: A trio of Republican senators are moving to overhaul how federal childcare funds are distributed after what they call ‘mass fraud’ in Minnesota exposed a system that paid providers before verifying children were ever in the room.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, joined by Sens. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Rick Scott, R-Fla., is introducing the Payment Integrity Act, legislation that would require states to distribute federally funded childcare dollars based on verified attendance — not enrollment claims.

‘Programs in Minnesota for welfare and childcare were designed to channel resources into protecting vulnerable children, but were treated like an open ATM by criminals,’ Cruz told Fox News Digital.

‘The mass fraud in Minnesota shows that American taxpayers can no longer rely on local and state politicians to prevent abuses, because those politicians often have electoral and partisan incentives to look the other way. My legislation reduces the risk of the waste and fraud we’ve seen and ensures that resources are provided to children and families who need it.’

The bill would reverse a 2024 Biden administration rule requiring states to pay childcare providers before attendance verification. Under Cruz’s proposal, providers would be paid only after services are confirmed — shifting from enrollment-based payments to attendance-based billing.

Cruz’s bill comes as the outspoken Texan led a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on alleged Somali fraudsters last week. There, lawmakers heard directly from David Hoch — a journalist seen accompanying blogger Nick Shirley to addresses proclaimed to be Somali daycares.

‘There are few crimes more morally repugnant than stealing from vulnerable children. Every dollar stolen is a meal not eaten, a doctor’s visit missed, and a future diminished,’ Cruz said, adding that such fraud ‘plunders our children’s potential.’

Gesturing towards a photo of the ‘Quality Learing Center’ in Minneapolis during the hearing, an allegedly fraudulent childcare provider Cruz called ’emblematic’ of the crisis, he said the fraud was occurring not in ‘some distant or lawless place, but in the heart of America’s Midwest.’

Co-sponsor Lee said that support for childcare should ‘go to real kids, not empty rooms.’

‘Fake childcare operations are stealing funding from the ones who are actually taking care of America’s children in need. Our bill will address this massive fraud by granting funding based on actual attendance rather than reported enrollment, and allowing states to pay retroactively instead of in advance,’ Lee said, adding such ‘diligence’ should have been the law all along.

The Payment Integrity Act also puts into law January rule from Health and Human Services that established attendance-based billing procedures

That rule, according to Secretary Robert F. Kennedy’s deputy Jim O’Neill was also spurred on by what has been happening in Minnesota.

‘We’ve seen credible and widespread allegations of fraudulent daycare providers who were not caring for children at all. The reforms we are enacting will make fraud harder to perpetrate,’ O’Neill said in a statement.

The Payment Integrity Act officially amends the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act signed into law by President George Herbert Walker Bush, to include such ‘attendance-based billing.’

‘Nothing in this subchapter shall be construed to require a lead agency to make a payment to a child care provider prior to the provision of child care services,’ the bill reads, a direct reversal of the pre-payment system Cruz says allowed fraud to flourish.

A new attack ad from Republicans targeting U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., is slamming the vulnerable Democrat senator for requiring entrants at his political rallies to show proof of identification, but arguing that identification requirements for voting are a form of voter suppression. 

‘Want to get into a Jon Ossoff rally?’ the advertisement’s narrator begins, before it goes into a montage of staffers at Ossoff’s Feb. 7 rally asking for entrants’ IDs.

‘Don’t forget your ID’ rally staff can be heard saying as folks walked into the Georgia International Convention Center located in metro Atlanta.

‘Also, do you have your ID with you?’ another staffer can be heard asking entrants in the video captured by a GOP tracker. ‘I’ll just grab your ID from you. Thank you so much,’ another said. ‘Please have your IDs ready, please, thank you.’

Meanwhile, Ossoff has referred to attempts to establish stricter photo-identification rules for voting and voter registration in federal elections as ‘nakedly partisan, totally unworkable, [and] bad faith.’

Ossoff’s team declined to comment for this story. 

On Wednesday, Republicans in the House of Representatives passed the latest iteration of a voter integrity law aiming at requiring stricter in-person documentation requirements, such as needing a photo-ID to vote. This bill is a broader and stricter version of the 2025 version of the bill which focused predominantly on registering to vote as opposed to the act of voting itself.

Ahead of the vote’s passage, one of Ossoff’s Republican challengers in the upcoming U.S. Senate race in Georgia, Rep. Buddy Carter, R-Ga., called out the incumbent Democrat Senator for ‘once [saying] that voter ID was ‘right and appropriate,’ [but] now supports his party as reframing it as ‘voter suppression.”

‘The law didn’t change. Public opinion didn’t change. What changed was he – and other Democrat politicians like him – realized that illegal immigrants could no longer vote to keep Democrats in office,’ Carter asserted. ‘They oppose this bill because it chips away at their voting base; plain and simple.’

Despite Ossoff’s previous opposition to voter integrity laws, his campaign event framed the requirement for photo ID as a security measure.

‘Due to security requirements … be ready to show ID that matches our RSVP list and these arrival instructions (printed or on your phone),’ the campaign event’s confirmation email said.

Fox News Digital’s Leo Briceno contributed to this report.

: A trio of Republican senators are moving to overhaul how federal childcare funds are distributed after what they call ‘mass fraud’ in Minnesota exposed a system that paid providers before verifying children were ever in the room.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, joined by senators Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Rick Scott, R-Fla., is introducing the Payment Integrity Act, legislation that would require states to distribute federally funded childcare dollars based on verified attendance, not enrollment claims.

‘Programs in Minnesota for welfare and childcare were designed to channel resources into protecting vulnerable children but were treated like an open ATM by criminals,’ Cruz told Fox News Digital.

‘The mass fraud in Minnesota shows that American taxpayers can no longer rely on local and state politicians to prevent abuses because those politicians often have electoral and partisan incentives to look the other way. My legislation reduces the risk of the waste and fraud we’ve seen and ensures that resources are provided to children and families who need it.’

The bill would reverse a 2024 Biden administration rule requiring states to pay childcare providers before attendance verification. Under Cruz’s proposal, providers would be paid only after services are confirmed, shifting from enrollment-based payments to attendance-based billing.

Cruz’s bill comes as the outspoken Texan led a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on alleged Somali fraudsters last week. There, lawmakers heard directly from David Hoch, a journalist who accompanied blogger Nick Shirley to sites claiming to be Somali daycare centers.

‘There are few crimes more morally repugnant than stealing from vulnerable children. Every dollar stolen is a meal not eaten, a doctor’s visit missed and a future diminished,’ Cruz said, adding that such fraud ‘plunders our children’s potential.’

Gesturing toward a photo of the ‘Quality Learing Center’ in Minneapolis during the hearing, an alleged fraudulent childcare provider Cruz called ’emblematic’ of the crisis, he said the fraud was occurring not in ‘some distant or lawless place, but in the heart of America’s Midwest.’

Co-sponsor Lee said support for childcare should ‘go to real kids, not empty rooms.’

‘Fake childcare operations are stealing funding from the ones who are actually taking care of America’s children in need. Our bill will address this massive fraud by granting funding based on actual attendance rather than reported enrollment and allowing states to pay retroactively instead of in advance,’ Lee said, adding such ‘diligence’ should have been the law all along.

The Payment Integrity Act also puts into law the January rule from Health and Human Services that established attendance-based billing procedures.

That rule, according to Secretary Robert F. Kennedy’s deputy, Jim O’Neill, was also spurred by what has been happening in Minnesota.

‘We’ve seen credible and widespread allegations of fraudulent daycare providers who were not caring for children at all. The reforms we are enacting will make fraud harder to perpetrate,’ O’Neill said in a statement.

The Payment Integrity Act amends the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act signed into law by President George H.W. Bush, to include such ‘attendance-based billing.’

‘Nothing in this subchapter shall be construed to require a lead agency to make a payment to a child care provider prior to the provision of child care services,’ the bill states in a direct reversal of the prepayment system Cruz says allowed fraud to flourish.

With little time and no deal in sight to fund the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), a partial government shutdown by midnight is all but guaranteed.

The battle to prevent the third government shutdown under President Donald Trump in less than six months was lost in the Senate on Thursday. Now, with Congress scattered across the U.S. and several senators headed abroad, there’s no chance that a shutdown will be averted.

Senate Republicans were unable to smash through Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Senate Democrats’ unified front to pass a full-year DHS funding bill, nor were they able to do yet another short-term, two-week extension.

‘The idea of not even allowing us to have an extended amount of time to negotiate this suggests to me, at least, that there isn’t a high level of interest in actually solving this issue,’ Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said.

The final fight on the floor Thursday wasn’t with every lawmaker present, but between Sens. Katie Britt, R-Ala., and Chris Murphy, D-Conn., over giving lawmakers a little more time to keep the agency open while negotiations continue.

Senate Democrats argued that Republicans offered their legislative proposal in the dead of night, giving little time to actually move toward a compromise.

‘We had plenty of time to get a deal in the last two weeks,’ Murphy said. ‘And the lack of seriousness from the White House and from Republicans not getting language until last night has put us in the position we are in today.’

And with the expected shutdown, Democrats’ main targets — Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) — won’t see their cash flow dry up because of billions injected into the agency by Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill.’

Instead, agencies like TSA, FEMA, the Coast Guard, and several others will suffer the brunt of the shutdown.

‘There is no way that you can’t say we’re working in good faith. We want to continue this conversation,’ Britt said on the Senate floor. ‘But yet you’re penalizing a TSA agent. A TSA agent is going to go without a paycheck. Why? So that you can posture politically? I’m over it.’

‘Everybody on that side of the aisle knows that ICE and CBP will continue to be funded,’ she continued. ‘They’re going to continue to enforce the law just as they should. Who’s going to pay the price?’

The final floor argument was a microcosm of what the week had devolved into. Senate Republicans argued that Democrats had burned too much time producing their list of demands, while Senate Democrats contended that they weren’t given enough time by the White House.

And as is typical during the string of shutdowns in the last several months, it has devolved into a public blame game. When asked about the effects a shutdown would have on the agencies not involved in immigration enforcement, Schumer pointed the finger at the GOP and the White House.

‘Talk to the Republicans, OK? We’re ready to fund everything,’ Schumer said. ‘We’re ready to have good, serious proposals supported by the American people. They’re not; they’re sort of dug in the ground, and they’re not moving forward.’

But neither side is willing to divulge publicly what the exact sticking points are in their ongoing negotiations. And Senate Democrats now appear to be considering a counteroffer to the White House, a sign that negotiations aren’t totally dead in the water.

‘Negotiations will continue, and we will see in the course of the next few days how serious they are,’ Thune said.

President Donald Trump’s administration fired a U.S. attorney the same day he was sworn in for the role by a federal court this week.

A board of judges for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York tapped Donald T. Kinsella to serve as U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York, according to a court announcement that said Kinsella was sworn in on Wednesday. But Kinsella was then booted from the post on Wednesday. 

Deputy U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche was blunt about the firing in a Wednesday post on X.

‘Judges don’t pick U.S. Attorneys, @POTUS does. See Article II of our Constitution. You are fired, Donald Kinsella,’ Blanche wrote.

In a Thursday statement, the court noted, ‘Yesterday the United States District Court appointed a United States Attorney for the Northern District of New York, a position that was vacant.’ 

‘The Court exercised its authority under 28 U.S.C. § 546(d), which empowers the district court to ‘appoint a United States Attorney to serve until the vacancy is filled.’ The United States Constitution expressly provides for this grant of authority in Article II, Section 2, Clause 2, which states in part: ‘the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment’ of officials such as United States Attorneys ‘in the Courts of Law.’ By the end of the day, Deputy Director of Presidential Personnel, Morgan DeWitt Snow notified Mr. Kinsella that he was removed as the judicially-appointed United States Attorney, without explanation,’ the statement noted.

‘The Court thanks Donald T. Kinsella for his willingness to return to public service so that this vacancy could be filled with a qualified, experienced former prosecutor, and for his years of distinguished work on behalf of the citizens of the Northern District of New York,’ the statement added.

Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment on Friday.

Kinsella was tapped to succeed John Sarcone III after a judge declared in January that he was serving in the role of acting U.S. attorney illegally, according to NBC News. 

The outlet said U.S. District Judge Lorna Schofield ruled that the Department of Justice took improper action to keep Sarcone in the role past the 120-day limit for U.S. attorneys who the Senate has not confirmed. He demoted himself to first assistant attorney while awaiting an appeal of the judge’s decision, the outlet added.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said she received a criminal referral from the House Judiciary Committee alleging former CIA Director John Brennan lied to Congress, confirming the receipt during a hearing before the panel on Wednesday.

Bondi’s was responding to committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, who directly asked the attorney general if Brennan would be indicted. The DOJ has for months been investigating Brennan and several others over the origins of the 2016 Trump-Russia probe.

‘What I can confirm is that we have received a referral from you, Chairman Jordan, to investigate John Brennan,’ Bondi said.

‘His attorneys have made some public statements, but the department is still bound, of course, by our longstanding policy of not discussing matters,’ Bondi said. ‘What I will say today I can’t confirm nor deny whether there’s a pending investigation, but what I will say [is] that no one is above the law. Weaponization has ended.

Jordan’s referral to the DOJ, sent in October, centered on Brennan’s testimony about the Steele dossier, a salacious document containing unverified, negative claims about Trump, and its role in an Obama-era Intelligence Community Assessment on Russia’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 election.

The referral followed CIA Director John Ratcliffe also asking the DOJ to prosecute Brennan over broader conspiracy allegations.

A grand jury subpoenaed Brennan and former FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, among others, as part of the DOJ’s investigation, Fox News Digital reported in November. The subpoenas originated from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, leading Brennan’s lawyers to accuse the DOJ of forum shopping for Republican-friendly judges.

Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., chimed in after Bondi answered, alluding to comments Trump has made about targeting his pollical enemies.

‘If we want to know whether Mr. Brennan will be indicted, you should just ask the president,’ Goldman said.

Fox News asked Trump last summer about Brennan after reports first surfaced that the FBI was investigating him and several others involved in what Republicans have widely viewed as a politically motivated effort to undermine Trump’s 2016 election campaign and victory. Trump said at the time that ‘whatever happens, happens.’

‘I think they’re very dishonest people. I think they’re crooked as hell. And, maybe they have to pay a price for that,’ Trump said at the time.

Senate Democrats aren’t budging on their Homeland Security demands, and appear ready to again thrust the government into a partial shutdown as Republicans scramble to keep the lights on.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., announced that he and Senate Democrats were prepared to reject a short-term funding extension, known as a continuing resolution (CR), for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) just days ahead of the funding deadline.

‘We’re 3 days away from a DHS shutdown, and Republicans have not gotten serious about negotiating a solution that reins in [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] and stops the violence,’ Schumer said on X. ‘Democrats will not support a CR to extend the status quo.’

Congress has until Friday at midnight to fund the agency, and as the days go by, the odds of doing so are becoming increasingly slim.

Schumer’s edict comes as both sides of the aisle continue negotiations behind the scenes on a compromise bill to fund the agency.

Senate Democrats unveiled the legislative text of their 10-point proposal over the weekend, and for a time, Republicans were optimistic that talks were moving in a positive direction.

Now, Schumer and his caucus are at an impasse with Republicans and the White House. While President Donald Trump and his administration presented a counteroffer earlier this week, Democrats say it’s not enough.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., teed up the original DHS funding bill for another vote on Tuesday. That bill could be modified to be a CR, and Republicans are leaning toward a four-week extension to keep the agency open.

And he noted that the legislative text from the White House could be coming on Wednesday.

‘There’s going to be the legislative text coming over from the White House today,’ Thune told reporters. ‘But I think it’s, like I said, the White House is operating in good faith.’

Still, Democrats have dubbed the GOP’s counter, which has been kept under strict lock and key, ‘sophomoric talking points.’ However, several items from their proposal, like requiring Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to obtain judicial warrants, demask, and have identification, are red lines for the White House and Republicans.

Whether the GOP can siphon off enough votes to avert a partial shutdown remains an open question, given the unified front Schumer and his caucus are presenting. And they will have a math problem of their own to contend with in trying to break the 60-vote filibuster.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who was discharged from the hospital on Tuesday, ‘will be working from home this week,’ his office said in a statement.

Legendary boxer Mike Tyson found himself in a new arena on Wednesday as he stood with Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, partnering with the Trump administration to fight obesity.

‘I had a sister that died at 25 from obesity. And where I come from, Brownsville, Brooklyn, is the most violent, poverty-stricken neighborhood in the city of New York and ultra-processed food was just the norm,’ Tyson said. ‘We didn’t have much money, but we had food stamps, and food stamps can buy you the candy, the sugar and all that soda and all that rotten stuff.’

Kennedy and Rollins were providing updates on the rollout of the government’s new dietary guidelines, which were unveiled in January. During the event on Wednesday, several speakers, including Tyson, spoke about the dangers of ultra-processed food and the need to get Americans to shift their diets toward real food.

‘We were able to reduce hundreds of pages of dietary guidelines… to about six pages, but it’s just three words: Eat real food,’ Kennedy said to the crowd as he closed the event. ‘I ask you all to start doing that today if you’re not already doing it.’

Tyson said that when he went to work with a trainer in upstate New York, he was given the tools to keep his health in check. While he admits that he can ‘fool around’ and get ‘lazy,’ leading to gaining 20-40 pounds, he says the tools he learned have allowed him to lose weight fast.

‘This is the biggest fight of my life,’ Tyson added. ‘I want to be a hero in this particular field because it affects my life.’

The event comes just days after the airing of an ad during the Super Bowl in which Tyson speaks about the importance of tackling the U.S.’s reliance on processed food. In the ad, Tyson also speaks about his sister, Denise, who died at the age of 25 from an obesity-linked heart attack.

The legendary boxer posted the video on his Facebook page, and said it was ‘the most important fight of my life.’

‘The most important fight of my life isn’t in the ring. I’m not fighting for a belt. I’m fighting for our health. Processed foods are killing us. We have been lied to, and we need to eat real food again,’ Tyson wrote.

Kennedy’s focus, even during his own 2024 presidential campaign, has been the rise of chronic illness in the U.S., which he believes is linked to an increased consumption of ultra-processed foods. The guidelines that he and Rollins unveiled in January effectively flip the already outdated food pyramid, moving protein, dairy, health fats, fruits and vegetables to the wide top of the inverted triangle, while relegating whole grains to the narrow bottom.

‘Better health begins on your plate — not in your medicine cabinet. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2025-2030 put real, whole, nutrient-dense foods back where they belong: at the center of health,’ the government website on the guidelines, RealFood.gov, reads.

The protein target in the new guidelines is ‘1.2–1.6 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day.’ Additionally, the guidance recommends Americans consume three servings of vegetables and two servings of fruits every day. Meanwhile, it is recommended that Americans eat two to four servings of whole grains daily, although it specifies that refined carbohydrates are not recommended.

Iran dominated the agenda in Wednesday’s White House meeting between President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with both leaders signaling that diplomacy with Tehran remains uncertain and that coordination will continue if talks fail.

In a post on Truth Social following the meeting, Trump said he pushed for continued negotiations but left open other options.

‘There was nothing definitive reached other than I insisted that negotiations with Iran continue to see whether or not a deal can be consummated. If it can, I let the Prime Minister know that will be a preference. If it cannot, we will just have to see what the outcome will be… Last time Iran decided that they were better off not making a deal, and they were hit with Midnight Hammer — That did not work well for them.’

Netanyahu’s office said the leaders discussed Iran, Gaza and broader regional developments and agreed to maintain close coordination, adding that the prime minister emphasized Israel’s security needs in the context of negotiations.

Earlier in the day, Netanyahu formally joined the U.S.-backed Board of Peace, signing onto the initiative ahead of the meeting after weeks of hesitation. The move places Israel inside a forum that includes Western partners as well as Turkey and Qatar, whose involvement in Gaza has drawn criticism in Jerusalem.

Experts say the decision reflects strategic calculations tied to both Gaza and Iran.

Dr. Dan Diker, president of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, said Netanyahu’s participation is directly linked to cooperation with Washington and to shaping postwar arrangements in Gaza.

‘It is in Israel’s interest for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to join the Board of Peace. He needs a place at that table even alongside adversarial powers such as Muslim Brotherhood-aligned countries Qatar and Turkey. Netanyahu’s membership in the Board of Peace is an important element in his cooperation with President Trump to help implement the 20-point plan, with deradicalization, disarming Hamas and demilitarization as the first three non-negotiable actions.’

Diker said the decision is also tied to Iran. ‘More strategic reason that Netanyahu’s membership on the Board of Peace is important is that it represents an element of cooperation to counter the Iranian regime. Netanyahu is likely counting on action against the Iranian regime from the Iranian people themselves and from the United States in the coming weeks. In exchange, Netanyahu continues to cooperate in implementing the 20-point plan in Gaza as part of a quid pro quo.’

Blaise Misztal, vice president for policy at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, described Israel’s move as a pragmatic choice shaped by the incomplete implementation of the Gaza deal and the broader regional threat environment.

‘The implementation of the Gaza peace deal leaves much to be desired. Hamas, despite being given 72 hours to release all hostages, took over 100 days to do so; Hamas has still not disarmed; there is neither an International Stabilization Force nor any countries jumping at the chance to join it; and the Board of Peace comprises countries that have shown themselves enemies of peace with Israel.’

He said Israel ultimately chose engagement over isolation. ‘Proceeding with the deal — including joining the Board of Peace — is Israel’s least bad option. Israel has a better chance of countering or balancing Turkish and Qatari influence on the Board of Peace by being in the room with them, rather than outside it.’

Misztal also linked the timing to Iran. ‘With the United States having a real chance to disarm, or even topple, the Iranian regime and the risk that Tehran might yet lash out at Israel, there is no interest in doing anything that would risk restarting the war in Gaza.’