clients, they’re saying let us be the parents. Keep us involved in the school decision-making process. Don’t try to cut us out.’

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday in parents’ fight to opt their children out of LGBTQ-related curriculum. 

The issue at hand in the case, Mahmoud v. Taylor, is whether parents have a right to be informed about and to then opt their children out of reading books in elementary schools that conflict with their faith.

‘Our case is not a book ban case,’ Stanberry emphasized.

‘We’re not saying that these books can’t be on the shelves. We’re saying we want to be out of the class,’ Stanberry continued. ‘And we’re also not saying that teachers can’t teach this material.’

A coalition of Jewish, Christian and Muslim parents with elementary school children in Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland brought suit against the school board after it introduced new LGBTQ books into the curriculum as part of the district’s ‘inclusivity’ initiative. The curriculum change came after the state of Maryland enacted regulations seeking to promote ‘educational equity,’ according to the petitioner’s brief filed with the high court.

The school board introduced books that featured transgender and non-binary characters and storylines, according to the brief. 

The parents’ coalition stated in its brief that the Board ‘initially honored parental opt-outs in accordance with its own Guidelines and Maryland law’ after parents raised concerns over the new curriculum. After the board issued a public statement in line with this stance, the petitioners stated that the board ‘reversed course’ without prior notice. 

‘Without explanation, it announced that beginning with the 2023-2024 school year, ‘[s]tudents and families may not choose to opt out’ and will not be informed when ‘books are read,’’ the brief reads. 

The parents sued the school board, arguing that the denial of notice and opt-outs ‘violated the Free Exercise Clause by overriding their freedom to direct the religious upbringing of their children and by burdening their religious exercise via policies that are not neutral or generally applicable,’ petitioners wrote. 

The parents cited Wisconsin v. Yoder, a 1972 Supreme Court case, to support their argument. In Yoder, the Court held that a state law requiring children to attend school past eighth grade violated the parents’ constitutional rights under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to direct their children’s religious upbringings.

Stanberry says that while this case is much narrower than Yoder, the issue at hand is ‘a right parents have had from the Supreme Court for over 50 years.’ 

The school board argued in its brief, ‘The record contains no evidence that teachers have been or will be ‘directed’ or ‘instructed’ to inject any views about gender or sexuality into classroom discussions about the storybooks.’ 

The school board writes that the storybooks were ‘offered as an option for literature circles, book clubs, or reading groups; or used for read-alouds.’ 

‘Teachers are not required to use any of the storybooks in any given lesson, and were not provided any associated mandatory discussion points, classroom activities, or assignments,’ the brief continued. 

The lower court denied the parents’ motion, finding that they could not show ”that the no-opt-out policy burdens their religious exercise.”

On appeal to the Fourth Circuit, the appeals court affirmed the district court’s decision, with the majority holding that the parents had not shown how the policy violated the First Amendment.

Despite the lower court proceedings, Stanberry shared they are ‘hopeful and excited’ as the high court considers the case. 

‘We think this court will really consider the case,’ Stanberry said ahead of Tuesday’s arguments. ‘Obviously, I don’t have a crystal ball. I can’t predict how it’s going to come out, but we’re feeling good going into it.’ 

In a statement to Fox News Digital, the school board said its policy ‘is grounded in our commitment to provide an appropriate classroom environment for all of our students,’ saying the board believes ‘a curriculum that fosters respect for people of different backgrounds does not burden the free exercise of religion.’ 

‘Based on established law, as discussed in our brief and by our counsel at today’s argument, we believe the Supreme Court can and should affirm the lower courts’ rulings,’ Liliana LópezPublic Information Officer for the public schools, said. ‘Regardless of the outcome, we are grateful for the opportunity to have our case heard by the highest court in the land. We await the Court’s decision.’

The case comes at a time when President Donald Trump and his administration have prioritized educational and DEI-related reform upon starting his second term. The Supreme Court has notably also heard oral arguments this past term in other religious liberty and gender-related suits. 

‘I think that this case could be seen as people of faith coming forward and saying, ‘Hey, we want to be accommodated in this pluralistic society. So, I think it’s coming at an opportune moment,’ Stanberry said. 

The Supreme Court agreed to hear the case in mid-January during its 2024-2025 term.

Fox News’ Bill Mears, Shannon Bream, and Kristine Parks contributed to this report. 

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With President Donald Trump back in the White House and the final rollout of federal REAL ID requirements set to take effect in May, many of the loudest privacy advocates in Washington have been largely silent.

While privacy-minded lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have spent years blasting voter-ID laws and TSA facial recognition tools, among other measures, few are raising alarms over the Trump administration’s looming implementation of the REAL ID Act — a law passed in 2005 that critics describe as a national identification system.

Some of the privacy-hawk lawmakers remaining silent on REAL ID were very vocal when another expansion of the national security surveillance apparatus came about – the Patriot Act of 2001 – but not so when the U.S. is only days away from REAL ID implementation.

Sens. Edward Markey, D-Mass., Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., were all in Congress when the Patriot Act faced ultimately-successful renewal in 2010s and when the 2020 bill amending and reauthorizing the related Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court came up for a vote.

‘Congress has a duty to safeguard Americans’ privacy, but the USA Freedom Reauthorization Act fails to adequately limit the types of information that the government can collect about Americans, and it fails to adequately limit how long the government can keep the information it collects about us,’ Markey said in a 2020 statement objecting to the FISA renewal.

‘I am unwilling to grant any president surveillance tools that pose such a high risk to Americans’ civil liberties,’ he said.

In 2011, Merkley was one of eight senators who voted to prevent the Patriot Act renewal from even coming to the floor for debate, according to Oregon Live.

His Beaver State colleague, Wyden, ultimately voted to allow debate, but said on the Senate floor during such discourse that it needs to be potentially reconsidered.

‘The Patriot Act was passed a decade ago during a period of understandable fear,’ Wyden said at the time.

‘Now is the time to revisit this… and ensure that a better job is done of striking that balance between fighting terror and protecting individual liberty.’

Merkley expressed concern at the time about the Patriot Act’s ability to let law enforcement collect many types of personal data like emails and phone records.

In order to get a REAL ID, licensees must provide their Social Security number and other documentation.

While the REAL ID implementation was delayed 20 years by several factors including COVID-19, Merkley cast a ‘protest vote’ at the time of the Patriot Act renewal that a four-year extension of the post-9/11 act was being put forth without sufficient time for debate.

In 2005, Wyden also gave a Senate floor speech opposing the first reauthorization of the Patriot Act.

Markey did not respond to multiple requests for comment, left at his Washington and Boston offices. Merkley also did not respond to a request for comment.

A representative for Wyden acknowledged Fox News Digital’s comment request, but said the Oregonian was traveling and holding town halls with constituents back home and could not be immediately reached.

On his senatorial webpage, Wyden offered a rundown of all his comprehensive actions in favor of privacy, as well as ‘le[ading] the fight to address the Intelligence Community’s reliance on secret interpretations of surveillance law.’

‘When the American people find out how their government has secretly interpreted the Patriot Act, they will be stunned and they will be angry,’ he said in 2011.

Wyden was also outraged in 2013 when the NSA was found to be secretly interpreting the act to collect personal data of millions of Americans without a warrant.

In a statement to Fox News Digital on privacy concerns with REAL ID, Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said REAL IDs rightly ‘make identification harder to forge, thwarting criminals and terrorists.’

‘Eighty-one percent of air travelers [already] hold REAL ID-compliant or acceptable IDs,’ McLaughlin said.

‘DHS will continue to collaborate with state, local, and airport authorities to inform the public, facilitate compliance, curb wait times and prevent fraud.’

Fox News also reached out for comment to a bipartisan series of lawmakers who have been party to pro-privacy bills or taken pro-privacy stances in the past, including Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.

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U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi on Tuesday hosted Cabinet officials from across the Trump administration for the first meeting of a new interagency task force aimed at eradicating ‘anti-Christian bias’ within the federal government. 

During Tuesday’s meeting, Bondi described the task force as one aimed at remedying the ‘abuse’ under the Biden-led Justice Department and at other federal agencies prior to Trump’s second presidential term.

‘As President Donald Trump has stated, the Biden administration engaged in an egregious pattern of targeting peaceful Christians while ignoring violent, anti-Christian offenses,’ Bondi told a small group of reporters. ‘The president is right.’ 

Bondi was joined Tuesday by a long list of senior Cabinet officials from across the federal government, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, FBI Director Kash Patel, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Other senior agency officials were also present. 

Bondi also used the meeting to highlight some of the actions the Trump administration has taken to crack down on anti-Christian biases.

To date, the Justice Department has dropped three ongoing cases against pro-lifers and ‘redefined the FACE Act’ to help protect against what Bondi and others have described as the weaponization of pro-life groups and others.

Ultimately, ‘the First Amendment isn’t just the line in the Constitution. It’s the cornerstone of our American memory,’ Bondi said. ‘It guarantees every citizen the right to speak freely, worship freely, and live according to their conscience without government interference. Protecting Christians from bias is not favoritism. It’s upholding the rule of law and fulfilling the constitutional promise.’

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the group planned to use the meeting to hear from individuals who had been harmed as a result of ‘anti-Christian sentiment’ under the Biden administration, and the various ways this bias may have shown up in their departments or agencies. 

That part of the meeting was closed to the press.

Shortly before reporters were escorted from the room, Fox News asked the Department of Justice officials and other members of the task force whether they would share any examples of the anti-Christian bias within their agencies or any of the personal stories that they planned to touch on in the closed-door portion of the meeting.

The officials in attendance did not immediately answer the question, and Justice Department officials told Fox News and other reporters present that they would circulate more information after the meeting.  

Trump first created the task force via an executive order in February, with the goal of rooting out ‘anti-Christian targeting and discrimination’ within the government.

The president also selected Bondi to head up the task force — whom he praised as someone he trusted to ‘fully prosecute anti-Christian violence and vandalism in our society.’

The task force’s first meeting comes just days after Politico reported that the Trump administration sent an internal cable to State Department employees ordering them to report any instances of coworkers displaying ‘anti-Christian bias’ as part of the task force initiative.

The internal cable encouraged employees to share information via a tip form, noting that their responses could be kept anonymous, and was reportedly sent to embassies around the world, as well as the department headquarters in D.C.

‘Biden’s Department of Justice abused and targeted Christians,’ Trump said earlier this year. ‘Pro-life Christians were arrested and imprisoned for peacefully praying outside abortion clinics… NO MORE!’

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Justices Samuel Alito and Sonia Sotomayor snapped at each other during Tuesday’s arguments over parental rights in LGBTQ curriculum after the liberal justice attempted to jump back into the questioning as Alito was speaking. 

The short quarrel happened as the high court listened to arguments in Mahmoud v. Taylor, in which a coalition of parents sought to solidify the right to be informed about and opt their children out of reading LGBTQ-related material in elementary schools — which they argue conflicts with their faith.

‘There is a growing heat to the exchanges between the justices. Sotomayor just tried to disagree with Alito’s portrayal and Alito pushed back and asked to allow him to finish,’ Fox News contributor Jonathan Turley observed on X.  

Sotomayor initially asked Mahmoud attorney Eric Baxter about a particular book titled ‘Uncle Bobby’s Wedding’ that included a same-sex relationship storyline and whether exposure to same-sex relationships in children’s books could be considered coercion.

‘Our parents would object to that,’ Baxter responded. 

Sotomayor continued with her line of questioning to further clarify Baxter’s objection to the books. Baxter stated, ‘Our objections would be even to reading books that violate our client’s religious beliefs.’

Alito then jumped in with additional questions related to the book.

‘I’ve read that book as well as a lot of these other books,’ Alito began. ‘Do you think it’s fair to say that all that is done in ‘Uncle Bobby’s Wedding’ is to expose children to the fact that there are men who marry other men?’

Baxter objected to Alito’s question. Alito then said that while the book ‘has a clear message and a lot of people think it’s a good message,’ some with ‘traditional religious beliefs don’t agree with’ it.

As Alito continued with his explanation, Sotomayor jumped in.

‘What a minute. The reservation is—’ Sotomayor began. 

‘Can I finish?’ Alito said. 

‘It has a clear moral message, and it may be a good message. It’s just a message that a lot of religious people disagree with,’ Alito finished.

As arguments wrapped, the Supreme Court appeared inclined to agree with the parents.

A coalition of Jewish, Christian and Muslim parents with elementary school children in Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland brought suit against the school board after it introduced new LGBTQ books into the curriculum as part of the district’s ‘inclusivity’ initiative. 

The curriculum change came after the state of Maryland enacted regulations seeking to promote ‘educational equity,’ according to the petitioner’s brief filed with the high court.

The parents lost both at the district court and the appellate level. The Fourth Circuit held that the parents had not shown how the policy violated the First Amendment.

The case comes at a time when President Donald Trump and his administration have prioritized educational and DEI-related reform upon starting his second term. The Supreme Court has notably also heard oral arguments this past term in other religious liberty and gender-related suits. 

The high court heard oral arguments earlier this month in a suit brought by a Wisconsin-based Catholic charity group’s bid for tax relief. The decision could alter the current eligibility requirements for religious tax exemptions. 

Fox News’ Bill Mears, Shannon Bream, and David Spunt contributed to this report. 

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Rep. Dan Meuser, a Pennsylvania Republican, is supporting the White House’s proposed tax hike for people making more than $1 million. 

‘I believe we must help the President deliver on his promise of a tax and regulatory plan that supports pro-American economic and manufacturing growth, and delivers for the vast majority of Americans – while creating savings and promoting fiscal responsibility. Any adjustments in taxes to accomplish these goals should be considered,’ Meuser told Fox News Digital in a statement on Tuesday. 

Last week, White House aides began quietly floating a proposal to House Republicans that would raise the tax rate to 40% for Americans making more than $1 million, sources told Fox News Digital about the preliminary discussions. The plan would shore up income to fund President Donald Trump’s ambitious campaign promises to eliminate taxes on overtime, tips and Social Security.

On Thursday, Meuser said on ‘Mornings with Maria’ that he suggested a less than 2% tax hike for the ‘wealthy, high-end income’ tax bracket months ago. He noted that Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act lowered the top tax rate from 39.6% to 37%, so raising it to 38.6% would still keep it below the pre-TCJA level by nearly one percentage point.

‘We’re fighting for small business. We’re fighting for all of America and for the job creators that might be in those categories. So, if you were to bring it up by 1 point, it brings $15 billion in revenues, right? Without any elasticity, which could take place. So, if it did come up to 39[%], it’s almost $25 billion,’ Meuser said, touting the billions in revenue that a small tax hike could reap for the economy. 

The Pennsylvania Republican, who joined Trump on the 2024 campaign trail and is considered a potential candidate to challenge Gov. Josh Shapiro in 2026, stressed Trump’s all-of-the-above tax approach.

‘The president is determined not to have a standard – and this is my view, from what I’ve based upon him, I’m not putting in words in his mouth – a standard Republican-style budget. What he wants to see is something that is in the interest of all America, middle-income America, small businesses, and by the way, we would be talking about an exemption for pass-through small businesses so they would not be paying at the higher rate, as they do now, at their income level rate,’ Meuser said. 

While Meuser has indicated his warmth to the idea of tax hikes for the ultra-wealthy, other conservatives have remained steadfast in their rejection of any tax increases. 

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., told Fox News Digital last week that tax cuts are ‘what Republicans are good at’ as he urged his fellow Republicans to protect tax cuts for working-class Americans who fuel Trump’s base. More Republicans, including Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota and Rep. Tom Tiffany of Wisconsin are pushing to make Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent, which is considered a Republican priority during budget negotiations. 

Former Vice President Mike Pence, who refers to the 2017 tax cuts as the ‘Trump-Pence tax cuts,’ last week urged House Republicans to stand firm against raising taxes on the country’s top earners and make the 2017 tax cuts permanent. 

Advancing American Freedom, Pence’s conservative policy advocacy group, sent a letter to congressional Republicans, including House Ways and Means Committee Chair Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., and Senate Finance Committee Chair Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, last week, urging Congress to ‘stand firm against tax hikes.’

Fox News Digital’s Elizabeth Elkind contributed to this report.

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A federal judge ordered the restoration of Voice of America (VoA) on Tuesday, the federally-funded state media network that the White House dismantled earlier this spring.

Judge Royce Lamberth ruled in favor of the plaintiff’s request for a preliminary injunction, though the Trump administration is allowed to appeal the decision.

The plaintiffs asked the court to ‘cancel the orders putting approximately 1,300 VOA employees on administrative leave’ and to ‘cancel the termination of contracts with approximately 500 personal service contractors (PSCs) with VOA, cease dismantling VOA, and restore VOA’s personnel and operating capacities.’

President Donald Trump dismantled the news agency through an executive order (EO) in March, claiming that VoA promoted biased reporting.

‘The non-statutory components and functions of the following governmental entities shall be eliminated to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law, and such entities shall reduce the performance of their statutory functions and associated personnel to the minimum presence and function required by law,’ the EO stated. 

The EO also dismantled VoA’s parent company, the United States Agency for Global Media, as well as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. 

‘Voice of America has been out of step with America for years. It serves as the Voice for Radical America and has pushed divisive propaganda for years now,’ a senior White House official told Fox News Digital at the time.

On Mar. 22, VoA employees filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration and Kari Lake, who serves as the special advisor to the United States Agency for Global Media.

‘In many parts of the world, a crucial source of objective news is gone, and only censored state-sponsored news media is left to fill the void,’ the lawsuit reads.

‘The second Trump administration has taken a chainsaw to the agency as a whole in an attempt to shutter it completely,’ the suit stated.

Fox News Digital’s Emma Colton and Hanna Panreck contributed to this report.

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Chipotle Mexican Grill will open its first location in Mexico early next year as the latest stage in its international expansion.

The company announced Monday that it has signed a development agreement with Alsea, which operates Latin American and European locations of Starbucks, Domino’s Pizza and Burger King, among other chains.

After the initial restaurant opens in 2026, Chipotle plans to explore “additional expansion markets in the region,” which could mean broader Latin American development.

The deal to expand in Mexico comes as President Donald Trump wages a trade war with the country, straining the relationship between the two neighbors. Avocados from Mexico were originally subject to a 25% tariff until he paused new duties on goods compliant with the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. While Chipotle has diversified its avocado sourcing in recent years, it still imports about half of its avocados from Mexico.

In recent years, Chipotle has been trying to expand internationally, after decades focusing almost entirely on its U.S. business. The company operates 58 locations in Canada, 20 in the United Kingdom, six in France and two in Germany. Chipotle also currently has three restaurants in Kuwait and two in the United Arab Emirates through a deal with Alshaya Group.

Chipotle is betting that Mexico’s familiarity with its ingredients and appreciation for fresh food will win over consumers, according to a statement from Nate Lawton, Chipotle’s chief business development officer.

But U.S. interpretations of Mexican food don’t always resonate in the market; Yum Brands’ Taco Bell has twice attempted to expand into Mexico, but both efforts failed quickly.

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RTX and GE Aerospace expect a more than $1 billion impact combined from President Donald Trump’s tariffs on imported goods and materials, the latest sign of higher prices for major U.S. manufacturers that rely on a global supply chain.

Neil Mitchill, chief financial officer of defense contractor and commercial aerospace supplier RTX, said on an earnings call Tuesday that the company will likely take a $850 million hit this year from tariffs, including the sweeping 10% levies that Trump imposed earlier this month alongside higher duties on countries like China and separate taxes on imported steel and aluminum.

That estimate doesn’t include RTX’s own tariff mitigation measures, Mitchill said.

GE Aerospace, which makes engines for popular Boeing and Airbus planes, kept its 2025 earnings outlook in place during its quarterly report Tuesday and said it would seek to save about $500 million by cutting costs and raising prices.

GE Aerospace CEO Larry Culp said on Tuesday’s analyst call that he recently met with Trump and discussed the U.S. aerospace sector’s trade surplus. GE has a joint venture with France’s Safran to make popular airplane engines.

The new tariffs are a shift for a global industry that has enjoyed mostly duty-free trade for decades.

“All we have suggested is the administration works through a myriad of issues, is they can consider the position of strength that the country enjoys as a result of this tariff-free regime,” Culp said.

The White House didn’t immediately comment.

Boeing, a major customer of both companies and the top U.S. exporter, is scheduled to report quarterly results before the market opens on Wednesday.

Airlines have recently announced cuts to U.S. domestic capacity plans this year because of softer demand, but executives have emphasized it is hard to predict the direction of the economy or future trade policies. United last week provided two earnings outlooks for 2025, one in the event of a recession, one assuming status quo.

“There is uncertainty,” Culp said Tuesday. “None of us, I think, know for sure how this plays out.”

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“One more trip,” he says. “And then I’ll stop.”

He’s a fisherman by trade, born and raised in the coastal city of Manta — a place once known for tuna and tranquility. But these days, the fish are harder to find. The trips are longer. And the money, he says, just isn’t there anymore.

“As a fisherman, in a month you can make $300,” he says. “But with the drug, the white one… that’s the money, brother!”

One trip, running cocaine by sea to Mexico, pays $60,000, he says. Half up front. Half when you make it back alive. “I think that if I get one more trip, I would go, to try my luck,” he says, adding he wants to buy his mother a house. “And then I’ll stop.”

He agrees to take us out — not on a drug run, but to show us how it’s done. The routes, the tactics, the escape paths. He asks that we not use his name or show his face.

If this was his one last trip, he says he would have dozens of black sacks of cocaine — worth an estimated $500,000 in Ecuador but as much as $5 million on US streets, he says — hidden beneath the false floors of “pregnant” speedboats he and three others power across the Pacific. “We leave from here to get to one point over there in Mexico, where there’s a boat waiting for us. We don’t enter a port,” he explains.

Once the drop is made, they head back to Ecuador, this time with a cargo of fish as a cover story. “If I come back with nothing,” he says, “the people will quickly realize one is involved in something that’s not good.”

The fisherman says he isn’t proud of what he does. And he knows the risks: rough waters, failing engines, criminal rivalries, and coast guard patrols. “If we are stopped, we lose everything… we don’t know if they stop us to rob us or kill us.”

Still, he goes, moving with a youthful energy in his voice and a face weathered by decades at sea. They carry just enough to last: food, water, energy bars — “six sacks of supplies,” he says.

Now in his late 50s, he says fear doesn’t stop him. “Fear, only towards God,” he says. “I know it’s a crime. I know it goes against God… but I have to support my mother.”

She runs a small evangelical church and pleads with him not to go. “‘Don’t be involved in that,’ she tells me. But I tell her, ‘Mom, you can’t clean anymore… I’m the one who needs to care for you,’” he says.

When we meet him, the sun is dipping behind the Pacific. The dock is alive with fishing boats weaving between larger vessels anchored offshore. The water glows in the orange light and the air is thick with the sharp smell of gasoline.

As we pull away, another boat full of police officers drifts past. The fisherman smiles and waves, confidently.

The officers wave back.

Patrolling a paradise under siege

Several hundred miles from the Ecuadorian mainland, the waters off the Galápagos Islands glisten with postcard beauty. But this stretch of the Pacific has become a critical corridor in the cocaine trade — and a battleground in Ecuador’s fight against it.

“The area where drugs are smuggled is about 200 miles off the shore… right by the limits of the Galápagos exclusive economic zone with the high seas,” he says.

It’s only March, and already his crew has seized six tons of cocaine. “Last year, we caught 15 tons,” he adds — noting this year’s pace, if sustained, could nearly double last year’s haul.

The captain says their first responsibility is saving lives at sea — shipwrecks, distress calls, rescue operations. But close behind is the fight against organized crime.

“What’s happening is the boats (the drug runners) are using are not massive, so they need to refuel. Some of these refueling stations are in Galápagos, and they then continue onto Central America,” he explains. “That’s why our navy is looking for the fuel… because it’s one of the ways the narco-traffickers move drugs.”

What officials call the “gas stations at sea” look like fishing boats — nets tossed off the sides, poles out for show — but they’re part of a vast narco-logistics network. Quietly stationed near the Galápagos Islands, each contains up to 40 large canisters of fuel to supply the high-speed boats running cocaine north toward Mexico and the United States.

The strategy is simple: stay just outside Ecuador’s territorial waters, avoid major patrol routes, and supply the drug runners as they go. If they’re not intercepted, the vessels link up mid-ocean — often under cover of night — and continue their journey, undetected.

It’s a supply chain built for stealth — and for speed. And it’s helping fuel a wave of cartel-driven violence that’s turned Ecuador’s coastal cities into some of the deadliest in Latin America.

‘Our fishermen are mules not traffickers’

Many of those who take these trips never return.

In a modest home near the port, more than two dozen women crowd into Solanda Bermello’s living room — mothers, wives, and sisters of men who were arrested abroad or simply never came home. Some hold photographs. Others clutch letters, hoping someone might deliver them to husbands or sons locked up overseas.

Bermello founded the Association of Mothers and Wives of Fishermen Detained in Other Countries nine years ago — after her own son was caught running drugs and imprisoned. Today, she says the group includes 380 members and they’ve documented more than 2,000 cases in Mexico, Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the United States since January 2024.

“We’ve sent letters to all those countries,” she says, pleading for repatriation of their loved ones.

Many don’t know where their relatives are being held or even if they’re still alive.

“Our fishermen are not drug traffickers,” Bermello says. “They are drug trafficking mules. Unfortunately, they are offered an amount of money that is so large for them… but at times they do not collect any of that money because they end up in prison and leave their families adrift and their children fatherless.”

She says economic desperation, not ambition, is what drives them. “They are not drug traffickers,” she repeats. “Unfortunately, they do it because of the economic situation in the country — we don’t have money, we don’t have work, we don’t have a way to subsist.”

Even those trying to fish legally, she says, aren’t safe. “Our fishermen are robbed by pirates. Not even making an honest living is possible.”

She supports the idea of a US security presence returning to a nearby military base, vacated in 2009 after Ecuador banned foreign troops on its soil. “The US used to help us,” she says. “We need that again.”

Newly re-elected president seeks help

The streets of Ecuador’s coastal cities are soaked in blood. In just the first few months of 2025, more than 2,500 homicides have been recorded according to national police statistics — on pace to make this the deadliest year in the country’s history. InSight Crime, an organization that tracks and investigates crime in the Americas, now ranks Ecuador as having the highest homicide rate in Latin America.

The surge in violence is fueled by a complex web of transnational crime: drug trafficking routes, turf wars, and brutal alliances between local gangs and foreign cartels. Ecuador’s location between Peru and Colombia, top producers of cocaine, and its efficient transport and export network has made it attractive to traffickers.

It’s a crisis unfolding beyond its borders but with real consequences for the US — from the cocaine flooding into American cities to the migration pressures reshaping its southern border.

“There are plans,” he said. “We had conversations, we had a plan, we had options… and now we just need another meeting, post-election, to consolidate it.”

But Noboa insists this won’t mean American boots patrolling Ecuadorian streets. “The control of the operations will be in the hands of our military and our police,” he said. US forces, he explained, would play a support role — focused on monitoring illegal operations and reinforcing Ecuador’s ability to stop them before they reach open waters.

Noboa, who was born and educated in the United States, has pushed to revive Ecuador’s cooperation with Washington across multiple fronts, including security, trade, and migration. He says he wants to fix conditions at home to keep Ecuadorians from fleeing north, while also stepping up efforts to intercept drug flows bound for the US.

He’s even expressed willingness to reform Ecuador’s constitution — potentially allowing for the formal return of a US military presence, like the one that existed from 1999 to 2009 at the now-defunct Manta Air Base.

“That would help to keep peace,” Noboa said. “Like we had in the past.”

As he heads into his second term, the young president is staking his political future on security. He has invited both US President Donald Trump and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele — another right-wing populist who cracked down on gangs — to his inauguration in May. And he insists another meeting with US officials is just around the corner.

For Ecuador, the war is already underway — at sea, on land, in homes and streets. And for the fisherman who once cast lines for tuna, it’s a war that pays. His next drug run, he says, might be his last. But the system that pulled him in shows no signs of stopping.

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