Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said Sunday that while President Biden had a ‘terrible’ debate against former President Trump, he recently spoke to Biden and continues to support him in his quest for re-election.

Sanders – who at 82 is older than Biden – said people should look beyond age, despite increasing concerns from both parties over the president’s mental fitness.

‘Biden is old,’ Sanders told host Robert Costa of the 81-year-old president. ‘He’s not as articulate as he once was. I wish he could jump up the steps on Air Force One. He can’t. What we have got to focus on is policy, whose policies have and will benefit the vast majority of the people in this country.’

The senator said he believes the American people want a president with the ‘guts to take on corporate America.’ Someone who will expand Medicare, raise and extend the life of Social Security benefits, and talk about a ‘permanent child tax credit to cut childhood poverty in America by 50%.’ 

Sanders said 60% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, and that 25% of ‘elderly people’ are trying to live off $15,000 a year or less.

‘The American people want an agenda for the next four years that speaks to the needs of the working class of this country,’ Sanders said. ‘He has got to say, ‘I am prepared to take on corporate greed, massive income and wealth inequality and stand with the working class in this country.’ He does that, he’s going to win and win big.’

Sanders wrapped up the interview by saying he is running for re-election as senator from Vermont. 

The White House announced on Sunday that Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff recently tested positive for COVID-19. 

In a statement, the office of the Second Gentleman noted that Emhoff tested positive on Saturday ‘after experiencing mild symptoms.’

‘He is fully vaccinated and three times boosted,’ the statement read. ‘He is currently asymptomatic, continuing to work remotely, and remaining away from others at home.’

The press release also noted that Vice President Kamala Harris recently tested negative for the virus.

‘Out of an abundance of caution, yesterday, the Vice President was tested for COVID-19,’ the release added. ‘She tested negative and remains asymptomatic.’

Emhoff and Harris were photographed standing near President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden on Thursday during the White House’s Fourth of July celebration. 

Fox News Digital asked the White House if Biden was tested for the illness, but did not receive an immediate response.

The second gentleman’s diagnosis comes nearly three-and-a-half years after the COVID-19 pandemic began. Earlier in June, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) warned that coronavirus infections are ‘growing or likely growing’ in 44 states and territories.

Dr. Marc Siegel, physician, clinical professor of medicine at NYU Langone Medical Center and a Fox News medical contributor, recently spoke to Fox News Digital about the uptick in recent cases.

‘There has been an upsurge in certain areas, including California — fueled by the so-called FLiRT variants, KP.3, KP.2 and KP.1,’ he explained. ‘It could spread to more states.’

Siegel explained that the new COVID1-10 variants are still ‘immunoevasive,’ meaning that they impact people with prior immunity.

‘[Like] all respiratory viruses, it spreads further in low humidity,’ he said. ‘Having said that, it has not shown itself to be seasonal, meaning that it can spread in warm weather easily as well.’

Fox News Digital’s Melissa Rudy contributed to this report.

A far-left political coalition that unexpectedly assembled ahead of France’s snap elections is projected to win the majority of parliamentary seats up for grabs and the country’s prime minister has announced his intention to resign – leading the country into unforeseen territory and possible turmoil.

As the election results came in, French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced he will be turning in his resignation on Monday. 

President Emmanuel Macron’s centrist alliance was projected to take the second most seats, while the far right was projected to come in third.

Macron called the snap election just four weeks ago, after the right-wing National Rally (RN) scored enormous success in the European Parliamentary elections in June. Polling before the first round of voting indicated RN would continue to dominate. However, more recent polling ahead of the runoff indicates those returns have diminished and RN will fall short of a clear majority. 

The first round occurred on June 30 and resulted in just 76 of the 577 constituencies in the French National Assembly determining their representative. Candidates who did not receive an outright majority in the first round of voting went on to a second-round runoff, which happened on Sunday.

Going into the election, France was set to elect the RN as the largest party in government, though it was possible no party might emerge with a clear majority in the tightly contested election.

When the results started to come in, projections changed toward the left, signifying a lack of majority for any single alliance, which threatened to plunge France into economic and political turmoil.

The final results of the election are not expected until late Sunday or early Monday.

Macron made a huge gamble when he called for the snap election, and the projections show the gamble may not have paid off for the unpopular president and his alliance, which lost control of parliament.

While the far-right RN greatly increased the number of seats it now holds in parliament, the results fell short of the party’s expectations.

Far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon urged Macron to invite the leftist New Popular Front coalition to form a government, given projections that put it in the lead.

Macron’s office said the president would ‘wait for the new National Assembly to organize itself’ before making any decisions.

A hung parliament with no single bloc coming close to getting the 289 seats needed for an absolute majority in the National Assembly, the more powerful of France’s two legislative chambers, would be unknown territory for modern France.

France doesn’t have a tradition of lawmakers from rival political camps coming together to form a working majority.

The projections, if confirmed by official counts, will spell intense uncertainty for a pillar of the European Union and its second-largest economy, with no clarity about who might partner with Macron as prime minister in governing France.

Fox News Digital’s Peter Aitken and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

France is set to elect the right-wing National Rally (RN) as the largest party in government, yet no party may emerge with a clear majority in this tightly contested election as the second round of voting kicks off this weekend. 

The first round, which occurred June 30, resulted in just 76 of the 577 constituencies in the French National Assembly determining their representative. Any candidate who did not receive an outright majority in the first round of voting heads on to the second-round runoff, which is set for July 7.

Those few contests that concluded in the first round revealed a lot about voter sentiment and indicated trouble for the current government after RN took one-third of the vote, the most by any party.

The current government is an ‘ensemble,’ a coalition of parties, including French President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance (RE), Democratic Movement, Horizons, En Commun and the Progressive federation. Despite the assembly election results, Macron will retain his mandate as president until the 2027 election. 

Macron called the snap election after RN scored enormous success in the European Parliamentary elections in June. Polling before the first round of voting indicated RN would continue to dominate, but more recent polling ahead of the runoff indicates those returns have diminished and RN will fall short of a clear majority. 

Wednesday’s poll indicates RN will end up taking between 190 and 220 seats, but it would need 289 seats to control the assembly, according to Reuters. Additionally, its closest ally, the Republicans, are projected to win – at most – around 50 seats, ruling out some kind of right-wing coalition to take control of the assembly.

The next largest share would go to the New Popular Front alliance, which could net between 159 and 183 seats, leaving Macron’s ensemble third with around 110 to 135 seats. Macron has already ruled out making a new alliance with the left-wing party France Unbowed (LFI), according to French daily Le Figaro.

Many candidates from Macron’s alliance who reached the runoff have already stood down in an effort to focus voters and support behind the strongest non-RN candidate in any given constituency. Former French Prime Minister Edouard Phillippe told French network TF1 TV he would vote for a Communist candidate to stop RN from winning the seat. 

Macron insisted, however, that ‘withdrawing today for left-wing elected officials in the face of National Rally does not mean governing tomorrow with LFI.’

French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal last month blasted LFI as equally extreme and just as dangerous to French society as RN, writing on social media platform X that ‘Insoumise France fuels the National Rally and the National Rally fuels Insoumise France.

‘They fuel hatred, fears and divisions between the French,’ Attal added. ‘On June 30 and July 7, against the extremes and for the Republic, vote!’ 

Opposition to RN stems from its roots as National Front, headed up by Marine Le Pen’s father Jean-Marie Le Pen, who was repeatedly convicted for racist and antisemitic remarks, including elements of Holocaust denial, such as when he referred to Nazi gas chambers as a ‘detail’ of history.

But Marine Le Pen has found support among some of France’s Jewish voters as antisemitism continues to grow in Europe.

Her anti-Islam views and comments, however, have raised concerns among other voters, as well. In 2017, she suggested France expel any foreigners convicted of a crime or suspected of being radicalized and said convicted extremists with dual nationality should be stripped of their French passports, Radio France Internationale reported. 

‘The measures that I want to put in place would mean that many of these people (Islamist attackers) would not have been on our territory or living freely,’ she said in an interview with BFM TV. 

In the event the votes should fall as the polls predict, the most likely outcome for France will be a hung parliament with some kind of begrudging alliance created to get a leader in place. The Conservative Party in Britain regained power from Labour in 2010 through a hung parliament alliance with the Liberal-Democrats, ultimately establishing an outright majority in the following election.

But, at that time, the Conservatives had 306 of 650 seats, making it far easier to broker such a deal. For France, RN would need support from two other parties or would need to form some kind of alliance with a direct rival. 

The government has urged voters to do what they can to continue diminishing RN’s chances of achieving control of the assembly, with Attal arguing voters had a ‘responsibility’ to block RN from victory. 

‘On Sunday evening, what’s at stake in the second round is to do everything so the extreme right does not have an absolute majority,’ Attal said during an appearance on France Inter radio as reported by Voice of America.

‘It is not nice for some French to have to block … by using a vote that they did not want to,’ he added, clarifying that he ‘did not speak about a coalition. I do not want to impose on the French a coalition they did not choose.’ 

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced four principles that it says must be part of any hostage release deal with the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. 

The declaration comes as the ‘Prime Minister’s steadfast position against the attempt to halt IDF action in Rafah is what has led Hamas to enter negotiations,’ the office says. The city in the southern Gaza Strip has been described as Hamas’ last stronghold following months of fighting in the war-torn territory. 

The principles are: 

‘Any deal will allow Israel to resume fighting until all objectives of the war have been achieved.’ 

Israel has repeatedly said its military campaign against Hamas will not end until the Palestinian terrorist group is eliminated. 

Netanyahu, who made this vow in late June, also said months ago that ‘Israel has no intention of permanently occupying Gaza or displacing its civilian population.’ 

‘Our goal is to rid Gaza of Hamas terrorists and free our hostages. Once this is achieved, Gaza can be demilitarized and deradicalized, thereby creating a possibility for a better future for Israel and Palestinians alike,’ Netanyahu said in a video posted on X in January. 

‘There will be no smuggling of weapons to Hamas from Egypt to the Gaza border.’ 

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) released video footage in June showing tunnels allegedly used by Hamas to smuggle weapons into Gaza from Egypt, according to The Times of Israel. 

At least 20 tunnels crossing from Egypt into Gaza have been detected, the outlet reported.

Throughout the nine-month war, Israeli troops have discovered a labyrinth of tunnels throughout the Gaza Strip that are integral to Hamas’ movements and military operations. 

‘There will be no return of thousands of armed terrorists to the northern Gaza Strip.’ 

The prime minister’s office is vowing that armed terrorists should not be allowed to return to the northern Gaza Strip in its vision for a post-war Gaza. 

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East said on Friday that ‘up to 1.9 million people in Gaza are internally displaced, including people who have been displaced nine or 10 times.  

‘Previous estimations were 1.7 million but this was before the operation in Rafah, and since May there have been additional displacements from Rafah and other parts across the Gaza Strip,’ the agency added. 

‘Israel will maximize the number of living hostages who will be released from Hamas captivity.’ 

Approximately 116 hostages are still believed to be held by Hamas since the beginning of the war last Oct. 7. 

Over the past nine months, 109 hostages have been released, seven have been rescued by the IDF, and the bodies of 19 have been recovered by the military from Gaza, including three who were mistakenly killed by troops.

Fox News’ Yonat Friling and Michael Dorgan contributed to this report. 

President Biden’s staffers reportedly prepare him with meticulous details on how to enter and exit fundraiser event spaces. 

According to a copy of the instructions obtained by Axios, Biden’s aides created a document that read in bold letters, ‘Walk to podium.’ With the White House insignia, it included photos showing a clear pathway to the podium. 

Axios cited some Democrats who attended or helped set up events for Biden in recent months as wondering whether the meticulous attention to detail is more of a reflection of the 81-year-old president’s limitations. 

‘I staffed a simple fundraiser at a private residence, but they treated it like it was a NATO summit with his movements,’ one person, who reportedly staffed a Biden event in the past 18 months, told Axios. 

Axios obtained a copy of a five-page document template that the White House reportedly sends to staffers to prepare the president. 

The document reportedly also usually included a large picture of the event space on each page. The messages ‘View from podium,’ and ‘View from audience’ are written. 

Biden’s disastrous debate performance against former President Trump in Atlanta has prompted serious concerns from within the Democratic Party about the president’s viability to run for a second term. The White House insists that these detailed instructions for the 81-year-old president are nothing out of the ordinary.

‘High levels of detail and precision are critical to presidential advance work – regardless of who is president – and these are basic approaches that are used by any modern advance team, including the Vice President’s office and agencies,’ White House senior deputy press secretary and deputy assistant to the president Andrew Bates said in a statement to Fox News Digital, reacting to the report. ‘And then-Vice President Biden’s team did the same, as did other principals, during the second term of the Obama-Biden Administration.’

‘These documents are standard logistical briefing materials and photos for any principal including the Vice President,’ Vice President Harris’ communications director Kirsten Allen added. 

A House Democrat backing President Biden is blasting members of his own party for speaking out against Biden’s 2024 candidacy in public, arguing it is putting the president in a worse position amid the fallout from the 81-year-old’s disastrous debate performance last month.

Congress is back in session on Monday for the first time since the immediate fallout of Biden’s debate performance, and it is expected to bring a heap of scrutiny on Democratic lawmakers.

Rep. Ritchie Torres, D-N.Y., who has signaled he is backing Biden, called his fellow Democrats out for the public disarray.

‘Regardless of where one stands on the question of President Biden’s political future, the intra-party mixed messaging strikes me as deeply self-destructive,’ Torres said Monday. ‘Those publicly calling on President Biden to withdraw should ask themselves a simple question: ‘what if the President becomes the Democratic nominee?’ The drip, drip, drip of public statements of no confidence only serve to weaken a president who has been weakened not only by the debate but also by the debate about the debate.’

‘Weakening a weakened nominee seems like a losing strategy for a presidential election. The piling-on is not so much solving a problem as much as it is creating and compounding one. The process by which we decide how to move forward matters as much as the decision itself.’

The debate has led to more intra-party fractures within the House Democratic caucus as members are split on calls for Biden to drop out of the race. 

Over the past week, five House Democrats have publicly urged Biden to step aside ahead of his November rematch with former President Trump. 

A senior House Democratic aide told Fox News Digital on Friday that they anticipate more people to join the list this week.

However, Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., a Biden ally, took a shot at her colleagues on Sunday for criticizing the president.

‘Any ‘leader’ calling for President Biden to drop out needs to get their priorities straight and stop undermining this incredible actual leader who has delivered real results for our country,’ she said in a statement. ‘What Democrats need to be doing is stop listening to these political pundits and focus on what’s at stake this election: our democracy. End of story.’

It is part of the political minefield the Biden campaign has been navigating since last month’s CNN Presidential Debate. The 81-year-old president’s hoarse voice and sometimes aimless answers exacerbated concerns that he is not a viable candidate to face Trump in November and spurred questions over whether he is fit to lead in a second term.

This week will be the longest time House Democrats have had to face each other and the Capitol Hill media since that debate. 

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., has said very little about Biden’s debate performance, only telling reporters on Friday that he was dedicated to making sure Democrats win in November. 

‘Until he articulates a way forward in terms of his vision for America at this moment, I’m going to reserve comment about anything relative to where we are at this moment, other than to say I stand behind the ticket,’ Jeffries told reporters on Friday.

House Democrats held a caucus-wide call on Sunday afternoon to discuss the path forward in the election. Four senior Democratic lawmakers – Reps. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., Mark Takano, D-Calif., Adam Smith, D-Wash., and Joe Morelle, D-N.Y. – reportedly said Biden should step aside.

There was more confusion on the left after the call, however, when Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., responded to reports that he too criticized Biden with a statement declaring: ‘I support President Biden. I support the Biden-Harris ticket, and look forward to helping defeat Donald Trump in November. I was proud to host an event this week in Northern Virginia with the President, and will continue doing all I can to support the Biden-Harris campaign in Virginia and across the country.’

Fox News Digital reached out to the four lawmakers mentioned on the call for comment.