Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. and Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, are forming an unlikely alliance, teaming up in a bid to allow troops access to psychedelic drugs.

‘Psychedelics have shown so much promise,’ Ocasio-Cortez said of the effort, according to a report from the New York Daily News. ‘We desperately need the resources to treat PTSD, traumatic brain injury and depression. At least one in two PTSD patients cannot tolerate or do not respond adequately to existing treatments.’

The progressive lawmaker’s comments come as the military and Department of Veterans Affairs grapple with the growth of post-traumatic stress disorder in the ranks, an ailment that has doubled among veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan compared to Vietnam-era veterans. According to the VA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, over 450,000 combat veterans have suffered from a some sort of traumatic brain injury between 2000 and 2021.

But new data suggest that unorthodox treatments with psychedelics help, leading Crenshaw and Ocasio-Cortez to form an unlikely alliance.

‘This is a real wild coalition,’ Crenshaw, a Navy SEAL veteran who lost an eye in Afghanistan, said of his partnership with Ocasio-Cortez, according to the New York Daily News. 

Crenshaw said the issue has personally touched him, recounting the stories of friends who have returned from war and were not cured of their aliments until they gained access to psychedelics, which are typically illegal in the United States.

‘I was turned on to this issue because I had so many friends… who were going down to a specific clinic and doing ibogaine – one treatment of ibogaine would cure them,’ Crenshaw said.

The duo targeted this year’s National Defense Authorization Act to introduce their proposal, managing to get a ‘watered-down version’ of the bill they authored into the massive yearly legislation.

Crenshaw said House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., has promised the lawmakers to get a comprehensive version of the bill, which will include funding and clinical trials, in the legislation during meetings with the Senate to combine the two chamber’s versions of the bill.

Meanwhile, Ocasio-Cortez called on veterans to apply pressure to the Senate to make sure the provision gains approval.

‘I know the power of this community to rise up and make itself heard,’ Ocasio-Cortez said.

MANCHESTER, N.H. – The founding co-chair of No Labels says it’s not a done deal that the centrist group will sport a bipartisan, third-party presidential ticket, if President Biden and former President Donald Trump are the major party nominees in the 2024 election.

‘We haven’t decided to run a ticket. It’s not even clear that if it ends up being Trump and Biden, as it looks like it will now, that we’ll do that,’ former Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut said in an interview with Fox News Digital ahead of No Labels town hall Monday in New Hampshire where the group will formally unveil its policy platform.

But speculation is mounting about a third-party ticket following last week’s announcement by No Labels that moderate Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia would serve as an honorary co-host of the group’s ‘Common Sense’ town hall, which will take place at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College in Manchester.

Manchin, who often clashes with his party’s progressive wing, Senate leadership and the White House, has yet to announce whether he will seek another six-year term in the Senate in 2024 in a state that’s turned dark red in recent years. He’s also refused to shut down speculation about a possible presidential run. 

The senator is serving as an honorary co-chair of the No Labels event, along with former moderate Republican Gov. of Utah Jon Huntsman, who later served as ambassador to China in President Obama’s administration before running unsuccessfully for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination.

‘I think No Labels invited Joe Manchin and Jon Huntsman because they’re former chairs of our organization and they represent centrist Democrats, centrist Republicans, which is what we’re about,’ Lieberman told Fox News. ‘I guess it’s natural for people to speculate, particularly in Manchin’s case whether it means he will run on a possible No Labels ticket year. It’s way too early to say that. I think Joe hasn’t decided that at all, as he’s said, and No Labels hasn’t decided it.’

No Labels for months has been discussing the possibility of bipartisan, third party ‘unity ticket’ the organization could field in next year’s presidential election if it appears the nation is headed for a Biden-Trump rematch in 2024, which poll after poll has indicated many Americans would like to avoid.

Lieberman, a former longtime senator from Connecticut who served as the Democratic vice presidential nominee in the 2000 election and ran unsuccessfully in 2004 for his party’s presidential nomination before winning a final election to the Senate in 2006 as an independent, reiterated that No Labels is aiming to get on the ballot in all 50 states in order to be in the position to possibly field a third party ticket next year.

‘We call it the insurance policy project. We’re trying to qualify for a third ticket, bipartisan ticket in all 50 states. We’re working hard at that now,’ Lieberman explained.

But he emphasized that ‘we want to make sure is that we’re not going to be spoilers. We’re not going to elect one or another of the candidates. We want to run because we think we have a chance to win. And if we don’t have a chance to win, at least we will bring a different voice to the national debate in the election next year, which is toward the center and putting the country first and not the interest of the political parties first.’

Lieberman has praised Manchin, telling Fox Digital in May that Manchin, along with two other moderates – Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and former GOP Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland – ‘are very active members of No Labels’ and ‘would be naturals to consider’ for any potential third-party ticket. 

But No Labels CEO and co-founder Nancy Jacobson told Fox News last month that ‘this is too premature. We have not made any decisions,’ regarding a 2024 presidential ticket.

And Lieberman, ahead of Monday’s No Labels event, reiterated that ‘we haven’t really started to think about candidates, although naturally the media and others are.’

But he added that ‘we are going to start a process by the fall in which we can both talk to people who may be interested in being on a bipartisan party ticket, or frankly reach out and ask some people to think about it. And I think we want this search to be as wide as possible. Not just current elected officials or former elected officials but a lot of the other areas of leadership in our country.’

No Labels has already raised over $30 million as part of its effort to get on the ballot in all 50 states. And if it does move forward towards launching a third-party White House run, the potential ticket would likely be unveiled at the group’s national convention, which will convene next April in Dallas, Texas.

Democrats have been raising alarms for months about a third-party ‘spoiler’ effort that could upend the 2024 elections and allow Trump to win back the White House. And former longtime House Democratic leader Richard A. Gephardt is planning to launch a new bipartisan group this week to oppose the potential No Labels third-party presidential effort.

‘I have the greatest respect and affection for Dick Gephardt, so I guess I’m disappointed that he’s taken this leadership role,’ Lieberman said. 

And he argued ‘I think the Democrats have really, totally overreacted to what we’re doing. Look, they’ve got a problem now. Trump is either close or ahead of Biden in all the polling we’ve seen lately. I think to focus on No Labels and the possibility we would run a third ticket – even though we said over and over again we’re not going to do it if we think it will elect Trump – is just frankly wasted time.’

‘I don’t know what the Dick Gephardt group is going to do but somebody out there is convincing state election officials to try and block us from gaining access to the state ballots even when we’ve submitted enough signatures and satisfied enough legal requirements,’ Lieberman claimed. ‘Frankly that goes beyond freedom of expression. They’re violating a constitutional right that the Supreme Court has upheld which is that people have a right of political association, to form a new party and try to gain access to the ballot. I certainly hope and trust that Dick Gephardt won’t be part of doing anything like that.’

But Lieberman stressed that Monday’s gathering in New Hampshire, the state that for a century’s held first presidential primary in the race for the White House and which is a key general election battleground, is not about presidential politics.

‘I know Monday in New Hampshire we’re going to try really hard to bring this back to our Common Sense policy agenda, which is in very specific terms our way of saying in the 2024 cycle at the presidential level and Congressional level, No Labels offers this program which is aimed at getting American politics back from the extremes, back to the bipartisan center where great things have always been accomplished in American history. We can do it again.’

Lieberman, pointing to No Labels polling and conversations with the public, highlighted that Americans ‘are actually in a lot more agreement than the leading spokesmen in the Republican and Democratic parties would have you believe. I think the Democrats and the Republicans have unfortunately divided America much more than it really is and I think most of the American people want to come back to the center, back to unity, and back to solving our problems, and that’s what No Labels is about.’

And Lieberman, spotlighting his group’s platform, argued that ‘neither of the two major political parties would put out a policy agenda like this.’

‘There’s a way to come back from extremes from both sides. There’s a way to come back from just fighting each other across party lines and to adopt something that will really make a majority of the American people satisfied or happy because a lot of what we’re recommending in this Common Sense policy agenda really follows an opinion of the majority of the American people,’ he emphasized.

Former Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms will be returning to the White House in a new role as a member of the President’s Export Council.

Bottoms served as director of the Office of Public Engagement and senior adviser to President Biden from June 2022 until April of this year. 

She announced Friday on social media that she is ‘honored’ to be rejoining the White House.

The President’s Export Council serves as the ‘principal national advisory committee on international trade. The Council advises the President of government policies and programs that affect U.S. trade performance; promotes export expansion; and provides a forum for discussing and resolving trade-related problems among the business, industrial, agricultural, labor, and government sectors,’ according to the White House.

Bottoms, a Democrat, served as the mayor of Atlanta from 2018 to 2022, but decided not to seek re-election. Though she was initially hired by CNN as a political commentator after her departure from the mayor’s office, she announced she would join Biden’s team beginning in June 2022.

Former Columbia, South Carolina, mayor Stephen Benjamin replaced Bottoms in the White House after she officially stepped down from her previous role on April 1.

Bottoms will succeed Cedric Richmond on the President’s Export Council – the same man she replaced as White House Office of Public Engagement Director and Senior Advisor to the president.

Bottoms was among a number of appointments announced by the Biden administration on Friday.

When announcing her role, the White House described Bottoms as a ‘visionary leader’ who headed the transformation of the Office of Public Engagement.

‘Through crafting effective engagement strategies and advising the president on matters concerning various stakeholders, Bottoms helped ensure that the diverse voices of the American public were heard and concerns translated into meaningful action by the administration,’ the White House said in a statement.

‘Serving as mayor of Atlanta in the midst of a global pandemic and racial justice movement, Bottoms proved herself to be a highly respected leader and voice,’ the statement continued. ‘During one of the worst economic downturns in history, Bottoms led her administration in proactively dealing with the impact of the COVID-19, successfully delivering four years of balanced budgets without resorting to property tax increases, layoffs, or furloughs of City employees.’

–>

President Biden took to Twitter Monday to tout his economic policies and the impact ‘Bidenomics’ was having on workers’ wages over the last two years. His self-praise was short-lived, however, as Twitter fact-checkers said it ‘contains a factual error.’

‘Right now, real wages for the average American worker is higher than it was before the pandemic, with lower wage workers seeing the largest gains,’ the president wrote on Twitter. ‘That’s Bidenomics.’

Twitter’s Community Notes added context for readers that said: ‘The tweet’s claim about real wages contains a factual error.’

‘On 3/15/20 when US COVID lockdowns began real wages adjusted for inflation (AFI) were $11.15. As of 7/16/23 real wages AFI are $11.05,’ the Twitter note continued. It added: ‘Real wages AFI remain lower (not higher) than before the pandemic.’

Several users commented on the tweet, pointing out that inflation has risen to a historic high under the Biden administration.

The Republican Party responded, ‘Since Biden took office, real wages are down 3%.’

In June, Biden claimed he cut the deficit by $1.7 trillion, which the Washington Post rated ‘highly misleading,’ and the claim was similarly scrutinized by other fact-checkers. He also touted the impact of the new 988 suicide hotline, which was signed into law by former President Trump, and previously said healthcare was ‘a right not a privilege in this country.’ Twitter’s Community Notes said Biden has ‘never publicly supported universal healthcare or Medicare for All, and has suggested he would veto bills that implement such a system.’

Biden’s praise for his own economic policies comes as he is seeking re-election in 2024. He has spent recent weeks traveling from Maryland to Illinois to New York for a series of speeches and campaign receptions, where he peddled ‘Bidenomics’ and its alleged impact.

However, economists and voters remain unconvinced. Some economists who spoke with Fox News Digital equated the president’s economic policy to excessive spending and inflation.

‘Bidenomics has been defined by 40-year-high inflation, record drops in labor productivity, anemic economic growth, growing credit card debt, rising interest rates, insipid labor force participation, onerous regulation, falling real incomes, and runaway government spending, borrowing, and printing of money,’ EJ Antoni, a research fellow for the Heritage Foundation’s Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget, told Fox News Digital. ‘Distilled down to a single word, Bidenomics means ‘failure.’’

‘They spend like drunken sailors — that is what’s causing problems,’ Desmond Lachman, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told Fox News Digital. ‘It’s easy to get unemployment down for a short period of time, but it’s difficult for a long period of time. The way they got it down so much is by overstimulating the economy, but now they have inflation.’

A Fox News poll from May found nine in 10 voters remain worried about inflation and the future of the economy.

According to the poll, 90% remain worried about higher prices while 88% are concerned about the future of the country.

The poll found Republicans are increasingly worried through three years of Biden at the helm of the country, while Democrats are only slowly rallying behind him.

Among Republicans, 96% said they were concerned about the future of the country. In 2017, 74% of Republicans said the same. In 2017, 91% of Democrats said they were worried and that figure has fallen to 83% under Biden.

‘With a Democrat in the White House, it’s no surprise that Republican concern about the future of the country is higher than it was in 2017,’ said Democratic pollster Chris Anderson, whose company Beacon Research conducts the Fox News Poll with Republican Daron Shaw. ‘But Democratic concern hasn’t fallen as fast as Republican concern has risen, so we have a particularly worried electorate heading into the 2024 elections.’

Biden’s approval rating on the economy was just 32%.

Biden took office in January 2021 with an inflation rate of a little over 1%, which hiked to 9% by June 2022, and has since fallen to 3%. The figure still exceeds the Federal Reserve’s desired 2%.

Fox News’ Patrick Hauf and Victoria Balara contributed to this report.

–>

The White House was silent when asked by Fox News Digital whether it agrees with Special Presidential Envoy for Climate (SPEC) John Kerry’s recent comments lamenting the Ukraine war’s carbon footprint.

Spokespeople for both the White House and National Security Council failed to provide a comment about Kerry’s remarks after they were contacted multiple times by Fox News Digital. Last week, Kerry doubled down on past comments that a key consequence of the ongoing Ukraine war stemming from Russia’s invasion last year is increased global greenhouse gas emissions.

‘Lots of parts of the world are exacerbating the problem right now, but when you have bombs going off and you have damage to septic tanks or to power centers etcetera, you have an enormous release of greenhouse gas, methane, all of the family of greenhouse gasses and the result is it’s adding to the problem,’ Kerry said during an interview with MSNBC on July 10.

Kerry added that the war in Ukraine is a fight ‘we have to make,’ but that there are ‘ancillary impacts as a result.’

Kerry’s remarks were later widely condemned by conservatives and Republicans including presidential candidate Nikki Haley who tweeted ‘you can’t make this stuff up’ and ‘the end of the Biden (Harris) administration can’t come fast enough.’

The comments were the latest example of Kerry warning about the climate change implications of war in Ukraine. Shortly before Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, for example, Kerry told multiple media outlets that he was concerned about emissions from a potential military conflict.

‘Equally, importantly you’re going to lose people’s focus,’ Kerry told BBC on Feb. 21, 2022. ‘You’re going to lose certainly big country attention because they will be diverted and I think it could have a damaging impact. Hopefully (Russian President Vladimir Putin) would realize that in the northern part of his country, they used to live on 66% of a nation that was over frozen land. Now, it’s thawing.’

‘I am concerned in terms of the climate efforts that a war is the last thing you need with respect to a united effort to try to deal with the climate challenge,’ Kerry told Reuters in a separate interview that same day. ‘Obviously we hope that we can compartmentalize, but it’s just made that much more difficult without any question.’

And months after the Russian invasion, in April 2022, Kerry again expressed concern about how the war may cause people to lose concentration on fighting global warming.

‘What’s happened in Ukraine has not helped to concentrate people on reducing [emissions],’ Kerry told The Washington Post on April 21, 2022. ‘It’s concentrated people on trying to find substitutes for Russian gas and to meet higher levels of production because of low supply. But it obviously does interrupt the momentum that we had created coming out of Glasgow.’

More recently, Kerry told The New York Times in June that the war shows ‘climate change is a threat multiplier.’

Shortly after taking office in 2021, President Biden appointed Kerry to be the U.S. SPEC, a position that hadn’t previously existed, didn’t require Senate approval, and gives him a spot on the president’s cabinet and National Security Council. The SPEC office is housed at the State Department and has an estimated $13.9 million annual budget with approval for 45 personnel.

Since taking on the role, Kerry has traveled worldwide, attending high-profile climate summits and diplomatic engagements in an effort to push a global transition from fossil fuels to green energy alternatives.

EXCLUSIVE: A top Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee is warning of a growing Chinese Communist Party influence in Latin America – as he returns from a trip to the region, where he spoke to officials about the dangers of the geopolitical foe.

Rep. August Pfluger, R-Texas, led a congressional delegation to the region, which included Brazil, Colombia and Panama. Lawmakers spoke with government officials and representatives from the private sector. They also toured the Darien Gap region and had briefings from law enforcement officials in multiple countries.  

Much attention has been focused on the flow of migrants to the U.S. through the gap, as migrants from countries such as Venezuela make their way north to try and enter the U.S. amid an ongoing border crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border.

But Pfluger is alert to a different threat that the U.S. needs to tackle – telling Fox News Digital in an interview that the Chinese Communist Party is ‘present in this region, they’re present in the trade relationships, they’re present with telecommunications, they’re present with a desire to build ports and use their own tactics.’ 

‘And so we have to be working in this area because it’s not just about the issues that we see on our border. The homeland security of the United States depends on us engaging, and quite frankly, I think that we have ignored this region,’ he said.

Last month, it was revealed that China has been seeking to build a listening post in Cuba, something the U.S. government has called an ‘ongoing issue.’

Meanwhile, other lawmakers have also highlighted the threat. Sen Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., has warned about the threat of Chinese influence where he said there was a ‘vacuum’ left due to a lack of U.S. leadership.

In conversations with government officials, Pfluger, who is chairman of the Counterterrorism, Law Enforcement, and Intelligence Subcommittee, said he brought the threat up repeatedly.

‘My message to the foreign ministers in these countries was very simple. I basically said ‘You and your countries have to push back, and you have to be clear-eyed about what the objectives of the Chinese Communist Party are.’ And I think that they were somewhat surprised to hear such a strong message.’

Pfluger noted that Panama signed onto aspects of the Chinese Belt & Road Initiative in recent years and is trading with the regime. Pfluger said it was a key area where China is seeking greater control.

‘The Panama Canal is a very strategic point and the Chinese have been desiring control of both the Pacific and the Atlantic side to build ports, to build projects that would give them a greater degree of control over the Panama Canal. So when you talk about the shipping – of course, if you control the shipping line that goes through there, then you can really move the needle and influence the region,’ he said.

‘I did not mince my words to the foreign minister of Colombia and the foreign minister of Panama, when I said, ‘We need you as a partner to push back against the Chinese Communist Party, especially in the area of ports and telecommunications, because they desire to undermine the Western world and freedom,’’ he said.

Pfluger says the ongoing crisis of migrants and drugs up through the continent and into the U.S. is related to Chinese influence in the region.

‘If the Chinese Communist Party can get a foothold in those countries, then think about the increases in narcotic trafficking and human trafficking that would exist,’ he said.

He also said there are signs of an increase in specific routes set up by trafficking organizations to fly from China into South America and move north. 

‘We have seen Chinese high-value targets in my district that have been arrested and apprehended in the last couple of years, and the uptick has increased sharply. And so the malign activity, if they get influence in these countries, will continue to increase in a lot of other areas,’ he said.

‘We know that the Chinese Communist Party wants to undermine the United States in any and all areas that they possibly can. And it starts by gaining a foothold with partners. And, you know, maybe it starts economically and it doesn’t look like it’s that serious. But we know it’s serious because we’ve seen it all throughout the world.’

Mass riots that have torn through France in recent weeks have made migration, particularly mass migration from Africa, a top European issue once again while also resonating in the U.S. as it also continues to tackle an ongoing crisis at its southern border.

‘As the horrific riots in France have proven, we must also redouble our efforts to ensure that anyone who comes to America shares our values and assimilates into our culture,’ former President Donald Trump said last week. ‘We don’t want people coming into our country that hate us.’

The riots began after the June 27 death of Nahel Merzouk, a 17-year-old of Algeria-Morocco descent, who was shot and killed by a police officer during a traffic stop in Nanterre, a suburb of Paris.

It sparked historic violence even in a country known for its regular rioting on issues such as pensions. But these riots have led to hundreds of police officers injured and the destruction of buildings. An Associated Press tally found that more than 6,000 vehicles have been destroyed and more than 1,100 buildings attacked. France remained on edge ahead of its July 14 Bastille Day celebrations, with firework sales banned out of concern of ‘serious disturbances’ to public order.

It is similar in some respects to rioting seen in 2005 when there were weeks of rioting after the deaths of two teens of African heritage killed at a power station while fleeing police.

The riots have raised issues to do with alleged racism and discrimination by police against men of African descent, similar to the way that the 2020 riots in the U.S. in the wake of the death of George Floyd sparked a national conversation on race. Advocates have pointed to statistics that show Black or Arab men are 20 times more likely to be stopped by police. Some outlets have also cited statistics that only one in 10 of those arrested is a non-citizen.

But in France and across Europe, the unrest is reviving discussion about immigration, particularly from North Africa and Muslim countries, which became a major EU-wide issue during the 2015 migrant crisis but then largely drifted when COVID-19 hit in 2020.

The 2015 migrant crisis played a key role in both the victory of a number of right-wing movements in Europe, including Britain’s exit from the European Union, and the rise of a number of populist governments in countries, including Italy and Austria. It is also seen as playing a role in the victory of Donald Trump in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Now, with the riots having torn through France, many on the right in Europe and the U.S. are highlighting the connection with migration, arguing that it emerges from a lack of assimilation amid large numbers of arrivals.

In France, former right-wing presidential candidate Eric Zemmour was blunt in his assessment of the problem.

‘You tell us that these riots have nothing to do with immigration because many of the rioters are French. But it’s even worse. We have forged for 40 years a people of French people who hate France,’ he said.

Meanwhile, Poland cited the French riots when rejecting an EU migration agreement that would require countries to accept a certain number of migrants or be fined.

‘Shops looted, police cars set on fire, barricades in the streets – this is now happening in the center of Paris and many other French cities. We don’t want such scenes on Polish streets,’ Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki tweeted. ‘We don’t want scenes like this in any city in Europe. That is why we will defend the conclusions of the 2018 European Council, we will defend the principle of voluntary admission of immigrants. Stop illegal migration. Safety first.’

‘Europe is threatened by mobs of anti-Europeans who smash police stations, burn libraries and stab to steal a mobile phone, who are unwilling to adapt to our way of life and our laws,’ Spanish Vox party leader Santiago Abascal said, according to Politico. ‘They think that we are the ones who have to adapt.’

Douglas Murray, author of the 2017 book ‘The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam,’ told Fox News Digital that France and many other developed countries have ‘badly mismanaged migration.’

‘France has segments of the country that are populated by people who find it convenient to be in France because the standard of living is better than their home countries, but they’re not of France. Now, what normally happens at this stage is that people say, ‘Well, what can we do to integrate better?’ And the answer is: maybe nothing. Maybe they can’t be integrated. And that’s the fatalistic conclusion that an increasing number of French people come to: This isn’t working.’

‘Why do I say that? Because when, for instance, an incident like [the shooting] occurs, the idea that it automatically should lead to, as in 2005, mass civil disturbance, rioting, looting, burning is a suggestion that something else is going on,’ he said.

He disagreed with the claim made by some that police racism was the issue, saying that no matter the debate about the incident, it doesn’t justify the intense violence seen across the country.

‘It’s not about police racism. It’s not even about the police. It’s about a significant chunk of the migrant community who are not integrated and will not integrate and dislike the country they’re in,’ he said.

Alan Mendoza of the Henry Jackson Society recently told Fox News Digital that the riots are ‘the consequence of a failure to integrate the country’s Muslim immigrant population’ while also connecting the violence to French culture.

‘The France of legend is far removed from the daily realities of life in a ghettoized community that does not have the same opportunities to progress and succeed as the native population,’ he said. ‘France’s forgotten communities are showing that they will stay forgotten no longer. The simmering rage felt in the banlieues (suburbs) just needed a spark to explode and is now being taken advantage of by an anarchical strain of French society that has always welcomed disorder in the form of rioting and looting.’

The U.S., too, has been in the middle of a heated national about immigration – primarily illegal immigration. Presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, has come out promising to ‘stop the invasion’ as the U.S. continues to face a crisis at its southern border now into its third year that has seen historic numbers of migrants seeking entry.

As a result, the French riots are resonating with U.S. Republican politicians, too. Trump cited the riots when he promised to bring back his travel ban on certain countries if elected to the White House.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia also cited the riots, writing on social media, ‘Muslims migrated to France over the past two decades and France took them in while making it difficult for the people of France to own guns for [self-protection]. We need strict immigration laws and strong borders and always defend our great [Second Amendment] rights.’

France is not the only European country that is having difficulties with tackling migration. In the U.K., the government’s plan to send migrants to Rwanda was shot down by an appeals court last month. Britain has seen record numbers of migrants crossing from France in small boats, and its conservative government is under pressure to tackle the issue.

Murray, a Fox News contributor and National Review Institute fellow, says there are three key factors when it comes to mass migration: the speed at which people arrive, the number of arrivals, and the identity of those people.

What the U.S. is facing, a crisis of illegal immigration at its southern border primarily from Latin America, may have similarities in terms of numbers and speed, but Murray says the identity issue is a key difference.

‘Most people who study migration, like me, would say that America has a serious border problem, and there is much to be said about the importance of plugging that problem. Nevertheless, by comparison, and I’m not by any means downplaying this, America has migration from the Central, South American world. Europe, France has migration from Africa. And it’s a simple truism to say that that is a harder integration process,’ he said.

Murray said, however, that there is a common factor connecting the U.S. and Western Europe on the question of migration.

‘The huge similarity is that both America and Western Europe seem to have lost the ability to say ‘no.’ There are too many people in charge who cannot justify why the world should not come in,’ he said. ‘And remember, it was not long ago that mainstream Democrats like [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer used to acknowledge that you’ve got to get rid of illegals in America. Now it’s all about amnesty, it’s all about welcoming people at the border, helping them, people fleeing oppression, economic deprivation and much more.’

He also warned that the U.S. could eventually see the sort of violence that recently tore through France.

‘The American political class has increasingly ended up in the same position as the European political class, which is they cannot find a way to justify having secure borders and repelling illegal migration,’ he said. ‘And so it continues, and it gets encouraged, and it acts as a pull factor, which will only increase the numbers in the years ahead. And the results will be of the kind that we’ve seen in France.’

Fox News’ Peter Aitken and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

Former President Donald Trump explained his plan to secure peace in Ukraine within 24 hours of taking back the White House on Sunday, saying he would tell Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to make a deal.

Trump made the comments during an interview on Fox News’ ‘Sunday Morning Futures’ with host Maria Bartiromo. The former president said he has a good relationship with both Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin, and added that President Biden is not capable of dealing with world leaders.

‘These are smart people, including Macron of France. I could go through the whole list of people, including Putin.… These people are sharp, tough and generally vicious. They’re vicious, and they’re at the top of their game. We have a man that has no clue what’s happening. It’s the most dangerous time in the history of our country,’ Trump said.

‘So what should be the response?’ Bartiromo asked. ‘You said you could end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours. How would you do that?’

‘I know Zelensky very well. I felt he was very honorable because when they asked him about the perfect phone call that I made, he said it was indeed, he said it was. He didn’t even know what they were talking about. He could have grandstanded–’ Trump said before Bartiromo cut him off.

‘That’s not going to be enough for Putin to stop bombing,’ she pointed out. Trump then explained how he would get Russia and Ukraine to end their conflict.

‘I know Zelenskyy very well, and I know Putin very well, even better. And I had a good relationship, very good with both of them. I would tell Zelenskyy, no more. You got to make a deal. I would tell Putin, if you don’t make a deal, we’re going to give him a lot. We’re going to [give Ukraine] more than they ever got if we have to. I will have the deal done in one day. One day,’ Trump responded.

Trump is among several Republican 2024 presidential candidates who are skeptical of the war in Ukraine.

Former President Donald Trump praised Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., and said the 2024 candidate may be a good fit in Trump’s own administration if he wins the White House.

Trump made the comment during an appearance on Fox News’ ‘Sunday Morning Futures’ with host Maria Bartiromo. Trump complimented some in the Republican primary field during the interview, saying he believed that many of his fellow candidates were ‘talented’ people, and hinted that he was already having thoughts about a potential running mate.

‘Is there anyone on that stage you see as potential running mate, as your VP?’ Bartiromo asked.

‘Possibly. I mean, I think you have some good people on the stage. Actually, I think you have some very talented people. I’ve been impressed by some of them. Some of them I’m very friendly with,’ Trump responded. ‘Actually, a number of them called me up not to ask for permission, but sort of to ask for permission, to say they’d like to do it. A number of the people up there – I’m not going to embarrass them by saying who – but no, I think you have good people. I think you have good potential Cabinet members to actually do that.’

‘Do you see yourself perhaps with the senator, Tim Scott?’ Bartiromo pressed.

‘I think he’s a very good guy. And we did opportunity zones together. It’s never been talked about. It’s one of the most successful economic development things ever done in this country. And Tim is very good. I mean, I could see Tim doing something with the administration, but he’s in right now campaigning…. But Tim is a talented guy, and you have other very talented people.’

When reached for comment, Scott’s campaign referenced a statement the candidate made to Fox News’ Neil Cavuto last week.

‘I did not enter this race to come in second place. Second place is the first loser,’ he said at the time.

Former President Donald Trump said he believes the Secret Service knows who owned the bag of cocaine found at the White House.

In an interview with ‘Sunday Morning Futures’ host Maria Bartiromo that aired Sunday morning, Trump doubted that officials could not know who owned the substance that officials said was located near the White House’s West Executive entrance in the Situation Room.

‘You know how many cameras they have opposite the front door of the Situation Room?’ Trump asked.

‘I’ve gotten to know the Secret Service really well, and I can’t speak more highly of these people, they are incredible people,’ Trump added. ‘And I believe that they know everything – they’re really smart and good at what they do.’

The bag of cocaine was found at the White House in July, and it was announced last week the Secret Service was unable to identify who owned it.

Trump, in the Sunday interview, was highly skeptical of the outcome of the probe. 

‘I don’t think it’s possible for bags of cocaine to be left in a certain area, in the Situation Room,’ he added. ‘I’m not talking about five blocks away, the Situation Room, where you decide on war, where you decide on nuclear.’

The Secret Service said in a statement Thursday that their investigation ‘included a backwards examination that spanned several days prior to the discovery of the substance and developed an index of several hundred individuals who may have accessed the area where the substance was found,.’

Investigators developed ‘a pool of known persons for comparison of forensic evidence gleaned from the FBI’s analysis of the substance’s packaging,’ the Secret Service said. The investigation’did not develop latent fingerprints and insufficient DNA was present for investigative comparisons,’ they added.