Proposal requires California seniors seeking state medical benefits to pass unique test
California Gov. Gavin Newsom is proposing an “asset test” for seniors to prove eligibility for Medi-Cal healthcare benefits for low-income Californians in response to a budget shortfall. To qualify, people would have to possess less than $2,000 in assets to qualify.
The governor’s budget proposal, written by the California Department of Finance, said the reasons for the increased costs include “higher overall enrollment, pharmacy costs and higher managed care costs.”
In the last 10 years, he said, Medi-Cal costs have increased by $20.5 billion.
NEWSOM PROPOSES FREEZE ON ALLOWING ADULT ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS TO JOIN CALIFORNIA MEDICAID PROGRAM
Newsom has also proposed freezing new enrollment for adults in the country illegally as a way to cut Medi-Cal costs.
“Some of the most significant contributing factors to this growth are the COVID-19 continuous coverage requirement and the implementation of major policy changes such as the full elimination of the asset test for older adults and the full-scope expansion to all income-eligible Californians, regardless of immigration status,” the proposal said. .
The assets included in the test would be salary, money in a bank account, cash on hand, a second car, home value and retirement funds. Applicants with more than $2,000 in assets would be ineligible for Medi-Cal.
The 2025-26 budget proposal said Medi-Cal costs have increased starkly and continue to outpace revenues. The program cost $37.6 billion over the last year, and the cost is expected to increase by $10 billion over the next year without cuts.
Along with low-income adults, many seniors and people with disabilities use Medi-Cal benefits that include in-home care services.
For decades before 2024, the asset test was required for seniors to prove their eligibility for Medi-Cal, and Newsom’s proposal would reinstate it.
The proposal said that the asset test would save $94 million this fiscal year and $791 million by the 2028-29 fiscal year.
LAWMAKERS IN DEEP BLUE STATE DEMAND AUDIT OVER SKYROCKETING HEALTHCARE COSTS: ‘ALARMING NATURE’
Disability Rights California, a nonprofit, said the proposal would do “tremendous harm” to Californians.
ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT HEALTHCARE COSTS IN BLUE STATE TRIGGERS INTENSE BUDGET DEBATE
“While we understand the reality of budget shortfalls and that cuts will sometimes be necessary, the priorities and reality of this May revision are even worse than what we imagined,” the group said in a statement. “It demonstrates a continued willingness on the part of the governor to sacrifice the health and human services of California’s people, particularly the disabled, poor, and elderly populations of this abundant state.”
The group added that the asset test “effectively demands extreme poverty in order to continue receiving critical healthcare.”
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The governor defended his proposals, according to the Los Angeles Times, saying, “None of this is the kind of work you enjoy doing, but you’ve got to do it. We have to be responsible. We have to be accountable. We have to balance the budget.”
Fox News Digital has reached out to Newsom’s office for comment.
Musk and Rogan fact-check Bono’s claim of deaths from Trump aid cuts
U2 frontman and longtime global activist Bono took a swing at the Trump administration disbanding the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)) on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, blaming the cuts for a staggering 300,000 deaths.
And he was swiftly fact-checked by Rogan and Elon Musk in a takedown that lit up social media.
“This will f— you off,” Bono warned, claiming tens of thousands of tons of food are “rotting” in warehouses from Djibouti to Houston because of recent USAID cuts, and that the people who ran those warehouses have been fired.
“What is that? That’s not America, is it?”
I AM A USAID WHISTLEBLOWER. I’VE GOT TO ADMIT, MUSK IS MOSTLY RIGHT ABOUT AGENCY’S WASTE
Rogan wasn’t having it.
“They’re throwing the baby out with the bathwater,” he said, acknowledging that while some aid groups do good work, the USAID system has been riddled with corruption.
“For sure, it was a money laundering operation. For sure, there was no oversight. … Trillions that are unaccounted for.”
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION CUTTING 90% OF USAID FOREIGN AID CONTRACTS, DOCUMENTS SHOW
Reacting on X to a clip of the conversation, Elon Musk slammed Bono directly.
“He’s such a liar/idiot,” Musk wrote.
Musk, who has championed sharp cuts to what he sees as a bloated foreign aid machine, pushed for major USAID reforms under the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) before his formal departure this week.
His response ignited debate online, with conservatives cheering for overdue accountability.
Popular online commentator “Catturd” posted that “I agree 100% with Elon Musk that Bono is an idiot and a liar.”
One commentator also wrote, “They’ve made this 300,000 number up and propagandized people with it.”
Another eagle-eyed X user posted, “Bono starts off by saying, ‘It’s not proven.’ So he’s lying.”
Bono’s 300,000 figure comes not from confirmed deaths, but from a speculative model built by Brooke Nichols, a mathematical health modeler at Boston University, projecting what could happen as a result of the cuts.
Nichols has said that the number is a projection, not a direct count, due to the absence of real-time tracking in many affected regions.
“The biggest uncertainties in all of these estimates are: 1) the extent to which countries and organizations have pivoted to mitigate this disaster (likely highly variable),” she wrote in The Washington Post. “And 2) which programs are actually still funded with funding actually flowing — and which aren’t.”
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The State Department did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
WNBA player who gave Caitlin Clark black eye gets security called on her during game
Dallas Wings player DiJonai Carrington spoke out against referees for calling security on her in a social media post Friday.
During a heated altercation with officials during the Wings’ loss to the Chicago Sky Thursday, security guards approached as Carrington became increasingly demonstrative.
One security guard even got between Carrington and an official. The official backed away from Carrington while pulling the security guard by his shirt in front of Carrington for protection.
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Carrington responded to the incident in a post on X Friday, suggesting the summoning of security was a “microaggression.”
“Security… when I’m literally having a civil conversation is insane. Mind you, he called the “sEcUrItY” over there…” Carrington wrote over a clip of the incident with a misspelled “microaggression” hashtag.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the WNBA and the Sky for comment.
DIJONAI CARRINGTON, CAITLIN CLARK’S TEAMMATE APPEAR TO JOKE ABOUT INFAMOUS EYE-POKING INCIDENT
Former Dallas Wings player Cheryl Swoopes also spoke out against the referee who summoned security in a post on X.
“If this man was scared (of what, I don’t know) and needed security, he should NEVER be able to ref again! This can’t be real!” Swoopes wrote.
Carrington became a controversial figure in the WNBA last season.
As a member of Connecticut Sun in 2024, Carrington gave Indiana Fever rookie Caitlin Clark a black eye after poking her during a game in the first round of the playoffs in September. Carrington laughed with teammate Marina Mabrey after the incident.
Carrington has said she didn’t intentionally poke Clark in the eye and that she wasn’t laughing about the incident. However, she appeared to make light of the controversy over Clark’s black eye in an Instagram Live video in October.
In the video, Carrington and her girlfriend, NaLyssa Smith, who plays for the Indiana Fever with Clark, were in their kitchen when Smith poked Carrington in the eye.
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“Ow, you poked me in the eye,” Carrington said. Smith apologized, and the two laughed.
“Did you do it on purpose?” Carrington asked.
During the “Unrivaled” league season in January, Carrington wore a shirt that said, “The F— Donald Trump Tour” while walking into Wayfair Arena in Miami, Florida.
Then, during a press conference after another game that month, Carrington declared it was time for WNBA players to “take action” in response to President Donald Trump’s policies.
“We see that some of the policies are already going into action, and, of course, that means that as the WNBA and being at the forefront of a lot of these movements, it’s time for us to also take action,” Carrington said.
“It definitely needs to happen as women, women’s rights being taken away. Like, now, LGBTQ rights being taken away now. They haven’t happened yet, but definitely in the works.”
Trump honors Elon Musk as billionaire steps away from DOGE, returns to businesses
The Trump White House released a video on Friday marking the end of Elon Musk’s time working with the administration. The billionaire has been leading the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) since January.
The video, which was posted on multiple social media platforms, is a highlight reel, starting with Musk’s endorsement of President Donald Trump in July 2024, just after the then-candidate was nearly assassinated, and goes up to his last day in D.C.
WHITE HOUSE DISCLOSES WHO WILL LEAD DOGE EFFORTS AFTER MUSK’S DEPARTURE
In addition to the video, the White House published several posts on X thanking Musk for his service, including a list of “DOGE Wins,” which include saving American taxpayers $170 billion, canceling approximately 523,000 active U.S. government credit cards/accounts it uncovered in an audit, cleaning up records at the Social Security Administration, among other initiatives.
During a joint news conference on Friday, Trump awarded Musk a “key to the White House.” The White House quoted the president as saying that “Elon’s delivered a colossal change in the old ways of doing business in Washington… Elon Musk’s service to America has been without comparison in modern history.”
WHAT’S NEXT FOR DOGE AFTER ELON MUSK’S DEPARTURE? ‘ONLY JUST BEGUN’
Another Republican leader joined Trump in recognizing the changes Musk worked to implement in Washington.
House Speaker Mike Johnson thanked Musk for his “selfless, patriotic service” and praised both the billionaire and DOGE, saying they “dug through the bureaucracy and shined a light on MASSIVE waste, fraud, and abuse.”
“They have saved the American people BILLIONS of dollars, and are updating old and inefficient systems across the federal government — all while providing Republicans with a list of targets of pointless programs that Congressional action will address.”
MUSK OFFICIALLY STEPS DOWN FROM DOGE AFTER WRAPPING WORK STREAMLINING GOVERNMENT
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While some wonder about the future of DOGE, the Trump administration is insisting that the department will go on without Musk at the helm. The Tesla founder addressed this question as well just as Trump marked 100 days in office. He told a small group of reporters that “DOGE is a way of life, like Buddhism. You wouldn’t ask who would lead Buddhism. Is Buddha needed for Buddhism?”
A few days before the end of his White House tenure, Musk vowed in a post on X to go “back to spending 24/7 at work and sleeping in conference/server/factory rooms,” a big switch from the Lincoln Bedroom, where the billionaire allegedly slept multiple times. However, Trump teased that even though it was Musk’s last day, it wasn’t “really, because he will, always, be with us, helping all the way.”
Pickup driver in crash near Yellowstone that killed him and six others was drunk
A driver who crashed a pickup into a tour van near Yellowstone National Park earlier this month, causing the death of seven people including himself, had a blood alcohol level more than twice the legal limit for driving, police said Friday.
Isaiah Moreno, 25, of Humble, Texas, was operating a Dodge Ram pickup truck on U.S. Highway 20 in eastern Idaho when his vehicle crossed the center line and collided head-on with a Mercedes tour van carrying more than a dozen people.
Both vehicles burst into flames, and Moreno, along with six people from China, Italy and California, were killed. Survivors were taken to nearby hospitals with injuries.
YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK EMPLOYEE DIES FROM MYSTERIOUS INJURIES IN STAFF HOUSING
The deadly crash happened near Henrys Lake, about 16 miles west of Yellowstone in Wyoming. Yellowstone is one of the country’s largest national parks and draws millions of visitors each year.
Moreno had a blood alcohol level of .20%, Idaho State Police said in a statement. The limit is .08%.
“This tragedy should be a wake-up call,” police Capt. Chris Weadick said. “No one plans to cause a crash or take a life when they get behind the wheel, but choices have consequences.”
Video from the May 1 crash shows a red truck on the wrong side of the road, its front crushed and on fire, while the tour van is engulfed in flames. Survivors were being tended to on the side of the road while a helicopter arrived.
LOS ANGELES TOUR BUS CRASH LEAVES 1 DEAD, 32 HOSPITALIZED ON MOTHER’S DAY
Roger Merrill, 60, told The Associated Press he was driving home when he came upon the collision, and he said there was an anxious wait for first responders.
“It took an unnervingly long time for help to arrive just because of the location,” he said.
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ISP troopers responded to the collision at milepost 399. The highway where the crash happened is on a route between Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons that is open in the spring before a north-south route is plowed and the park fully opens for summer.
The victims in the tour van were named by Local News 8 as van driver Yu Zhang, 30, of Eastvale, California; Ivana Wen, 28, of Milan, Italy; Jianping Li, 71, of Guangxi, China; Xiaoming Jiang, 66, of Guilin, China; Li Nie, 64, of Arcadia, California; and Aifeng Wan, 53, also of Arcadia, California.
Popular band draws strong reaction after singer raises Palestinian flag on stage
Rock band Imagine Dragons set social media ablaze after lead singer Dan Reynolds waved a Palestinian flag on stage during a concert in Milan, Italy on Tuesday.
Video clips of Reynolds picking up a Palestinian flag and waving it before draping it across his shoulders at the concert’s end racked up millions of views and drew mixed reactions on social media.
The band’s frontman also kissed the flag and threw it back into the crowd.
Palestinians on social media praised the band for its support. One post that reached over one million views applauded the “powerful gesture.”
LIBERAL, PRO-ISRAEL COMEDIAN SAYS THERE’S A DOUBLE STANDARD FOR CELEBRITIES WHO BACK THE JEWISH STATE
“Very nice to see more people showing support,” another pro-Palestinian account posted.
Liberals also applauded the band for appearing to take a political stand while they poked fun at the band over their dislike of their music.
“Omg Radiohead has now been lapped by IMAGINE DRAGONS?!?” Stand-up comedian Matt Lieb wrote in a post that reached over two million views.
Lieb was referring to the band Radiohead telling off an anti-Israel heckler during a show last October.
“Imagine Dragons are now on the very short list of respectable celebs,” another person praised.
RADIOHEAD SINGER CONFRONTS ANTI-ISRAEL PROTESTER DURING CONCERT: ‘COME UP HERE AND SAY THAT’
But Jewish fans of the band and pro-Israel commentators expressed their disappointment and outrage.
“It looks like the band ‘Imagine Dragons’ supports terrorism,” ACT for America Chairman Brigitte Gabriel wrote.
“You know it’s moments like these where I genuinely don’t know what to do with myself anymore… I actually really liked Imagine Dragons, But now it seems they genuinely hate my people,” one Jewish fan posted, adding, “It’s disgusting how people still view Palestine as a moral virtue when it’s all a myth.”
One popular post by a Jewish woman who says her grandparents were Holocaust survivors accused the band of “waving their solidarity with terrorists.”
“They’re calling for ‘gay rights’ and ‘Free Palestine,’” her post continued.
“Essentially, they just called for the deaths of all gay people — and their music career. Goodnight, Imagine Dragons.”
The band is outspoken about its support for the LGBTQ community and Reynolds waved “Progress Pride” flags at previous shows.
During the Milan concert, Reynolds also waved a Ukrainian flag.
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Representatives of Imagine Dragons did not immediately return a request for comment.
The band faced blowback for playing in Israel in August 2023, before the October 7 Hamas terror attacks.
During a July 2024 interview with Rolling Stone, Reynolds said he didn’t have any regrets about playing shows in Israel and in Azerbaijan.
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“I don’t believe in depriving our fans who want to see us play because of the acts of their leaders and their governments. I think that’s a really slippery slope. I think the second you start to do that, there’s corrupt leaders and warmongers all over the world, and where do you draw the line?” Reynolds told the outlet.
Trans athlete wins titles at California championship, defying Trump’s warning
Just days after President Donald Trump sent a warning to California about letting a male compete in girls’ track and field, the state allowed a trans athlete to take two state titles against female competitors.
AB Hernandez, a transgender student athlete for Jurupa Valley High School, took first place in the girls’ high jump and triple jump at the state championship on Saturday at Veteran’s Memorial Stadium in Clovis, California.
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Hernandez also finished in second place in the high jump to Woodrow Wilson High School’s Loren Webster. Webster was the only female to finish ahead of Hernandez in any competition the trans athlete competed in this weekend.
Hernandez previously took first place in all three events at the preliminary round on Friday. Meanwhile, female competitors who finished behind Hernandez in this weekend’s events were all bumped up one spot and received the medal they would have earned had the trans athlete not competed.
The California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) made a series of sweeping rule changes in the days leading up to the event to ensure any females who finished behind a biological male would be appropriately rewarded a medal based on where they placed among female competitors.
So during the medal ceremonies for the three events, the female competitors who finished one spot behind Hernandez had to stand next to the trans athlete on the podium.
Even with the rule changes, Hernandez’s presence in the girls’ competition prompted controversy and a heavy protest presence throughout the weekend.
Conflicting protests plagued the championship starting on Friday with pro-LGBTQ protesters and pro-female protesters wielding signs, flags and clothing expressing their respective messaging.
On Friday, a plane flying a banner that read “No Boys in Girls’ Sports!” even passed over the stadium.
However, the conflict between the protesters at one point became violent, when an LGBTQ protester allegedly struck local conservative activist Josh Fulfer with a flag pole on Friday. Footage obtained by Fox News Digital shows the LGBTQ protester Ethan Kroll appear to attack Fulfer through a car window, and Kroll subsequently getting arrested.
Police records obtained by Fox News Digital show that Kroll, a male, was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon other than a firearm, obstructing a public officer and vandalism.
Clovis Police Sgt. Chris Hutchison told Fox News Digital no other criminal incidents occurred at or near the track meet Friday night.
“Our stance is always to allow people to exercise their constitutional right to free speech and protest,” Hutchison said. “They have a right to do it in a manner that isn’t inciting violence or causing other problems. … We don’t have room for violence or property damage or anything like that.”
CALIFORNIA TOWN RALLIES BEHIND TRUMP AS IT HOSTS TRACK AND FIELD CHAMPIONSHIP AMID TRANS ATHLETE CONTROVERSY
But on Saturday, California Family Council outreach director Sophia Lorey was escorted out of Veteran’s Memorial Stadium by CIF officials for passing out “Save Girls’ Sports” wristbands with pro-female messaging to spectators. Footage shared by Lorey on social media shows the confrontation between her and the CIF official as Lorey is gestured out of the venue.
Lorey told Fox News Digital that she had passed the messages out at previous events without any issues.
“We handed out half-page fliers at the prelims event and we were not told anything that we couldn’t do that,” Lorey said.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the CIF for comment on Lorey’s video.
Lorey and local conservative activist Beth Bourne told Fox News Digital that, unlike previous events, a man on a megaphone repeatedly ordered spectators not to make disparaging comments about any competitors, officials or other spectators on Saturday.
Lorey attended a press conference at the meet earlier that day where California 2026 gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton spoke in support of protecting girls’ sports from trans inclusion.
Current Governor Gavin Newsom has been the subject of frequent local and national criticism throughout the track and field postseason for enabling the trans athlete to compete, despite previously admitting on his podcast that he believes males competing in girls’ sports was “deeply unfair.”
Trump singled out Newsom in a Truth Social post on Tuesday when he threatened to cut funding to the state if a trans athlete was allowed to compete in the girls’ competition this weekend. But the state did not yield to Trump, and instead simply passed the rule changes to accommodate other female athletes.
The U.S. Department of Justice announced an investigation into the state over the issue on Wednesday, and the U.S. Department of Education has been investigating the state over the issue since February.
However, California is far from the only state that saw its girls’ track and field championships overshadowed by trans athlete controversy.
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This very same weekend, trans athletes reportedly competed and won state competitions in Maine, Washington, Oregon and Minnesota.
Trump signed his “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” executive order on Feb. 5, but many Democratic states have openly defied the order, resulting in multiple controversial situations like the one involving Hernandez across the nation in 2025.
White House pulls billionaire’s NASA nomination over ‘America First’ alignment issues
The Trump administration recently pulled Jared Isaacman’s nomination to be NASA administrator, alluding that he was not in “complete alignment” with the president’s agenda.
“The Administrator of NASA will help lead humanity into space and execute President [Donald] Trump’s bold mission of planting the American flag on the planet Mars,” White House Assistant Press Secretary Liz Huston told Fox News Digital on Saturday.
Huston added it is “essential” that the next leader of NASA “is in complete alignment” with President Trump’s “America First” agenda.
A replacement will be announced directly by Trump “soon,” according to the White House.
ASTRONAUTS TO STAND WITH NASA ADMINISTRATOR NOMINEE JARED ISAACMAN AT SENATE CONFIRMATION HEARING
Trump later took to Truth Social to confirm the ousting.
“After a thorough review of prior associations, I am hereby withdrawing the nomination of Jared Isaacman to head NASA,” the president wrote in a post. “I will soon announce a new Nominee who will be Mission aligned, and put America First in Space. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”
Isaacman is the billionaire founder and CEO of Shift4 payments, a credit card payment processing company.
He reportedly dropped out of high school as a teen, using a $10,000 check from his grandfather to form his tech business.
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Sen. Tim Sheehy, R-Mont., who introduced Isaacman to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, described him as “a successful innovator, entrepreneur, pilot, and astronaut.”
“Jared believes in NASA’s core mission,” Sheehy told Fox. “He has the experience and skillset to ensure we continue to lead in the greatest frontier ever known, and I look forward to adding NASA administrator to his already remarkable resume.”
RESCUED NASA ASTRONAUTS DELIVER MESSAGE TO TRUMP, MUSK AFTER ‘INCREDIBLE’ NINE MONTHS IN SPACE
“For nearly 70 years, the United States has been at the forefront of space exploration,” he continued. “President Trump knows how critical it is to reinvigorate NASA so we can once again lead the world to new heights, and that’s why he chose exactly the right man for the job: Jared Isaacman.”
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The White House did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.