Former President George W. Bush joined up with former President Barack Obama and U2 singer Bono to comfort United States Agency for International Development employees Monday, while also taking shots at President Donald Trump and his administration for shuttering the agency plagued by accusations of fraud and abuse. 

‘Gutting USAID is a travesty, and it’s a tragedy,’ Obama said in a video that was shown to departing USAID employees Monday, according to the Associated Press. ‘Because it’s some of the most important work happening anywhere in the world.’ 

Obama summed up the decision to shutter the agency as ‘a colossal mistake,’ and added that ‘sooner or later, leaders on both sides of the aisle will realize how much you are needed.’

Bush, Obama and Bono spoke to departing USAID employees Monday in a videoconference as the agency officially was shuttered following the Trump administration’s reporting that it was overrun with alleged corruption and mismanagement. The videoconference did not include members of the media, with the Associated Press reviewing and reporting on clips of the conference later that day.

USAID is an independent U.S. agency that was established under the Kennedy administration to administer economic aid to foreign nations. It was one of the first agencies investigated by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in early February for alleged mismanagement and government overspending, with DOGE’s then-leader Elon Musk slamming the agency as ‘a viper’s nest of radical-left marxists who hate America.’ 

USAID officially was absorbed by the State Department Tuesday. 

Bush, who overwhelmingly has shied away from publicly criticizing Trump, lamented in his recorded message to the staffers that the end of USAID marks an end to his administration’s work rolling out an AIDS and HIV program that is credited with saving 25 million people nationwide.

‘You’ve showed the great strength of America through your work — and that is your good heart,’’ Bush told USAID staffers, according to the Associated Press. ‘Is it in our national interests that 25 million people who would have died now live? I think it is, and so do you.’ 

Bono of U2 fame recited a poem he wrote reflecting on USAID’s closure and his claims that millions around the world will likely now die, according to the Associated Press. 

‘They called you crooks. When you were the best of us,’ Bono said.

Fox News Digital reached out to Obama’s and Bush’s respective offices Wednesday morning for additional comment, but did not receive responses. 

Other longtime Trump foes, such as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, thanked foreign service officers for their work before USAID’s closure. 

‘In all my years of service, I found that foreign service officers and development professionals were among the most dedicated public servants I encountered,’ Clinton posted to X Tuesday. ‘Their work saves lives and makes the world safer. Today, and every day, I stand with them.’

Obama and Bush overwhelmingly have remained tight-lipped on their views of Trump under his second administration, with both former presidents attending Trump’s inauguration and not weighing in on the majority of Trump’s policies. Obama has taken issue with Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill,’ which is clearing its final hurdles to passage and will fund Trump’s agenda on social media, while Bush has consistently shied away from public rebukes of Trump in recent history. 

Bono previously has claimed that cuts to USAID would kill hundreds of thousands of people, and had slammed Trump in 2016 as ‘potentially the worst idea that ever happened to America.’

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who was serving as acting administrator of USAID, announced the State Department absorbed USAID’s foreign assistance programs Tuesday after decades of failing to ensure the programs it funded actually supported America’s interests. 

‘Beyond creating a globe-spanning NGO industrial complex at taxpayer expense, USAID has little to show since the end of the Cold War,’ Rubio wrote in his announcement. ‘Development objectives have rarely been met, instability has often worsened, and anti-American sentiment has only grown.’  

‘This era of government-sanctioned inefficiency has officially come to an end,’ he continued. ‘Under the Trump Administration, we will finally have a foreign funding mission in America that prioritizes our national interests. As of July 1st, USAID will officially cease to implement foreign assistance. Foreign assistance programs that align with administration policies—and which advance American interests—will be administered by the State Department, where they will be delivered with more accountability, strategy, and efficiency.’

The shuttering comes after DOGE gutted USAID as part of Trump’s effort to remove waste, fraud and abuse from the federal government earlier in 2025. 

Trump repeatedly had touted DOGE’s work uncovering fraud and mismanagement within the federal government, including in his March address before Congress celebrating that DOGE identified $22 billion in government ‘waste,’ including at USAID.

‘Forty-five million dollars for diversity, equity and inclusion scholarships in Burma,’ Trump said as he rattled off various examples of federal waste. ‘Forty million to improve the social and economic inclusion of sedentary migrants. Nobody knows what that is. Eight million to promote LGBTQI+ in the African nation of Lesotho, which nobody has ever heard of. Sixty million dollars for indigenous peoples and Afro-Colombian empowerment in Central America. Sixty million. Eight million for making mice transgender.’

President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda temporarily ground to a halt in the House of Representatives Wednesday afternoon.

Plans for an early afternoon vote to begin debate on Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ slipped away as both conservative concerns and weather delays led to issues in passing two procedural votes ahead of the critical measure.

It’s not clear if the key vote will proceed today at this point. House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., one of the bill’s biggest critics, told reporters a vote was still ‘possible.’

‘No, not yet,’ he said when asked if he was getting what he needed from the White House to support the measure. ‘But the evening is so young.’

House GOP leaders had hoped to vote to begin debate on the vast tax and immigration bill, a maneuver known as a ‘rule vote,’ with the goal of teeing up a vote on the legislation’s final passage by late Wednesday or early Thursday at the latest.

The president has directed Republicans to get a bill to his desk for a signature by the Fourth of July, though he’s suggested in some recent comments he would not mind a delay of a few days.

The rule vote was meant to be the third in an early afternoon series of three votes. As of early evening Wednesday, that vote is still being held open, and the House floor is effectively paralyzed.

Lawmakers who expected a vote were told to return to their offices to await further instructions.

Multiple House Freedom Caucus members who left a meeting next to the House floor declined to comment on what they discussed, but several have made clear in recent days that they have serious issues with the Senate’s version of Trump’s agenda bill.

The mammoth piece of legislation includes Trump’s agenda on taxes, the border, energy, defense and the national debt.

Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought was seen briefly entering and exiting the room where the fiscal hawks were gathered.

He said little to reporters other than announcing they were ‘making good progress’ on his way out of the room.

Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, suggested that conservatives were speaking with the Trump administration about how Republicans could make up for what they saw as deficiencies in the current version of the bill.

Fiscal hawks were angered by last-minute moves made to placate Senate GOP moderates who were uneasy about the bill’s near-immediate phase-out of most green energy tax subsidies in former President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

They’ve also argued the Senate’s bill would add more to the federal deficit than the House’s earlier version, though Senate Republicans have pushed back.

‘We were not happy with what the Senate produced. We thought there was a path forward as of late last week, even though I had concerns in public about them. But then they jammed it through at the last minute in a way that, you know, we’re not overly excited about,’ Roy said. ‘So, now we’re trying to understand what our options are from this point.’

Other representatives, like Keith Self, R-Texas, and Josh Brecheen, R-Okla., declined to comment about the meeting to reporters.

Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., who is not a member of the Freedom Caucus but had some concerns about the bill, told reporters when leaving the meeting, ‘I’m just waiting to see what’s going on honestly. Everybody’s just discussing what’s going on and trying to get to some [resolution].’

Burchett told reporters earlier he was leaning in favor of voting to debate the bill.

But Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., can afford just three defections to still pass the bill along party lines.

‘We’re going to get there tonight,’ Johnson told reporters.

President Donald Trump’s Justice Department filed an emergency appeal with the Supreme Court on Wednesday, seeking to overturn lower court rulings that blocked the administration from firing three Biden-appointed regulators.

The emergency appeal asks the High Court to allow the Trump administration to fire three members of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), a five-member independent regulatory board that sets standards and oversees safety for thousands of consumer products. The appeal comes after the Supreme Court, in May, granted a separate emergency appeal request from the Trump administration pertaining to the firing of two Biden-appointed agency officials from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB).  

‘It’s outrageous that we must once again seek Supreme Court intervention because rogue leftist judges in lower courts continue to defy the high court’s clear rulings,’ said White House spokesperson Harrison Fields. 

‘The Supreme Court decisively upheld the president’s constitutional authority to fire and remove executive officers exercising his power, yet this ongoing assault by activist judges undermines that victory,’ he continued. ‘President Trump remains committed to fulfilling the American people’s mandate by effectively leading the executive branch, despite these relentless obstructions.’

Mary Boyle, Alexander Hoehn-Saric and Richard Trumka Jr. were appointed to serve seven-year terms on the independent government agency by former President Joe Biden. Their positions have historically been protected from retribution, as they can only be terminated for neglect or malfeasance.

After Trump attempted to fire the three Democratic regulators, they sued, arguing the president sought to remove them without due cause. Eventually, a federal judge in Maryland agreed with them, and this week an appeals court upheld that ruling. 

However, according to the emergency appeal from the Trump administration, submitted to the High Court on Wednesday morning, the three regulators in question have shown ‘hostility to the President’s agenda’ and taken actions that have ‘thrown the agency into chaos.’

The emergency appeal to the Supreme Court added that ‘none of this should be possible’ after the High Court ruled in favor of the Trump administration’s decision to fire two executive branch labor relations officials.

‘None of this should be possible after Wilcox, which squarely controls this case. Like the NLRB and MSPB in Wilcox, the CPSC exercises ‘considerable executive power,’ 145 S. Ct. at 1415—for instance, by issuing rules, adjudicating administrative proceedings, issuing subpoenas, bringing enforcement suits seeking civil penalties, and (with the concurrence of the Attorney General) even prosecuting criminal cases,’ Solicitor General John Sauer wrote in the emergency appeal to the Supreme Court.

The request, according to Politico, will go to Chief Justice John Roberts, who is in charge of emergency appeals stemming from the appeals court that upheld the previous Maryland court ruling blocking the Trump administration’s firings.

The House of Representatives has voted to advance President Donald Trump’s $3.3 trillion ‘big, beautiful bill’ to its final phase in Congress, overcoming fears of a potential Republican mutiny.

It’s a significant victory for House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., though the fight is not over yet.

Lawmakers voted to proceed with debate on the mammoth-sized Trump agenda bill in the early hours of Thursday – a mechanism known as a ‘rule vote’ – teeing up a final House-wide vote sometime later Thursday morning.

The House adopted the rules for debate on the measure in a dramatic 219 to 213 vote – with all but moderate Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., voting to proceed.

The vote had been stalled for hours, since Wednesday afternoon, with five House Republicans poised to kill the measure before lawmakers could weigh the bill itself.

Several members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus and their allies, meanwhile, appeared ready to skip the vote altogether in protest of GOP leaders’ compromise bill.

But both Johnson and Trump spent hours negotiating with holdouts, apparently to some success.

But the process could still take hours. Democrats could still call up various procedural votes to delay the final measure, as they did when the legislation passed the House by just one vote for the first time in late May.

Plus, the bill itself could still face opposition from both moderates and conservative Republicans.

Conservative lawmakers were threatening to derail the rule vote as recently as Wednesday over changes the Senate made to the legislation, which fiscal hawks argued would add billions of dollars to the federal deficit.

But those concerns appear to have been outweighed by pressure from House GOP leaders and the president himself – who urged House Republicans to coalesce around the bill.

The Senate passed its version of the bill late on Tuesday morning, making modifications to the House’s provisions on Medicaid cost-sharing with states, some tax measures, and raising the debt ceiling.

Moderates are wary of Senate measures that would shift more Medicaid costs to states that expanded their programs under Obamacare, while conservatives have said those cuts are not enough to offset the additional spending in other parts of the bill.

Two members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus who also sit on the House Rules Committee, Reps. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., and Chip Roy, R-Texas, voted against the measure during the Rules Committee’s 12-hour hearing to consider the bill.

Johnson himself publicly urged the Senate to change as little as possible in the run-up to the vote. But the upper chamber’s bill ultimately passed by a similarly narrow margin as the House – with Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote.

‘I’m not happy with what the Senate did to our product,’ Johnson told reporters late on Tuesday afternoon. ‘We understand this is a process that goes back and forth, and we’ll be working to get all of our members to yes.’

But Trump took to Truth Social after the Senate passed the bill to urge House Republicans to do the same.

‘It is no longer a ‘House Bill’ or a ‘Senate Bill’. It is everyone’s Bill. There is so much to be proud of, and EVERYONE got a major Policy WIN — But, the Biggest Winner of them all will be the American People, who will have Permanently Lower Taxes, Higher Wages and Take Home Pay, Secure Borders, and a Stronger and More Powerful Military,’ the president posted.

‘We can have all of this right now, but only if the House GOP UNITES, ignores its occasional ‘GRANDSTANDERS (You know who you are!), and does the right thing, which is sending this Bill to my desk. We are on schedule — Let’s keep it going, and be done before you and your family go on a July 4thvacation. The American People need and deserve it. They sent us here to, GET IT DONE.’

Both the House and Senate have been dealing with razor-thin GOP majorities of just three votes each.

The bill would permanently extend the income tax brackets lowered by Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), while temporarily adding new tax deductions to eliminate duties on tipped and overtime wages up to certain caps.

It also includes a new tax deduction for people aged 65 and over.

The legislation also rolls back green energy tax credits implemented under former President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which Trump and his allies have attacked as ‘the Green New Scam.’

The bill would also surge money toward the national defense, and to Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the name of Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigrants in the U.S.

The bill would also raise the debt limit by $5 trillion in order to avoid a potentially economically devastating credit default sometime this summer, if the U.S. runs out of cash to pay its obligations.

New and expanded work requirements would be implemented for Medicaid and federal food assistance, respectively.

Democrats have blasted the bill as a tax giveaway to the wealthy while cutting federal benefits for working-class Americans.

But Republicans have said their tax provisions are targeted toward the working and middle classes – citing measures eliminating taxes on tipped and overtime wages – while arguing they were reforming federal welfare programs to work better for those who truly need them.

Progressive Rep. Maxwell Frost, D-Fla., told reporters it was Democrats’ intent to delay proceedings on Wednesday for as long as possible.

‘This last go around, we were able to delay the bill upwards of 30 hours. And so we’re going to do the same thing, do everything we can from a procedural point of view to delay this,’ Frost said.

Meanwhile, there were earlier concerns about if weather delays in Washington could delay lawmakers from getting to Capitol Hill in time for the planned vote.

‘We’re monitoring the weather closely,’ Johnson told reporters. ‘There’s a lot of delays right now.’

Fox News’ Dan Scully contributed to this report.

Omaha City Councilman Brinker Harding has launched a bid to succeed outgoing U.S. Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., who announced that he will not seek re-election next year.

‘I’m a husband, father, businessman, and Omaha City Councilman. Today, I am announcing my run for Congress in NE-02 to make America more like its Heartland and to make the next 250 years a New Golden Age for America. I hope you’ll join me!’ Harding declared in a July 1 post on X.

Bacon, who has served in Congress since 2017, has announced that he will finish his current term, but will not run for re-election in 2026.

‘Thank you, @DonJBacon, for your 30 years of distinguished service in the Air Force and a decade of dedicated leadership representing NE-02 in Congress,’ Harding declared in a June 30 post on X. ‘You’ve been a true statesman who’s served with integrity and heart. Wishing you and Angie all the best in this next chapter.’

While Republicans have been divided on the issue, Bacon is a staunch proponent of U.S. aid to Ukraine.

‘It is a time for honesty. Peace talks are having zero effect on Putin. His goal is to dominate Ukraine & he won’t stop until he realizes he cannot win. The U.S. & Allies must arm Ukraine to the teeth, sanction Russia to the max, & confiscate the $300B in overseas Russian assets,’ the congressman declared in a post on X in late May.

U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., is backing Harding for the House seat.

‘Throughout a lifetime of service to Omaha and Nebraska, Brinker Harding has always championed public safety, economic development, and fiscal responsibility. Brinker will make America safer, stronger, and more prosperous. I am honored to endorse him for Congress,’ Fischer noted in a post on X.

President Donald Trump’s administration released its annual report revealing the salaries for every staffer inside the White House on Thursday.

The report shows employees’ earnings in a range of $59,070 at the lowest to $225,700 at the highest, though a few aren’t accepting salaries at all.

The top-paid staffer at the White House is Jacalynne Klopp, a senior adviser and the sole staffer earning $225,700. Behind her is Edgar Mkrtchian, an associate counsel making $203,645.

Behind them comes a group of 33 staffers making $195,200, which includes many well-known names. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt takes in this level of salary, as does border czar Tom Homan, chief of staff Susan Wiles, trade adviser Peter Navarro, communications director Steven Cheung, and homeland security adviser Stephen Miller.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.

According to the report, there are 108 employees who make between $59,000 and $80,000, while Trump’s speechwriters earn between $92,500 and $121,500.

Eight employees do not receive salaries at all, though some of those are due to overlapping roles in other sections of government.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio is chief among these, not receiving any compensation for his White House role as national security adviser. Special envoy Steve Witkoff also receives compensation from the state department rather than the White House.

Trump’s own compensation is not listed in the report, but the pay scheme for the president is laid out in federal law. As president, Trump earns a base salary of $400,000, as well as a $50,000 expense allowance, $100,000 for travel, and $19,000 for entertainment.

Trump donated his salary to government agencies during his first term in office, but he has not clarified whether he will do the same during his second term.

The White House did not immediately respond when asked about Trump’s compensation.

Read the full list of White House salaries below (App users click here)

President Donald Trump’s $3.3 trillion ‘big, beautiful bill’ has reportedly set the House record for the longest vote in the history of the lower chamber of Congress. 

The procedural vote on the Senate-amended version of the bill lasted for more than seven hours. In 2021, the House spent seven hours and six minutes voting on former President Joe Biden’s ‘Build Back Better’ legislative package. 

Wednesday night’s voting surpassed the previous record at 9:15 p.m. ET Wednesday by at least 15 minutes, according to Axios.

Assistant House Minority Leader Joe Neguse, D-Colo., goaded House Republicans by claiming the protracted voting period Wednesday violated House rules, Axios reported. 

The extended voting period came as House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., wrangled with members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus. They pushed back on the Senate’s version of the megabill over its projected increase to the federal deficit, as well as what they deemed insufficient Medicaid reforms and spending cuts. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, took issue with Senate revisions reintroducing green energy tax credits despite House efforts to roll back such programs. 

With the Democrats united in opposition, the future of the more than 800-page, Trump-backed legislative package depends on a handful of GOP holdouts. 

Following the overnight session, Johnson said Thursday he was determined to get the Senate-amended bill passed by the House and to the president’s desk by the Independence Day deadline on Friday. 

Lawmakers voted to proceed with debate on the Trump agenda bill in the early hours of Thursday – a mechanism known as a ‘rule vote’ – teeing up a final House-wide vote sometime later Thursday morning.

Speaking to reporters Thursday morning, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., said that beyond the House Freedom Caucus, some moderate Republicans also have final questions about how the megabill would be implemented. 

‘Some of them wanted to talk to some of the different agencies about, you know, how they’re planning on implementing it, which obviously the agency heads have been planning for months on these changes,’ Scalise said. ‘So they walk through those things and that was helpful to members just to at least get a good idea of what to expect once the bill becomes law. Of course, none of it happens if the bill doesn’t become law. So the focus has always been, let’s get this bill passed.’ 

The Senate passed the ‘big, beautiful bill’ by a razor-thin, 51-50 margin last week, with Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote. 

Fox News’ Liz Elkind and Tyler Olson contributed to this report.