The Senate is in for a rare weekend session as the chamber remains in limbo while lawmakers try to find a way out of the government shutdown.

Behind the scenes, appropriators are cooking up a trio of spending bills to attach to the House-passed continuing resolution (CR), along with an extension to the bill that would, if passed, reopen government until December or January.

But the package was not ready for primetime Saturday, and no votes were held. Instead, Senate Republicans spent hours railing against Obamacare and Senate Democrats’ desire to extend the expiring premium subsidies on the floor. 

When the package does hit the floor, Senate Democrats, as they’ve done 14 times previously, are likely to block it. It all comes as the upper chamber is scheduled for a week-long recess to coincide with Veterans Day.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., now wants to keep lawmakers in town until the shutdown ends.

When asked if there would be a vote on the plan, Thune said it would be ideal to have the package on the floor, but ‘we’ve got to have votes to actually pass it.’ Republicans are reticent to put the CR out again just to see it fail.

‘I’ve been talking all morning with some of the folks that are involved with the meeting, and I think we’re getting close to having it ready,’ Thune said. ‘We just need to get the text out there.’

The spending package, however, is just one piece of the puzzle to reopening the government. 

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and his caucus, freshly emboldened by sweeping Election Day victories earlier in the week, are sticking by their newly released plan that would extend the expiring Obamacare subsidies by one year and create a bipartisan working group to negotiate next steps after the government reopens.

But Senate Republicans immediately rejected the idea; Thune called it a ‘non-starter,’ while others in the GOP were angered by the proposal.

Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., said he would appeal to President Donald Trump and his administration to slash funding from ‘pet projects’ in blue states and cities to pay federal workers as the shutdown drags on.

‘The idea that you’ve got a bunch of kamikaze pilots trying to burn this whole place down because they’re emboldened by an election where Democrats won in Democrat areas is totally insane,’ he said.

Senate Democrats were largely unsurprised that Republicans rejected the offer, however.

‘I know many Republicans stormed out of the gate to dismiss this offer, but that’s a terrible mistake,’ Schumer said.

Thune and his conference have, throughout the course of the 39-day shutdown, said they would only deal with the subsidies after the government reopened and have offered Schumer and Senate Democrats a vote on a bill addressing the healthcare issue once the closure ends.

‘I’m not surprised,’ Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., said. ‘They don’t want to help people with their healthcare.’

But Republicans countered that a simple extension of the enhanced subsidies, which were modified under former President Joe Biden during the COVID-19 pandemic, would funnel money straight to insurers.

Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., has been in talks with Senate Democrats on a path forward, particularly through jump-starting government funding with the impending trio of spending bills.

After Schumer unveiled Democrats’ plan, she charged that ‘since Obamacare came into effect, look who’s gotten rich? It’s not the people.’

‘They’re talking about the people’s premiums and have … they have taken it to the companies that are actually making the money off of it? They’re not,’ Britt said. ‘So, I look forward to hearing why in the world they want to continue these profits and not actually help the people they serve.’

Senate Democrats, however, contend that their offer was fair.

Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., argued that there were some in the caucus that wanted to do a multi-year extension, while others wanted to go beyond just the enhanced subsidies. He reiterated his frustration that the core of the issue, from his perspective, was that neither Schumer nor Thune would sit down and negotiate.

‘We made a really simple, really scaled-down offer that could get the government up and operating and [is] really good for them politically,’ he said. ‘I just still don’t understand why they won’t accept the offer.’

The Senate could take a test vote as early as tomorrow afternoon on a revamped Republican bill to end the government shutdown and fund parts of the government for the rest of the fiscal year. 

We are still waiting on bill text on a measure which would fund the government through late January and provide money for the Agriculture Department (which funds SNAP), the Veterans Affairs Department and military construction projects and Congress through Sept. 30, 2026. 

But things will begin moving once text is posted tonight or tomorrow morning. 

This appears to be a pure spending bill with nothing separate for renewing Obamacare subsidies. 

The test vote needs 60 yeas. That entails Democratic buy-in. Fox is told to watch the following Democratic senators to see if they will vote to break a filibuster — although they might not be needed to vote for the final bill. Only a simple majority is needed there. 

Fox is told here is the universe of potential senators who caucus with the Democrats to watch as possible yeas to break a filibuster:

Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Sens. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., Jack Reed, D-R.I., Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., John Fetterman, D-Pa., Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., Gary Peters, D-Mo., Angus King, I-Maine, and Patty Murray, D-Wash. Murray is the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee. Fox is told that Murray scored some significant language in the tenuous spending pact. 

This is a fragile coalition and could fall apart. 

But if the Senate breaks the filibuster, it is just a matter of time before the senators vote to re-open the government. In fact, it’s possible that the Senate could vote Sunday night if senators can forge a time agreement. 

By the book, the Senate is afforded significant debate time once it breaks a filibuster. Fox is told that progressives, steamed that they scored nothing on health care — and were burned by their own party — could try to stretch things out as much as possible. That could mean the Senate doesn’t vote until Tuesday or beyond on final passage. 

But by the same token, Democrats are only preventing SNAP benefits from going out. So they could agree to an expedited process. 

The House is on 48 hours notice to come back. So the House may not return until midweek to align with the Senate and re-open the government. But it’s likely the House could be recalled as soon as possible. 

The House’s disposition is unclear on this legislation. However, it’s hard to believe that most Republicans wouldn’t take this deal. In additon, Reps. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Wash., and Jared Golden, D-Maine, are among moderate Democrats who may be in play to vote yes if the GOP loses a few votes. Golden was the lone House Democrat who voted for the old interim spending bill on Sept. 19. Golden has since announced his retirement.

Here’s another question:

Would the House swear-in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz., before or after the vote? Democrats will bray if Johnson fails to swear-in Grijalva before a possible House vote.

And, as we say, it’s always about the math. 

Swearing-in Grijalva puts the House at 433 members with two vacancies. The breakdown is 219 Republicans to 214 Democrats. That means the GOP can only lose two votes before needing help from the Democrats.
 

In addition, brace for the internecine Democratic warfare which will start once Democrats break with their party. Big divisions will emerge between those Democrats who vote to break the filibuster and those holding out for Obamacare subsidies. 

Moreover, consider the emerging chasm between House and Senate Democrats once this is over. 

And, here’s the kicker: It’s entirely possible that a group of Senate Democrats threw their colleagues under the bus to end the shutdown — and the party scored no guarantees on health care money despite their risky political shutdown gambit. 

A reckoning is coming.

Or shall we say, ‘reckonings.’

And they’re coming, whether the government re-opens soon or remains shuttered.

If the government stays closed, voters will likely torch both parties for not hammering out a deal. Air traffic delays are stacking up. Those problems only intensify as we near Thanksgiving and Christmas. That’s to say nothing of multiple missed paychecks for federal employees, stress, economic consequences and no SNAP benefits for the needy.

Some of those concerns will dissipate if lawmakers address the shutdown quickly. But there will be a reckoning if the shutdown drags deeper into November.

There are likely specific reckonings for both political parties.

For Republicans, it’s a resistance by GOP leaders to address spiking health care subsidies. Yes. The GOP is making a compelling argument that health care subsidies are only necessary because Obamacare is a problem and health care prices skyrocketed. So Republicans are back fighting against Obamacare.

In fact, the entire government shutdown is not about spending levels and appropriations. It’s a re-litigation of the touchstone law passed under President Obama in 2010. And Republicans — despite multiple campaign promises and dozens of efforts to kill the law over a six-year period, failed at nearly every turn.

Despite issues with Obamacare, Democrats annexed the public’s concern about health care costs and linked that to government funding. Democrats appear like the party trying to address the issue as premiums spike. And Republicans, despite promises that they’ll get to it, are inert on the subject. They’re even championing efforts to lambaste Obamacare — much the same as they did in 2010 when Congress passed the law.

Republicans are latched on to the concept that the subsidies are ‘pumping money to insurance companies,’ as Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., put it on Fox. Lankford also characterized those who benefitted from Obamacare as a ‘select group.’ It works out to about 24 million people. That’s seven percent of the U.S. population. So maybe that burns the GOP politically. Maybe it doesn’t.

A major reckoning looms for the Democrats, too.

It’s possible that a coalition of Democratic senators may break with the Democratic Party and support a new GOP plan to re-open the government on a temporary basis. Nowhere is it written that Democrats — who made the shutdown about health care — are guaranteed an outcome on Obamacare subsidies. Yes, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., have said they’ll address the health care issue after the government is open. But that’s not necessarily a fix.

So Democrats are fuming.

Therefore, it’s a distinct possibility that Democrats will refuse to fund the government in an effort to extract a concession on Obamacare subsidies — and walk away empty-handed.

Such an outcome will spark an internecine firestorm inside the Democratic Party. Progressives felt that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., rolled them back in March when he and a squadron of other Democrats helped the GOP crack a filibuster to avoid a shutdown.

It’s doubtful that Schumer will help this time. But Senate Republicans hope to coax just enough Democrats to overcome the filibuster on a pending test vote and then fund the government through late January.

That’s the reckoning for the Democrats. 

No outcome on health care. And getting the screws put to them by members of their own party.

Again.

Progressives will be apoplectic. And House Democrats will seethe — not so privately — at Senate Democrats.

The Senate’s test vote on the new GOP proposal could come as early as Sunday evening. The revised package would also fund the Department of Agriculture and Department of Veterans Affairs, plus, Congress until Sept. 30, 2026.

Fox is told Republicans believe they are in range of persuading Democrats who are sweating the shutdown to join them.

Fox is told that air traffic control and flight delays are contributing to the Democrats’ consternation.

That said, it is believed that the Senate GOP leadership is reluctant to force a vote related to the retooled, spending bill without a guarantee it could break a filibuster. The last thing the Senate needs is another failed procedural vote – after repeated failed test votes over the past six weeks.

Let’s game out the timing for a moment:

By the book, if the Senate breaks the filibuster late Sunday, it’s doubtful the chamber can take a final vote on the package until Monday or Tuesday.  But Fox is told there is a distinct possibility that Democrats could yield back time to expedite the process in the interest of quickly re-opening the government. By the same token, angry liberal senators could bleed out the parliamentary clocks and attempt to amend the bill to their liking — presumably with Obamacare provisions.

The Senate must break yet another filibuster to finish the bill. Then it’s on to final passage. That only needs a simple majority. And even if some Democrats voted to hurdle the filibuster, they might not support the underlying plan at the end. However, that’s not a problem if GOP senators provide the necessary votes.

Then it’s on to the House. The House’s disposition is unclear on this legislation. However, it’s hard to believe that most Republicans wouldn’t take this deal. Reps. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Wash. and Jared Golden, D-Maine, are among moderate Democrats who may be in play to vote yes if the GOP loses a few votes. Golden was the lone House Democrat who voted for the old interim spending bill on Friday, September 19. Golden has since announced his retirement.

Another big question: 

Would the House swear-in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz., before or after the vote? Democrats will bray if Johnson fails to swear-in Grijalva before a possible House vote

And, as we say, it’s always about the math.

Swearing-in Grijalva puts the House at 433 members with two vacancies. The breakdown is 219 Republicans to 214 Democrats. That means the GOP can only lose two votes before needing help from the Democrats.

Regardless, the House would not come back until at least the middle of next week if not later. It hinges on how fast the Senate can move, if it has the votes to break a filibuster and what happens to the Obamacare question.

All of this is uncertain after 39 days of the government shutdown.

And the only thing which is certain is the political reckoning for both parties.

Nov. 8, 2025, marks the 50th anniversary of Chevy Chase’s comedic portrayal of U.S. President Gerald Ford as a bumbling klutz on ‘Saturday Night Live.’

Nowadays, we expect ‘SNL’ to mock the president. (There’s even speculation going into each administration about who will play the president.) 

But when Chase did it for the first time, it was groundbreaking. In fact, in the years before ‘SNL,’ mocking the president on what was still the relatively new mass medium of television often had to overcome resistance from network censors and presidential pressure.

In the early 1960s, NBC executives would not allow a comedy sketch about President John F. Kennedy to appear on its ‘Art Carney Show.’ As a network spokesperson explained, ‘We thought it would have been improper to have performers actually portraying the president and his wife,’ adding the ‘decision was based on a matter of good taste.’

The networks were similarly reluctant to mock Kennedy’s successor, Lyndon Johnson. In 1964, NBC imported the British parody show ‘That Was the Week That Was,’ which was specifically developed in England to ‘prick the pomposity of public figures.’ 

Although the show did get in an occasional poke at Johnson, NBC censors constantly battled the show’s producers over LBJ jokes. NBC also took the step of suspending all political humor on the show around the 1964 presidential election.

Another show that tried to make fun of the president was ‘The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.’ The show, which premiered on CBS in 1967, even got pushback from Johnson himself. One skit that mocked Johnson prompted Johnson to tell CBS Chairman William Paley in a late-night call, ‘get those b——- off my back.’ Paley asked the show to go easier on the president.

When Richard Nixon was elected in 1968, the brothers pledged to ‘lay off the jokes’ about the incoming president for a time. But that pledge did not stop them from having the comedian David Frye impersonate Nixon on the show. 

Still, the show was canceled in April 1969, over a host of controversies, including sex and religion jokes, as well as political ones.

On the final episode, the brothers read a letter from former President Johnson, claiming that he had been OK with being mocked.

‘It is part of the price of leadership to be the target of clever satirists. You have given the gift of laughter to us. May we never grow so somber or self-important that we fail to appreciate humor.’ 

Although the words were admirable, it was a little hard to take Johnson seriously given his earlier intervention with Paley.

As for Frye, with the show canceled, he continued to impersonate Nixon on comedy albums. But even here, the networks continued to obstruct. In 1973, the three major networks refused to accept advertising in New York for Frye’s Watergate-related album. According to a WABC-TV spokesman, ‘It’s such a serious matter we’ve decided not to accept advertising for any comedy material relating to Watergate.’

With this backdrop in mind, ‘SNL’ must have known that it was taking a risk when it had Chase send up the president on live TV. Chase’s portrayal went beyond light jokes at the president’s expense. Chase was pratfalling around the Oval Office, holding up a glass rather than a phone to his ear and pouring water from a pitcher onto the papers on his desk. Yet the show not only survived, it thrived.

That first ‘SNL’ presidential skit was a watershed moment that helped fundamentally change the relationship between the American people and the president. The 1960s and 1970s had brought the U.S. presidency down in the eyes of the American people. The Kennedy assassination shocked Americans who did not realize the president was so vulnerable. 

The Johnson years punctured the bubble of presidential honesty about foreign affairs. Nixon’s Watergate scandal punctured a similar bubble about domestic affairs. And then the unelected Ford came to power and almost immediately pardoned Nixon for Watergate. The decision is lauded in retrospect but was controversial at the time.

Chase’s opening the show as Ford on that day in 1975 brought mocking presidents out from the narrowcast world of Lenny Bruce and Mort Sahl comedy routines and more regularly into the mass media. That first ‘SNL’ sketch ushered in a period in which presidents became both closer to and further from the American people. 

Mockery can keep physically- removed politicians less distant from everyday citizens. As a result, presidents are now nearly ubiquitous in a world of TV and social media, with constant mockery taking them down a peg — or more. In this world, even a short presidential disappearance of a day or two can lead to unfounded rumors of a presidential demise.

At the same time, presidents are further from the American people in that the security bubble around them is so much tighter. The White House resembles an armed camp. Presidential motorcades are unapproachable, and presidents are hard-pressed to continue to communicate regularly with friends. George W. Bush gave up e-mail. Obama resisted pressure to give up his BlackBerry.

In our current Chevy Chase-enabled world, presidential mockery is a constant. While Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel learned that presidents and network suits can still target an individual comic or show, those are unfortunate exceptions rather than the rule, and even Kimmel’s exile lasted barely a week. 

The continuing mockery of the president on Kimmel, as well as South Park, Jon Stewart, social media and a host of other places, shows that the genie of mass market, largely uncensored, mockery of presidents unleashed by Chevy Chase on ‘SNL’ a half century ago is not going back in the bottle, and for that we should be grateful.

Republican Rep. Riley Moore said the United States could take a range of actions — including sanctions and ‘even kinetic military action’ — in response to what he called the ‘genocide’ of Christians in Nigeria.

Trump designated Moore, a member of the Appropriations Committee from West Virginia, along with Chairman Tom Cole, R-Okla., to lead an investigation into the killing of Christians by Islamist militants in the African nation.

Frustrations with the matter boiled out into the open when Trump this week designated Nigeria as a country of particular concern and ordered the Pentagon to prepare to intervene militarily.

In a video on Truth Social this week, Trump threatened to ‘do things to Nigeria that Nigeria is not going to be happy about’ and ‘go into that now-disgraced country guns-a-blazing.’

Moore told Fox News Digital the designation unlocks ’15 different levers’ the administration can use against Nigeria, including halting arms sales, freezing aid and sanctioning officials or institutions accused of ignoring or enabling religious killings.

‘All options are on the table here for this, even kinetic military action,’ Moore said. ‘That could mean targeted, strategic counterterrorism strikes to get rid of some of the top leadership if that’s what it takes to stop the killing.’

‘We’ve been providing security assistance to this country since at least 2009 – billions of dollars worth of arm sales, training and equipment that they’ve received. And it’s a question of prioritization in what’s important to them. And clearly this has not been one of the most important things.’

The West Virginia Republican said he has been working with the House Appropriations Committee and the State Department to identify what he called ‘legislative levers’ that could support the administration’s response. Moore said he’s also consulting with NGOs and Christian organizations ‘on the ground’ in Nigeria to document the scale of the violence.

He described the attacks as a ‘genocide,’ claiming Christians are being killed at a rate of five to one compared with non-Christians. Moore accused Nigeria’s government of ‘looking the other way’ despite receiving billions in U.S. security aid since 2009.

‘They’re not taking this seriously,’ he said. ‘We had a pastor warn the government about an impending attack — they called it fake news. Within 24 hours, that pastor and 20 of his congregants were murdered.’

The Nigerian government denies a genocide is taking place. ‘Portraying Nigeria’s security challenges as a targeted campaign against a single religious group is a gross misrepresentation of reality. Terrorists attack all who reject their murderous ideology — Muslims, Christians, and those of no faith alike,’ the office of the presidency wrote on X. 

Moore said he and House Appropriations Chairman Tom Cole, R-Okla., plan to meet with Nigerian officials in Washington this month as part of the investigation, and may even send delegations to the nation. He added that the U.S. could still work with Nigeria’s government if it shows a willingness to confront extremist groups.

‘It’s not all sticks here — there are some carrots in this,’ Moore said. ‘If they’re willing to work with us, this could actually lead to a stronger relationship between our countries.’

The Nigerian government has denied that the killings amount to religious persecution, arguing that extremist and criminal groups target civilians of all faiths.

With a population of more than 230 million, Nigeria’s vibrant and often turbulent cities and villages are home to people of strikingly diverse backgrounds. The country’s more than 500 languages and mix of Islam, Christianity, and traditional indigenous faiths have long been marred by tension.

Nigeria’s faith communities remain sharply divided, with Muslims dominating the northern regions and Christians concentrated in the south.

Christianity took firm root in the 19th century, when freed slaves educated in Sierra Leone returned home as teachers and missionaries — establishing schools, churches, and early congregations that continue to shape southern Nigeria’s identity today.

Despite vast oil and mineral wealth, decades of corruption and mismanagement have left much of the nation impoverished.

Nigeria’s growing cache of lithium, cobalt, nickel, and other rare minerals has drawn quiet U.S. attention as Washington looks to counter China’s dominance in Africa’s critical-minerals market. The Commerce Department and U.S. International Development Finance Corp. have eyed investment opportunities in Nigeria’s nascent lithium industry, but persistent insecurity in mining regions threatens Western access and future development.

For over a decade, Nigeria’s Christians fleeing the nation’s northern half have been subject to the violence of Boko Haram, an Islamist militant group known for its terrorist spectacles. Churches and homes burned, communities vanishing in the group’s night raids.

Numbers are difficult to verify, but the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law reports at least 52,000 Christians have been killed, some 18,500 abducted and unlikely to have survived, and 20,000 churches and Christian schools attacked between 2009 and 2023.

In 2014, Boko Haram famously kidnapped and enslaved 276 teenage girls in a raid on a high school dormitory. The group regularly arms children as suicide bombers and holds slave markets in captured territories.

But a direct U.S. military campaign would prove difficult with current U.S. assets in the nation and is unlikely, one defense official told Fox News Digital.

The United States currently has no permanent military base in Nigeria, though small teams of U.S. advisors and special operations trainers work periodically with Nigerian forces under AFRICOM programs.

Washington approved about $600 million in security aid to Nigeria over the past decade, mostly focused on counterterrorism in the northeast.

The Iranian regime has managed to smuggle at least $1 billion to its terrorist proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon despite heavy sanctions this year, top officials at the U.S. Treasury Department say.

John Hurley, the undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, says Iran remains committed to its proxy groups throughout the Middle East. Nevertheless, he says there is any opportunity to cut off the funding streams while Iran is in its current weakened state.

‘There’s a moment in Lebanon now. If we could get Hezbollah to disarm, the Lebanese people could get their country back,’ Hurley said.

‘Even with everything Iran has been through, even with the economy not in great shape, they’re still pumping a lot of money to their terrorist proxies,’ he continued.

‘The key to that is to drive out the Iranian influence and control that starts with all the money that they are pumping into Hezbollah,’ he argued.

Hurley pushed for the increased pressure campaign during a tour of Turkey, Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates and Israel this weekend.

Western nations have already laid down heavy sanctions on Tehran over its unwillingness to negotiate a nuclear deal. The regime insists its nuclear development program exists solely for civilian purposes.

President Donald Trump ordered bombings on Iran’s key nuclear cites earlier this year in Operation Midnight Hammer, which U.S. officials say succeeded in crippling Tehran’s progress toward a bomb.

Iran has nevertheless continued its efforts to spread chaos across the globe. U.S. officials say they, along with Israel and Mexico, thwarted an Iran-backed attempt to assassinate Israel’s ambassador to Mexico earlier this year.

‘We thank the security and law enforcement services in Mexico for thwarting a terrorist network directed by Iran that sought to attack Israel’s ambassador in Mexico,’ Israel’s foreign ministry told Fox News on Friday.

‘The Israeli security and intelligence community will continue to work tirelessly, in full cooperation with security and intelligence agencies around the world, to thwart terrorist threats from Iran and its proxies against Israeli and Jewish targets worldwide.’

A U.S. official told Reuters the plot targeting ambassador Einat Kranz Neiger ‘was contained and does not pose a current threat.’

Fox News’ Greg Norman and Reuters contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump said Friday during a meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán he is considering granting an exemption on Russian oil sanctions to allow Hungary to purchase the resource from Russia. 

‘We’re looking at it because it’s very difficult for him to get the oil and gas from other areas,’ Trump said Friday when asked by the media if he is prepared to grant Orbán’s request for an exemption. ‘As you know, they don’t have, they don’t have the advantage of having seas. It’s a great country.

‘It’s a big country. But they don’t have sea, they don’t have the ports,’ he continued. ‘And so they have a difficult problem. There’s another country that has that same problem, by the way. But when you look at what’s happened with Europe, many of those countries, they don’t have those problems, and they buy a lot of oil and gas from Russia. And, as you know, I’m very disturbed by that because we’re helping them, and they’re going and buying oil and gas from Russia.’ 

After months of waffling between confrontation and conciliation toward Moscow, Trump imposed sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies — Rosneft and Lukoil — in October as the Kremlin backed off from talks to end the war with Ukraine. 

‘Every time I speak to Vladimir, I have good conversations, and then they don’t go anywhere,’ Trump said in October when announcing the sanctions. ‘They just don’t go anywhere.

‘I just felt it was time. We’ve waited a long time,’ Trump added when asked why he chose to impose the sanctions at that time and not sooner. 

The sanctions came after a planned meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in October was called off. 

Orbán, who has a longstanding warm relationship with Trump, in October called the sanctions imposed by Trump ‘a mistake,’ from Hungary’s perspective. 

‘We are thinking about how to build a sustainable system for the Hungarian economy because Hungary is very dependent on Russian oil and gas. And, without them, energy prices will skyrocket, causing shortages in our supplies,’ Orbán said in October during a meeting with Italian leaders in Rome. 

Orbán told the media his discussion with Trump Friday will include the exemption request, explaining that the pipelines transporting oil and gas are ‘vital’ to the nation because it is landlocked and that he will negotiate the matter with the White House. 

Trump told the media that he and Orbán agree the war between Russia and Ukraine — which has raged since 2022 — will end soon, adding, ‘The basic dispute is they just don’t want to stop yet. And I think they will. I think it’s taking a big toll on Russia.’

The pair said it would likely take a ‘miracle’ for Ukraine to win the war. 

Trump praised Orbán during the meeting as a ‘great leader,’ namely on his strict immigration policies. 

‘The fact is that he’s a great leader, and he’s respected all over,’ Trump said. ‘Not necessarily liked by some of the leaders, but, you know, those leaders have proven to be wrong.

‘If you look at his stance on immigration and other things, you know, if you look at Europe, they made tremendous mistakes in immigration. It’s really hurting them very badly. He has not made a mistake on immigration.’ 

Orbán also commended Trump, arguing ‘everything was ruined’ by the Biden administration while celebrating Trump’s return to the White House. 

‘The reason why we are here to open a new chapter between the bilateral relations of the United States and Hungary, basically, because during the Democrat administration, everything was ruined,’ he said. 

‘So, after your leaving president, everything was basically blocked, ruined, canceled. A lot of harm done by the previous administration. In the last ten months, president, what you have done, we are very much grateful for that. You restored the old level of the relationship. You improved the bilateral relation. You repaired what was done badly by the previous administration,’ Orbán said. 

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Friday that air travel could take ‘days if not a week’ to get back to normal once the government shutdown ends.

‘If the government opens tomorrow — which it won’t, it doesn’t look like — it’s going to take us days to assess the controllers coming back into their facilities or their towers,’ Duffy told ‘America Reports.’

‘And then once we start to move those numbers back down to zero on our required 10%, the problem is the airlines then have to put those planes back on for booking again,’ he said.

Duffy said there will be a lag of several days to a week before airlines and airports can return to normal operations.

‘It’s going to take some time for the airlines to respond. So once we see more controllers in the towers, then the airlines have to respond to that,’ Duffy said. ‘It can be days, if not a week, before we get back to full-force flights when the shutdown ends.’

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

Senate Republicans had planned to put the House-passed bill to reopen the government on the floor for a vote again on Friday, but after Senate Democrats signaled that they were willing to hold out longer, that course of action is likely to change.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., opted to keep the chamber in session for a rare Friday vote, with the idea being to put the House-passed continuing resolution (CR) on the floor for a 15th time.

However, after Senate Democrats met behind closed doors on Thursday and exited their meeting with a renewed sense of unity, Thune raised the concern that, ‘We’ve got to get the Democrats back and engaged.’

Bipartisan talks among several Republican and moderate Democratic senators had picked up significantly in the last week, with rays of hope that an end was near that could cut through the fog of the shutdown.

But Tuesday’s election sweep and pressure from progressives and more left-leaning members of the Democratic caucus have possibly tripped up progress in those talks.

‘All I know is that the pep rally they had at lunch yesterday evidently changed some minds,’ Thune said. ‘I thought we were on a track. We were giving them everything they wanted or had asked for, and at some point, I was gonna say, they have to take yes for an answer, and they were trending in that direction. And then yesterday, everything kind of — the wheels came off, so to speak.’

Thune’s remarks came as a flurry of activity was happening behind-the-scenes. The plan was to advance the CR and then add a trio of spending bills in a package known as a minibus, but a series of counteroffers and demands from Senate Democrats have slowed momentum.

But some in the Senate GOP don’t appear too keen on the idea of putting the same bill on the floor again without real progress being made.

‘There’s no reason to vote on the same stuff that we voted on in the past just to do it again,’ Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., said.

It also comes as the Senate creeps toward a scheduled recess for Veterans Day next week, and as questions linger on whether Thune will keep lawmakers in town over the weekend. If there’s no CR vote on Friday, it could be punted until Saturday.

‘Our members are going to be advised to be available if, in fact, there’s a need to vote, and we will see what happens and whether or not over the course of the next couple of days, the Democrats can find a way to reengage,’ Thune said.

A possible second option could be voting on a bill from Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., to ensure that federal workers and the military would get paid as the shutdown drags on. That bill was blocked by Senate Democrats last month, and since Johnson has workshopped it with his colleagues across the aisle, he plans to offer an amendment that would include furloughed federal workers into the mix.

He said in a statement to Fox News Digital that he hopes to pass the bill Friday through unanimous consent or a voice vote, two fast-track methods that don’t require a full vote.

‘No Republican senator objects to the bill, and we hope the same is true among the Democrat senators,’ Johnson said. ‘If not, we will call for a roll call vote to reveal which senators are willing to use federal workers as political pawns and jeopardize the safety and security of the American people.’

The core of Senate Democrats’ demand is to see an extension to the expiring Obamacare subsidies in exchange for reopening the government.

Thune and Republicans offered a vote on legislation for the subsidies only after the government reopened, but many Senate Democrats view that as not enough. For now, the chamber is in limbo until a play call is made.

Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., told Fox News Digital that ‘it seems Republicans don’t know what they want to do.’

‘This thing could be solved in an hour,’ he said. ‘What is their resistance to just stopping these premium increases from going into effect? I mean, this is so insane.’

Senate Democrats unveiled their alternative to Republicans’ plan to reopen the government that would see an extension to expiring Obamacare credits for one year, asking that Republicans just say ‘yes.’ 

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., announced the plan in dramatic fashion on the Senate floor Friday afternoon with a backdrop of the Senate Democratic caucus in a bid to show a tangible version of the newfound unity among Democrats since their Election Day sweep earlier this week. 

Schumer argued that after 14 failed votes on the House-passed continuing resolution (CR), ‘It’s clear we need to try something different.’ 

He offered to attach a one-year extension to the expiring Obamacare subsidies and to create a bipartisan committee that could negotiate further on how to deal with the subsidies after the government reopened, a clear nod to the GOP’s position that negotiations won’t happen until the government is reopened. 

‘Democrats are ready to clear the way to quickly pass a government funding bill that includes healthcare affordability,’ Schumer said. ‘Leader Thune just needs to add a clean, one-year extension of the [Obamacare] tax credits to the CR so that we can immediately address rising healthcare costs. That’s not a negotiation. It’s an extension of current law, something we do all the time around here.’

‘Now the ball is in the Republicans’ court,’ he continued. ‘We need Republicans to just say ‘yes.’’

Whether Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and Senate Republicans will accept the offer remains in the air. Republicans are set to meet Friday afternoon and are expected to discuss the Democrats’ olive branch. 

Initially, Thune had planned to hold a vote on the House-passed plan as a means to amend it and attach a trio of spending bills in a package, known as a minibus, to jump-start the government funding process.

However, that plan was canned Friday morning after Thune charged that the ‘wheels came off’ of ongoing bipartisan discussions with Senate Democrats on the minibus and a path forward. Now it’s likely that the Senate will vote for a 15th time on the same plan on Saturday. However, that all depends on whether they accept Senate Democrats’ offer.

It also comes after Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., made a bid to have his bill that would ensure that federal workers and the military would be paid during this shutdown and future shutdowns move through a fast-track process known as unanimous consent that doesn’t require a full vote of the Senate. 

However, Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., blocked the bill — despite it being amended to include furloughed federal workers into the mix — over lingering concerns that it still gave President Donald Trump too much power to pick and choose ‘which federal employees are paid and when.’

That move prompted a fired-up Thune to question why, exactly, Peters, and more broadly, Senate Democrats, would object to the bill, given that it would solve a major pain point of the shutdown. He said that lawmakers would vote on the bill on Friday. 

‘In other words, we’re going to keep federal employees hostage,’ Thune said of Peters’ objection. 

‘It’s about leverage, isn’t it? That’s what ya’ll have been saying,’ he said.