The customer reviews of these gourmand scents do not disappoint. 

​The customer reviews of these gourmand scents do not disappoint. 

A federal judge denied a request from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to reconsider his order calling for the Trump administration “to take all immediate steps” to return a Guatemalan deportee to the U.S. 

The decision by U.S. District Court Judge Brian Murphy in Massachusetts comes after he issued a ruling last week saying that the removal of the individual – identified only as O.C.G. – “lacked due process.”

“In general, this case presents no special facts or legal circumstances, only the banal horror of a man being wrongfully loaded onto a bus and sent back to a country where he was allegedly just raped and kidnapped,” Murphy wrote Friday.

“Defendants are hereby ORDERED to take all immediate steps, including coordinating with Plaintiffs’ counsel, to facilitate the return of O.C.G. to the United States,” he added. 

US JUDGE ACCUSES TRUMP ADMIN OF ‘MANUFACTURING CHAOS’ IN SOUTH SUDAN DEPORTATIONS, ESCALATING FEUD 

In the filing, Murphy described O.C.G. as a native and citizen of Guatemala who first entered the U.S. “without proper authorization” in March 2024.  

“O.C.G. alleges that he presented himself for asylum at the border and was denied an interview. In any event, he was deported shortly thereafter to Guatemala.  In April 2024, O.C.G. decided to try again and crossed Mexico on his way to the United States. There, he was raped and held hostage until a family member paid ransom,” the filing said.

READ THE JUDGE’S ORDER – APP USERS, CLICK HERE:

“In May 2024, O.C.G. again arrived at the United States and was arrested by Border Patrol. This time, however, he was referred to an asylum officer after expressing fear of return to Guatemala. That officer determined that O.C.G. had a credible fear of persecution or torture and initiated withholding-only proceedings, where an immigration judge agreed and determined that it was more likely than not that O.C.G. would be persecuted or tortured if sent back to Guatemala. Accordingly, O.C.G. was granted withholding of removal from Guatemala,” it continued. 

“Two days after being granted withholding of removal, and with no advanced warning, O.C.G. was put on a bus and sent to Mexico. According to O.C.G., he begged the officers to let him call his attorney but was refused,” according to the filing. 

NY AG, 19 OTHERS FILE 2 LAWSUITS AGAINST TRUMP ADMIN, ALLEGING FEDERAL MONEY TIED TO IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT 

“In Mexico, O.C.G. was given the option of being detained indefinitely while trying to obtain asylum there — a country where he has consistently maintained that he faces a significant risk of violence — or of being sent back to Guatemala — the very country from which an immigration judge awarded him withholding from removal due to the risk of persecution that he faced.  O.C.G. chose Guatemala. He remains there today,” Murphy said in the filing. 

“Just yesterday, O.C.G. submitted a declaration informing the Court of his current status. He reports living in constant fear of his attackers, being unable to leave the place where he is staying, not being able to rely on the police to protect him, and not being able to see his mother for fear of exposing her to violence, among other hardships,” Murphy also wrote. 

DHS said in response to the decision that “America’s asylum system was never intended to be used as a de facto amnesty program or a catch-all, get-out-of-deportation-free card.  

“The person in question was an illegally present alien who was granted withholding of removal to Guatemala. He was instead removed to Mexico, a safe third option for him, pending his asylum claim. Yet, this federal activist judge is ordering us to bring him back, so he can have an opportunity to prove why he should be granted asylum to a country that he has had no past connection to,” the department wrote on X in response to a news article about Murphy’s decision. 

“The Trump administration is committed to returning our asylum system to its original intent,” it declared. 

MARYLAND REP. IVEY BACK FROM EL SALVADOR AFTER FAILING TO MEET KILMAR ABREGO GARCIA 

The order from Murphy to return O.C.G. came in response to a class action lawsuit filed on behalf of him and three other plaintiffs, identified as immigrants from Cuba, Ecuador and Honduras who are residents of Massachusetts and Texas. 

“Plaintiffs and proposed class members are noncitizens with final removal orders resulting from proceedings in which they have been notified that they could be deported to a designated country of removal (usually their country of origin) and, in some cases, an alternative country of removal (usually a country of which they are a citizen or in which they hold status) and had an opportunity to contest removal to the designated country based on a claim of fear,” read a complaint filed in March. 

“They bring this class action to challenge the policy or practice of the Department of Homeland Security of deporting, or seeking to deport, them to a third country — a country never designated for removal — without first providing them with notice or opportunity to contest removal on the basis that they have a fear of persecution, torture, and even death if deported to that third country,” the complaint added. 

“DHS’ policy or practice of failing to afford these basic, minimal protections violates the Immigration and Nationality Act, the Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act of 1998, the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment, and the treaty obligations of the United States,” it also said.

Attorneys representing the four plaintiffs did not immediately respond Wednesday to requests for comment from Fox News Digital.

The eldest daughter of longtime Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire is taking a step to follow in her mother’s political footsteps.

Stefany Shaheen on Wednesday declared her candidacy for the U.S. House in the open seat race in New Hampshire’s competitive 1st Congressional District.

The younger Shaheen wasted no time in targeting President Donald Trump, Elon Musk, who has been steering Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr, and Republicans in Congress.

In a campaign launch video, Shaheen spotlighted her efforts as a healthcare advocate for her daughter Elle, who has Type 1 diabetes. Shaheen said the diagnosis turned her “into a fierce fighter for medical research and innovation to help Elle and millions like her.”

MARINE VET JUMPS INTO RACE FOR KEY HOUSE SEAT IN 2026 BATTLE FOR MAJORITY

“So, when I see Donald Trump crushing medical research and slashing health care for kids, seniors and veterans to give tax breaks to billionaires and corporations, I have to fight back. That’s why I’m running for Congress,” Shaheen said in a statement.. “No one fights harder than a mom for her kids, and that’s how I will fight for your family, too. I’ll never give up.” 

Shaheen, in her video, also charged that Musk has been “chasing out our best scientists and doctors” and claimed that Kennedy is “allowing measles to run rampant because he believes in conspiracy theories instead of proven vaccines.”

The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), the House GOP’s campaign arm, took aim at Shaheen over her famous family’s political pedigree.

THIS LONGTIME DEMOCRATIC SENATOR IS NOT RUNNING FOR RE-ELECTION IN 2026

“Nepo baby Stefany Shaheen is a DC elitist who is committed to the Democrats’ radical agenda that makes life more expensive and less safe. Granite Staters will resoundingly reject her and her out of touch policies,” NRCC spokeswoman Maureen O’Toole argued in a statement to Fox News.

Shaheen is running for the seat currently held by four-term Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas, who is campaigning to succeed the elder Shaheen, the first woman in U.S. history to be elected both as a governor and a U.S. senator.

The 78-year-old senator announced in March that she would not seek re-election to the Senate in 2026.

The move by the younger Shaheen, who previously served on the Portsmouth City Council and the Portsmouth Police Commission, sets up a likely blockbuster primary with Maura Sullivan, a New Hampshire Democratic Party vice chair. Sullivan is also a Marine veteran who served in the Iraq War and was the 2018 Democratic primary runner-up to Pappas in the 1st District.

Sullivan launched a congressional campaign last month.

New Hampshire’s 1st District, which covers the eastern half of New England’s only battleground state and includes the cities of Manchester and Portsmouth, was once one of the nation’s premiere swing congressional districts. 

Republicans are aiming to flip the seat in next year’s midterm election, and the race is likely to be competitive and expensive. However, no Republican has won the district since 2014.

In the race for the GOP congressional nomination, facilities management executive Chris Bright, who ran unsuccessfully in 2024 for the seat, has declared his candidacy.

Former state Sen. Russell Prescott, the 2024 nominee who lost to Pappas, is mulling another run for Congress.

So are New Hampshire GOP Vice Chair Hollie Noveletsky and Joe Kelly Levasseur, who, along with Bright, came in behind Prescott in the 2024 GOP primary. State Attorney General John Formella is also thought to be a possible contender for the GOP nomination.

FIRST ON FOX: A pair of House Republicans are urging Secretary Marco Rubio to punish Iraq with sanctions for its “complete subjugation” by Iran as part of the U.S.’s “maximum pressure” policy toward Tehran. 

“More than 4,400 American service members sacrificed their lives since the start of the Iraq War, yet today, Iraq stands as nothing more than a puppet of Tehran,” Reps. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., and Greg Steube, R-Fla., wrote in a letter to the secretary of state and interim national security advisor. 

The letter laid blame on the Obama administration, arguing former President Barack Obama and his Iraq envoy Brett McGurk “propped up” Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose leadership was marred by brutal political crackdowns and led to the rise of ISIS. 

“The Obama administration doubled down on its mistakes, relying on Iranian-backed militias to fight ISIS,” the letter read. “The consequences of those failed decisions are now undeniable: Iran-backed forces wield unchecked power over Iraq’s government and security services.”

TRUMP ADMIN ENDS WAIVER ALLOWING IRAQ TO BUY IRANIAN ELECTRICITY AS PART OF ‘MAXIMUM PRESSURE’ CAMPAIGN

Since 2015, the U.S. has offered Iraq’s forces $1.25 billion in foreign military financing, in addition to billions more for the interior ministry and defense ministry. 

Iran’s influence over Iraq was on full display when, in 2021, Iraq issued an arrest warrant for President Donald Trump for the killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, even as the U.S. still has 2,500 forces on the ground in Iraq to partner with local forces and fight ISIS. 

Steube and Wilson called on the U.S. to cut all foreign aid to Iraq until it comes out from under Iran’s influence. 

The letter calls for the U.S. to sanction Iraq’s importation of Iranian gas. Currently, only payment for the gas is under sanction, meaning Iran gives fuel to Iraq without charge but expects repayment in other ways. The Trump administration ended a waiver that allowed Iraq to buy Iranian electricity in March. 

GOP REP. JOE WILSON TRUMPETS ‘MAKE IRAQ GREAT AGAIN!’ MESSAGE

The lawmakers called for designating the Popular Mobilization Forces, an Iranian-backed paramilitary group operating in Iraq, and its financial backers as foreign terrorist groups and sanctioning Iraq’s state banks that financially support Iran. It also called for sanctions on Iraq’s political figures that allow Iranian influence to flourish. 

“We urge you to take immediate action to implement these necessary policies and ensure that American resources are no longer used to prop up Iran’s control over Iraq.”

The U.S. initially invaded Iraq in 2003, toppling Saddam Hussein’s regime and drawing down its troop presence from wartime levels in 2007 and leaving altogether in 2011, before returning in 2014 at the head of the coalition to fight the Islamic State.

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Other nations, including Germany, France, Spain and Italy, also contribute hundreds of troops to the coalition.

In September, reports emerged that the Biden administration was working on a plan to draw down the U.S. troop presence in Iraq within the year, but no set-in-stone decision was made. 

Fox News Digital reached out to the State Department and the Iraqi Embassy for comment. 

Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced new visa restrictions the Trump administration is implementing against foreign authorities who it says are “complicit” in censoring Americans. 

“For too long, Americans have been fined, harassed, and even charged by foreign authorities for exercising their free speech rights,” Rubio wrote on X. “Today, I am announcing a new visa restriction policy that will apply to foreign officials and persons who are complicit in censoring Americans. Free speech is essential to the American way of life – a birthright over which foreign governments have no authority.” 

TRUMP ADMIN ASKING FEDERAL AGENCIES TO CANCEL REMAINING HARVARD CONTRACTS

“Foreigners who work to undermine the rights of Americans should not enjoy the privilege of traveling to our country,” America’s top diplomat added. “Whether in Latin America, Europe, or elsewhere, the days of passive treatment for those who work to undermine the rights of Americans are over.”

The United States has long condemned censorship and repression by the Chinese Communist Party, Russia, and the Iranian and Cuban regimes, but the Trump administration more recently has added criticism against allies in the European Union. 

Vice President JD Vance argued that the EU’s Digital Services Act could effectively export European-style censorship to the U.S. through pressure against American tech companies. 

In February, Vance accused European leaders at the Munich Security Conference of suppressing dissenting opinions by categorizing those views as “misinformation” and “disinformation.” 

The vice president specifically cited the United Kingdom’s prosecution over silent prayer outside an abortion clinic, the annulment of the Romanian 2024 presidential election results over alleged foreign interference, the conviction of a Christian activist in Sweden for burning a Quran and Germany policing anti-feminist views online. 

“What I worry about is the threat from within—the retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values,” Vance said at the time. 

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

Politics

Bringing Global Conflict Home

A country whose citizens are at each other’s throats is unlikely to solve the world’s problems.

(MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)

Back in 1994, then Vice President Al Gore was giving a speech in Milwaukee when he mistranslated the national motto “E pluribus unum” as “Out of one, many.”

“You all share the American belief that there is strength in all our differences,” Gore told the local Institute of World Affairs. This was likely an accurate description of the assembled crowd at such a gathering as far back as the 1990s, though he got the national motto exactly backwards—it is actually “Out of many, one.”

While you can make an argument that is proof even our politicians’ gaffes were smarter 30 years ago, it does speak to the differing answers Americans have always given as to how it was possible to forge a nation out of disparate elements. 

There are various answers to this question, many of which don’t comport well with the multiculturalist ideology to which Gore was paying lip service. There is real diversity, and then there is the diversity, equity, and inclusion variety. 

But from settlers to immigrants, many who became Americans came here to escape the wars and hatreds of the old world. In the 20th century, that remained the motivation for any number of people even as the countries of origin became more diverse. No country, not even one as great as the United States, has a limitless capacity for this sort of thing. This is among the reasons open borders don’t work, regardless of whether family values stop at the Rio Grande.

Limiting immigration is one way to guard against bringing home the conflicts some immigrants themselves come here to escape. But this is not a panacea when homegrown ideologies lead people to want to join these fights without any meaningful personal or ancestral connection to them.

Elias Rodriguez, the alleged shooter in last week’s attack outside an American Jewish Committee event outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. that left two Israeli embassy staffers dead, appears to be one such case. The suspect is from Chicago. A longtime left-wing activist, his politics might have predicted where his sympathies might lie in the war in Gaza, but not necessarily a proclivity to take up arms in that conflict or do violence to victims who can hardly be considered combatants. 

There are plenty of reasons for Americans to care deeply about the victims of Hamas in the October 7 attacks of 2023, the civilian population of Gaza, Ukrainians being bombed by the Russians, or white farmers in South Africa. We are a big and rich country. Our taxpayer dollars are often involved to varying degrees, sometimes on multiple sides. The policeman of the world has many beats, some better policed than others.

What ought to be avoided is recreating the climate of hatred that exists in so many places overseas here in our own country. This is an inevitable pitfall of taking on so many of these conflicts as our own, especially at a time when we are so deeply polarized ourselves.

American citizens now often report cutting off their families over voting differences and disagreements on issues that have actually divided the country for generations. The diversity of opinion that exists in our land often threatens to tear it apart, much less the diversity of opinion that exists throughout the whole world. 

If you cannot have dinner with your uncle who favors different marginal tax rates or spending levels, you may not be the best positioned to achieve a lasting peace in the Holy Land.

This is especially true when we view longstanding religious and ethnic tensions abroad through the prism of secular American ideologies, which have limited explanatory power not because they have nothing to teach us—there is growing investment in Western civilization as a whole on the right and a certain empathy that animates corners of the left—but because they are far from the whole story. If you really want to understand the lands whence your great-grandparents came and the people who live there now, intersectionality can really only get you so far.

There is also something to be said for the American example, which has the potential to go further than our interventions. It is extremely difficult for us to exhort others to lay down their arms when we begin to take them up against each other, often in the name of their causes. 

The post Bringing Global Conflict Home appeared first on The American Conservative.

This is how you should take your sips and drams. 

​This is how you should take your sips and drams. 

Gov. Ron DeSantis urged House Republicans to take note of Florida’s successful implementation of “DOGE”-type governance and get moving on slashing waste, fraud and abuse identified by the executive branch organization.

“Elon Musk took massive incoming – including attacks on his companies as well as personal smears, to lead the effort on DOGE,” DeSantis posted on X.

“He became public enemy #1 of legacy media around the world. To see Republicans in Congress cast aside any meaningful spending reductions (and, in fact, fully fund things like USAID) is demoralizing and represents a betrayal of the voters who elected them,” the Republican said on Tuesday.

DeSantis had reposted a comment from former government scientist Matt van Swol, who claimed congressional Republicans have not done enough to go to bat for DOGE.

WINNERS, LOSERS AND GRAB-BAGS FROM HOUSE GOP’S NARROW PASSAGE OF BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL

“DOGE is literally one of the most popular government initiatives in history. 73% of Americans say they support cutting government waste. Trump brought in the smartest man on earth to do it… …the Left destroyed Elon for it …the GOP won’t vote on it I can’t believe this,” van Swol said in the shared message.

In remarks Tuesday, DeSantis expounded upon his concerns, saying that Florida’s executive branch has successfully implemented DOGE-type policies in the state, increasing affordability, lowering taxes and ridding Tallahassee of waste and fraud.

He said Florida has been a state for 180 years, and it was his own administration who reportedly paid down 41% of its accumulated debt to-date. 

DeSantis said the average Floridian’s share of the state debt is $400, while federally, their onus is about $105,000.

The governor noted how Musk stuck his neck out for DOGE and saw his car dealerships “firebombed” and how the media “smearing him relentlessly because he basically said, look, we can’t keep doing this…”

“And yet, we have a Republican Congress, and to this day, we’re in the end of May, past Memorial Day, and not one cent in DOGE cuts have been implemented by the Congress,” the one-time congressman said.

DEMS CALL BUDGET BILL ‘BUREAUCRATIC WATER TORTURE’ AS GOP ‘GLAD TO HAVE THE BALL IN OUR COURT’

“That’s one of the reasons why we need a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It’s another reason why we need term limits for members of Congress. But I think what you’ve seen with how, and I kind of said this early on, that DOGE and Elon were on a collision course with the swamp.”

Libertarian-minded Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., had lodged a similar complaint – claiming that rescission votes to act on DOGE’s proposed cuts were “cancelled” earlier in May – but a top aide to House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., disputed the claim. 

“No votes on rescissions were cancelled this week. The Speaker has repeatedly expressed his commitment to save taxpayer funds via the rescissions process,” wrote press secretary Athina Lawson.

“Under law, this process requires a special message to Congress detailing proposed rescissions before Congress can act.”

House Republicans could not include any DOGE cuts in the “big beautiful bill” because, in order to pass the Senate, the bill could only deal with statutorily “mandatory” spending concerns.

The rules of Senate Reconciliation preclude that move as well.

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The two options House Republicans have are to wait for a formal rescission request for a cut or cuts from Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought – a Trump appointee – and take that up within 45 days, or try to pass separate legislation themselves through the appropriations process.

The issue with the latter is that legislation independent of a request originating from the executive branch would require 60 votes – while a rescission request only requires a simple majority.

Republicans currently hold 53 seats in the Senate. Two independents – Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Angus King, Jr. of Maine – caucus with Democrats.

However, Republicans have had luck putting Democrats in a bind via the appropriations process, as the last passage of the typically massive bills led to members of that party turning on its leader – Sen. Charles Schumer of New York – for ultimately voting to fund the government earlier this year.

Fox News Digital reached out to DeSantis and Johnson for comment.

A Texas sheriff, whose county shares 54 miles of the U.S. southern border with Mexico, told Fox News Digital he has seen a “dramatic decline” in illegal migrant crossings since President Donald Trump took office, specifically, a sharp decrease in the last two weeks. 

“Since President Trump took over, we have seen a continued decline in apprehensions,” Terrell County Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland told Fox. “This past two-week period, we should have been busier because it coincides with the full moon cycle, that’s usually when we see more activity in our area.”

ALLEGED HUMAN SMUGGLERS ARRESTED IN TEXAS AFTER HIDING MIGRANTS INSIDE HOLLOWED HAY BALES

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) revealed earlier this month that April year-over-year apprehensions at the border were down 93%. CBP reported 129,000 apprehensions in April 2024 under the Biden administration, compared to 8,383 this past month under Trump. 

“You know, during the Biden administration, we saw, just like the rest of the U.S.-Mexico border, record levels of crossings and gotaways in our county,” Cleveland explained. “We also saw record levels of deaths from people trying to enter the United States. So that was definitely a challenge for us when you talk about the 10th largest county in the state of Texas, just over 2300 square miles, 54 miles of river.”

Trump border czar Tom Homan weighed in on the dramatic decrease in illegal crossings, telling Fox News Digital last week that the U.S. border “is the most secure in the nation’s history.”

TRUMP SANCTIONS ARE ‘FULL-FRONTAL ASSAULT’ ON ORGANIZED CRIME AT THE BORDER, EXPERT SAYS

“The way we did it, that we got a president in the White House, a strong president, who simply ruled a lot of [Executive Orders], the same [Executive Orders] that were proved effective in Trump 45, remain in Mexico, third state country agreements, ending catch and release, and continue building border barriers,” Homan told Fox.

Cleveland’s comments come days after a San Diego immigrant center shut down due to an “unprecedented decrease in illegal crossings this year.”

“In 3/2025, San Diego Sector arrested 1,199 illegal aliens with an average of 38 per day. This was a 186% drop compared to 3/2024,” the U.S. Border Patrol San Diego Sector posted to X on Sunday. 

ICE BEGINS NEW, NATIONWIDE EFFORT TO ARREST ILLEGAL ALIENS AT IMMIGRATION HEARINGS

Cleveland noted there might be additional facility closures if illegal crossing numbers continue to plummet. 

“As the border activity becomes slower and we see less and less crossings, we’re starting to see Border Patrol close more of these south side of facilities,” the Texas sheriff added. “We don’t have any out here in our area of West Texas. The closest one we had was down in Eagle Pass.”

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“There’s no reason to spend that money to keep those open, and they can definitely use that money in other parts of the border.”

FIRST ON FOX: A pro-energy group is renewing its call for an investigation into over half a dozen Biden administration executive actions related to climate that it believes should be deemed null and void due to them being signed by an autopen without any public comment from former President Joe Biden confirming his knowledge of them. 

Power the Future, a nonprofit organization that advocates for American energy jobs, reviewed eight Biden executive orders that it says were significant shifts in domestic energy policy and said it found no evidence of the president speaking about any of them publicly, raising concerns that the orders were signed by autopen and that he was not aware of them. 

“These are not obscure bureaucratic memos; these were foundational shifts in American energy policy, yet not once did Joe Biden speak about them publicly,” Daniel Turner, founder and executive director of Power The Future, told Fox News Digital. 

The executive orders reviewed by Power the Future include an Arctic drilling ban in 2023, a 2021 executive order committing the federal government to net-zero emissions by 2050, an executive order mandating “clean energy” AI centers and an offshore drilling ban executive order shortly before leaving office in 2025. 

PRO-ENERGY GROUP URGES AG BONDI TO PROBE BIDEN’S AUTOPEN ON CRUCIAL DECISIONS THAT DEVASTATED INDUSTRY

Finding no evidence of Biden publicly speaking about the executive orders on climate, Power the Future sent letters this week to the DOJ, EPA, DOI, DOE, along with the House and Senate Oversight Committees, calling for an investigation to determine who made the decisions, drafted the executive orders and ultimately signed them. 

“In light of the growing evidence that actions purportedly taken by the former president may not have been approved or signed by him, but instead promulgated by a small coterie of advisers in his name without his knowledge or over his signature using an ‘autopen,’ the need for congressional access to information has grown in importance with these revelations,” the letter to GOP House Oversight Chair James Comer states. 

“Congress deserves to know how or whether these executive actions were authorized, and whether the former President was aware of such orders before they were implemented by the federal bureaucracy. Were these actions taken on behalf of the president and purporting to execute his authority undertaken with the president’s knowledge and approach? It appears incumbent upon Congress to inquire, about all parties involved in these actions, who instructed them to do what, when.”

WHAT IS AN AUTOPEN? THE SIGNING DEVICE AT THE HEART OF TRUMP’S ATTACKS ON BIDEN PARDONS

Fox News Digital reached out to Biden’s office for comment but did not hear back by press time.

The presidential autopen has been a topic of conversation with Republicans in recent weeks and months as questions continue about Biden’s mental acuity during his presidency, particularly the last few years, which have faced increased scrutiny after the release of Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson’s book “Original Sin.”

“Power The Future remains concerned that key policies of major economic and national security significance directed by the White House during the Biden administration may have been undertaken without presidential awareness and approval, but perhaps instead by a small coterie of staff,” the letter states.

“Although this likelihood has become more apparent by claims made in a recent book titled Original Sin, those claims merely support information that had already emerged.”

An autopen is a device that physically holds a pen and is programmed to replicate a person’s signature. The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel determined in 2005 that the president is permitted to use an autopen to sign bills into law, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit issued a ruling in February that said the absence of “a writing does not equate to proof that a commutation did not occur.”

In March, President Donald Trump claimed that Biden’s pardons of lawmakers who served on the House Select Committee to investigate the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, and others, are “VOID,” alleging that they had been signed via an autopen and that Biden did not even know about them.

DAVID MARCUS: OLD MAN BIDEN’S AUTOPEN PARDONS SHOULD BE NULL AND VOID

Despite Trump’s concerns over the validity of Biden’s pardons due to the alleged use of an autopen, constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley told Fox News Digital that the odds of successfully legally challenging them in court are “vanishingly low.” 

“Presidents are allowed to use the autopen, and courts will not presume a dead-hand conspiracy,” Turley said. 

Power the Future’s letter references House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., who in January shared that Biden, during a meeting, appeared to forget that he signed an order to pause LNG exports.

A report published by an arm of the Heritage Foundation claimed that the majority of official documents signed by Biden were allegedly an autopen signature.

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“During the Biden administration, hundreds of billions of dollars were funneled towards pet green projects, while the American fossil fuels industry was punished, and there is no evidence that Biden ordered it, directed it, or was even aware it was happening in his name,” Turner told Fox News Digital, adding that the American people “deserve to know” who was signing the executive orders “behind closed doors.”

“This autopen scandal is evidence that these green EOs are invalid, and the instigators should be thoroughly investigated by the DOJ for violating the trust of the American people and perpetuating a great fraud on the nation.”

Fox News Digital’s Diana Stancy contributed to this report.