FIRST ON FOX: A group of House conservatives are putting Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., on notice: quickly pass a Trump-backed election bill or expect the House of Representatives to block every Senate measure.

Two dozen House Republicans, led by Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla., are vowing to oppose any Senate bill until the House-passed Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act clears the upper chamber.

“We made a promise to the American people. It’s time to deliver,” the Republicans wrote in an open letter to Thune, first obtained by Fox News Digital. “Consider this our filibuster.”

It’s a notable division between Republicans controlling the majorities in both houses of Congress.

REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK: TRUMP’S SAVE ACT ULTIMATUM RUNS INTO SENATE REALITY

House Republicans have threatened for weeks to derail Senate legislation until President Donald Trump signs the measure into law. The SAVE America Act would require proof of citizenship to register to vote and photo identification for voters at the ballot box.

It comes as the Senate kicked off a marathon process Tuesday to debate the SAVE America Act, though the measure is ultimately expected to fail given unanimous opposition from Senate Democrats and Sens. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Thom Tillis, R-N.C.

The group of House conservatives is calling on Senate leadership to pursue a talking filibuster to steer around the 60-vote requirement and pass the bill with a simple majority. However, internal divisions among Republicans have kept the conference from pursuing that approach. Thune has also warned a talking filibuster could backfire on Republicans if Democrats were to saddle the bill with Democrat-authored amendments.

REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK: GOP WEIGHS ‘NUKING’ FILIBUSTER TO PASS TRUMP’S SAVE ACT

Despite clear math problems in the Senate, the group of House conservatives said they will continue to ratchet up the pressure. They also slammed Thune for beginning debate on the bill without having the votes to advance the measure to a vote on final passage.

“Continuing the same old kabuki shows is unacceptable, and the American people deserve better,” Fine told Fox News Digital in a statement. “Majority Leader John Thune can say whatever he wants about my colleagues and me holding the line, but we won’t tolerate Washington’s games any longer.”

“In the last election, the American people overwhelmingly elected President Trump and gave him and the Republican Party a mandate to Make America Great Again. Core to that mandate was a promise to restore confidence in the security of our elections — to guarantee that only Americans vote in them,” the House lawmakers wrote in the letter.

It’s not clear the defecting group has the numbers to immediately derail Senate legislation with significant bipartisan support. 

Forty-one conservatives revolted Tuesday on the House floor against Senate legislation that would reauthorize a program supporting small businesses. The measure still sailed through the House after nearly all Democratic lawmakers backed it.

However, House conservatives’ threats could still hamper efforts by Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to steer party-line legislation through the chamber.

TRUMP URGES CONGRESS TO PASS SAVE AMERICA ACT, FULLY FUND DHS AS TSA WORKERS GO WITHOUT PAY

With just a razor-thin majority, Johnson can currently only afford to lose one House Republican on any legislation that does not have Democrats’ support.

“On Sunday, President Trump announced that he will not sign any additional legislation until the SAVE America Act is passed out of the Senate. The President has also called on the Senate to use the talking filibuster to secure passage of the SAVE America Act immediately, superseding everything else. We agree,” the letter said. “Until that occurs, we, the undersigned, are prepared to vote NO on any Senate bill on the House Floor.”

A Senate GOP aide shot back at the House Republicans over their effort, saying, “Republicans fighting Republicans over congressional procedure is definitely a recipe for midterm success.” 

It comes weeks after a group of House Republicans pushed Johnson on a lawmaker-only call to reject any Senate-led legislation until the SAVE America Act was passed.

“If we’re going to go to war against our own party in the Senate, there may be implications to that,” Johnson said at one point, according to people on the call. “So we want to be thoughtful and careful.”

The letter notably did not make a carve-out for a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding bill, despite the White House assuring that Trump would make an exception for a spending bill to end the partial government shutdown.

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday issued a post on X in which she noted that President Donald Trump targeted Iran based on his conclusion that the regime “posed an imminent threat.”

She issued the post in the wake of Joe Kent’s resignation from his role as National Counterterrorism Center director over his opposition to the Iran war that Trump launched more than two weeks ago in conjunction with Israel.

“Donald Trump was overwhelmingly elected by the American people to be our President and Commander in Chief. As our Commander in Chief, he is responsible for determining what is and is not an imminent threat, and whether or not to take action he deems necessary to protect the safety and security of our troops, the American people and our country,” Gabbard noted in her post.

WHITE HOUSE, AFTER TOP COUNTERTERRORISM OFFICIAL QUITS, SAYS TRUMP HAD ‘STRONG’ EVIDENCE IRAN WOULD ATTACK US

“The Office of the Director of National Intelligence is responsible for helping coordinate and integrate all intelligence to provide the President and Commander in Chief with the best information available to inform his decisions,” she added.

“After carefully reviewing all the information before him, President Trump concluded that the terrorist Islamist regime in Iran posed an imminent threat and he took action based on that conclusion,” Gabbard wrote.

TRUMP BIDS GOODBYE TO INTEL OFFICIAL WHO RESIGNED OVER IRAN: ‘GOOD THING THAT HE’S OUT’

Kent publicly shared his resignation letter on Tuesday, asserting that Iran did not pose an imminent threat to the U.S.

“I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran,” Kent wrote.

“Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” he asserted in the resignation letter.

TOP COUNTERTERRORISM OFFICIAL RESIGNS IN PROTEST OF US WAR AGAINST IRAN

Trump pushed back on Tuesday, saying that “it’s a good thing that he’s out because he said that Iran was not a threat. Iran was a threat. Every country realized what a threat Iran was. The question is whether or not they wanted to do something about it.”

In the wake of Joe Kent’s resignation from the position of National Counterterrorism Center director over his opposition to the Iran war, President Donald Trump highlighted a years-old tweet in which Kent had urged the president to “wipe Iran’s ballistic capability out.”

In the January 2020 post on X, Kent tagged the president and wrote, “We should not sit and wait for the next attack, wipe Iran’s ballistic capability out and get our troops out of Iraq – they are only targets now. No US WIA/KIA is a tribute to the professionalism of our military and intel professionals not Iranian restraint.”

Kent made the post in January 2020 after a U.S. strike earlier that month killed Qasem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force.

TOP COUNTERTERRORISM OFFICIAL RESIGNS IN PROTEST OF US WAR AGAINST IRAN

In the resignation letter that he posted to X on Tuesday, Kent asserted that Iran did not pose an imminent threat to the U.S.

“I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Kent wrote.

IRANIAN INTELLIGENCE MINISTER KILLED IN PRECISION AIRSTRIKE, WHILE US MILITARY TARGETS MISSILE SITES

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard issued a post on X in which she noted that the president targeted Iran due to his view that the regime represented “an imminent threat.”

“The Office of the Director of National Intelligence is responsible for helping coordinate and integrate all intelligence to provide the President and Commander in Chief with the best information available to inform his decisions,” Gabbard said in the post. 

TRUMP BIDS GOODBYE TO INTEL OFFICIAL WHO RESIGNED OVER IRAN: ‘GOOD THING THAT HE’S OUT’

“After carefully reviewing all the information before him, President Trump concluded that the terrorist Islamist regime in Iran posed an imminent threat and he took action based on that conclusion,” she noted.

U.S. forces hammered Iran’s anti-ship missile sites near the Strait of Hormuz with 5,000-pound bunker buster bombs on Tuesday, U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said.

The strikes near the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most important oil choke point, come as Iran’s stranglehold over the vital waterway has grown concerns over the regime’s threats to oil tankers.

“Hours ago, U.S. forces successfully employed multiple 5,000-pound deep penetrator munitions on hardened Iranian missile sites along Iran’s coastline near the Strait of Hormuz,” CENTCOM posted Tuesday evening on X.

Deep GBU- 72 penetrator weapons, often referred to as bunker busters, are designed to cut through hardened or underground targets before detonating. The munition was first tested by the Air Force in 2021.

TRUMP SAYS MOST NATO ALLIES ‘DON’T WANT TO GET INVOLVED’ IN IRAN OPERATION, BUT US ‘NEVER’ NEEDED THEIR HELP

“The Iranian anti-ship cruise missiles in these sites posed a risk to international shipping in the strait,” the command said.

Most shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway for global oil and gas transport that supplies roughly one-fifth of the world’s crude oil, has been halted since early March, after the war started. About 20 vessels have been attacked in the area.

Oil prices have jumped more than 40% to above $100 per barrel since the Iran war began, and Iran has threatened it won’t allow “even a single liter of oil” destined for the U.S., Israel and their allies to pass through.

TRUMP WARNS NATO OF ‘VERY BAD’ FUTURE IF ALLIES DON’T HELP SECURE STRAIT OF HORMUZ

At least 89 ships crossed the Strait of Hormuz between March 1 and 15 — including 16 oil tankers, The Associated Press reported, citing Lloyd’s List Intelligence. The number of vessel passages per day was down from roughly 100 to 135 before the war, it said, with more than one-fifth of the 89 vessels believed to be Iran-affiliated and others being Chinese- and Greece-affiliated ships.

As crude prices spiked above $100 a barrel, President Donald Trump pressured allies and trade partners to send warships and reopen the strait, hoping to bring oil prices lower. No allies, however, have yet to commit.

“I think NATO’s making a very foolish mistake,” Trump said in the Oval Office on Tuesday when a reporter asked about getting America’s allies to assist the U.S. in escorting oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz. “And I’ve long said that, you know, I wonder whether or not NATO would ever be there for us.”

Trump added: “So this was a great test because we don’t need them, but they should have been there.”

The U.S. on Friday bombed military sites on Kharg Island off the Iranian coast, which is key for Iran’s oil network and exports, but Trump said he had left its oil infrastructure alone for now.

Fox News Digital’s Jasmine Baehr and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

FIRST ON FOX: A top senator involved in slashing red tape will tout a plan requiring line-item proof of every federal tax dollar from entities that receive federal funding.

Sen. Joni Ernst said her move would guard against rampant fraud such as the slew of allegedly fake Minneapolis daycares, adding the measure could have helped prevent wasted taxpayer funds.

Ernst’s bill coincides with the White House announcing a state-federal anti-fraud task force led by Vice President JD Vance, which White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News is a “whole of government effort to fight fraud at the state and federal level” and fulfills another campaign promise.

CRUZ TARGETS MINNESOTA-STYLE FRAUD WITH BILL FORCING PROOF BEFORE FEDERAL CHILDCARE PAYOUTS

The COST (Cost Openness and Spending Transparency) Act will ensure every government agency lists every project it uses taxpayer money for, as Ernst prepares to lead a Senate Small Business Committee hearing featuring watchdogs like White Coat Waste and Open The Books.

“As I always say, if you can’t find waste in Washington, there can only be one reason – you didn’t look,” Ernst told Fox News Digital.

“But after years of fighting to hold Washington accountable, I’ve also learned that you can’t stop what you can’t see. That’s why this Sunshine Week, I’m leading the COST ACT to post the price on every single project the American public is footing the bill for,” she said.

FEDERAL FRAUD FACES SENATE SHOWDOWN AS THUNE TAPS ERNST TO LEAD REFORMS AFTER MINNESOTA SCANDAL

Under the COST Act, allegedly fraudulent businesses like Minneapolis daycares would be required to list all of their federal funding.

Such transparency would have exposed Minnesota fraudsters earlier, helping authorities catch scofflaws and alleged tax-dollar thieves.

The COST Act’s official purpose is “to put a public price tag on all projects supported with taxpayer dollars,” according to a copy obtained by Fox News Digital.

Any agency, individual or entity — including those within state and local governments and federal research grant recipients — must clearly report through a press release or other approved documentation any program or project carried out using federal funds, whether fully or in part.

The recipient of taxpayer funds must report the percentage of total costs covered by federal funds, the dollar amount, and the portion financed privately.

It then instructs the Office of Management and Budget — currently led by Director Russell Vought — to review a random sample of such recipients to enforce compliance and publicly report its findings.

A source familiar with the legislation added that the work of citizen journalists in Minneapolis who helped expose the “Quality Learning Center” and other allegedly fraudulent daycares and medical services companies inspired a new requirement to give civilians an outlet for their concerns.

Vought’s office would have one year to set up such a mechanism for anonymous reports of noncompliance, according to the bill.

“Calling taxpayers’ attention to how and where their hard-earned money is being spent exposes fraudulent spending, like what we saw at the Quality ‘Learing’ Center in Minnesota, so it can no longer fester in the shadows,” Ernst said on that account.

FIRST ON FOX: A top conservative organization advocating parents’ rights is descending on Capitol Hill Wednesday to meet with both Republicans and Democrats on the subject of transgender issues and other agenda items.

Moms For Liberty is taking its “parents pledge” to Congress, with group members expected to sit down with Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and others in a bid to grow support for its movement to define what rights parents have over their children while in school and other places outside their immediate control.

“Moms for Liberty brought 100 members from across 20 states to Capitol Hill,” the group’s co-founder and CEO Tina Descovich told Fox News Digital.

CHLOE COLE ACT AIMED AT BLOCKING MINORS FROM UNDERGOING LIFE-ALTERING TRANSGENDER SURGERIES, GOP LAWMAKER SAYS

She said members of Congress would join President Donald Trump in signing their pledge, which Descovich called “a commonsense promise to the American people that you support their rights.”

The pledge states, “I pledge to honor the fundamental rights of parents, including, but not limited to the right to direct the education, medical care, and moral upbringing of their children. I pledge to advance policies that strengthen parental involvement and decision-making, increase transparency, defend against government overreach, and secure parental rights at all levels of government.”

Among the group’s legislative priorities, Fox News Digital was told, are to eliminate school-based health clinics, oppose any policy that circumvents parental authority in schools, and require schools to give parents full access to curriculum, lesson plans, evaluations, and learning standards.

On the issue of transgender policies, Moms for Liberty is pushing to maintain sex-specific spaces like school sports and restrooms, as well as the biological definition of sex and promoting pronoun usage consistent with students and staff members’ sex.

Moms for Liberty was established in 2021 to fight COVID-19 pandemic restrictions on students.

Since then, it’s ballooned into a nationwide group with multiple chapters across the country.

And their meeting with Johnson on Wednesday is notable in that it’s a sign of their influence and Republicans’ focus on culture war issues like parental rights, even as they fight an uphill battle to keep control during the November midterms.

FIRST ON FOX: FBI Director Kash Patel is expected to tout a list of his agency’s top reforms and accomplishments under President Donald Trump’s second term during a Senate hearing Wednesday on worldwide threats impacting the United States.

Patel is set to address several reforms during the hearing, which is being held by the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, including expanded biometric collection overseas, sending more agents into the field from D.C., doubling the size and funding for drone utilization, a new first-of-its-kind training center meant to assist local law enforcement with counter-drone training, new artifical intelligence initiatives to support intelligence collection, among several other reforms, Fox News Digital has learned ahead of his planned remarks.

In addition to Patel, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is also slated to testify alongside Patel at the hearing Wednesday, as well as Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Ratcliffe, Director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, James Adams, and Acting Commander of U.S. Cyber Command, William Hartman.  

FBI SPOX UNLEASHES ON MEDIA’S ‘TRANSPARENT SPIN JOB’ THAT RECENT FIRINGS WERE ‘DEVASTATING’ TO IRAN WORK

“Under President Trump’s leadership, this FBI has been rebuilt into a faster, more accountable force focused on protecting Americans and crushing violent crime. We’ve surged agents out of Washington and into the field, expanded biometric screening overseas to stop threats before they reach our homeland, overhauled our intelligence and operations systems, and strengthened partnerships and technology to move at the speed of today’s threats,” Patel exclusively told Fox News Digital. “This is a results-driven FBI delivering real security for the American people.”

Patel is also expected to tout a laundry list of accomplishments that the FBI has racked up over the last year, including disrupting 1,800 gangs and criminal enterprises, seizing over 2,250 kilos of fentanyl, and several statistics highlighting major arrests, including a 112% increase in violent crime arrests, almost 350 cyber indictments, 6,000 child victims located, 1,700 child predators arrested, among many other accomplishments.

Democrats have charged Patel with politicizing the FBI, but Patel and Republicans have argued that the current efforts are aimed at doing just the opposite. 

“You’ve begun the important work of returning the FBI to its law enforcement mission,” Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, told Patel during a September Senate hearing. “It’s well-understood that your predecessor left you an FBI infected with politics.” 

“As I’ve committed to you during my confirmation hearing and my conversations with you, this FBI will not be weaponized anymore in either side of the aisle,” Patel added during the September hearing on FBI oversight.  

FBI BUSTS CONVENIENCE STORE CLERKS FOR ‘STAGED ARMED ROBBERIES’ TO APPLY FOR IMMIGRATION BENEFITS

One reform aimed at reducing agency politicization at the FBI includes an end to what Patel has described as “politicized” threat-banding. Threat-banding is the process of assigning certain threats, such as White Supremacy violence, to high-priority categories. 

Under former FBI Director Christopher Wray, in 2020, the agency had indicated it would be elevating racially motivated violent extremism to a “national threat priority,” with Wray indicating it was at the “top of the priority list” for the agency. 

During Wray’s tenure under former President Joe Biden, a leaked memo from the FBI’s Richmond, Virginia field office, warned about the violent domestic extremism threat allegedly posed by traditionalist Catholics, leading to GOP anger and concern that Catholics were being targeted based on biased information.

Meanwhile, Patel’s push to make the FBI less Washington-centric and more Main Street-focused resulted in the FBI sending more than 1,000 agents, who were originally positioned in the nation’s capital, to locations around the country. Patel told lawmakers last year during congressional testimony on Capitol Hill that this priority allows the FBI to “focus our resources where they’re needed the most.” 

Increasing federal and state cooperation, including via a first-of-its-kind counter-drone operations training center in Alabama, where state and local law enforcement can learn about federal law enforcement techniques. Additionally, the FBI has been ramping up its counter-drone capabilities, doubling the current size of their efforts, per Patel. 

Patel also has led initiatives to ramp up the FBI’s utilization of artifical intelligence, such as new working groups meant to test artificial intelligence’s ability to process large volumes of national security and intelligence information. Efforts to streamline communications and improve threat detection systems have also been a focus of the FBI during Trump’s second term. 

Another big change Patel is ushering into the agency includes strengthening and providing more funding to the FBI’s Threats Screening Center, renamed by the agency last year from the Terrorist Screening Center. The aim is to expand the system to assist with more than just terrorism-related threats, but also threats from cartels and others impacting border security.   

Senate Republicans dug in for the long haul as they embarked on their floor takeover and signaled that the hours of debate that crept well beyond the upper chamber’s usual twilight business hours were just the beginning.

The GOP launched its plan to control the Senate floor earlier Tuesday and spent the ensuing hours lauding and defending the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act as Senate Democrats hammered the bill as a tool of voter suppression.

But without Democratic support, the bill is destined to fail. And the vote to open the marathon debate session, which lawmakers predict could last days if not weeks, was an indicator that the support did not exist in the upper chamber to pass the SAVE America Act.

GOP TRIGGERS MARATHON SENATE FIGHT TO EXPOSE DEMS’ OPPOSITION TO TRUMP-BACKED VOTER ID BILL

Still, Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, the bill’s sponsor in the upper chamber and the lawmaker who led lobbying efforts with Senate Republican leadership to get the bill on the floor, argued late Tuesday night that Senate Republicans would be remiss to waste the opportunity ahead of them.

“This is our moment,” Lee said. “Stand for a simple principle; let the American people see who is willing to defend their sacred right to vote and who is not.”

Several other lawmakers took to the floor throughout the late afternoon and evening, with debate often weaving in and out of the topic at hand and stretching into other matters of the day, like President Donald Trump’s war in Iran or honoring the Ohio service members who died in a midair refueling mission in the Middle East.

Democrats charged that the bill went far beyond just voter ID and was designed to suppress a plethora of groups from voting.

TRUMP VOTER ID PUSH FACES SENATE TEST AS GOP REBELS THREATEN TO SINK BILL

Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., accused Republicans of using the floor exercise to distract from other pressing issues.

“Instead of focusing on the affordability crisis or trying to save us from endless wars, Senate Republicans are once again doing Donald Trump’s bidding,” Padilla said. “This time, they’re making his conspiracy-fueled election takeover bill their top priority.”

Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., said that repeated probes and investigations found that “you are more likely to get struck by lightning than for a non-citizen to vote.” Republicans argue the bill is explicitly designed to end that practice.

Merkley countered that the legislation was about “rigging the November election.”

“And that’s exactly what Trump said — ‘You give me this bill, my party will win November and every other election for a long time to come,’” Merkley said.

Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., who is leading an amendment to include several changes to the bill requested by Trump, argued that “a republic has the right to distinguish citizens from noncitizens.”

“That should not be controversial,” Schmitt said. “That should not even be difficult. The vote is not a global entitlement. The vote is not a participation trophy for anyone who happens to cross our borders.”

SENATE GOP EYES BLAME GAME AS TRUMP-BACKED SAVE ACT HEADS FOR DEFEAT

The floor debate is expected to continue for the next several days. In the meantime, some Republicans believe they can wear down Senate Democrats enough to pass the legislation, despite the challenge of the 60-vote filibuster threshold.

Lee and a cohort of like-minded Republicans pushed for Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., to turn to the talking filibuster to pass the SAVE America Act, which, after possibly several weeks of debate, would lower the threshold to pass the bill to a simple majority.

Despite pressure from within his conference, Trump, and conservatives beyond the walls of Congress, the notion has become an insurmountable math problem that Republicans have not been able to unify behind.

Lee, however, was ready for the long haul Tuesday night.

“Let’s face it, there is no legitimate reason to oppose this bill,” Lee said. “And I stand by that, and I will continue to stand by that in the coming days and weeks. And I’m ready for many, many weeks. We’re going to stay on this bill until it damn well passes, because the American people demand and deserve nothing less than that.”

Senate Democrats are set to grill Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., during his confirmation hearing on Wednesday, his first hurdle to becoming the next Homeland Security chief.

Mullin’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee comes as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) remains shuttered over Democrats’ desire for stringent reforms to the agency’s immigration enforcement operations.

Senate Democrats on the panel plan to use those demands to gauge Mullin’s willingness to make changes at the agency. They have argued since current DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s reassignment from the position that changes must go beyond a shift in personnel.

FIRED DHS CHIEF KRISTI NOEM FACES CRIMINAL REFERRAL FROM CONGRESSIONAL DEMOCRATS

“He’s made some pretty incendiary statements that reflect his resistance to reform and would make him unqualified, unless he has a clear explanation and even retraction,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., told Fox News Digital.

When asked if he wanted guarantees on changes to the agency, Blumenthal said Mullin “needs to make commitments for reform.”

“If he fails to make commitments to far-reaching and fundamental reform, he should be defeated and rejected,” he said.

Mullin also has an icy relationship with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who chairs the committee. When asked how the hearing could go, Paul said, “Come tomorrow, and you’ll find out more.”

Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., the top-ranking Democrat on the Homeland committee, said that he plans to give Mullin a fair shake but has questions about his colleague’s views on how the agency could change with him at the helm.

KRISTI NOEM FIRED FROM HOMELAND SECURITY POST AMID RECENT TURMOIL

“Certainly, I’d like to get his assessment of how he sees things currently and what he might change,” Peters told Fox News Digital. “That would be a fair range of questions.”

Senate Republicans are sprinting to move Mullin through the process, given that President Donald Trump wants Mullin in and Noem out by March 31. The confirmation hearing is the first step, and despite Democratic resistance, Mullin will likely clear that hurdle and head for a full vote in the Senate later this month.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said he and his leadership team haven’t tried to corral votes for Mullin, but noted that Democrats would “decide to turn on one of their colleagues in the Senate” after getting exactly what they wanted: Noem replaced.

DEM SENATORS CALL TO FUND DHS AFTER VOTING TO BLOCK IT 4 TIMES AMID SHUTDOWN FIGHT

“He’s got good, strong relationships on the other side of the aisle,” Thune said. “And I mean, this is what the Democrats were clamoring for. They wanted a new change and shake-up in the leadership, and it’s now happening.”

While Mullin will walk into a hearing that will test his relationship with colleagues across the aisle, he does have at least one Democratic friend on the committee.

Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., who almost immediately came out in support of Mullin’s nomination, said he is still having conversations with the lawmaker about reforms to DHS. Fetterman planned to meet with Mullin ahead of the hearing.

“Is it controversial to talk to members of the opposite party? It might be controversial for some people, but that’s going to be an ongoing dialogue with him,” Fetterman said. “You know, I’ve said it, he’s a good dude, and I got to know him on a CODEL over the years.”

Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., on Tuesday sought to defend his social media post comparing New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s rhetoric to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Tuberville shared a post last week that juxtaposed a photo of the terror attack on the Twin Towers with an image of Mamdani, who appeared to be hosting a Ramadan Iftar event at City Hall. An account called “End Wokeness” posted the images along with a message that read, “Less than 25 years apart.”

“The enemy is inside the gates,” Tuberville said on X in response to the image.

Asked to explain his post on the social platform X, Tuberville said, “I just go by his rhetoric.”

GOP SENATOR EARNS DEM BACKLASH FOR ‘ENEMY IS INSIDE THE GATES’ COMMENT ABOUT NYC MAYOR ZOHRAN MAMDANI

“He’s made a lot of statements about his stance with Islam and radical Islam, all the things that go along with what he preaches every day. And I’m just kind of repeating what he’s saying,” the senator told DC News Now’s Reshad Hudson.

“We don’t need a division in this country. We need everybody to go with the Constitution, understand we have moral values. And if we all stick with those –– I don’t care if you’re Muslim or Catholic or Baptist, it makes no difference,” he continued.

He added, “We need to make the country better; we don’t need to divide it. That’s what he’s doing in New York.”

REPUBLICAN SAYS ‘MUSLIMS DON’T BELONG IN AMERICAN SOCIETY,’ DRAWS FIERCE DEMOCRATIC BACKLASH

When asked about whether Muslim Americans in Alabama may find his post offensive, Tuberville said he has “some great Muslim friends” and that he spoke to “two Iranians in Alabama this past week about the war. Obviously, they’re Muslim.”

“If you teach and preach Sharia law, if you bow down to the Quran, it teaches death to Americans. That don’t fly with me, okay?” he said, although the Quran makes no reference to the U.S. or Americans.

The Alabama lawmaker and former college football coach reiterated that he does not care about a person’s religious background.

“Hey, you come be part of our country [and] don’t try to divide people, don’t try to push your culture — we already have a culture — [then] I’m all for you,” he added.

Tuberville made several more social media posts on Tuesday targeting Islam.

“Radical Islam is the enemy of any freedom-loving American. The liberal media is running cover for Radical Islamists, but the Quran is pretty CLEAR on its instructions to KILL all non-Muslims,” he said in one post.

“To anyone offended by me calling radical Islamic jihadists the enemy: If the shoe fits, wear it,” he said in another post.

The senator’s initial “the enemy is inside the gates” post, which was pinned to the top of his X account as of Wednesday morning, prompted a heavy rebuke from Democrats, including Mamdani, who is Muslim.

“Let there be as much outrage from politicians in Washington when kids go hungry as there is when I break bread with New Yorkers,” Mamdani said on X in response to the senator’s post.