The House of Representatives passed a stopgap measure that would temporarily fund the Department of Homeland Security late Friday, but the 43-day shutdown could drag on for several more weeks.

The two-month funding extension approved by the House is likely dead on arrival in the Senate, where any funding bill needs to overcome a 60-vote threshold, meaning buy-in from a handful of Democrats. That hurdle has not stopped House GOP leadership from arguing that their rejection of a Senate-passed deal — and pitching a subsequent rival DHS funding proposal — is the way out of the shutdown.

“We’re not going to split apart two of the most important agencies in the government and leave them hanging like that,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters leaving the U.S. Capitol on Friday night. “We just couldn’t do it.”

“House Republicans will have no part in reopening the border and stopping illegal immigration enforcement,” Johnson said earlier Friday on “The Ingraham Angle,” in a scathing takedown of the Senate-passed deal that stopped short of funding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and portions of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP).

TSA CALLOUTS HIT HOUSTON, ATLANTA, NEW ORLEANS HARDEST, 450 OFFICERS HAVE QUIT NATIONWIDE

But the full-court press launched by House Republicans aimed at persuading the Senate to return to Washington to take up their bill is likely to fall on deaf ears in the upper chamber.

A GOP aide told Fox News Digital that “the easiest way to end this shutdown is for the House to pass the Senate-passed bill.”

“We know the Democrats are not going to support a CR, in fact the Senate tried to pass CRs for the last 40 days and Dems have blocked Every. Single. One,” they said.

Senators left Washington, D.C., for a two-week Easter recess after unanimously approving a DHS funding measure in the early morning hours Friday with some traveling abroad on congressional delegations.

“I would suggest that the Senate does come back and at least take a vote,” House Republican Conference Chairwoman Lisa McClain said Friday. “That is what they were elected to do. So they’re going to stay out on recess for two weeks and not come back while people don’t get paid. That’s pretty sad.”

Republican Study Committee Chairman August Pfluger, R-Texas, also called on the Senate to return to Washington “immediately” to take up the House-passed measure in a statement late Friday. 

House lawmakers are also scheduled to be in recess for the next two weeks.

Left holding the tab in the cross-chamber feud are the tens of thousands of DHS employees working unpaid during the shutdown.

President Donald Trump moved Friday to shield TSA agents from further financial distress by taking executive action directing DHS to pay those employees with existing funds. 

The roughly 50,000 agents have missed two full paychecks during the ongoing funding lapse, leading hundreds to quit their jobs and forcing others to grapple with mounting financial distress.

The president’s move is likely to alleviate lengthy wait times at TSA security checkpoints, though senior officials have warned of long-term impacts due to more than 500 agents quitting during the funding lapse.

DEMS BLOCK DHS FUNDING AFTER GOP REJECTS THEIR COUNTER, THUNE SAYS SCHUMER ‘GOING IN CIRCLES’

However, other DHS personnel, such as those employed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the U.S. Coast Guard and certain support staff working for ICE and CBP will still have their paychecks withheld until the department’s funding is restored. 

“Anybody who shows up to work deserves to get a paycheck, and the Senate needs to come back and at least do their job,” McClain told Fox News on Friday. 

Democratic lawmakers are sure to spend the next several weeks blaming Republicans for the impasse after Johnson’s decision to reject the Senate deal. 

“We’re here dealing with a partisan spending bill that the Senate has already indicated is dead on arrival,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said on the House floor Friday. “And so Republicans have taken the decision to own this shutdown decisively. There is no doubt.”

The short-term DHS funding patch passed by the House is a clean extension of government funding and has no partisan policy riders.

Trump also came out against the bill Friday afternoon in an interview with Fox News.

The bill notably does not include any of the reforms that Democrats have demanded for six weeks to rein in immigration enforcement, including tightening warrant requirements and prohibiting agents from wearing masks.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., who warned throughout the funding stalemate that nobody wins in a shutdown, has indicated that Democrats are less likely to get those demands met than when the funding lapse first started.

“I mean, I think that ship has sailed, and they kind of kissed that opportunity goodbye by failing to provide funding for those agencies,” Thune said.

Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger flatly denied any deal was made in crafting the new boundaries of the Second Congressional District on the Eastern Shore and Virginia Beach after former Rep. Elaine Luria was followed out of an event by an individual demanding answers.

Luria, a Democrat who previously represented the Second District, is challenging Rep. Jennifer Kiggans, R-Va., in a race considered “Even” under the current map but that would skew Democratic under newly drawn boundaries that pull in heavily liberal Newport News and the city of Franklin while carving out more moderate parts of Chesapeake.

An individual filmed Luria this week as she left an evening event in Hampton Roads and asked twice: “Did you make a backroom deal with your best friend Abigail Spanberger to redraw the district?”

Luria ignored the man, but the video spread on social media as observers raised questions, given the tone of the redistricting effort led by Senate President L. Louise Lucas, D-Portsmouth.

VIRGINIA JUDGE VOIDS REDISTRICTING PUSH, RULES LAWMAKERS OVERSTEPPED AUTHORITY

Luria’s campaign formally declined comment and Spanberger’s camp flatly denied the allegation.

“There was no deal,” Spanberger’s top spokeswoman Libby Wiet told Fox News Digital.

Meanwhile, Kiggans campaign spokesman Joe Link said the clip of the confrontation “speaks for itself.”

“Virginians should keep this in mind when they vote on April 21,” Link told Fox News Digital, referring to the date of the special election on the Democrats’ redistricting amendment.

5 VIRGINIA CONGRESSMEN: DEMOCRATS ARE REJECTING VOTERS TO GERRYMANDER OUR STATE

Lucas did not respond to a request for comment but has been vocal online about the redistricting effort, mocking opponents like former Gov. Glenn Youngkin and Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Va., and swearing at Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, by telling him she is “f—ing finish[ing]” what he purportedly started.

In January, Lucas took aim at Kiggans, suggesting she is intentionally trying to push her out of office. The 82-year-old progressive posted an image of Kiggans wearing a McDonald’s uniform and asking if a customer “want[s] fries with that.”

Meanwhile, across the commonwealth, Republicans continue expressing outrage at the new map being put to voters as “restor[ing] fairness” on April 21, with the Prince William County GOP posting an image of their exurban county “sliced” into five pieces next to an image of deli salami.

Prince William, Arlington and Fairfax counties appear to be anchors for most of Virginia’s congressional districts, which critics say will suppress, if not dilute, the reported 45% of the population that votes Republican or lives in rural areas.

In Rockingham County, which surrounds Harrisonburg and sits in the Shenandoah Valley and is currently represented in whole by GOP Rep. Ben Cline of Botetourt, Fairfax-based Del. Dan Helmer was pictured campaigning for the newly drawn 7th District, according to the local GOP.

Helmer dismissed claims he also helped draw his own district, saying he is doing what Democratic leaders assigned him to do in “electing a Democratic majority” in his caucus role, according to the Virginia Mercury.

Del. Joe McNamara, R-Cave Spring, told the outlet he still believes Helmer “craft[ed] maps for his benefit, and he’s just the next one.”

“My role was electing a Democratic majority two years ago so we could fight back against what Trump is doing and reelect it this year,” Helmer told the Mercury in response. Helmer, who authored the state’s new sweeping gun ban, has two previously unsuccessful congressional bids under recent maps.

The Rockingham County GOP took issue with his previous campaign pledge to be a “voice for Fairfax,” hinting, as in Kiggans’ district, that Democrats are intentionally drawing seats for themselves.

THIS CRUCIAL STATE IS THE LATEST BATTLEGROUND IN REDISTRICTING WAR BETWEEN TRUMP AND DEMOCRATS

“They have no shame,” the party said in captioning a photo of Helmer campaigning locally.

Former first lady Dorothy McAuliffe, who also does not live in the majority-rural confines of the newly drawn “lobster-shaped” district, is also running for the seat.

JP Cooney, a prosecutor who worked under much-maligned special counsel Jack Smith, is the third Democrat to seek the newly drawn district, further increasing Republicans’ ire at the process.

Earlier this week, Rep. Donald Beyer, an Alexandria Democrat, admitted that his party’s redistricting effort is aimed squarely at rebuking President Donald Trump.

That comment led to outrage on the right, including from Virginia House Minority Leader Terry Kilgore.

Kilgore, of Gate City in Scott County along the Tennessee line, represents one of the few areas rendered safe under the new map – if not simply because the aforementioned 45% of Republicans had to be collected somewhere.

“This is manifestly unfair for the Commonwealth of Virginia. We’re a 51-49 state, not a 90-10 state. If they’re willing to silence nearly half of the Commonwealth’s voters in the name of ‘fairness’ what else are they willing to do?” Kilgore told Fox News Digital.

His area is represented by Rep. Morgan Griffith, a Republican who collects a swath of mountainous communities from Galax, Martinsville and Independence in the east to Cumberland Gap, Wise and coal-filled Grundy in the west.

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz insists that President Donald Trump will be “impeached over and over and over again” if the Democrats win back control of the House in this year’s midterm elections.

And the conservative firebrand and three-term senator from Texas, in a sit-down interview this week with Fox News Digital, argued that if Democrats win both the House and Senate majorities in the midterms, “they will do whatever they can to burn it down,” as he pointed to the agenda passed by Trump and Republicans in Congress.

As they fight to hold their slim majorities in both the House and Senate, Republicans are battling stiff political headwinds as the party in power in the nation’s capital traditionally loses seats in the midterms. And they also face a rough political climate fueled by economic concerns over persistent inflation, an unpopular war with Iran and Trump’s underwater approval ratings.

“I think these midterm elections are unbelievably consequential,” said Cruz, who won re-election in 2024 and isn’t on the ballot this year.

TRUMP BOOSTS GOP WARCHEST AS HOUSE REPUBLICANS GEAR UP FOR HIGH-STAKES MIDTERM FIGHT

And the senator pledged, “I am all in fighting for us to win in the midterms, fighting for us to hold the House, fighting for us to hold the Senate and, ideally, grow our majorities in both houses.”

“If the Democrats take the House, no meaningful legislation will pass for the next two years, and we will see the president impeached over and over and over again. And by the way, it won’t matter what for. They will impeach President Trump just because they hate him, because he is Donald Trump,” Cruz claimed.

CRUZ: TRUMP’S MOVE TO STRIKE IRAN ‘MOST CONSEQUENTIAL DECISION’ OF HIS PRESIDENCY

And he argued, “We will see investigations attacking the administration in every House committee if they take the House.”

Cruz said implications for Trump and the GOP are even worse if Democrats also win back the Senate.

“If they take the Senate, we would see an almost complete halt of Senate confirmations — Cabinet members. I think these radical Democrats would leave cabinet offices empty, leave them vacant, rather than confirm President Trump’s nominees. I think judicial nominations. If the Democrats took the Senate, they would essentially halt judicial nominations,” he claimed.

And he charged, “I think Chuck Schumer and the radicals are so extreme that if they get a majority, they will do whatever they can to burn it down.”

But Democrats argue it’s President Trump who’s lighting the match due to what Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee chair Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York called Trump’s “hurtful and harmful agenda.”

“President Trump is creating a toxic agenda that’s harming people, and they’re looking for Democratic leadership to take them out of this nightmare,” Gillibrand argued in an interview last month with Fox News Digital.

And Democratic National Committee Rapid Response Director Kendall Witmer told Fox News Digital: “If Democrats take Congress, the Republicans won’t be able to give massive tax breaks to billionaires, shutter nursing homes and rural hospitals, bomb foreign countries instead of feeding kids, or turn a blind eye to Trump’s open and egregious corruption.”

Cruz heads back home to Texas this weekend, where he’ll address the crowd Saturday in Dallas at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, better known by its acronym CPAC.

But it’s a stop on May 1 in Iowa — the state whose caucuses for half a century have kicked off the race for the Republican presidential nomination — that’s sparking speculation that Cruz is gearing up for a second White House run.

Cruz was runner-up to Trump in the combustible 2016 GOP presidential primaries, and he took a look at making another run in the 2024 cycle before deciding to seek re-election to the Senate.

“There will be plenty of time to make those decisions. I don’t have an announcement for you today,” Cruz answered when asked by Fox News Digital if seriously considering another White House campaign.

But he appears to be laying the groundwork for a possible bid, as he positions himself as a conservative alternative to Vice President JD Vance, who is currently the odds on favorite to be Trump’s MAGA and America First heir.

Cruz has grabbed plenty of attention with his clashes with far-right figures, such as Tucker Carlson, and he’s enhanced already strong standing among conservative leaders and donors. And he’s bolstered his grassroots outreach with his popular and widely downloaded podcast, ‘Verdict with Ted Cruz.’

In his Fox Digital interview, Cruz also shared what seemed to be the beginnings of a possible 2028 stump speech.

“I look back to the last year with President Trump in the White House and with a Republican Senate in the house, we have accomplished more in the last year than I’ve seen Congress and the president accomplish in the preceding 13 years that I was here. It is an incredible record of success that we’ve been able to produce. And so my focus is, number one, keep delivering results, keep delivering big wins for the American people,” Cruz said.

Cruz spotlighted that he was “the author of no tax on tips. I wrote that law.” The cuts were one of the tax provisions in the GOP’s massive domestic policy bill that was passed nearly entirely along party lines last summer.

The senator also pointed to the so-called “school choice” provisions in the measure, as well as the Trump Accounts, tax-advantaged, IRA-style investment accounts for children under 18 that were also included in the law.

“Both of those provisions I wrote, both of them are in the bill,” he noted.

And Cruz predicted that in “10, 20, 30 years from now, those two provisions, school choice and the Trump accounts, will be, by an order of magnitude, the most consequential provisions in the entire bill. So we’ve got a record of wins, of victories for the American people to run on.”

Neither party escaped travelers’ ire as some estimated they had to walk miles to reach the back of the security line and wait several hours to catch their flights at Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport. 

Fox News Digital asked travelers waiting in line at Bush who they believed was to blame for the massive wait times. One traveler named Tim simply responded: “The politicians.”

On Thursday, lines at Bush snaked through check-in, baggage claim, out the doors and through underground subway tunnels. One traveler, who did not share his name, estimated that he and his family had to walk two miles to reach the back of the line. While many arrived several hours ahead of their scheduled departure times, those who did not could be seen frantically searching for terminals with smaller lines.

When it comes to who bears the blame, another traveler, who did not identify herself, answered: “All congressmen.”

WATCH: AIRPORT TRAVELERS REVEAL WHAT THEY TRULY THINK ABOUT ICE HELPING TSA WITH MASSIVE LINES

“All of them, regardless of their party,” she added. “They just need to do their jobs.”

Another, named Lancet, singled out the Democrats, who have demanded reinstating funding for the Department of Homeland Security contingent on broad reforms to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol.

“I mean, honestly, look, the Democrats are not voting on the DHS being reinstated. And they’re the ones who pay for TSA from what I know,” said Lancet. “So, without paying the people, they obviously can’t work.”

Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport has been among the airports most heavily impacted by the partial government shutdown, which has led to TSA agents missing paychecks for more than 40 days. Nearly 500 TSA agents have quit, and as of Friday, the agency has missed out on $1 billion in pay.

The partial shutdown was caused by disagreements in Congress over ICE and Border Patrol’s enforcement of immigration law in cities across the U.S., with Democrats making funding contingent on major changes in tactics and policy. Late Thursday night, the Senate passed a bill to fund most of DHS, including TSA, but it is not final. The House still needs to approve the measure and send it to the president before funding resumes and workers are paid.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday directing federal officials to ensure TSA employees are paid, calling the ongoing shutdown an “emergency,” 

One traveler named Kevin, who was waiting in a security line in an underground subway corridor with hardly functioning air conditioning, did not hold back.

“Anybody who votes for a Democrat after this should be shipped out of the country,” said Kevin. “This is a Democrat mess.”

FETTERMAN URGES FELLOW DEMOCRATS TO ‘DO THE RIGHT THING’ AS GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN TAKES TOLL ON WORKERS

At the front of the same line, which stretched halfway across the airport’s subway corridor, a traveler named April answered, “I have no idea to be honest with you, but also the construction doesn’t help either.”

“Having to go to Terminal A and Terminal E and going back and forth, yeah, it’s not been great,” she added.

One traveler named Maria, who despite the line bore a large smile and a chipper attitude, told Fox News Digital, “You know what? I would only blame myself for not getting to the airport sooner.”

“I’ve been flying for many, many years, so I know. Got to get to the airports soon, guys. Get your Subway, get your Starbucks, and get to airports,” she quipped, smiling.

“I don’t know, man, I don’t get political about these things,” answered a traveler named Pinal. “It is what it is, and we all are just going through the motions right now.”

DEMOCRATS HAMMER ICE FOR ARRESTING 2 AT SAN FRANCISCO AIRPORT

“There’s a lot of people to blame,” said a woman who did not identify herself. “But at least I think the important part is everybody’s working together to try to be as efficient as possible. I got here at 10, and my flight is at 1:30, so I got there in enough time, hopefully.”

“It’s just the division,” remarked a young man named Nick. “Everybody should be unified, working together, instead of just picking teams, fighting against each other, you know?” 

“People rather be on a team than rather just focus on a solution,” Nick continued. “If we could just focus more on the problem and working together rather than focusing on the differences, I think that would be a major change. But it’s tough, man.”

“No Kings,” a decentralized protest movement that crystallized in opposition to President Donald Trump’s second term, will hold thousands of events on Saturday morning, according to Sarah Parker, an organizer for one of the events in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The protests mark the most recent development for the amorphous group, which has prompted similar events in the past.

“Tomorrow we’re going to have over 3,500 events across the country,” Parker said. “I think it’s important to be out in the streets at this moment in time to save our country. The events will be overwhelmingly peaceful and there are going to be millions of Americans from different affiliations, different ages and different ethnic backgrounds coming together to be in community.”

Parker did not describe how “No Kings” works with local figures to organize events but said the protests aim to build on local displeasure with the administration.

LIZ PEEK: DEMOCRAT FURY FUELS ‘NO KINGS’ PROTESTS BUT ENDGAME IS ELUSIVE

“I think this is organic. This is a people-powered movement. We have different local hosts that are volunteers who have stepped up to host an event in their areas, even in rural areas. We have hundreds of events in rural and deep-red states,” Parker said.

Unlike other organized organizations, “No Kings” is not a non-profit, a business, or a formal organization, making its structure a mystery. Because of its lack of centralization, it has little to no financial reporting requirements and no easily identifiable leadership.

“No Kings” first burst onto the scene through “No Kings Day” in June 2025, an event that, in the words of their website, inspired “a nationwide uprising 14 times larger than both of Trump’s inaugurations combined.”

‘NO KINGS’ PROTESTERS FILMED HAVING CHILDREN BASH TRUMP PIÑATA

Almost a year later, the protests scheduled for Saturday hope to continue their opposition, touting opposition to Trump’s recent actions in Iran and debates over immigration enforcement.

“Masked secret police terrorizing our communities. An illegal, catastrophic war putting us in danger and driving up our costs. Attacks on our freedom of speech, our civil rights, our freedom to vote. Costs pushing families to the brink,” their website’s description reads.

Despite Parker’s framing of a decentralized movement, No Kings provides a highly-structured document for organizers titled “March 28 Toolkit,” instructing viewers on how to recruit their own speakers, delegate roles, register their event and use No Kings branded media materials. It also lays out best practices for logistics as well as how to avoid permitting and insurance requirements for event-holders.

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN DOUBLES DOWN ON ANTI-TRUMP, ANTI-ICE STANCE, SAYS ‘BLOWBACK IS JUST PART OF IT’

Notably, the document also includes a “host hotline,” providing a number with a Maryland area code.

A map of events scheduled for Saturday shows organizational activity in the vast majority of urban centers across the country. Parker said that no one center will play a lead role, but that Minneapolis will act as a “flagship.” 

Parker isn’t affiliated with No Kings directly. Instead, she described herself as a part of 50501 — another decentralized organization that partners with No Kings. She did not describe the nature of the partnership or how they interacted amid their similarly decentralized structures.

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Asked what 50501 meant, Parker said the name originally stood for “50 states, 50 capitols, one day.”

It, too, is not registered as a non-profit or as a business.

When asked who should be listening to No Kings’ messaging, Parker said she believes its lawmakers that should pay attention.

“I think it’s for any elected official that is not listening to their constituents again. It should be a message for any, any elected officials, regardless of their political affiliation,” Parker said.

President Donald Trump’s second-term agenda is hitting repeated roadblocks in Washington, D.C., federal court, where judges have halted major policies — fueling a growing clash over whether the judiciary is checking executive power or overstepping into it.

The rulings have halted key parts of Trump’s agenda on immigration, policing and federal authority, intensifying debate over whether courts are acting as a constitutional check or obstructing elected leadership.

Here are some of the biggest court clashes Trump is facing in D.C. federal court.

One of the biggest fights is also one of the earliest lawsuits filed against the Trump administration in D.C. federal court  — centered on the Trump administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 wartime law, to deport certain migrants to El Salvador’s CECOT prison.

Civil rights groups and immigration advocates have argued the Trump administration is stretching the law beyond its intended use case, including the three previous times it was used in U.S. history — most recently, during World War II. The Trump administration has defended the move as a lawful exercise of executive authority over national security and immigration enforcement.

The case quickly landed in D.C. federal court and has since moved up on appeal, with higher courts now weighing the scope of the president’s authority under the centuries-old statute. The outcome could have sweeping implications for how rarely used emergency powers are applied in modern immigration policy.

EX-JUDGES BLAST TOP TRUMP DOJ OFFICIAL FOR DECLARING ‘WAR’ ON COURTS
 

The scope of federal power over states and localities has also been tested. Courts have imposed limits on Trump’s efforts to assert control over National Guard units, raising federalism concerns about the balance between state and federal authority.

The standoff began in August 2025. Trump moved to expand federal control over policing in Washington, D.C., including deploying National Guard troops to respond to crime. 

A related lawsuit, District of Columbia v. Trump, challenges what city officials describe as an unprecedented federal intrusion into local policing. The case remains a key test of presidential authority over the nation’s capital.

The Supreme Court agreed to hear a pair of appeals from the Trump administration seeking to immediately halt Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designations for Haitian migrants. Haitians were first granted TPS status in 2010 after a devastating earthquake. Previously, a lower court judge in D.C., U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, had blocked the Trump administration from lifting the TPS designation.

U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer urged the high court to take up the broader issue of whether the Trump administration can revoke TPS protections for other migrants living in the U.S. — citing the Justice Department’s appeal of a similar case centered on TPS protections for Syrian migrants that was kicked to the high court earlier this year.

“Unless the court resolves the merits of these challenges — issues that have now been ventilated in courts nationwide — this unsustainable cycle will repeat again and again, spawning more competing rulings and competing views of what to make of this court’s interim orders,” Sauer said last week. “This court should break that cycle.”

The appeal comes as the Trump administration has sought to wind down most TPS designations, arguing the programs have been extended for too long under Democratic presidents.

“Haiti’s TPS was granted following an earthquake that took place over 15 years ago,” said then-spokesperson for DHS Tricia McLaughlin. “It was never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades.”

SCOTUS TO REVIEW TRUMP EXECUTIVE ORDER ON BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP

Early in the term, the administration’s effort to rapidly scale back the U.S. Agency for International Development was halted by a federal judge, who blocked mass leave orders and the dismantling of the agency’s workforce.

The Supreme Court eventually intervened in the case. Last March, the high court denied the Trump administration’s request to block a lower court’s order for the administration to pay nearly $2 billion in foreign aid money for previously completed projects, and leaving to the lower court judge the details of how those contracts should be paid out. That suit was eventually appealed to a higher court, where litigation remains pending.

BIDEN-APPOINTED FEDERAL JUDGE RULES TRUMP’S ‘THIRD COUNTRY’ DEPORTATION POLICY IS UNCONSTITUTIONAL

The independence of the Federal Reserve is also an issue before the courts.

Lawyers for the Trump administration asked U.S. District Judge James Boasberg earlier this month to reconsider an earlier order that quashed grand jury subpoenas of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, appearing to make good on a vow from U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro to appeal the order to a higher court.

In the Justice Department’s motion for reconsideration that was submitted Monday, prosecutors argued that the court “applied an incorrect legal standard, erred with respect to certain facts, and overlooked other relevant facts.” 

They argued that a subpoena should be allowed when there is even a “reasonable possibility” that the category of materials the government seeks will produce information “relevant to the general subject of the grand jury’s investigation,” and even where a subpoena recipient “proposes a plausible theory of an ulterior motive.”

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a separate case, Trump v. Cook, earlier this year. That case centered on whether Trump has the power to fire Lisa Cook from the Fed’s board of governors — without notice and largely without the ability for courts to challenge the “for cause” provision underpinning her removal.

Cook remains in her position for now, following an order from U.S. District Court Judge Jia Cobb. 

Meanwhile, White House officials have railed against the “activist” judges who they have accused of overstepping their agenda or acting with a political agenda to halt or pause Trump’s policies from taking force.  

House Republicans passed a short-term funding patch for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) over the fierce objections of Democratic lawmakers late Friday evening.

But the 42-day shutdown that has snarled air travel and left tens of thousands of federal employees without pay is far from over.

House lawmakers voted 213-203 largely along party lines to approve a two-month funding extension for the beleaguered department, which has been operating without full-year appropriations since the funding lapse began on Feb. 14. 

Reps. Don Davis, D-N.C., Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Wash., and Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, crossed party lines to support the measure. More than a dozen lawmakers did not vote.

DEMOCRATS RIP TRUMP’S ICE AIRPORT MOVE AS SHUTDOWN NEARS 40 DAYS: ‘NO REASON’

The House-passed DHS measure faces an uphill battle in the Senate, where Democrats have filibustered GOP-authored legislation that includes immigration funding for the past six weeks. 

Both chambers are scheduled to leave Washington for an Easter recess without ending the funding standoff, paving the way for the partial government shutdown to become the longest in history. 

“In those eight weeks, we will figure this out with Democrats and figure out a couple of reforms or whatever they need to make sure that we do this right, but we are going to protect the homeland. We have to,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said on the Ingraham Angle on Friday evening. “It’s the most important and most basic function of Congress, and Democrats don’t want to do that.”

Democratic lawmakers, who have repeatedly voted against DHS spending bills funding President Donald Trump’s illegal immigration crackdown absent reforms, echoed the same position Friday. 

“House Republicans have decided that they would rather inconvenience you, create chaos for you and for your families so that they can continue to jam their extreme right-wing ideology down the throats of the American people so they can continue to spend billions of dollars for ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] to brutalize and kill American citizens,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said during a news conference Friday. 

The vote came after House GOP leadership and the conservative House Freedom Caucus unequivocally rejected a Senate-passed deal earlier on Friday. The agreement, which passed the Senate unanimously, would have funded the vast majority of DHS sub-agencies minus ICE and parts of U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The National Border Patrol Council endorsed the House bill late Friday, arguing the Senate’s failure to fund all of DHS is “completely unacceptable and should not stand.”

JAYAPAL DOUBLES DOWN ON ANTI-ICE TERROR CLAIMS AS DHS SHUTDOWN TRIGGERS HISTORIC TRAVEL CHAOS

Senate Republicans have teased a second “big, beautiful” bill to give additional funding to ICE and the Border Patrol, though that could be a difficult feat in an election year with slim majorities in both chambers.

“It wasn’t good. It wasn’t appropriate,” Trump told Fox News in an interview Friday, referring to the Senate agreement. “You can’t have a bill that’s not going to fund ICE.”

House GOP leadership has also voiced concern about funding ICE and the Border Patrol through a second budget reconciliation package.

“That’s a very difficult task. It is a high-risk gamble for us to assume that we could do that,” Johnson told the Ingraham Angle. “And in the meantime, people are still going unpaid in this. We’ve got to make sure that we take care of those who take care of ourselves.”

The most pressing pain point of the shutdown — a shortage of Transportation Security Administration employees at airports nationwide — is set to be alleviated. The staffing constraints had created hours-long wait times at TSA security checkpoints, leading to travel disruptions and missed flights.

Trump, through an executive order, directed DHS to pay the more than 50,000 TSA personnel who had been reporting to work without compensation since the start of the shutdown to cover their salaries. The agents are expected to receive their first full paychecks in more than six weeks on Monday.

President Donald Trump on Friday signaled a shift away from the war with Iran after apparent positive negotiations this week and the administration’s capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, saying “Cuba is next.”

While speaking in Florida at the Future Investment Initiative (FII) Institute Summit at the Faena Forum in Miami Beach, Trump said that even though he campaigned on peace through strength, sometimes force is necessary.

“And Cuba is next, by the way. But pretend I didn’t say that,” Trump said. “Please, please, please media, please disregard that statement. Thank you very much — Cuba’s next.”

TRUMP TOUTS ‘MASSIVE’ IRAN ‘PRESENT’ LINKED TO STRAIT OF HORMUZ AS DEAL TALKS HEAT UP

He added that he thought NATO’s absence in negotiations with Iran was a “tremendous mistake.”

“They just weren’t there,” he said. “It’s going to make a lot of money for the United States, because we spent hundreds of billions of dollars a year on NATO, hundreds of protecting them. And we would have always been there for them. But now, based on their actions, I guess we don’t have to be, do we?”

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The president talked about the Strait of Hormuz, which he pressured NATO to help the U.S. reopen. 

“We’re negotiating [with Iran] now, and it would be great if we could do something, but they have to open it up,” he said. “They have to open up the Strait of Trump — I mean, Hormuz. … The fake news will say he accidentally said [that]. No, there’s no accidents with me.”

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Previously, when asked about control of the Strait of Hormuz, Trump said the U.S. will “have control of anything we want.”

The Iranian regime has imposed multimillion-dollar charges on some tankers transiting the critical global shipping choke point, through which one-fifth of the world’s oil supply flows.

Mainstream media outlets reportedly used the phrase “war crime” nearly three dozen times in the first three weeks of the Iran conflict, but 88% of that usage was directed toward the U.S. or Israel, according to an analysis released by a U.S.-based, Mideast-focused media watchdog.

CAMERA, the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis, and its research manager, David Litman, released a study Wednesday counting 32 uses of the term “war crime” from the BBC, CNN, NBC News, The New York Times and The Washington Post.

In his review, Litman asked readers to consider how the term “war crime” has been applied in reporting on the conflict, noting that simple internet searches return usages “almost exclusively” against the U.S. and Israel.

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“CAMERA found 32 total applications of the phrase ‘war crime’ during the first three weeks of the war (Feb. 28-Mar. 21). Of those, 28 (88 percent) were directed solely toward the actions of the United States and/or Israel,” Litman wrote on CAMERA’s website. 

“Zero were directed solely toward the actions of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Four (12 percent) were unattributed or directed at both sides.”

CAMERA found nearly all references stemmed from an airstrike early in the conflict that allegedly destroyed a school in Minab, Iran. The Pentagon is continuing to investigate the incident, according to CAMERA.

“Several of the other allegations refer to the sinking of an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean in what can assuredly be classified as a lawful attack,” Litman wrote.

The analysis also contrasted that usage with events that have not been labeled “war crimes” in CAMERA’s findings.

The group cited cluster bombs fired by Iran, many of which hit populated areas in Israel and elsewhere.

“While cluster munitions are not universally banned, using them to target populated areas almost certainly constitutes a war crime,” the analysis found.

CAMERA also pointed to Iranian strikes that hit energy and other key installations in nations not officially engaged in the conflict, such as Kuwait and Bahrain.

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The analysis found that, among the mainstream media sources examined, the term “war crime” was not applied to these strikes, and if Iran was cited in a war crimes discussion, it was paired with equal criticism of the West.

“This journalistic malpractice inverts reality,” Litman wrote.

George Mason law professor Adam Mossoff commented on the analysis, writing on X that “data analytics confirm huge bias in favor of pro-Islamic regime of Iran by BBC, CNN, NBC and NY Times.”

“These media orgs used ‘war crime’ 32 times in news reports in the first 3 weeks of the U.S./Israel-Iran war. Zero references solely to crimes by Islamic regime, and 88% media uses referred solely to U.S. or Israel.

“Islamic regime uses cluster bombs against Israeli civilians, shoots missiles and suicide drones at civilian targets in numerous Arab countries not involved in war, fires missiles at holy sites in Old Jerusalem, [but] zero identification of these war crimes as standalone crimes by major Western media organizations. This is shameful.”

Fox News Digital reached out to communications officials at CNN, the BBC, The Washington Post, The New York Times and NBC News for comment but did not hear back by deadline.

CAMERA was founded in Washington in 1982 by social worker Winifred Meiselman in response to The Washington Post’s coverage of Israel’s incursion into Lebanon and allegations of anti-Israel bias.

Early advisors included Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa; former Sen. Rudy Boschwitz, R-Minn.; and former Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., according to its website.

The White House pushed back hard Friday amid a news report that Todd Lyons, the acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), has been hospitalized at least twice for stress-related issues with the Trump administration that left him visibly upset and strained. 

The pushback came following a Politico report that said Lyons was hospitalized at least twice for stress-related issues while carrying out President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda. 

The stress has left Lyons unable to carry out key decisions, the report states, citing two current and two former administration officials, who were unnamed. 

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“He would be visibly upset and struggling to make the decisions that were needed to be made by the director,” one former unnamed official told the news website. 

“Trash reporting from a trash “reporter” pushing tabloid b*******in an attempt to divide and distract. Todd Lyons is an American Patriot,” the White House Rapid Response X account said in response to the story. 

The episodes were attributed to pressure from above for Lyons to ramp up deportations and from top adviser Stephen Miller, who allegedly yelled at Lyons during morning phone calls with administration officials, Politico reported. 

“This is b******* and more of the trash that Daniel Lippman has peddled over the years in the name of clicks and clout,” Miller’s wife, Katie Miller, wrote on X in response to Politico reporter’s story. 

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said Politico was given “on record” denials prior to the story being published. 

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“Shame on Politico for publishing such inaccurate trash,” Jackson wrote on X. “Todd Lyons is an American patriot who has worked tirelessly to undo Biden’s disastrous immigration policies that wreaked havoc on American communities. And the American people are deeply appreciative for his hard work making our country safer. Despite multiple on record denials and sources refuting their pathetic ‘reporting’ and *still* ran with this absurd article.”

The reported hospitalizations took place over several months. In one incident, Lyons was driven to a hospital by his security detail and he was admitted overnight. 

In September, Lyons became distressed that ICE agents were unable to locate an illegal immigrant in Los Ángeles during a ride along with top administration officials. 

One of his bodyguards took a portable defibrillator from a nearby government office to Lyons in case he needed medical intervention, the report said. 

After heated calls with Miller, Lyons expressed frustration that the White House was often mad at his agency, according to the current official and former official who heard such comments.

“Todd, Stephen, and the entire White House team have a great working relationship and coordinate closely to deliver on the president’s many promises,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement. “Todd Lyons is an American patriot who has worked tirelessly to undo Biden’s disastrous immigration policies that wreaked havoc on American communities.”

Fox News Digital has reached out to ICE and Politico.