Swalwell warns Noem he has ‘bulls— detector’ during heated exchange
Democratic California Rep. Eric Swalwell warned Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem that he has a “bullsh— detector” during a heated exchange about a photo of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an El Salvadoran citizen who the Trump administration deported.
Swalwell was grilling Noem about a photo of Abrego Garcia’s hand that shows alleged MS-13 tattoos during a Homeland Security budget hearing in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday.
“I want you to have credibility and I want you to be taken seriously. Is this doctored or is it not?” Swalwell asked, referring to the photo that President Donald Trump shared on social media. Swalwell was asserting that the letters “M,” “S” and the numbers “1” and “3” above the tattoos were edited onto the photo.
Noem tried to respond, saying that the deportation of Abrego Garcia was based off an investigation, not a photo, but was interrupted by Swalwell.
TRUMP’S REMARKS COULD COME BACK TO BITE HIM IN ABREGO GARCIA DEPORTATION BATTLE
“Madam Secretary, I have a seven-year-old, a six-year-old and a three-year-old,” Swalwell said. “I have a bulls— detector. I’m just asking you, is this doctored or not?”
Noem replied that it was “unbelievable” that the lawmaker’s focus was on a photo and not on the importance of U.S. national security, before saying she had “no knowledge” of the photo in question.
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Last month, President Donald Trump shared a photo of himself in the Oval Office holding a picture of what the White House said were tattoos on Abrego Garcia’s knuckles that are affiliated with the MS-13 terrorist group.
While Swalwell continued to use his time to push Noem about the photo, the secretary responded that the mission of DHS is to secure the country and go after “the worst of the worst, the criminals, the bad actors.”
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“Abrego Garcia is a known terrorist and member of MS-13, a wife beater and a human trafficker that should never have been in this country to begin with,” Noem said.
Top Democrats deflect questions about Biden’s cognitive decline
Several top Democrats have deflected questions about former President Biden’s cognitive decline, as alleged in multiple books about the 2024 election, telling the media that they’re looking to move forward and not look back.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., dismissed the questions surrounding the latest book to come out with allegations of the president’s decline on CNN, MSNBC and during a press conference on Tuesday.
During an interview with CNN’s Kasie Hunt, Schumer was asked, “Did you really not have any idea that he was not fit to serve a second term?”
“Kasie, we’re looking forward. We have the largest Medicaid cut in front of us. We have the whole federal government,” he said as Hunt pushed back, noting the reason they were dealing with President Donald Trump now was because the Democrats lost in 2024.
EX-BIDEN AIDE SAYS FORMER PRESIDENT WAS ‘FATIGUED, BEFUDDLED, AND DISENGAGED’ PRIOR TO JUNE DEBATE: BOOK
“Is that not Joe Biden’s responsibility for deciding to run again?” Hunt followed up as the Democratic lawmaker repeated, “We’re looking forward.”
Hunt pressed, “That’s it?” Schumer said, “That’s it,” before the interview ended.
While multiple books have come out about Biden, former Vice President Kamala Harris and the 2024 election, the most recent excerpts from CNN’s Jake Tapper and Axios reporter Alex Thompson’s upcoming book, “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,” detail several insider concerns over whether Biden could last a second term as president.
The senator was also pressed on Tuesday by MSNBC’s Katy Tur, who asked him to respond to a specific portion of the book that mentioned the Democratic senator. “The book also reports that Biden put his hands on your shoulder and said, ‘You have bigger,’ I’m going to say huevos, it’s not what the book said, ‘than anyone I’ve ever met.’ Do you think Biden deserves the blame for the loss in 2024?” Tur asked.
“Katy, we’re looking forward. We have the largest Medicaid cut in history facing us. We are focused on the future and doing right for the American people, plain and simple,” he said.
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Tur followed up and asked if Biden actually said what was reported in the book, and he said again, “We’re looking forward.”
The senator gave the same response during a press conference earlier in the day when a reporter asked if he was being straight with the American public in posting on X in June that the president was “in command and impressive” in meetings.
The reporter juxtaposed Schumer’s post with an insider describing to Tapper and Thompson a “terrifying” moment that same month when Biden failed to recognize award-winning actor George Clooney at a June fundraiser.
Schumer dismissed the question, saying, “We’re just looking forward.”
NEW BOOK PLACES BLAME ON BIDEN FOR HARRIS 2024 LOSS TO TRUMP
Asked by a reporter on Tuesday whether it was helpful for the Democratic caucus to have these books about Biden and the 2024 campaign, and whether he wanted Biden to help campaign for Democrats, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries deflected.
“We’re not looking backward, we’re looking forward at this particular moment in time,” Jeffries said.
Gov. JB Pritzker, D-Ill., said the commentary about the president’s health was “very backward-looking” during an interview on CNN on Tuesday, but argued that the former president should have either stayed in the race or not run for re-election at all.
He added, “So I don’t know whether he should have been the nominee or not. I don’t really want to review all of it because it’s past history, and we live in a moment right now when 500,000 people in the state of Illinois are being told basically they’re going to lose their healthcare because of what the Republicans are doing.”
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Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., was confronted on Sunday by NBC’s Kristen Welker about Biden’s insistence that it didn’t matter that he dropped out of the race in July, only giving former Vice President Kamala Harris about 90 days to campaign.
“You know, everything we look at in a rearview mirror after you lose an election. Yes, we would have been served better by a primary, but we are where we are. We’re not on the History Channel right now, and I believe that President Biden can come out and speak and do interviews whenever he wants,” Klobuchar said.
“But I will say this: We’re not in the ‘History Channel’ and our Republican colleagues, instead of dealing with where we are now, think they’re in some kind of a way back zone, that they can go bring time backwards and blame everything on Joe Biden. Donald Trump is the president right now, and we have to deal with helping the American people,” the senator added.
After listing what she wanted the party to focus on going forward, the Democratic senator added, “So I’m not interested in going backward in time. I’m interested in going forward.”
Some Democrats acknowledged that the president put the party in a tough spot when pressed on the book allegations, and on whether they should have held a primary.
Rep. Morgan McGarvey, D-Ky., told MSNBC on Wednesday when pressed on Biden’s decline and revelations from the book that he shouldn’t have run for re-election, as he said he was going to be a transitional president.
“I don’t think he should have run for reelection. And I do think that it put the party in a much tougher spot to win, which we needed the best person on the field,” McGarvey told MSNBC’s Ali Vitali, citing Trump’s policies and the high stakes of the election. “We knew the stakes were that high, and we needed to make sure we had the best person on the field for the Democrats at that time.”
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Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said that Biden “maybe” hurt Democrats in running for re-election. However, Buttigieg defended the former president against allegations of decline.
“The time I worked closest with him in his final year was around the Baltimore bridge collapse. And what I can tell you is that the same president the world saw addressing that was the president I was in the Oval with, insisting that we do a good job, do right by Baltimore. And that was characteristic of my experience with him,” he told reporters in Iowa this week.
School district takes legal action to ban trans athletes from girls’ sports
A school district in Colorado is suing the state’s athletic association and attorney general over the state’s laws requiring schools to allow biologically male transgender athletes to compete in girls sports.
School District 49 (D49) in El Paso County, Colorado, joined a growing list of school districts in states that allow trans athletes to compete in girls sports by changing its own policy to ensure female-only participation.
But D49 is going a step further with preemptive legal action after observing “increasing tension between Title IX obligations and the state system that requires discrimination against female student-athletes,” according to documents obtained by Fox News Digital.
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“Knowing that the approved policy would generate opposition and potentially trigger legal challenges, D49 filed a pre-enforcement action in the Colorado District of the federal court system seeking declaratory and injunctive relief,” the school district said.
The lawsuit takes aim at the Colorado High School Activities Association (CHSAA) and Attorney General Philip J. Weiser and seeks legal protection for its new policy to protect girls sports.
The lawsuit does not come in response to a specific incident of a trans athlete competing in the district. Instead, it’s a response to the state’s sweeping policies conflicting with the school’s obligation to abide by federal law, specifically Title IX.
“Political culture is far out of balance on gender issues. Our lawsuit seeks a rational correction to excessive accommodations,” D49 Superinterdent Peter Hilts told Fox News Digital. “Our state athletic association simultaneously advocates equity and discrimination. We asked them to resolve that discrepancy, and they declined, so we were compelled to pursue a legal ruling.”
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Lori Thompson, president of the School District 49 Board of Education, lamented the state’s current policies and their effects on competition among girls.
“Current Colorado law requires us to violate Title IX by taking opportunities from deserving girls and delivering them to boys,” Thompson told Fox News Digital.
Colorado is one of the many blue states to protect the rights of trans athletes in girls sports.
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Students in the state can compete in either gender category if they inform their school in writing that their gender identity differs from their sex assigned at birth. CHSAA requires schools to do a confidential evaluation, and all forms of documentation are voluntary. There are also no medical or legal requirements stated.
Weiser’s office responded to the lawsuit in a statement provided to Fox News Digital.
“The attorney general is committed to defending Colorado’s anti-discrimination laws. The attorney general’s office has no further comment on this ongoing litigation,” the statement said.
The CHSAA says it is aware of the lawsuit, but it has not yet been officially served, a spokesperson told Fox News Digital.
“Should official notice be received, we will organize our team accordingly and proceed through the appropriate legal channels,” the spokesperson added.
A representative for the legal firm Miller Farmer Carlson, representing D49, said the document has not been served due to a lack of correspondence from CHSAA.
“The counsel for CHSAA, Alex Halpern, has not responded to our requests to waive service. Unless he does so by tomorrow, we will then just go ahead and serve their registered agent,” said Brad Miller.
Officials in West Coast state sound alarm after traveler diagnosed with viral disease
Public health officials in Washington state are warning residents that a Canadian traveler who was contagious with measles visited several public locations, including the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.
The person, whose vaccination status is unknown, traveled through Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and visited multiple public locations in Renton, Bellevue, Seattle, Everett and Woodinville between April 30 and May 3, according to a King County news release.
Health officials said the Canadian was given the diagnosis after traveling through the area.
MEASLES VACCINES GIVEN LONG AGO COULD BE LESS EFFECTIVE NOW, DOCTORS SAY
The spread of measles can happen before any rash appears, and the virus can remain in the air for up to two hours after someone contagious with measles leaves the area.
Officials said potential exposure sites where the Canadian traveled include Seattle-Tacoma International Airport; Bellevue Market Place at Factoria Shopping Center; Chateau Ste. Michelle Winery; Home Depot in Redmond; Dunn Lumber in Renton; Genki Sushi in Renton; Topgolf Renton Sport Bar and Restaurant; Pho Mignon in Kirkland; Kobo at HIGO Art Gallery; Uwajimaya Seattle Asian Market; Stoup Brewing; Spicy Style of Sichuan; a hotel; and three fitness centers.
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE MEASLES OUTBREAK
While the case is not connected to any previous local measles cases, Public Health – Seattle and King County responded to two other measles cases this year from non-residents.
There have been a total of five cases of measles in Washington state residents this year.
Meagan Kay, medical epidemiologist for Public Health – Seattle and King County, said there is a “significant measles resurgence” in the U.S. and globally.
MEASLES SCARE AT MAJOR AIRPORT: WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT POTENTIAL EXPOSURE
“With over 1,000 cases reported so far this year nationally, 2025 is on track to have the highest number of measles cases in the U.S. since the early 1990s,” Kay said. “It’s an important time to check your vaccination status and get vaccinated if you aren’t protected.”
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Officials encouraged those who were in the potentially affected locations to find out if they are vaccinated for measles and call a healthcare provider promptly if they develop an illness with fever or with an unexplained rash.
Popular burger chain announces changes are coming to its recipes
In-N-Out Burger has announced a major menu switch, changing the ingredients of a few of its beverages.
“As part of our ongoing commitment to providing our customers with the highest-quality ingredients, we have removed artificial coloring from our Strawberry Shakes and Signature Pink Lemonade,” Patty Pena, a spokesperson for the California-based burger joint, confirmed to Fox News Digital on Wednesday.
It is unclear which specific dyes have been removed by the popular fast-food restaurant or if the coloring will be replaced.
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Last month, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a ban on petroleum-based synthetic dyes within the nation’s food supply, citing health concerns.
Petroleum-based synthetic dyes are used to add color to food and drug items.
The dyes are commonly found in breakfast cereals, candy, snacks, beverages, vitamins and “other products [that are] aimed at children,” according to an article titled “The Artificial Food Dye Blues,” shared by the National Library of Medicine.
The FDA recently announced the approval of three natural-source colors in food items: Galdieria extract blue, butterfly pea flower extract and calcium phosphate.
Pena told Fox News Digital the chain will be making a major change to a staple condiment as well.
“We’re also in the process of transitioning to an upgraded ketchup, which is made with real sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup,” Pena said.
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called out sugar during the agency’s announcement on the artificial dye ban.
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“Sugar is poison,” Kennedy said at the time. “And Americans need to know that it is poisoning us.”
California-based certified nutritionist Courtney Swan of Realfoodology told Fox News Digital that high-fructose corn syrup needs to be examined.
High-fructose corn syrup is a processed sweetener derived from corn starch, which Swan classifies as an “ultraprocessed, refined sugar.”
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The syrup is “so far removed from its original source that it’s not even recognizable as something that would be considered food anymore,” Swan said.
Fox News Digital followed up with In-N-Out Burger for additional comment.
Lawyers claim Blake Lively threatened to expose Taylor Swift’s texts amid lawsuit
Justin Baldoni’s lawyers have made new bombshell claims in their case against Blake Lively.
On Wednesday, Baldoni’s team filed a document claiming the “It Ends With Us” actress threatened her close friend, Taylor Swift, if she didn’t publicly support Lively during Lively’s legal battle against her co-star, People reported.
Lively’s lawyer, Mike Gottlieb, shared a statement with Fox News Digital calling Baldoni’s claim “categorically false.”
“We unequivocally deny all of these so-called allegations, which are cowardly sourced to supposed anonymous sources and completely untethered from reality. This is what we have come to expect from the Wayfarer parties’ lawyers, who appear to love nothing more than shooting first, without any evidence, and with no care for the people they are harming in the process,” Gottlieb said.
JUSTIN BALDONI SUES BLAKE LIVELY, RYAN REYNOLDS FOR $400M AFTER ACTRESS ACCUSED HIM OF SEXUAL HARASSMENT
“We unequivocally deny all of these so-called allegations, which are cowardly sourced to supposed anonymous sources and completely untethered from reality.”
“We will imminently file motions with the court to hold these attorneys accountable for their misconduct here.”
On Wednesday, Lively’s lawyers filed a motion asking the court to strike the accusations from its docket as “baseless, unnecessary, improper and abusive,” they told Fox News Digital.
“It should be unnecessary to respond to anonymously sourced, baseless, allegations recklessly leveled without any supporting evidence. It is worth stating for the record, however, that each of the allegations in the Freedman Letter is unequivocally and demonstrably false. As a legal matter, the Freedman Letter is improper,” Lively’s legal team wrote.
Baldoni’s team wrote May 14 that it believes subpoenaing Swift is necessary for this case.
“The Lively Defendants’ insistence that the Subpoena seeks irrelevant information is wrong,” Baldoni’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, wrote.
Freedman wrote that he received a tip from an anonymous “source who is highly likely to have reliable information.” Freedman said that the source shared that Lively asked Swift to delete specific text messages.
WATCH: Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds crack jokes on Time100 carpet as they fight legal battle
Freedman also alleged that Lively’s lawyers contacted Swift’s legal team “and demanded that Ms. Swift release a statement of support for Ms. Lively.” He also said they were “intimating that if Ms. Swift refused to do so, private text messages of a personal nature in Ms. Lively’s possession would be released.”
Fox News Digital has reached out to Baldoni and Swift’s reps for comment.
On May 9, Swift was subpoenaed as a witness in the Lively-Baldoni legal battle.
Shortly after the news became public, a spokesperson for Swift denied the pop star had any connection to the 2024 film aside from the licensing of her song “My Tears Ricochet,” which was featured in the movie’s trailer and used in one scene.
“Taylor Swift never set foot on the set of this movie. She was not involved in any casting or creative decisions. She did not score the film. She never saw an edit or made any notes on the film. She did not even see ‘It Ends With Us’ until weeks after its public release and was traveling around the globe during 2023 and 2024, headlining the biggest tour in history,” Swift’s representative previously told Fox News Digital.
“The connection Taylor had to this film was permitting the use of one song, ‘My Tears Ricochet,'” the spokesperson added. “Given that her involvement was licensing a song for the film, which 19 other artists also did, this document subpoena is designed to use Taylor Swift’s name to draw public interest by creating tabloid clickbait instead of focusing on the facts of the case.”
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Lively and Baldoni starred together in the romance drama “It Ends with Us,” which was based on Colleen Hoover’s 2016 book and premiered in August 2024. After a press tour rife with rumors of behind-the-scenes issues between the two, Baldoni and Lively filed lawsuits against each other.
In January, Baldoni accused Lively and her husband, Ryan Reynolds, of civil extortion, defamation and more in a $400 million lawsuit, which mentioned Swift.
The “Jane the Virgin” star’s lawsuit followed Lively’s December lawsuit accusing Baldoni of sexual harassment while filming “It Ends With Us.” However, Baldoni insisted Lively had “falsely” accused him in an attempt to repair her reputation from the fallout from the movie’s press tour after she allegedly took control of the film.
In an attempt to prove his claims that Lively had taken control of the movie’s production, Baldoni’s legal team suggested the actress had used her friendship with the globally famous Swift to threaten him. While working on the film, Lively insisted on rewriting the infamous rooftop scene. Baldoni had been hesitant about the idea, but he told the actress he would “take a look at what she put together,” according to the complaint.
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Afterward, Lively invited Baldoni to her New York City home, where the actor said he felt Swift and Reynolds had pressured him into using the rewritten scene.
“Later, Baldoni felt obliged to text Lively to say that he had liked her pages and hadn’t needed Reynolds and her megacelebrity friend to pressure him,” the complaint said.
“I really love what you did. It really does help a lot. Makes it so much more fun and interesting. (And I would have felt that way without Ryan and Taylor [emoji] You really are a talent across the board. Really excited nd [sic] grateful to do this together,” Baldoni’s text said, according to the complaint.
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Lively shared a lengthy response, referring to Swift and Reynolds as “dragons” who protect her.
Both sides have given no indication they intend to settle out of court. The legal conflict is scheduled to go to trial before a New York court in March 2026.
Former ‘Bond’ girl delivers verdict on whether 007 should be a woman
Former “Die Another Day” Bond girl Halle Berry weighed in on whether the iconic James Bond character should ever be played by a woman.
While serving on the jury for the Cannes Film Festival on Tuesday, the 58-year-old actress addressed the ongoing discussion about replacing the fictional spy with a woman in a future franchise.
“I don’t know if 007 really should be a woman,” Berry responded. “In 2025, it’s nice to say, ‘Oh, she should be a woman.’ But, I don’t really know if I think that’s the right thing to do.”
Berry previously played the character Giacinta “Jinx” Johnson in the 2002 film “Die Another Day” alongside Pierce Brosnan as James Bond.
FORMER ‘BOND’ GIRL EVA GREEN THINKS THE NEW 007 ‘SHOULD REMAIN A MAN’ AMID CALLS FOR A FEMALE RECASTING
The idea of a female James Bond has been a hot-button issue in Hollywood for nearly a decade. In 2017, Berry similarly dismissed Bond being played by a woman in favor of more original characters.
“I want [women] to be tough, but I don’t know if Bond should be a woman,” Berry said. “I mean, that series is steeped in history, you know, Ian Fleming’s stories. I don’t think you can change Bond to a woman.”
“We can create a new Bond character that’s a woman, and give her a new name, based on that theory, but I don’t know if Bond should be a woman,” she added.
Berry wasn’t the only former Bond girl who questioned the idea of gender-swapping James Bond over the years. In 2019, “The Spy Who Loved Me” actress Valerie Leon blasted the idea, arguing that the character was always successful as a man.
“He’s a fantasy. So many men have wanted to be Bond and women have wanted to be with Bond. How can people fantasize about a woman as Bond? Men aren’t going to go for a woman as a killer or an assassin,” Leon said.
In 2024, British actress Gemma Arterton, who starred in 2008’s “Quantum of Solace,” said Hollywood should respect the tradition of the character and called out the absurdity of the idea.
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“Isn’t a female James Bond like Mary Poppins being played by a man?” she remarked. “They talk about it, but I think people would find it too outrageous.”
The most recent iteration of James Bond was played by British actor Daniel Craig in the 2021 film “No Time to Die.” Though Amazon MGM Studios recently made a deal to control the creative rights to the 007 character, there have been no announcements regarding the future of the franchise.
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Netflix breaks ground on $1B studio as Trump pushes for movies to be made in America
Netflix has broken ground on its $1 billion “state-of-the-art” East Coast studio in New Jersey as President Donald Trump pushes to have movies made in America.
The $1 billion investment by Netflix will transform Fort Monmouth’s 292-acre army installation into a nearly 500,000-square-foot studio.
The studio will feature 12 cutting-edge sound stages and areas dedicated to supporting film uses and community amenities, according to Netflix.
The project was announced in 2022, and demolition is expected to take 13 months.
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Netflix expects the project to create an estimated 1,500 permanent production jobs and more than 3,500 construction-related jobs. It is expected to be finished sometime in 2028.
Ted Sarandos, co-CEO of Netflix, said the company is looking to invest even more in American innovation.
“Over the past four years, Netflix has contributed $125 billion to the U.S. economy and hired more than 140,000 cast and crew members,” Sarandos said.
LOS ANGELES SEES CONTINUING DECLINE IN FILM AND TELEVISION PRODUCTION
New Jersey-based actor Jared Johnston, who has appeared in projects for Netflix and Apple TV, told FOX Business the studio is going to be “great” for the industry.
“It’s going to be great for our industry as long as the local, state and federal governments do their part to offer competitive tax breaks to keep productions and the thousands of union jobs that TV/film creates here in the beautiful new studios that are being built as well as the established studios already in the NYC area,” Johnston said.
Reviving America’s film industry has become a priority for the Trump administration.
Earlier this month, Trump announced a 100% tariff on foreign-produced movies.
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In a Truth Social post, Trump wrote, “The Movie Industry in America is DYING a very fast death. Other countries are offering all sorts of incentives to draw our filmmakers and studios away from the United States.”