Minnesota Gov. and Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz was blasted on social media this week for visiting the upscale Manhattan apartment of Alex Soros, the son of billionaire liberal mega donor George Soros.

‘Honored to host Governor @Tim_Walz at my home in New York City!’ Alex Soros, his dad’s successor at the multibillion-dollar Open Society Foundations (OSF), posted on X on Tuesday along with photos alongside Walz in front of the New York City skyline.

The post was widely panned by conservatives on social media who made the argument that Walz’s portrayal as a ‘rural’ moderate was compromised by standing next to one of the most prolific progressive families in the United States. 

‘All you need to know……’ Fox News anchor Laura Ingraham posted on X.

‘If you squint, you can see the strings on the marionette,’ former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy posted on X.

‘A post like this does nothing to help Kamala Harris & Tim Walz win — if anything, it hurts them,’ journalist Jerry Dunleavy posted on X. ‘So why would Soros post something like this? To publicly signal his power & influence within the next would-be presidential administration.’

‘Real working man’s salt of the earth aesthetic for ol Walzy,’ Daily Caller editor-in-chief Geoffrey Ingersoll posted on X. 

‘This guy goes around saying he’s a small town midwestern guy who understands the struggles of the middle class and then goes to hang out at the floating home in the sky of the world’s biggest billionaire nepo baby,’ digital strategist Greg Price wrote on X.

‘Nothing screams Midwestern folksy like a billionaire penthouse view of Manhattan,’ Washington Free Beacon reporter Chuck Ross posted on X.

‘George was better at this than his weird son,’ Daily Wire managing editor Brent Scher posted on X. ‘Why would you post this?’

This is at least the second time that Walz has hung out with Alex Soros in the last month. Photos circulated on social media in August during the DNC showed Soros, his new fiancée, Huma Abedin, and Walz hanging out in Chicago.

Fox News Digital reached out to the Harris-Walz campaign and the Soros Open Society Foundation for comment but did not receive a response. 

Walz has been widely touted by various media outlets as a VP choice who will help Harris win rural voters in Middle America while George Soros is one of the most polarizing progressive figures in American politics, often criticized by Republicans for implementing a far-left agenda with his vast fortune.

The Justice Department (DOJ) has sided with the United Nations in defending in court its relief agency for Palestinians after some workers were found to have likely been involved in the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in Israel. 

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) fired at least nine of its employees in August after finding that they likely participated in the Hamas slaughter of 1,200 people, including more than 30 Americans. 

Victims of the massacre and their families sued UNRWA in a New York federal court, accusing the group and the individuals involved of aiding and abetting Hamas ‘in the commission of international torts.’

The United Nations (U.N.) says the lawsuit should be dismissed, claiming the charter between the U.S. and the U.N. gives the group and its subsidiaries diplomatic immunity. ‘Since the U.N. has not waived immunity in this instance, its subsidiary, UNRWA, continues to enjoy absolute immunity from prosecution, and the lawsuit should be dismissed,’ the U.N. stated in response. 

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams of the Southern District of New York filed a brief in July supporting that argument, saying, ‘In light of the United Nations’ immunity, the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over the United Nations.’

The brief notes that ‘the United States acknowledges and deplores the profound losses suffered on October 7,’ and that ‘the United States takes no position on the factual allegations in the complaint.’

‘The United Nations is absolutely immune from suit and legal process absent an express waiver of immunity,’ Williams said, citing the Charter of the United Nations, to which the United States acceded in 1945, that says the U.N. ‘shall enjoy in the territory of each of its Members such privileges and immunities as are necessary for the fulfilment [sic] of its purposes.’

Similarly, the individual defendants in the lawsuit also enjoy immunity from suit as U.N. employees, the brief said.

Among other things, the DOJ’s brief says that the victims’ lawsuit alleges that UNRWA ‘knowingly provided monetary and material support to Hamas to build its ‘terror infrastructure’ leading up to the Oct. 7 attacks, facilitated the construction of Hamas command and control centers, permitted weapons storage in UNRWA facilities, concealed rocket and rocket-launching materials on UNRWA premises, and that that UNRWA chose Hamas-approved textbooks for its schools that were used to indoctrinate children against Israel.’

The suit also alleges UNRWA ‘knew several local staff were affiliated with Hamas and paid staff ‘in a fashion calculated to further enrich Hamas,’ according to Williams’ brief.

Mark Goldfeder, director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, said that DOJ’s brief outlining the scope of UNRWA’s immunity ‘makes a lot of assumptions’ and exhibits a ‘lack of appetite on behalf of the executive branch to go after supporters of terror.’

‘There are also multiple technical arguments to be made here that UNRWA is not actually immune,’ Goldfeder said in a statement on X, directed at the Justice Department. 

‘The treaties above are not self-executing; it is only an affiliated organization and was never itself designated under the International Organizations Immunities Act of 1945,’ he continued. ‘It saddens me that you chose to simply assume that UNRWA’s positions are correct, instead of engaging on any of these points.’ 

‘Perhaps the most egregious assumption you accept is the idea that the claims made by the plaintiffs against all the individual defendants here relate to actions undertaken or omissions made by them in the performance of their official function,’ Goldfeder said.

‘To be clear… [the complaint is] chock-full of allegations that these defendants aided and abetted Hamas, and that they did so consciously, voluntarily, and culpably.’ 

‘Is it, pray tell, your contention that all of those actions were what UNRWA was supposed to be doing?’ Goldfeder questioned on the social media platform.

Goldfeder continued in an interview with Fox News Digital, arguing, ‘The basic premise of what makes it so absolutely crazy is this – the U.N. is claiming that immunity from civil suits for invading a country and massacring its citizens is necessary for the exercise of its functions. And again, the Biden-Harris administration just filed that they agree. So the point is, if you think that immunity for mass murder is necessary for the U.N. to function, maybe it’s time to rethink the U.N. entirely.’

Anne Bayefsky, president of Human Rights Voices and Director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust, says that the practical effect of DOJ’s position is ‘unaccountabillity’ for UNRWA.  

‘Regardless of the empty protestations to the contrary, the practical effect of the DOJ position is to contribute to unaccountability for UNRWA and its employees despite their demonstrable connections to Hamas and heinous behavior on multiple fronts,’ Bayefsky said. 

‘Legally-speaking immunity applies here when employees act within the boundaries of their official capacities. So is the DOJ now arguing that aiding and abetting an officially-designated terrorist organization is just UNRWA doing its job?’ she added.

UNRWA and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York did not respond to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment. 

Some House Democrats are already looking at the possibility of investigating former President Donald Trump if they win the House majority in November.

Two top lawmakers, Reps. Richard Neal, D-Mass., and Jamie Raskin, D-Md., did not rule out probing Trump if he wins the White House in November.

Neal, the top Democrat on the House Ways & Means Committee who led the probe into Trump’s tax returns in the last Congress, told Fox News Digital it would be ‘hard to assess’ whether he would see himself resuscitating that effort, but he added that the Supreme Court’s recent decision expanding presidential immunity could change the calculus.

‘That would be speculative, but I certainly would not back away from the positions I’ve taken over the years on that issue,’ Neal said.

Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, told Fox News Digital, ‘I’d rather look to the future than the past, but we’ll do our job.’

In a longer statement provided to Fox News Digital on Wednesday, Raskin accused Republicans of ignoring issues like gun violence and prescription drug costs.

‘Instead, for two years, House Republicans have used the gavel to pursue a laughingstock flop of an impeachment investigation to help their presidential nominee and personal cult leader, Donald Trump. Even worse, they have blocked and obstructed Democrats’ efforts to investigate the corruption of Donald Trump and his autocrat allies,’ Raskin said.

‘Investigating this endless corruption is critical for Congress to create legislative fixes to ensure government serves the people and to put an end to efforts to exploit the presidency and sell out our government to the highest bidder.’

Meanwhile, rank-and-file Democratic Reps. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., and Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., said investigations could be warranted into Trump’s family and their business dealings even if the former president lost his re-election bid.

Both singled out his son-in-law and former White House adviser Jared Kushner, whose investment firm got a $2 billion investment commitment from a fund led by Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman. 

‘His family has some ongoing deals that we learned about after we went out of the majority that I think are worth visiting,’ Swalwell said. ‘The Kushners and the Saudi deal – I think people want some closure on that.’

He took a shot at the House GOP’s probes into the foreign business dealings of President Biden’s son, Hunter, adding, ‘If you tell me you’re interested in Hunter Biden, then you probably owe it to the country to be interested in what happened there.’

Goldman, an Oversight Committee member, told Fox News Digital, ‘I think if Trump wins, obviously that’ll be the principal purpose [of the committee], is to provide the checks and balances that Congress needs to check, and that Donald Trump especially requires.’

‘I think there are a lot of really important, substantive issues that the committee has not investigated this year that are not partisan, that we should be focused on,’ he said, adding, ‘But we also were frustrated this term that obvious, obvious concerns were not investigated.’

‘How did Jared Kushner get $2 billion from Mohammed bin Salman for an investment company in something that he had never done before…That’s a tremendous amount of money. There’s been no investigation into that.’

Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt responded, saying, ‘Swalwell and Goldman should get a life. President Trump has endured two fake impeachments, four baseless witch-hunt indictments, and endless investigations into his businesses — all of which have failed because they are not based on facts but rather, they are fueled by the vitriolic Trump Derangement Syndrome that has taken over the Democrat Party.’

Raskin’s investigatory efforts into Trump during this Congress, as leader of the Oversight Committee’s Democratic minority, could also offer a possible preview of what Democrats’ probes could look like in a second Trump term.

Earlier this month, he and Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., sent a letter to Trump demanding that the former president prove he did not take a ‘cash bribe’ from Egypt’s president in 2017. The letter was spurred by a Washington Post report that also alleged former Attorney General Bill Barr had blocked a probe into the matter.

Investigating Biden and his family has been a core focus of the committee under Chairman James Comer’s tenure. Comer, R-Ky., released a report recently accusing the president of having committed impeachable offenses – something the White House denies.

He denied that the intensity of his Biden probe could give Democrats cover to investigate Trump, however – insisting their inquiries into Trump were political.

‘If the Democrats want to waste taxpayer dollars and time investigating the Trump administration again for the second time, then that’s their prerogative. But we focused on waste, fraud and abuse and mismanagement by the federal government,’ Comer told Fox News Digital.

‘If Trump wins…They’re going to harass and obstruct every step of the way.’

Congress took a significant step toward averting an end-of-month partial government shutdown just weeks before Election Day.

In a victory for Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., a majority of Republicans voted for the measure – it passed 341 to 82, with 132 House GOP lawmakers in favor. All the 82 ‘no’ votes were Republicans.

Faced with an Oct. 1 deadline and little bipartisan progress on fiscal year 2025 spending priorities, the House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a short-term extension of the current fiscal year’s federal funding levels to keep the government open through Dec. 20.

The measure, known as a continuing resolution (CR), gained wide bipartisan support – though more Democrats voted for it than Republicans, as expected.

A large contingent of Republicans, still angry with House GOP leaders for passing last year’s federal funding bills in two large segments rather than forcing the Democrat-held Senate to consider 12 appropriations bills individually, were always likely to vote against extending those measures.

The federal funding debate has been a lightening rod for political drama, particularly during the 118th Congress. Last year’s government funding stand-off precipitated the ouster of Johnson’s predecessor by a group of House Republicans.

Fiscal conservatives are frustrated about punting that fight into December, arguing it puts the House GOP majority in the position of being forced to reckon with a massive ‘omnibus’ spending bill right before the end-of-year holidays rather than work through their 12 individual appropriations bills.

‘I’ve said this in public forum – we are condemned to a Christmas lame-duck omnibus,’ Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital on Tuesday.

House Freedom Caucus member Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., said, ‘I think that’s the preview of coming attractions, unfortunately.’

But Johnson swore both in public and private that the House would not take up an omnibus in December.

‘There won’t be a Christmas omnibus. Somebody asked me in the hallway a little while ago, ‘Will there be mini-buses?’ We don’t want any buses. We’re not going to do any buses.’

Allies of former President Trump, meanwhile, have called for a CR into the new year in the hopes he will win the White House and carry Congress along with him.

House GOP leadership staff suggested to Fox News Digital over the weekend that it’s more likely Johnson will aim for a CR to do just that in December rather than consider an omnibus.

That would line up with his original plan for a more conservative CR – one that offered a six-month funding extension into March and was coupled with a measure to prevent noncitizens from registering to vote in U.S. elections.

The initial plan failed after a rebellion by 14 Republicans. Some defense hawks worried about the effect of a six-month CR on military readiness, while a group of fiscal conservatives balked at the principle of the CR itself.

The new plan is a more straightforward funding extension, though it adds $231 million for the U.S. Secret Service after two foiled assassination attempts against Trump.

And while the Democrat-led White House and Senate were both poised to reject Johnson’s initial CR, President Biden and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., have signaled they’re supportive of the recent deal.

The bill is expected to be considered in the Senate on Thursday, after which it heads to the White House for Biden’s signature. 

Vice President Kamala Harris has announced that she will not be attending this year’s Al Smith Dinner, making her the first presidential candidate since Walter Mondale in 1984 to snub New York City’s famous Catholic event.

The tradition began in 1960, with John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon donning their high hats, white spats and Arrow collars, and ever since, it has been an evening of national and political unity.

Gotham’s Cardinal Timothy Dolan called Harris’ decision ‘disappointing,’ reminding the veep that Walter Mondale lost all but his home state when he RSVP’d in the negative way back in 1984, and even some liberal pundits are scratching their heads at the decision.

After all, the Al Smith dinner is a venerated institution because it is a rare moment in today’s politics when candidates poke gentle fun at each other and enjoy dinner together, showing the country that there is more that unites us than divides us.

In fact, Harris has at least five very good reasons for ducking this showcase of togetherness, and each is deeply cynical. But taken together, they explain exactly why she is turning her back on tradition and potentially alienating Catholic voters.

1. Harris Does Not Want To Humanize Trump

The vice president is running a bizarre and unprecedented campaign in which she insists she no longer holds the positions she did three years ago and doesn’t feel much need to let us all know what the new positions are. This leaves one strategy for her, and that is to paint Donald Trump as a fascist would-be dictator who would destroy democracy a day after being sworn in using a copy of Project 2025. 

Having a wonderful dinner under the auspices of His Eminence, the smiling and congenial Cardinal Dolan, really doesn’t send that message. In fact, it sends exactly the opposite message. And if Trump isn’t actually evil incarnate, then people might suddenly start comparing economic policies, and the Democrats can’t have that.

2. The Al Smith Dinner Is Too Unscripted For Harris

It’s no secret that the Harris campaign has been closeting their candidate away from unscripted events whenever possible. Medieval monks weren’t this cloistered. In order to participate in the dinner, Harris would have to appear on the dais, without a teleprompter, in front of a crowd that wasn’t hand-chosen and deliver 5-10 minutes of comic material. Nothing we have ever seen Harris do even remotely suggests she is capable of this, and her handlers may know all too well that she isn’t.

3. Protesting The Church Is A Wink At The Far Left

The Harris campaign has settled into an approach in which it vaguely moves to the center by disavowing her past as the most liberal member of the Senate, while also winking at progressives to let them know she really doesn’t mean it. Snubbing the most important Catholic event on the political calendar sends exactly that message to her far-left supporters. Sure, she has to say certain things to get elected, but she is really all about sticking it to the oppressors, and what represents that better than insulting the Catholic Church?

4. Harris Does Not Want A Level Playing Field

As we have seen with the Harris campaign hand selecting only left-leaning networks for proposed debates against Trump, and declining the one on Fox News that had been scheduled with President Joe Biden, Kamala is not willing to face Trump on equal terms. Without an edge, without wildly biased debate moderators, there is no reason to believe Harris can go toe to toe with anyone, much less Donald Trump. She was not battle tested in a primary, and wants no part of a fair fight.

5. Kamala Harris Isn’t Funny

The main goal of anyone delivering remarks at the Al Smith dinner is to score some laughs, and with decent enough joke writers most politicians can manage it, but can Kamala Harris? While it’s true that many of her incomprehensible word salads are unintentionally funny, when she actually tries to be amusing she generally starts cackling at her own joke while saying, ‘right? right?’ to a confused and distinctly not laughing audience. This is just one more aspect of the vice president that the Hidin’ Harris campaign wants to keep under wraps.

Traditions matter to societiesc. So does the ability, even in the midst of the most heated political times, to put all that aside and remember that we are all human beings first. But sadly, those kinds of old-timey ideals do not fit with Harris’ agenda.

Harris not only wants us to dislike each other based on our politics, she needs us to, because if Trump is a human being, if he is a decent, fun person who simply has different political opinions, then Harris has no case to make. So tradition, the church, and basic comity be damned. 

China hawks are calling out Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, for failing to impose a TikTok ban on government-issued devices in his state, particularly considering more than 75% of other states did so amid national security concerns. 

When asked in 2022 whether Walz planned to ban the Chinese-owned social media app on Minnesota-issued devices, the Democrat governor said his team was looking at the issue ‘holistically’ and that he was deferring to tech experts in his administration for ‘recommendations.’ Walz also drew an equivalency between TikTok and X, formerly Twitter, arguing the Elon Musk-owned platform ‘can be somewhat dangerous.’

‘That equivalence goes to, I think, a broader confusion on the left that privacy is a protection from ourselves, from these big businesses. Not a protection from the government,’ said Trent England, executive director of Save Our States, a conservative nonprofit dedicated to defending the constitutional power of states. ‘They’re more trusting toward state actors in general… Elon Musk, however powerful people think he is, he’s not the Chinese Communist Party.’

Walz’s decision not to implement a TikTok ban on Minnesota’s government-issued devices stands in contrast with the actions of numerous other states, and is also out of step with the Biden administration. 

In December 2022, President Biden signed a bill banning TikTok from all federally issued devices. This year, Biden went even further when he signed an additional bill in April to ban TikTok nationwide, unless its Chinese-owned parent company, ByteDance, divests its entire stake in the social media company by next year.

Meanwhile, at least 39 separate states implemented a TikTok ban on government-issued devices. Many of those bans were initiated by governors, while others were introduced by the state legislature and later approved by the governor.

The federal and state bans have also coincided with warnings from the nation’s top law enforcement agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which has said it has ‘a number’ of ‘national security concerns’ related to the U.S. operations of TikTok. ‘They include the possibility that the Chinese government could use it to control data collection on millions of users or control the recommendation algorithm, which could be used for influence operations if they so chose, or to control software on millions of devices, which gives it an opportunity to potentially technically compromise personal devices,’ FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress in 2022.

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, a Republican, called the decision to ban TikTok from government devices ‘common sense.’

‘In the digital age, defending our state’s technology and cybersecurity infrastructure and protecting digital privacy have to be a top priority for us as a state,’ said Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, after signing an executive order banning TikTok on government devices.

Evers also pointed out how he, similar to Walz, consulted with cybersecurity and law enforcement experts.

‘I trust the professionals who work in this field, and it was important for me to consult with and get advice from experts in law enforcement, cybersecurity and counterintelligence, including the information technology experts working within DOA-DET, to make the best decision to protect state technologies, and ultimately, the people of Wisconsin.’

England told Fox News Digital on Wednesday that he thinks Walz’s actions are a ‘throwback’ to an earlier era of U.S.-China relations when the prevailing attitude was not to view China as an adversary.

‘Walz is still in this ’90s mindset that we’re going to fix China by engaging with them, which effectively means looking the other way when they’re stealing intellectual property, or engaging in what looks like espionage, or what obviously is espionage,’ England said. ‘I think Walz is really a throwback to an earlier era of China relations that most people have determined was a failure.’

Earlier this month, TikTok argued in federal court that Biden’s proposed nationwide ban on TikTok if ByteDance does not divest itself is unconstitutional. ‘The law before this court is unprecedented and its effect would be staggering,’ attorneys for TikTok said in court earlier this month, according to the Associated Press. 

Additionally, several pro-TikTok activists also rallied outside the courthouse in support of the social media platform. One content creator, Paul Tran, told The Associated Press that being able to make TikTok videos gave his company the lift it needed to stay competitive. ‘TikTok truly invigorated our company and saved it from collapse,’ Tran told reporters.

Fox News Digital reached out to both Walz’s office and the Harris campaign for comment but did not hear back prior to publication time.   

: House Speaker Mike Johnson is calling on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to fire Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States after she allegedly organized a U.S. taxpayer-funded visit to a battleground state ahead of the 2024 presidential election, Fox News Digital has learned. 

Ukraine’s ambassador to the U.S., Oksana Markarova, organized a tour of an American manufacturing site for Zelenskyy over the weekend in Pennsylvania, a key battleground state ahead of November’s election. 

Johnson, R-La., said that tour was led by a ‘top political surrogate’ for the Democratic presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, and ‘purposely excluded’ Republicans. Johnson called it clear ‘election interference.’ 

‘I demand that you immediately fire Ukraine’s Ambassador to the United States, Oksana Markarova,’ Johnson wrote in a letter to Zelenskyy exclusively obtained by Fox News Digital Wednesday. 

‘As you have said, Ukrainians have tried to avoid being ‘captured by American domestic politics,’ and ‘influencing the choices of the American people’ ahead of the November election,’ Johnson wrote. ‘Clearly, that objective was abandoned this week when Ambassador Markarova organized an event in which you toured an American manufacturing site.

‘The facility was in a politically contested battleground state, was led by a top political surrogate for Kamala Harris, and failed to include a single Republican because – on purpose – no Republicans were invited,’ Johnson continued, adding the tour was ‘clearly a partisan campaign event designed to help Democrats and is clearly election interference.’ 

Johnson said the ‘shortsighted and intentionally political move has caused Republicans to lose trust in Ambassador Markarova’s ability to fairly and effectively serve as a diplomat in this country.’ 

‘She should be removed from her post immediately,’ he wrote.  

Johnson stressed that ‘all foreign nations should avoid opining on or interfering in American domestic politics.’ 

‘Support for ending Russia’s war against Ukraine continues to be bipartisan, but our relationship is unnecessarily tested and needlessly tarnished when the candidates at the top of the Republican presidential ticket are targeted in the media by officials in your government,’ Johnson wrote. 

‘These incidents cannot be repeated.’ 

Johnson thanked Zelenskyy for his ‘prompt attention to this matter.’ 

‘I trust you will take immediate action,’ Johnson said. 

Zelenskyy over the weekend visited a Pennsylvania ammunition factory alongside two Pentagon leaders — the assistant secretary of the Army for acquisition, logistics and technology and the Pentagon’s top weapons buyer. 

Zelenskyy also met with Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro, who was said to be on the short list to be considered as Harris’ running mate before she chose Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

Zelenskyy recently participated in interviews and was critical of former President Trump and his running mate JD Vance, calling the Ohio senator ‘too radical.’

The House Oversight Committee is now investigating the Biden-Harris administration’s alleged use of taxpayer-funded resources to fly Zelenskyy to Pennsylvania ahead of the November presidential election. 

Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., announced the investigation Wednesday and is seeking records regarding the administration’s alleged ‘misuse of government resources’ to allow Zelenskyy to ‘interfere in the 2024 presidential election.’ 

‘The Committee seeks to determine whether the Biden-Harris Administration attempted to use a foreign leader to benefit Vice President Harris’ presidential campaign and, if so, necessarily committed an abuse of power,’ Comer wrote Wednesday in a letter to the White House, Justice Department and the Pentagon. 

Comer said his committee is investigating the circumstances that led to ‘justify’ the administration’s transport of Zelenskyy on a Department of the Air Force aircraft to Pennsylvania. 

Fox News Digital reached out to the White House, Pentagon, Justice Department and Harris campaign for comment. 

Ten Democrats voted with Republicans to rebuke Biden administration officials over their handling of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan on Wednesday.

It passed 219 to 194, and among the Democrats who voted for the measure are Reps. Jared Golden, D-Maine; Mary Peltola, D-Alaska; Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Wash.; Vicente Gonzalez, D-Texas; Greg Landsman, D-Ohio; and Jeff Jackson, D-N.C.

The bill was introduced by House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, who conducted a yearslong investigation into the chaotic military operation.

‘Three years after the deadly and chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Biden-Harris administration has yet to hold anyone accountable for one of the most devastating foreign policy blunders in American history,’ McCaul told Fox News Digital.

He accused Biden officials of having ‘prioritized optics over security,’ which McCaul said led to the deaths of the 13 U.S. servicemembers who were killed in a terror attack at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul during the withdrawal.

McCaul read their names on the House floor in closing remarks for debate on the bill.

‘Nothing will bring their lives back,’ he said.

The resolution specifically name-checks 15 current or former Biden administration members, including President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, former Ambassador to Afghanistan Ross Wilson, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, among others.

Leading opposition to McCaul’s bill was Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

‘This resolution, as I’ve said all along, is nothing more than political theater designed to score cheap points rather than address the real issues at hand,’ Meeks said. ‘It’s a distortion of the facts and a disservice to the American people, a disservice to our servicemembers, a disservice to our diplomats – all of who put their lives on the line during our 20-year war efforts.’

Them and their sacrifices should not be used as a political football. We should be working on real solutions, supporting our Afghan allies, ensuring that we learn the right lessons, and providing accountability that are based on truth, not partisan narratives.’

McCaul responded, ‘I have tremendous respect [for Meeks]. We work together on many things, bipartisan. And when we don’t agree, we do so civilly. However, I cannot disagree with you more than I do today.’

‘Who could ever forget the harrowing images of Afghans falling off the planes, and babies being flung over barbed wire in a desperate attempt by mothers to save their children and escape Afghanistan under Taliban rule?’ he asked.

McCaul is also poised to lead the House in holding Blinken in contempt of Congress over accusations he is stonewalling his probe. 

His committee advanced that resolution on Tuesday, and Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., suggested to Fox News Digital that he will bring it up for a House-wide vote when lawmakers return from a six-week recess that starts Wednesday.

State Department spokesman Matthew Miller criticized the move in a Tuesday statement, ‘Today’s action by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs was a naked political exercise masquerading as oversight, designed only to further the majority’s partisan interests under the guise of asking questions that have long ago been answered.’