The mandatory supervised driving period in North Carolina for young people before they can drive by themselves will be scaled back permanently after Gov. Roy Cooper said on Friday he’ll let a bill become law without his signature.

The General Assembly sent Cooper last month legislation addressing in part when a teen can move up from a learner’s permit to what’s called a limited provisional license and drive by themselves.

State law has required a young person to hold the permit for at least 12 months, although lawmakers reduced it to six months temporarily during the COVID-19 pandemic to address delayed driver’s education classes.

The law reverted to 12 months at the end of 2022, but legislators said they were still receiving complaints from parents whose children are trying to get to the next level of driving. So the latest measure reinstates the six-month minimum for the rest of 2023 before settling the time at nine months.

In a news release, Cooper recognized that the legislation passed the General Assembly by a large margin because it should help reduce waiting times for youths seeking their license.

But ‘I have concerns that this law could make our roads less safe and I encourage the Division of Motor Vehicles and the legislature to monitor its effects closely,’ the governor said. Cooper had until Friday night to sign the bill or veto it. Since he’ll do neither, it will become law.

Other rules remain in place. A young driver is eligible to obtain a learner’s permit at age 15 but must be at least 16 to move up to the limited provisional license. In between, the youth must complete 60 hours of supervised driving with an adult — usually a parent — and pass a road test.

The bill also would slightly ease passenger constraints for a limited provisional licensee so that the person could drive someone unrelated to them to and from school. This change begins Aug. 1. The Division of Motor Vehicles said later Friday that the supervised driving period change to six months will take effect starting Monday.

A challenger to Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz said it would have been ‘better’ if the Second Amendment ‘hadn’t been written.’

In a resurfaced video from 2018, Rep. Colin Allred, D-Texas, weighed in on the right to bear arms and said he did not believe the Second Amendment should have been written in the first place.

‘Within the confines of the accurately applied Second Amendment, we can do everything we want to do, as far as regulating weapons and all that,’ Allred said. ‘The Second Amendment does have, in the first sentence, in order to maintain a ‘well-regulated militia,’ and ‘the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

‘And it’s two ideas there. The recent trend has only been to focus on the right to bear arms instead of the well-regulated militia part,’ Allred continued in the video, which was first resurfaced by Breitbart. ‘So I just think we have to accurately apply it.’

‘Would it be better if it had not been written? Of course. But there’s no chance that we’re going to repeal any of the Bill of Rights amendments,’ the Texas Democrat said.

‘I’m not just talking about politically, it wouldn’t happen. It’s not within the bounds of reality in this country,’ he added. ‘But what we could do, I think, is there’s plenty of room within there to not allow people to have ‘weapons of war.”

Allred’s campaign manager Paige Hutchinson told Fox News Digital, ‘Congressman Allred’s record on this is clear: He supports common-sense reforms and respects the rights of law-abiding gun owners.’

‘He proudly supported Senator Cornyn’s bipartisan bill to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people, which Ted Cruz voted against,’ Hutchinson said. ‘A highly edited clip from six years ago is not in any way an accurate reflection of Allred’s position.’

Allred voted for Texas GOP Sen. John Cornyn’s Bipartisan Safer Communities Act that was signed into law last year and bolstered states’ red flag laws, enhance background checks for gun buyers under 21, add penalties for some gun criminals and provide funding for a variety of health and mental health-related programs.

Cornyn’s bill also addresses the so-called ‘boyfriend loophole,’ which is a gap in federal law that means spousal domestic abusers can have gun rights taken away but not unmarried ones.

On Wednesday, Allred, a former NFL linebacker who later worked in President Obama’s administration before defeating Republican Rep. Pete Sessions in 2018 in Texas’s 32nd Congressional District, which includes parts of the city of Dallas and its northeastern suburbs, became the first major Democrat to jump into the Senate race against Cruz, who is running for a third six-year term representing Texas.

Allred’s campaign on Friday said it raised $2 million in the first 36 hours since launching his campaign, but while his $2 million haul is significant, the Texas Democrat will need to keep the aggressive pace up. Cruz began the cycle with $3.3 million in cash on-hand, while bringing in an additional $1.2 million in the first quarter of this year.

Cruz has become a Texas powerhouse in the Senate after his victory over former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, a Democrat, in 2018.

Fox News Digital’s Elizabeth Elkind and Tyler Olson contributed to this report.

President Biden’s nominee to serve as U.S. ambassador to Jordan said she supports U.S. funding to provide a border wall in the country, saying it provides the U.S. ally with ‘physical security.’ And a Republican senator highlighted its contrast with the administration’s opposition to a wall at the U.S. southern border.

Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., in a Senate hearing asked nominee Yael Lempert about $150 million provided to Jordan for border security in the fiscal year 2023 omnibus package, funding that is partially continued in the 2024 budget request. Lempert said she supports that request.

‘In fact, the omnibus last year provides for at least $150 million for border security in Jordan. It’s a large amount of taxpayer dollars. And if you think about the purpose of this, it’s to provide physical security, to keep people from illegally crossing into Jordan, isn’t that correct?’ Hagerty asked.

‘It is to provide physical security, to stop drug smugglers, to deal with the threat of Jordan’s neighbor, Syria. Obviously, the conflict there continues, and it’s a dangerous neighborhood,’ Lempert replied.

Hagerty asked if there is a belief that ‘this sort of funding is important and that this sort of physical security is effective.’

‘In the Jordanian context? I do believe that that is correct, senator,’ the nominee responded.

Hagerty then contrasted her stance and the position of the administration with its decision to largely halt border wall construction at the southern border in early 2021 even as the administration faced a historic migrant crisis at its own southern border.

‘I just think it’s an important lesson for us to learn, as Americans, that we’re spending United States taxpayer dollars to support border security in a country that we’re trying to build stronger relations with,’ Hagerty said. ‘I think we ought to be learning a lesson ourselves because there’s not a penny in the president’s budget to support our own border security here.’

While the budget does include funding for Customs and Border Protection, including technology, staffing and processing, Republicans have argued it does not do enough to secure the border, including the failure to build additional wall. 

Republicans in the House recently unveiled legislation that would increase Border Patrol agents by 3,000 and restart funding for the border wall. The Biden administration, meanwhile, has accused Republicans of attempting to cut CBP funding with their own proposed spending cuts.

The debate over the border wall, even within the administration, was on display in March when Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz said he disagreed with the decision to stop construction of the wall at the southern border.

‘I do not believe in a wall from sea to shining sea, but I do believe in infrastructure and barrier systems in concentrated areas, especially urban areas,’ Ortiz said. 

‘And it’s always been our practice, from 2006 when I was an agent in charge in West Texas to now. But I also don’t agree that we should tear down a perfectly good barrier system to install something that is based upon requirements that we developed over the last few years.’

Former Attorney General Bill Barr said Friday that former President Donald Trump’s presidency would be a ‘horror show’ if he were re-elected because his former boss lacks the ‘discipline’ as well as the ‘ability for strategic thinking’ needed to get things done.

‘It is a horror show, you know, when… he’s left to his own devices,’ Barr said in remarks at the City Club of Cleveland in Ohio on Friday.

‘If you believe in his policies, what he’s advertising is his policies, he’s the last person who could actually execute them and achieve them,’ Barr said to a reporter who asked if Trump is fit to be president again.

The reporter noted that some voters say they want Trump re-elected for his policies and are willing to overlook his mistakes as president in his last term.

‘He does not have the discipline,’ Barr replied. ‘He does not have the ability for strategic thinking and linear thinking or setting priorities or how to get things done in the system.’

‘And, and so you may want his policies. But Trump will not deliver Trump policies,’ Barr said.

‘He will deliver chaos, and if anything lead to a backlash that will set his policies much further back than they otherwise would be.’

According to recent Fox News polling, Trump is the favored candidate for the Republicans in 2024, even ahead of popular Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has yet to announce his candidacy but is widely rumored to be considering a run.

Barr served as attorney general under Trump from 2019 to 2020. He was also attorney general during the George H. W. Bush administration.

The National Border Patrol Council (NBPC) mocked Vice President Kamala Harris on Friday, calling her a ‘clown’ as Title 42’s expiration date looms.

‘In 6 days the massive crush of illegal aliens coming through our border will make the last 2 years look like amateur hour,’ the Border Patrol Union wrote in a Twitter post.

Title 42, a Trump-era policy that allows the swift expulsion of illegal immigrants from the U.S., will expire on May 11 and tens of thousands of migrants are expected to seek entrance into America after it is lifted. 

‘Biden doesn’t have one clue about how to contain what he’s unleashed. He has a clown running DHS and a worse clown as VP. Watch what happens,’ NBPC said in an effort to draw attention to the ongoing crisis at the southern border.

Harris, who was appointed to lead efforts at the southern border as the Border Czar, has only visited the southern border once since taking office in 2021, despite the ongoing migrant surge into the U.S.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) sources revealed that they had encountered over 8,000 migrants a day border-wide in the first few days of May. However, the Department of Homeland Security warns that this number could nearly double after Title 42 expires, reaching up to 14,000 migrant encounters a day.

As concerns grow over the multitude of individuals expected to enter the U.S. after the policy ends, President Joe Biden ordered 1,500 active duty troops to guard the southern border.

Fox News’ Adam Shaw and Griff Jenkins contributed to this report.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, facing a potentially historic migrant surge once the Title 42 public health order ends in less than a week, made a final plea for migrants not to attempt to cross into the U.S. illegally — telling them they are being ‘deceived’ by smugglers.

‘The border is not open,’ Mayorkas said. ‘It has not been open, and it will not be open subsequent to May 11th. And the smugglers who exploit vulnerable migrants are spreading misinformation. They are spreading false information, lies in a way to lure vulnerable people to the southern border and those individuals will only be returned.’

Mayorkas spoke in Brownsville, Texas alongside Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz just days before the Title 42 order will expire on Thursday.  The public health order was implemented in March 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and millions of migrants have been rapidly expelled back to Mexico under the order for public health reasons. In March, 46% of all encounters resulted in a Title 42 expulsion.

With the order ending, there are widespread fears of a new border surge as migrants, believing they are more likely to be released into the U.S., flood to the border — with numbers already growing in areas like near Brownsville, where authorities are seeing a surge in Venezuelan single adults.

On Friday, Mayorkas said he ‘[does] not want to understate the severity of the challenge we expect to encounter.’

But he continued his claim that migrants who enter the U.S. illegally will be removed from the country, and pleaded with them not to try.

‘To the individuals themselves, who are thinking of migrating: Do not believe the smugglers. Please access the official government publications. Please access the official government Information on the Department of Homeland Security website for accurate information,’ he said.

‘Because you are being deceived, and you are risking your lives and your life savings only to meet a consequence that you do not expect at our southern border,’ he said.

The administration has been ramping up its preparations, including deployment of 1,500 troops to the southern border this week — as well as the establishment of migrant processing centers across Latin America and other agreements with Mexico to take back non-Mexican illegal immigrants.

The administration is also putting into place an asylum rule that, in theory, would make migrants ineligible for asylum if they cross the border illegally and fail to claim asylum at a country through which they have already traveled. However, Mayorkas has stressed that the ‘presumption of ineligibility’ is rebuttable — suggesting that the exemptions could be used liberally.

The DHS chief announced the distribution of an additional $332 million in funding to NGOs and local governments to aid migrants released from custody. 

Mayorkas also highlighted what DHS intends to be a greater use of penalties under the traditional Title 8 authorities to expel migrants who enter illegally — which include a five-year re-entry bar and criminal prosecution. 

‘So the consequence is going to be more severe. And what we will do, what we will do is remove individuals who do not qualify for relief under the standard that will be set by the rule that we will have finalized by May 11th,’ he said.

‘We have a plan, we are executing on that plan,’ he said, before repeating his calls for Congress to take action on fixing what he has called a ‘broken’ immigration system.

So far, Mayorkas has not assured lawmakers on the Hill. Multiple Republican senators have called on President Biden to reverse course on Title 42, while a bipartisan coalition of senators introduced legislation to grant DHS a Title 42-esque authority for two years.

Meanwhile, agents are already seeing a surge at the border, with CBP sources telling Fox News that they have seen 8,000 encounters a day in the first days of May — even before the order has lifted.

Fox News’ Griff Jenkins contributed to this report.

Gov. Tony Evers ordered a special election Friday to fill an open Assembly seat representing Milwaukee’s northern suburbs.

Republican Dan Knodl represented the 24th Assembly District from 2009 until last month, when he won a special election to fill a state Senate seat left vacant after longtime Republican incumbent Alberta Darling retired in November.

Evers issued an executive order setting a special election for Knodl’s seat on July 18, with a primary set for June 20 if necessary. Candidates could begin circulating nomination papers Friday. They must turn them in to the state elections commission by May 23.

A historical marker in Concord, New Hampshire, dedicated to former U.S. Communist Party chairwoman Elizabeth Gurley Flynn has come under Republican scrutiny for its potential connotations.Department of Natural and Cultural Resources Commissioner Sarah Stewart claims that such markers are not necessarily meant to be commemorative, but instead to illustrate broad historical significance. Stewart noted that ‘many potentially controversial’ markers appear throughout the Granite State.’We are the ‘Live Free or Die’ state,’ Republican Executive Councilman Joe Kenney said. ‘How can we possibly promote her propaganda, which still exists now through this sign in downtown Concord?’

A historical marker dedicated to a New Hampshire labor activist who championed women’s rights and was a founder of the American Civil Liberties Union — but who also joined the Communist Party and was sent to prison — has draw objections from Republican officials and scrutiny from the governor.

Known as ‘The Rebel Girl’ for her fiery speeches, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn was born in Concord in 1890. A green and white Historical Highway Marker dedicated to her, one of 278 across the state, was unveiled Monday near her birthplace.

In addition to her rights activism, the marker also says she joined the Communist Party in 1936 and was sent to prison in 1951. She was one of many party members prosecuted ‘under the notorious Smith Act,’ the marker says, which forbade any attempts to advocate, abet or teach the violent destruction of the U.S. government.

Flynn later chaired the Communist Party of the United States and she died in Moscow during a visit in 1964, at age 74. She was cremated, and her ashes were taken on a ‘flower-decked bier’ to Red Square during a funeral tribute, according to Associated Press accounts at the time.

Republican Gov. Chris Sununu is calling for a review of the state’s historical marker program.

‘This is a devout communist,’ said Joseph Kenney, a Republican member of the Executive Council, at a regular meeting Wednesday. ‘We are the ‘Live Free or Die’ state. How can we possibly promote her propaganda, which still exists now through this sign in downtown Concord?’

David Wheeler, a Republican who’s also part of a five-member Executive Council that votes on state contracts and Sununu’s department appointees, said he wanted the council to have more oversight of the historical marker process.

Sarah Stewart, the commissioner for the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, said at the meeting that the marker program is very popular ‘because it’s initiated at the local level. There is no state top-down effort to populate the state with historical highway markers.’

There are ‘many potentially controversial’ markers, Stewart said. ‘The purpose of them is not to commemorate heroes. The purpose is to provide a snapshot that the local community feels is of historic value.’

Any person, municipality or agency can suggest a marker as long as they get 20 signatures from New Hampshire residents. Supporters must draft the marker’s text and provide footnotes and copies of supporting documentation, according to the state Division of Historical Resources. The division and a historical resources advisory group evaluate the criteria.

The sign was approved last year by the Concord City Council following a recommendation from the marker program, which is jointly administered by the Historical Resources Division and the Transportation Department. It currently stands at the edge of a parking lot near the county courthouse.

Flynn is ‘one of the most significant radical leaders of the twentieth century,’ the marker’s supporters said in a letter to City Council last year. The sign also notes Flynn’s support for women’s voting rights and for access to birth control.

Historical markers run the gamut, telling stories about the last living Revolutionary War soldier, poets and painters who lived nearby, long-lost villages and contemporary sports figures.

‘We’re going to review the whole process,’ Sununu said at Wednesday’s meeting.

‘I completely agree with the sentiment here,’ the governor said, adding, ‘It’s the state marker. You can’t say we don’t have any responsibility in terms of what it says and where it goes.’

Stewart, the natural and cultural resources commissioner, sent a letter Thursday to Concord’s mayor saying the city can ‘reevaluate your approval of this marker,’ New Hampshire Public Radio reported. Mayor Jim Bouley did not immediately respond to a phone message seeking comment Friday.

One marker from 2011 that was brought up during Wednesday’s meeting celebrates the 50th anniversary of the ‘Betty and Barney Hill incident,’ during which the couple reported a close encounter with a UFO. Their experience was described in a best-selling book, a television movie, and numerous speaking engagements.

‘The UFO one I’m gonna live with,’ said Kenney, the Executive Council member. ‘That’s a funny story.’

A first-term Democratic congressman representing Wall Street has become one of Congress’s most prolific stock traders, and recently sold shares in a troubled California bank just days before the stock plummeted in value.

Rep. Dan Goldman, who represents a congressional district that includes Lower Manhattan’s Financial District in New York City, sold up to $15,000 in shares of PacWest Bancorp on March 6, according to his financial disclosures. The sale came just two days before the stock of the Beverly Hills-based bank holding company plummeted in value as investors fled from small and mid-sized banks amid news of Silicon Valley Bank’s pending failure. 

PacWest’s stock was valued at $27.40 when Goldman sold his shares but dropped to about $5.75 as of Friday, entering a freefall after Silicon Valley Bank collapsed on March 10.

‘The timing doesn’t look good, and that’s for sure,’ Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette of the Project on Government Oversight told the Washington Examiner. ‘It’s just another reason why the practice of members of Congress trading stocks is so problematic.’

The PacWest trade is one of hundreds that Goldman has made during his short time in Congress, where he has quickly becoming one of the most prolific stock traders. Goldman made more than 500 trades worth between $10 million and nearly $31 million since being sworn in as a congressman in January, his disclosure forms reveal.

Goldman, a multimillionaire and heir to the Levi Straus & Co. fortune, sits on the Committee on Homeland Security and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. While in those positions, he bought up to $50,000 in Northrop Grumman, one of the country’s biggest defense contractors, as well as up to $15,000 each in weapons manufacturers Raytheon Technologies and L3 Harris Technologies.

Goldman’s office told Fox News Digital that the congressman doesn’t manage his own stock trades and backs legislation to ban federal lawmakers from trading stocks.

‘Congressman Goldman is not involved in trading stocks in his portfolio, which is managed entirely by an investment adviser, with whom he has had no discussions about any stock trades since entering Congress,’ said Goldman spokesperson Simone Kanter. ‘The congressman supports legislation to prohibit members of Congress from trading stocks and immediately initiated the complicated process of entering into a blind trust upon entering Congress.’

Goldman is hardly alone in trading stocks as a member of Congress, even if he’s doing so at a higher rate.

Last Friday, Rep. Lois Frankel, D-Fla., disclosed that she sold up to $15,000 in shares of First Republic Bank stock on March 16, and then bought up to $15,000 in JPMorgan stock shares on March 22. The congresswoman told the Daily Caller that her ‘account is managed independently by a money manager who buys and sells stocks at his discretion.’

Stock trading is a bipartisan pastime in Congress not just confined to Democrats. Rep. John Curtis, R-Utah, sold up to $15,000 in First Republic Bank shares on March 16, when shares traded around $34 per share. They now sit at $0.35 per share.

Perhaps the member of Congress most notorious for her stock activity is Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who’s been long criticized for her husband’s profitable trades in companies she has worked to subsidize.

Critics argue that lawmakers can use their positions in Congress to profit from insider trading, in part since they have the ability to influence policies that can help or hurt certain companies and industries. Goldman’s frequent stock trading and close proximity to Wall Street may make him especially susceptible to such criticism.

Members of Congress are increasingly supporting legislation banning lawmakers from trading stocks. Last month, senators introduced a bill that would prohibit Congress from buying or selling stocks and mandate divestment or holdings to be placed into a blind trust.

The issue of banning stock trading has created unusual alliances in Congress. Earlier this week, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., teamed up to introduce legislation that would similarly ban lawmakers, their spouses, and dependents from trading stocks.

‘AOC is wrong a lot, she’d probably say the same thing about me, but she’s not corrupt,’ said Gaetz. ‘And I will work with anyone and everyone to ensure that Congress is not so compromised.’

Members of Congress reportedly traded $788 million worth of securities last year. According to an analysis by the popular stock-trading news site Unusual Whales, many lawmakers beat the stock market on total returns, despite Wall Street suffering its worst year since 2008.