EXCLUSIVE: Sen. Ted Cruz is criticizing Democrats for what he believes is a rush to regulate the artificial intelligence sector, and says new rules for AI would be a drag on the U.S. in the critical tech race against China.

‘I am concerned China is investing heavily in AI. I’m also concerned that Democrats want to impose such stringent regulations on the development of AI that it stifles innovation in the United States, and allows China to take the lead,’ Cruz told Fox News Digital after a classified briefing on AI and national security this week.

‘That would be a generational mistake,’ he said of the Democrats’ effort.

Cruz made those comments as lawmakers continue to propose new ideas to regulate AI, including bills that would create new agencies or commissions to impose Washington’s will on the sector. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has led the charge for guardrails on AI in the upper chamber, and says he can devise a regulatory framework to ensure the technology remains innovative while protecting user security and American jobs.

But Cruz argued that federal lawmakers were not in a place where they could reasonably approach rulemaking for AI.

He told Fox News Digital point-blank that he was opposed to Schumer’s regulatory efforts, however they end up.

‘I’m a believer in light touch regulations. And AI, over the coming decades, is certainly going to require a regulatory framework. But at this point, Congress doesn’t have even the barest modicum of understanding,’ Cruz said. ‘So it is far more likely that Congress would do harm than do good.’

‘I believe we need to study the challenges posed by AI, but not put in place barriers to creativity and innovation, because American inventors are leading the world today and should continue to do so,’ he said.

Like most members of Congress, Cruz acknowledged there are both benefits and drawbacks of allowing AI to advance at its current pace. But one thing he said was certain was that the U.S. must stay at the forefront of its development.

‘There’s no doubt AI is the next frontier in technology and more and more It’s becoming the current frontier. There are real and serious threats posed by AI at the same time, there’s enormous upside in terms of it – in productivity and job creation,’ he said.

‘I believe it’s critical that America lead the world in the development of AI, and that China not be allowed to overtake us,’ he said.

China’s severe regulatory environment has slowed the rollout of AI Chatbots and other accessible forms of the tech to the general public, but Beijing has nevertheless made strides. China-based tech startups pulled in nearly $14 billion in funding just in the last six months, according to Reuters.

While Schumer has stressed the need to move quickly on a regulatory framework, he has also indicated it may not be ready until next year. He said he still wants to hold a series of listening sessions with experts in the fall.

Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, let loose on his Democratic colleagues Friday, blasting them for defending sex change surgery for children.

‘I am not the one who is cruel. Doing a double mastectomy on a 12-year-old girl. That’s cruel. Castrating a ten-year-old boy. That’s cruel. Putting them on permanent hormone therapy and puberty blockers that could prevent them from ever having children permanently changing their physiology. There’s a cruelty to that for sure,’ Crenshaw said during a House health hearing this week.

‘We are not the crazy ones here,’ he added. ‘This has been called a manufactured culture war … If it’s a manufactured culture war, then why are we even debating? Why do you care if it’s banned? So it’s not manufactured.’ 

Crenshaw detailed what he said was a 45,000% increase in transition surgeries at hospitals that conduct the procedures, and that Republicans weren’t ‘making this up.’ He went on to argue that ‘peer influence’ was a major factor in the increase.

He later questioned why anyone would advocate for continued use of such procedures on children with such high level of risk involved in relation to their future biology and mental health.

‘You might not know that bananas are healthy for kids, but you also know that there’s not much risk to giving them a banana. So it’s not a big deal. This kind of stuff is a really big deal,’ he said. 

‘And when every single piece of evidence shows that there’s not a clear benefit associated with it, you just press pause. Heck, we’re not even pressing pause. We’re saying don’t fund institutions that are actively doing it. We’re doing way less than pressing pause,’ he added. 

Crenshaw then slammed Democrats for ignoring the overwhelming percentage of Americans who polls have shown don’t support such procedures, arguing they should care because the use of taxpayer money was involved. ‘So you do have to care just a little bit,’ he said. 

He went on to argue that ‘roughly 70%’ of U.S. teens going to gender clinics have a co-morbid psychiatric diagnosis that came about prior to the gender issues.

‘That’s a really important fact. Do you not care about that when you’re claiming that refusing this kind of care is causing suicide? Do you not care that those preconditions might have already been there? Is that not a fact that you would want to look at before you automatically propose permanent physiological change as someone,’ Crenshaw said. 

‘We are not the ones being uncompassionate. We are not the ones being cruel. We are the ones saying press pause. There’s an extreme trend going on, and we don’t have the science to back up its benefits. And you can’t argue with that, but please try,’ he added.

Iowa has gone from purple to deep red.

Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds of Iowa on Friday signed into law a controversial bill passed earlier this week by the state’s GOP-dominated legislature that sharply limits abortion.

The bill, which would ban most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, is the latest example of Iowa Republicans flexing their muscles in a state that over the past dozen years has transformed from a crucial general election battleground to solidly red, with the GOP in control of the governor’s office, both legislative chambers in the statehouse and Iowa’s entire congressional delegation.

Reynolds has signed laws this year that ban or significantly limit gender transition treatments for minors, allow families to use taxpayer money towards private-school tuition and loosen child labor rules in the state, as the GOP works to turn the onetime swing state into a bastion of conservatism.

‘Americans are taking notice as states around the country are looking to Iowa as a beacon for freedom and opportunity,’ the governor wrote in a statement this spring as she touted what she described as an ‘historic’ legislative session.

It wasn’t that long ago that Democrats were competitive in the state, controlling the governor’s office for a dozen straight years and one of the two U.S. Senate seats for three straight decades. But Democrats haven’t won a gubernatorial election since 2006 or a Senate contest since 2008. 

In the race for the White House, former President Barack Obama carried Iowa by nearly 10 points in 2008 and by six points in 2012. But four years later, former President Donald Trump captured the Hawkeye State by nine points in his White House victory. Trump carried Iowa by eight points in 2020 in his re-election defeat.

Last November, the sole remaining Democrat in the state’s congressional delegation went down to defeat.

‘There has been remarkable change in the political makeup of the state,’ veteran Iowa-based Democratic consultant Jeff Link told Fox News.

Link spotlighted that ‘what has changed the most is there was significant shift in the counties along the Mississippi River that were traditionally Democratic strongholds. They were counties that had lots of organized labor and those are the places that have had the biggest change.’

David Kochel, a longtime Republican consultant and veteran of numerous GOP presidential campaigns in Iowa and nationally, also pointed to ‘the migration of White working-class voters from the old Democratic Party coalition, which included a lot of labor and blue-collar workers.’

‘As the Democratic Party became more progressive, those White working-class voters migrated into the Republican Party,’ added Kochel, a former Iowa GOP executive director.

Kochel spotlighted Howard County in northeastern Iowa, which he noted ‘had the largest swing from Obama and Trump of any county in the country.’

‘We traded some votes. There were some suburban, moderate, voters that might have moved a little bit left, but replacing them was a much larger number of White working-class voters,’ he added.

Democrats hope that the new abortion law will help boost their chances in next year’s legislative and congressional elections in Iowa.

But Link argued that Iowa Democrats need ‘to focus on improving their voter registration number, which is not something the party has ever done before. But that is key because you just can’t persuade enough independents where we are right now to have enough of an impact. So you literally have to register more Democratic voters.’

And he urged that Democrats ‘need to not only travel to all the counties in the state, but we need to listen to voters in those places and not just write them off. I think that’s what’s happened from time to time, and it’s a strategy that’s a disaster.’

Abigail Disney, the heiress of the Disney fortune, was arrested in New York on Friday after she and several climate activists blocked a small airport servicing private jet departures and arrivals.

Disney was joined by members of New York Communities for Change, Planet Over Profit and Sunrise Movement NYC in the action held to protest and disrupt the ‘exclusive vacations of wealthy fossil fuel investors and polluters driving the climate crisis,’ a press release stated. The activists blockaded the regional East Hampton Airport in Wainscott, New York.

‘As a person who has been privileged enough to use private jets, I know it’s hard to give up a luxury that is special,’ Disney said in a statement Friday. ‘But I also know that the time has passed for spewing greenhouse gasses like this merely for our personal comfort.’

‘The events of the past week alone, with Earth’s average temperature hitting an all time high, drought and fatal heat waves across the country, floods in Vermont and New York, and ocean temperatures around Florida well over 90 degrees, should remove all doubt once and for all,’ she added. ‘The wealthiest 1% uses as much greenhouse gas as the entire bottom 50%. It is time for real change and this is the most obvious place to start.’

According to photos and videos of the incident, Disney and the other protesters formed a blockade at the main entrance of East Hampton Airport which serves private and charter flights, not commercial. It is situated in the Hamptons, a ritzy community in eastern Long Island that is home to a number of celebrities and affluent residents.

‘These same rich people farting into the Hamptons on private jets are often the ones who make their money in industries that hugely accelerate the climate crisis,’ said Teddy Ogborn, an organizer of Planet Over Profit who was also arrested at the protest. 

‘As long as the 1% continues to needlessly poison our air and heat our earth, we will continue to escalate our actions against them.’

The protest Friday is the first in a series of actions climate activists are planning in the Hamptons over the coming days. 

On Saturday, activists will hold a ‘Tax the Rich for Climate Justice’ march; on Sunday, they will protest near the private Sebonack Golf Course in Southampton; and on Monday, they are rallying outside the home of a Citibank board member with pitchforks.

The actions are part of a growing number of climate protests centered around disrupting public areas in an effort to push leaders to take more aggressive actions to curb global warming.

Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. claimed that President Biden’s mobilization of troops to support Operation Atlantic Resolve is preparation for a ‘ground war with Russia.’

Kennedy reacted to Biden’s decision to call up thousands of military reservists to bolster U.S. troops in Europe as part of the 2014 operation.

‘President Biden just called up 3,000 reservists to augment U.S. troops in Europe as part of ‘Operation Atlantic Resolve,” Kennedy tweeted on Friday.

‘I want people to understand what this troop mobilization is about,’ he continued. ‘It’s about preparing for a ground war with Russia.’

On Thursday, Biden announced that his administration is mustering reserve troops to ensure the ‘effective conduct of Operation Atlantic Resolve in and around the United States European Command’s area of responsibility.’

The president is calling up 3,000 reserve troops from the Selected and Individual Ready Reserves, with no more than 450 from the Individual Ready Reserve.

Biden’s troop augmentation comes while the president is overseas for the NATO conference.

‘This is reckless [and] dangerous,’ Texas GOP Senator Ted Cruz tweeted. ‘I want to see Putin defeated, but UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES should U.S. servicemen [and] women be sent to fight in Ukraine.’

‘Biden’s weakness started this war [and] now he’s threatening to put our military in a shooting war with Russia,’ Cruz added.

GOP Utah Sen. Mike Lee weighed in on the president’s European mobilization in a Twitter thread, warning that the move is ‘daring Russia to shoot first.’

‘I’ve been trying to figure out what this means. Bottom line up front: President Biden is arguably walking the U.S. up to the line of war and daring Russia to shoot first,’ Lee wrote.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis will become the first Republican to file his candidacy for South Carolina’s GOP presidential primary when he visits the Palmetto State next week.

DeSantis, according to his campaign, will file the paperwork on Tuesday at the state GOP headquarters in Columbia, the capital city of South Carolina.

DeSantis will make his candidacy official during his third campaign swing through South Carolina, where Republican hopefuls have been stumping for more than a year. On Monday, he is expected to stop in Tega Cay, an affluent community on Lake Wylie along the state line with North Carolina.

After he signs his candidacy paperwork, DeSantis plans to make a policy rollout in Columbia, the details of which the campaign did not immediately release. It will be DeSantis’ second policy announcement, following his immigration proposals — which call for ending birthright citizenship and finishing construction of the southern border wall — outlined during a June visit to a Texas border city.

The South Carolina trip comes on the heels of a Friday GOP gathering in Iowa, where DeSantis and other hopefuls — but not former President Trump, the field’s current frontrunner — were set to appear at the Family Leadership Summit.

It is one of many events that will be held in Iowa in the coming weeks as voters begin to more seriously consider their options in the remaining six months until the leadoff caucuses, and the sprawling field of Republican presidential candidates works to build bases of support to challenge Trump’s early lead in the field.

South Carolina is set to hold its GOP presidential primary Feb. 24. The state, which also boasts two homegrown 2024 candidates of its own — former Gov. Nikki Haley and Sen. Tim Scott — is critical for Republican presidential hopefuls and has been a strong base of support for Trump in his previous campaigns.

Aside from his visit to South Carolina, DeSantis also has plans to travel to Southampton, New York, next week for a private meeting with donors.

Fox Business senior correspondent Charlie Gasparino was told DeSantis, who has stalled in polls, will face questions from major East Coast donors during the meeting about the viability of his campaign. DeSantis is reportedly planning to tell donors he is playing the ‘long game’ against Trump.

People close to DeSantis, and the governor himself, are telling donors concerned about the polls to ‘ignore the noise’ and that media Democrats ‘are just making trouble so that Trump is the nominee’ and President Biden wins again because of Trump’s perceived baggage.

Most of the Republican congressional delegation from New York has so far resisted endorsing either Trump or DeSantis. A recent DeSantis fundraiser in Rockland County, New York, drew some organizational woes among local party leaders last month, and the venue was shifted from Republican Rep. Mike Lawler’s district, which remains a key Democrat House target in 2024.

Fox News’ Danielle Wallace, Charlie Gasparino and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

An annual survey on diversity among Senate Democratic offices found that Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Jon Tester, D-Mont., have the least diverse staffs on their side of Capitol Hill.

Just 12% of Manchin’s staff identify as non-Caucasian, the least of any Senate office, followed closely by Tester’s staff at 13% and Sens. Angus King, I-Maine, and Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., each with 15%.

Tester does not employ anyone who identifies as Latino in his Senate office, according to the poll, while 2% of Manchin’s staff are Latino. Manchin’s office was the only one listed without any staffers who identify as LGBTQ.

Fox News Digital reached out to Tester and Manchin’s offices for comment. Both moderate Democrats are up for re-election in 2024, both in states won by Donald Trump in the previous presidential race.

Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, boasts the most diverse Senate staff as 71% identify as non-Caucasian. Sixty-eight percent of her fellow Hawaii Democrat Sen. Brian Schatz’s staffers said the same, followed by 67% of Sen. Cory Booker’s, D-N.J.

The most diverse committee staffs were Indian Affairs and Small Business, while the least was Environment and Public Works.

The poll is part of Senate Democrats’ Diversity Initiative, which was created in 2007 by then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

The initiative’s website touts current Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer as ‘championing a definition of diversity and inclusion that is emblematic of our party and country; one that embraces diverse racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds and celebrates differences in gender, sexual-orientation, ability, and the military service of our veterans.’

In his office, 49% of staffers identify as non-Caucasian and 16% identify as LGBTQ. Black and Latino staffers each make up 15% of his staff, according to the poll.

Rev. Jesse Jackson, one of the most prominent civil rights leaders in American history, is stepping down as leader of the organization he founded in 1971.

A spokesperson for Rep. Jonathan Jackson, Jesse Jackson’s son, confirmed the longtime civil rights leader will be retiring this year as leader of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition.

The elder Jackson, a civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate, plans to announce his decision on Sunday during the organization’s annual convention, Rep. Jackson told the Chicago Sun-Times.

Jonathan Jackson, an Illinois Democrat, said his father ‘has forever been on the scene of justice and has never stopped fighting for civil rights’ and that will be ‘his mark upon history.’

Rev. Jackson, who will turn 82 in October, has remained active in civil rights in recent years despite health setbacks.

He announced in 2017 that he was receiving treatment for Parkinson’s disease and had gallbladder surgery in 2021. Later in 2021, Jackson said he was receiving treatment for COVID-19, which required time at a physical therapy facility.

In November 2021, Jackson was hospitalized for a head injury stemming from a fall.

Jackson, a protégé of the Rev. Martin Luther King, broke with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1971 to form Operation PUSH — originally named People United to Save Humanity — a sweeping civil rights organization based in Chicago’s South Side.

The organization was later renamed the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, with a mission ranging from encouraging corporations to hire more minorities to voter registration drives in minority communities. Its annual convention is set for this weekend in Chicago.

Jackson was the most successful Black candidate for the U.S. presidency before Barack Obama’s run in 2008. Jackson won 13 primaries and caucuses for the Democratic nomination in 1988.

‘Reverend Jesse Jackson is officially pivoting from his role as president of Rainbow PUSH Coalition,’ the Rainbow PUSH Coalition said in a statement to Fox News Digital. 

‘His commitment is unwavering, and he will elevate his life’s work by teaching ministers how to fight for social justice and continue the freedom movement. Rev. Jackson’s global impact and civil rights career will be celebrated this weekend at the 57th annual Rainbow PUSH Coalition convention, where his successor will be introduced.’

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

FIRST ON FOX: President Biden’s current ambassador to the European Union offered advice to Hunter Biden in 2016 on a Romanian ‘client’ who was on trial for corruption at the time, according to emails reviewed by Fox News Digital.

Mark Gitenstein, who was appointed as U.S. ambassador to the EU by Biden in July 2021 and helped spearhead Biden’s transition team after the 2020 election, is the president’s longtime friend and confidante of several decades who served under him in the Senate for over a decade and was the U.S. ambassador in Romania during the Obama-Biden administration from 2009 to 2012. 

While his emails with Hunter date back as early as 2010 on the abandoned laptop when he was the U.S. ambassador in Romania, and Hunter’s calendar shows that he met with Gitenstein at least three time in 2015, their correspondence in 2016 raises questions about his involvement in advising Hunter after he picked up Romanian tycoon Gabriel Popoviciu that spring as a client and what government resources may have been used to assist Hunter.

On June 16, 2016, Gitenstein, who was working in the private sector as a partner at Mayer Brown LLP during the 2016 correspondence, forwarded information to Hunter and his longtime business partner Eric Schwerin with the subject line ‘Romania.’ 

The email included an Associated Press article saying that Romania’s Constitutional Court was expected to rule on whether to decriminalize the abuse of office. The court wound up ruling against the move and keeping it a criminal offense, but Hunter’s associates briefly weighed whether it could help one of Hunter’s clients.

‘Looks like this will not help your client because it is not retroactive,’ Gitenstein wrote.

‘Please don’t forward,’ he added in a follow-up email, referring to an email chain that included Hans Klemm, then-Ambassador to Romania, Dean Thompson, then-deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Romania, and Debra Hevia, a longtime foreign service officer.

‘Thanks, Mark. We’ll keep this to ourselves,’ Schwerin responded.

Hunter’s business dealings in Romania were highlighted in a report released by the House Oversight and Reform Committee in May. Gabriel ‘Puiu’ Popoviciu, a Romanian tycoon who was facing criminal charges related to corruption and bribery, reportedly hired Hunter in the spring of 2016 to advise him in the case. Popoviciu was eventually convicted and sentenced to seven years in prison in August 2017, NBC News reported in 2019.

In a May 2016 email, Hunter said that Gitenstein had provided contacts for officials he felt could help in Popoviciu’s case.

‘Is [sic] now the time to begin to assemble a more high profile team that can speak to the injustice here,’ Hunter wrote to then-Boies Schiller lawyer Michael Gottlieb, Rob Walker, and James Gilliar on May 16, 2016. ‘Who do we have at the firm that can speak with authority about anti-corruption. Mike I was going to reach out to Judge Freeh and if you can think of others of that stature I think now is the time to read them into the situation and see if they are willing to help.’

‘Ambassador Gittenstein [sic] mentioned names like former US Atty Patrick Fitzgerald,’ he added.

It is unclear whether Fitzgerald was pursued or contacted by Hunter or any of his associates. However, Gitenstein’s advice is held in high esteem by the Biden family and transcend multiple Biden family members. During a 2009 visit to Romania, then-VP Biden praised Gitenstein as his ‘best personal friend.’

‘We have raised each other’s children.  We have — our wives are close friends.  My grandchildren are — consider the Gitenstein’s to be almost relatives.  So I can assure you first-hand, this is a man I’ve worked with for 35 years — 30 years, actually — and he has my ear,’ Biden said about Gitenstein. ‘I know you’ve already figured that out, because I know you’ve gone to him, and you know he immediately picks up the phone and calls me. I hope you won’t take advantage of my friendship with the ambassador too badly.’

‘He has a direct line, as I said, to me, and he is very effective,’ Biden added.

In the preceding communications in the email chain with Hunter, Gottlieb expressed frustrations about ‘difficulty getting traction’ with the U.S. Embassy to help Hunter’s client. However, he said he ‘reached out to Klemm and asked him to help us broker the meeting.’

‘If we are going to do this we should do it right – we should put together a persuasive deck with all the procedural and substantive defects in the indictment / case against Gabs, and we should also probably put together the start of what would be a press strategy,’ Gottlieb continued. ‘And we’ll want to line up the big names to bring over. I’d expect we only get one shot to do this.’ Hunter acknowledged that he ‘agreed’ with the strategy.

The day after Hunter’s email, Gottlieb reached out to Hans Klemm, who was serving as the U.S. ambassador to Romania at the time.

‘Our situation has not improved, so I think we need to try to reach out for a meeting with the DNA folks,’ Gottlieb told Klemm, referring to Romania’s National Anticorruption Directorate. ‘Is there someone on your team with whom I might speak to try to sort out the right protocol for moving forward?  We are most appreciative for any help you’re able to provide.’

Klemm then forwarded the email to Thompson, who is currently serving as the U.S. ambassador to Nepal.

‘Mr. Gottlieb, DNA has asked if this is in reference to the Popoviciu case?’ Thompson asked. 

Gottlieb then forwarded Thompson’s email to Hunter, Hunter’s longtime friend and business partner Rob Walker, and James Gilliar, another business associate. Gottlieb’s message was just ‘FYI.’

Gilliar responded with a thumbs up emoji, and Walker said, ‘Let’s talk before responding.’

‘I’m sorry, but I responded immediately when I got that,’ Gottlieb said. ‘There was no other answer to that question but yes.’

That same day, on May 18, 2016, Gilliar emailed Gottlieb, Hunter and Walker, saying the former president of Romania, Traian Basescu, was ‘heavily’ criticizing Klemm for alleged political interference. 

‘I understand the PM will meet JB and I hope that AK will get a lot of support,’ he added, referring to then-Romania Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos, Vice President Biden and Ambassador Klemm, respectively.

‘By the US emb reaching out, our message is delivered, and I guess the best is to see what happens tomorrow and make your best judgement call with H after,’ he added, referring to either Hunter or Hans Klemm. ‘I think we have achieved all that is possible through your friends and I personally am happy with AK contribution to justice.’

Days later, Vice President Biden met with PM Ciolos and praised his efforts to enact ‘rule of law reforms’ in Romania on May 24, 2016.

According to the White House visitor logs, Gitenstein, who was a frequent visitor at the Obama White House with more than a dozen visits in 2016, visited Biden’s Naval Observatory residence on the day preceding the meeting with Ciolos and on the day of it. It is unclear whom he met with due to that section being empty on the logs. The visitor logs also show that Klemm visited Biden’s West Wing office on the day of the Ciolos meeting. 

Early that afternoon, Gottlieb said, ‘Klemm is in DC and has reached out to talk today. He’s calling me this afternoon. I will report back on what he says.’

That evening, he emailed Hunter, Walker and Gilliar, saying he had spoken with Klemm about requesting a meeting with the Romanian DNA. 

‘Hans called me to discuss a development that is best relayed over phone,’ Gottlieb wrote. ‘Can we connect either tonight or first thing tomorrow? Bottom line is that we should proceed with requesting the meeting.’

‘Please whats ap [sic] me when u can, we have not much time,’ Gilliar said.

‘At one point we discussed Louis Freeh,’ Gottlieb later added, referring to the former FBI director who was hired by Popoviciu at the recommendation of Hunter, it’s been previously reported. ‘Do we have a good connection to him that would allow us to say he’d come?’

‘If not I’ll send it in for me, DB, and JS,’ he added. It is unclear whose initials are referenced in the email.

A couple of weeks later, on June 10, 2016, Schwerin emailed Hunter saying he had received some ‘marginally useful’ information in a phone call with Gitenstein related to Romania.

Republican members of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee told Fox News Digital that the timeline of events suggests influence peddling by the Bidens.

‘I think it’s pretty telling anytime someone says that something should be discussed over the phone instead of in an email,’ said Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn. ‘We saw this type of pressure regarding Burisma and Shokin being fired. This family has been linked to too many deals. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire. And there’s a lot of smoke.’

‘With every new email exchange that’s brought to light between Hunter Biden and his associates, one fact remains crystal clear: the moral rot of the Biden family compounds by the day,’ said Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C. ‘In the case of Gabriel Popoviciu, we still see Hunter Biden’s dirty fingerprints – and the same telltale signs of his influence peddling that serve as his calling card. Known lawbreaker Hunter Biden’s corruption knows no bounds.’

‘Joe Biden very well may be the most corrupt and incompetent president in American history,’ said Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz.  ‘Every week, new revelations come out on how his dealings with foreign governments enriched the entire Biden crime syndicate while selling out Americans.’

‘The Biden family needs to answer for the growing mountain of evidence suggesting they sold out their country to enrich themselves,’ said Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C. ‘Joe Biden appears very willing to pressure foreign officials and change American policy positions if his family gets paid off. 

‘Furthermore, the DOJ, FBI and other federal entities need to answer for their role in covering up these crimes,’ Mace said. ‘Until the people involved go to prison, the American people will be unable to have faith in our institutions and our democracy.’

‘We knew about China. We knew about Ukraine. Now it’s Romania,’ said Rep. William Timmons, R-S.C. ‘We need to know just how widespread the Biden Mafia Family was willing to go. In this two-tiered system of justice, one thing is clear: it pays to be a Biden. That is, unless you are a four-year-old girl in Arkansas.’

At the time of Hunter’s work for Popoviciu, Vice President Biden was calling on foreign governments to crack down on corruption, including in Romania. 

‘Corruption can represent a clear and present danger not only to a nation’s economy, but to its very national security,’ he said during a speech in Romania in 2014.

Biden held a meeting at the White House with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis on Sept. 28, 2015. The GOP committee announced in May that within five weeks of the White House meeting with Iohannis, Bladon Enterprises Limited, a Cyprus-based company allegedly owned by Popoviciu that he used to conduct business in Romania, started making deposits into Robinson Walker, LLC’s bank account, totaling over $3 million from November 2015 to May 2017.

Less than two weeks after Biden met with Iohannis, Hunter met Gitenstein for coffee at Hunter’s Rosemont Seneca office. In December 2015, about three months later, Rosemont Seneca’s president, Eric Schwerin, emailed a ‘Memo from Gitenstein’ to Hunter. However, it is unclear what it said, because the attached file cannot be accessed. Schwerin and Hunter also met with Gitenstein in February 2016 at his Mayer Brown office.

In one of the transactions from early November 2016, which was highlighted by the House Oversight and Reform Committee report, Robinson Walker, LLC, an LLC that belonged to the same Walker included in many of the Romania emails, received $183,329.29 from Bladon Enterprises Limited. Hunter then received $122,179 from Robinson Walker, LLC.

Multiple Biden family accounts, including those belonging to Hunter, Hallie Biden and an unnamed Biden, received approximately $1.038 million from the Robinson Walker, LLC account after the Bladon Enterprises deposits, and 16 of 17 of those transactions occurred while Biden was vice president, the committee said.

‘It appears from bank records the Bidens were using Robinson Walker, LLC to conceal that the source of these payments was Popoviciu,’ the report continued. ‘The Committee is investigating Hunter Biden and his business associates’ engagement with U.S. government officials on behalf of Popoviciu.’

It is unclear whether Gitenstein was ever paid for providing counsel to Hunter and Schwerin on Popoviciu or what the nature of his involvement was. In 2019, Gitenstein told the New York Times that ‘Both the vice president and I had total confidence in the anti-corruption prosecutors in Romania, and did everything in our power to support them, both during our time in office and after.’

Emails shows that the divorce lawyers for Hunter and his ex-wife, Kathleen Buhle, were aware of payments from a ‘Romania deal’ and discussed how it should be divided between the two parties, Fox News Digital previously reported.

The White House, Hunter’s lawyer, Gitenstein’s office, Klemm’s employer and Gottlieb did not respond to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment.

Fox News’ Aubrie Spady contributed to this report.

President Biden’s latest weird interaction with a little girl has once again drawn attention to his frequent awkward behavior with the children of other people.

The president appeared to nibble at the shoulder of a startled young Finnish girl during his departure from Helsinki on Thursday, according to video taken as he greeted embassy staff members and their families before boarding Air Force One.

The video showed Biden leaning into the girl, who was being held by a woman who appeared to be her mother, and placing his mouth on her shoulder as he nibbled lightly. The girl appeared frightened, and later turned away when Biden tried to give her a peck on the head.

In October, Biden was ripped on social media for telling a young girl not to have a serious relationship until she turns 30.

‘Now a very important thing I told my daughters and granddaughters — no serious guys until you’re 30!’ Biden said to the unknown young woman at an event in Irvine, California.

‘Ok,’ the woman said as the president leaned in close. ‘I’ll keep that in mind.’

During a speech to the National Education Association a month earlier, Biden left people disturbed and confused following a cryptic remark about a friendship he had with a 12-year-old girl when he was 30.

The instance occurred when Biden interrupted his speech to address a woman in the crowd he apparently knew long ago. He said, ‘And everybody found out, there’s not a lot of total climate deniers anymore after they’ve seen what happened this year. But guess what, we got a lot to do.’ 

He then pointed into the crowd, and in a low voice said, ‘You gotta say hi to me.’ The crowd laughed and Biden said, ‘We go back a long way. She was 12 and I was 30, but anyway. This woman helped me get an awful lot done. Anyway.’

In 2021, Biden made what some referred to as a ‘creepy’ comment about a young girl looking 19 ‘with her legs crossed’ during a speech to military families in Virginia ahead of Memorial Day.

He stopped his speech at one point to give a shoutout to the young daughter of a veteran who also addressed the crowd. 

‘I love those barrettes in your hair,’ Biden said to the girl in the audience. ‘Man, I’ll tell you what, look at her. She looks like she’s 19 years old sitting there like a little lady with her legs crossed.’

On another occasion years earlier, Biden discussed his younger days serving as a lifeguard at a pool in Delaware, but oddly described how children would rub his wet leg hair.

‘I got hairy legs that turned … blonde in the sun. And the kids used to come up and reach into the pool and rub my leg down so it was straight and watch the hair come back up again,’ Biden recalled during a speech at the Joseph R. Biden Jr. Aquatic Center in Wilmington, Delaware in June 2017. 

He then said he ‘learned about kids jumping on my lap, and I loved kids jumping on my lap.’

One of the most famous instances of Biden acting awkwardly around children was in 2015, while serving as vice president, when he oddly whispered into the ear of Sen. Chris Coons’ daughter during his swearing in ceremony for another Senate term.

In video that captured the exchange, the girl looked visibly uncomfortable and pulled away when Biden tried to give her a peck on the cheek.

Coons later defended Biden, telling Fox News in an interview at the time that his daughter didn’t think he was ‘creepy.’

Fox News’ Kyle Morris, Gabriel Hays, Joseph A. Wulfsohn, Ronn Blitzer and Andrew Mark Miller contributed to this report.