Author: NOVA Corp

President Donald Trump Friday sharply criticized former President Joe Biden’s handling of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, calling it an “embarrassment” and arguing his administration would not have left military equipment behind.

“You remember that where they left all the military equipment behind? We didn’t. We wouldn’t have left anything,” Trump said while speaking at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. “We were going to get out with dignity and strength, respect. We looked like we were running. We don’t run from anybody. That was a Biden embarrassment.”

Trump also questioned why aircraft were not flown out of the country.

“We don’t leave equipment behind. We don’t leave jets behind,” he said. “I said, why do you leave those jets behind, sir? I thought it was cheaper to leave it behind. You know, $150 million plane. All they had to do is put a little jet fuel in there and fly it to wherever they want to fly it.”

He said the U.S. military had been rebuilt during his first term and is now stronger than ever.

“So with the help of everyone in this room, America is the strongest military on the face of the earth. We rebuilt it. We really did,” Trump said. “We rebuilt it in my first term.”

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His remarks came during a visit that honored the special operators involved in the operation to capture former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, which he contrasted as an “extraordinary military operation.” 

The U.S. completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021 after nearly 20 years of war. The evacuation followed a February 2020 agreement negotiated during Trump’s first term that set a timeline for U.S. forces to leave the country.

Biden oversaw the final withdrawal as Taliban forces rapidly seized control of Afghanistan, culminating in a suicide bombing at Kabul’s airport that killed 13 U.S. service members and roughly 170 Afghan civilians.

Biden has argued that he was bound by the withdrawal agreement negotiated during Trump’s first term and faced the choice of completing the pullout or sending more U.S. troops back into combat. Trump has rejected that claim, saying his deal with the Taliban was “conditions-based” and that he would not have withdrawn if the Taliban failed to meet its commitments.

Fox News Digital reached out to Biden Friday for comment and has yet to receive a reply. 

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Friday made the case for the passage of the SAVE America Act, accusing opponents of the bill of favoring access to the ballot box for illegal immigrants. 

Noem was in the Phoenix area where she pushed the Trump administration’s efforts to shore up election integrity and voter security. 

She touched on the Save America Act, a bill that would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote, photo identification to vote in federal elections, and for states to remove non-citizens from their voter rolls. She noted that wide majorities of Republicans and Democrats approve of the legislation. 

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However, she criticized the bill’s opponents, who say it will disenfranchise millions of voters. 

“Each of the arguments that have been laid out to criticize this bill are baseless speculation from the radical left because they want illegal aliens to vote in our elections,” Noem told reporters during a press conference. “They want to disenfranchise American citizens by telling them that their votes don’t matter. There’s only one reason that anyone would oppose this bill, and that’s because they would want to cheat.”

“They want illegal people and aliens in this country to be able to vote for them, and to rob the United States citizens of their vote,” she added. “And that’s why they resist us at every single level.”

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Congressional Democrats have characterized the bill as an effort to disappear millions of American off voter rolls, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., calling it “Jim Crow 2.0,” a term used by some to describe modern so-called voter suppression laws.

During her remarks, Noem mentioned a handful of illegal immigrants who were registered to vote in various states.

“There is no room in our election system for people that aren’t Americans,” she said. “There is no room in our election system for fraudsters and foreign influence.”

The secretary also called for Arizona to clean up its voter rolls, noting that DHS Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) can be used to do just that. The program assists local, state and federal agencies to determine the citizenship and immigration status of individuals.

“Maybe people who’ve passed away, people that aren’t citizens, people that don’t live here,” she said. “That would make sure that in your next election, when people are casting their votes, they know they’re voting for the right decisions and that those votes are counted, and they’re counted appropriately, and someone else didn’t get to weigh in on their leadership.”

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Records obtained by The Post show the mayor was “directly” involved in the call to redirect scarce backup power to the Nutcracker ballet.

While the California governor immediately attacked President Trump during his visit to Munich, accusing the POTUS of “doubling down on stupid,” Gavin Newsom’s globetrotting has sparked its own backlash in the Golden State.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) laughed off ribbing by a panel moderator at the Munich Security Conference on Friday about a possible bid for the White House in 2028.

The official House Republican campaign arm is firing off backhanded valentines to a dozen of its top Democratic targets in the 2026 midterm elections, needling them over various controversies.

The secretary threatened federal investigations if the airlines refuse to comply.