A judge sentenced disgraced former Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez to 11 years in prison on Wednesday, concluding his trial for a ‘long-running bribery and foreign influence scheme of rare gravity.’

The sentence is the harshest ever handed down to a U.S. senator. Breaking down in tears, Menendez pleaded with U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein for mercy in a New York City courtroom. 

‘I have lost everything,’ he said. ‘Other than family, I have lost everything I care about. Every day I am awake is punishment. I am far from a perfect man… in half-century of public service, I have done far more good than bad.’

Before handing down his punishment, Stein said: ‘I take no pleasure in this sentence.’

‘You are quite right about your work. You worked your way up to a senator, to the chair of foreign relations committee,’ Stein told Menendez. ‘You were successful, powerful, stood at apex of political system. All letters are proof. Somewhere along the way, you lost your way.’

Defense attorney Adam Fee told Stein to give Menendez credit for his lifetime of public service, asking for a sentence of no more than eight years. 

‘Despite his decades of service, he is now known more widely as gold bar Bob,’ Fee said.

Prosecutors had requested a 15-year sentence for Menendez, 71, after he was convicted on July 24 on 16 counts of bribery, extortion, conspiracy and obstruction of justice. He is the first U.S. Senator in American history to be convicted of working as a foreign agent. His co-defendants, Wael Hana and Fred Daibes, were also sentenced to 8 years and 7 years respectively.

‘As proven at trial, the defendants engaged, for years, in a corruption and foreign influence scheme of stunning brazenness, breadth, and duration, resulting in exceptionally grave abuses of power at the highest levels of the Legislative Branch of the United States Government,’ prosecutors wrote.

Prior to the announcement of his sentence, Daibes, 67, tearfully told Stein the jury verdict had left him ‘borderline suicidal,’ and requested leniency so that he could care for his 30-year-old autistic son.

Hana told the judge, ‘I am an innocent man.’

‘I never bribed Senator Menendez or asked his office for influence.’

The judge, though, said the jury’s verdict was ‘very, very substantial.’

A third businessman pleaded guilty and testified against Menendez at a trial last year.

Outside the courthouse, Menendez proclaimed his innocence, calling his prosecution a ‘witch hunt’ by the Justice Department. 

‘President Trump is right. This process is political and it’s corrupted to the core. I hope President Trump cleans up the cesspool and restores integrity to the system,’ he said. 

Menendez’ conviction came after a nine-week-long trial. The former Democratic lawmaker was accused of accepting gifts totaling more than $100,000 in gold bars as well as cash.

The disgraced Democrat was accused and convicted of participating in a yearslong bribery scheme involving the governments of Egypt and Qatar. Menendez’s wife, Nadine, who is set to go on trial on March 18, also allegedly participated in the scheme. She is accused of receiving paychecks for a job that did not exist.

The indictment against Menendez came after co-defendant Jose Uribe – who allegedly gifted Nadine a Mercedes convertible – accepted a plea deal and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors. 

‘Menendez, who swore an oath to represent the United States and the state of New Jersey, instead put his high office up for sale in exchange for this hoard of bribes,’ prosecutors wrote ahead of the sentencing.

Menendez, who was charged in 2023, made history in July 2024 when he became the first US senator to be convicted of acting as a foreign agent. His conviction came after a nine-week-long trial. 

Jamie Joseph, Rachel Wolf, Maria Paronich and The Associated Press contributed to this report

DORAL, Fla. — House Republicans have their work cut out for them in the coming weeks, with three fiscal deadlines looming and President Donald Trump pushing for a very active first 100 days of his administration.

Congressional GOP leaders are working on a massive conservative policy overhaul via the reconciliation process. By lowering the threshold for passage in the Senate from 60 votes to a simple 51-seat majority, it allows the party in power to advance their policy goals into law, provided those policies deal with budgetary and other fiscal matters.

‘We want to deliver on all the things that President Trump talked about during the campaign… including no tax on tips, which was one of those early items that the president talked about, but also ensuring no tax increases happen. We can fully fund our border security needs, making sure we build the wall out, that we give more technology and tools to our Border Patrol agents,’ House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., told Fox News Digital.

‘We can produce more energy in America… try to get rid of some of these crazy rules and regulations that add so much cost for no good reason to families.’

Scalise said it would be ‘much more robust’ than Republicans’ last reconciliation bill passed in 2017 – the last time the GOP controlled Congress and the White House.

His optimism comes as congressional Republicans still appear divided over how best to enact their plans. Senate Republicans and some GOP hardliners in the House have argued that trying to pass a bill with border and energy policies first would give Trump a quick win, while allowing more time for more complex issues like taxes.

But House leaders are concerned that, given Republicans last passed two reconciliation bills in one year in the 1990s with much larger majorities, the two-track strategy could allow Trump’s 2017 provisions to expire and raise taxes on millions of families.

‘You have to start somewhere. We’re starting with one package,’ Scalise said. ‘No disagreement on the details of what we’re going to include.’

Meanwhile, lawmakers are also contending with the debt ceiling being reinstated this month after it was temporarily suspended in a bipartisan deal during the Biden administration. At least one projection suggests Congress will have until mid-June or earlier to deal with it or risk financial turmoil that comes with a downgrade in the U.S.’s national credit rating.

And coming on March 14 is the deadline to avert a partial government shutdown, which Congress has extended twice since the end of the previous fiscal year on Oct. 1.

The No. 2 House Republican floated the possibility of combining those latter two deadlines.

‘The Appropriations Committee, which is not directly involved in budget reconciliation, is simultaneously having a negotiation with the Senate on government funding, you know, working with the White House to make sure it meets President Trump’s priorities,’ Scalise said. 

‘I would imagine the debt ceiling could very well be a part of that conversation in that negotiation.’

Scalise spoke with Fox News Digital at the House GOP’s annual retreat, held this year at Trump’s golf club in Doral, Florida.

Lawmakers huddled behind closed doors for three days to hash out a roadmap for grappling with their multiple deadlines and enacting Trump’s agenda.

They also heard from the president himself, as well as Vice President JD Vance.

Trump has on multiple occasions called on Republicans to act on the debt limit to avoid a U.S. credit default. Vance told Republicans on Tuesday that Trump wanted them to do so without giving leverage to Democrats – a weighty task given some GOP hardliners’ opposition to raising or suspending the limit over the U.S.’s $36 trillion national debt.  

House GOP leaders can currently only afford one defection to still pass a bill along party lines.

They’ve been forced to seek Democratic support on government funding multiple times, including most recently in December. 

With no topline agreement reached and roughly 19 days in session before the March 14 deadline to avert a partial government shutdown, it’s becoming increasingly likely that congressional leaders will have to combine all 12 annual appropriations bills into one massive ‘omnibus,’ a move also generally opposed by GOP hardliners.

‘I think we’re getting closer,’ Scalise said of a topline number for fiscal year 2025 spending. ‘The House and Senate were apart by a pretty sizable amount of money. They’re trying to negotiate that down to get a resolution.’

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s former presidential running mate Nicole Shanahan called out various senators by name, warning that she will fund primary challenges against them if they oppose confirming Kennedy to serve as secretary of Health and Human Services.

‘Dear U.S. Senators, Bobby may play nice; I won’t,’ she wrote in a post on X.

In a video, Shanahan said that in 2020 she ‘cut large checks to Chuck Schumer to help Democrats flip two Senate seats in Georgia from red to blue.’ Peach State Democratic Sens. Raphael Warnock and John Ossoff both initially took office after winning runoff contests in early 2021.

Shanahan bluntly warned the two senators, ‘Please know I will be watching your votes very closely. I will make it my personal mission that you lose your seats in the Senate if you vote against the future health of America’s children.’

She then proceeded to call out Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.; Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska; Susan Collins, R-Maine; Bill Cassidy, R-La.; Thom Tillis, R-N.C.; James Lankford, R-Okla.; Cory Booker, D-N.J.; John Fetterman, D-Pa.; Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.; and Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev.

‘While Bobby may be willing to play nice, I won’t. If you vote against him, I will personally fund challengers to primary you in your next election. And I will enlist hundreds of thousands to join me,’ she declared.

Shanahan, who urged people to reach out to their senators to press them to support Kennedy’s nomination, followed up her video with a post tagging each of the 13 senators she had mentioned — the post also included phone numbers.

Kennedy, a Democrat-turned-independent presidential candidate, ultimately dropped out and backed Donald Trump in the 2024 White House contest.

Trump later announced Kennedy as his pick to serve as HHS secretary. 

But the HHS nominee still needs to earn enough support in the Senate to clear the confirmation hurdle.

Shanahan voted for Trump during the 2024 presidential election.

The White House remains committed to freezing federal grants and loans aimed at ‘woke’ programs, Fox News has learned, despite the administration’s move to rescind the original Office of Management and Budget memo — effectively ending the legal battle and any ‘confusion’ for recipients. 

A federal judge on Tuesday paused the Trump administration’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) memo, which aimed to freeze funding to various federal programs.

On Wednesday, the Trump administration rescinded the original memo. 

‘In light of the injunction, OMB has rescinded the memo to end any confusion on federal policy created by the court ruling and the dishonest media coverage,’ White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News on Wednesday. ‘The Executive Orders issued by the President on funding reviews remain in full force and effect and will be rigorously implemented by all agencies and departments.’ 

Leavitt told Fox News that rescinding the memo ‘should effectively end the court case and allow the government to focus on enforcing the President’s orders on controlling federal spending.’ 

‘In the coming weeks and months, more executive action will continue to end the egregious waste of federal funding,’ Leavitt said. 

The memo, sent to federal agencies on Monday, issued a pause on all federal grants and loans aiming to eradicate ‘wokeness’ and the ‘weaponization of government’ to improve government efficiency. 

‘Federal agencies must temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance, and other relevant agency activities that may be implicated by the executive orders, including, but not limited to, financial assistance for foreign aid, nongovernmental organizations, DEI, woke gender ideology, and the green new deal,’ the memo, obtained by Fox Digital, reads. 

The pause was set to take effect at 5 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on Tuesday.

Democrats had criticized the Trump administration’s freeze of federal funds, arguing that President Trump is circumventing Congress and withholding congressionally appropriated funds, violating the Impoundment Control Act. 

U.S. District Judge Loren AliKhan for the District of Columbia, appointed by former President Joe Biden, imposed an administrative stay on Tuesday afternoon, pausing the Trump administration’s action.

The administrative stay pauses the freeze until Monday.

The White House stressed that despite the memo being rescinded, if money coming out of federal agencies is at odds with the president’s executive orders, for example, funding for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs, those funds will still be frozen. 

But programs including Social Security benefits, Medicare, food stamps, welfare benefits and other assistance going directly to individuals will not be impacted under the pause, according to Leavitt. 

Leavitt, during the White House press briefing on Tuesday, described the pause as ‘temporary,’ and noted that the Trump administration has executed other freezes throughout the government, including a regulatory and hiring pause. 

‘It’s incumbent upon this administration to make sure, again, that every penny is being accounted for honestly,’ Leavitt said. 

Additionally, Leavitt said that Trump’s newly created Department of Government Efficiency that aims to eliminate government spending and waste identified $37 million that was about to go to the World Health Organization, along with $50 million to ‘fund condoms in Gaza.’ 

‘That is a preposterous waste of money,’ Leavitt said. 

It didn’t take long for the confirmation hearing of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), to turn contentious as Senate Democrats grilled him.

The verbal fireworks exploded minutes into the Senate Finance Committee hearing on Wednesday, the first of two straight days of congressional confirmation hearings for the controversial vaccine skeptic and environmental crusader who ran for the White House in 2024 before ending his bid and endorsing Trump.

Kennedy repeatedly insisted that he was not ‘anti-vaccine’ and slammed multiple Democrat senators for pushing a ‘dishonest’ narrative against him that he has ‘corrected’ on national television many times. Democrats on the committee pointed to a slew of past comments from the nominee in which he questioned or disparaged COVID shots and other vaccines.

‘The receipts show that Mr. Kennedy has embraced conspiracy theories, quacks, and charlatans, especially when it comes to the safety and efficacy of vaccines. He’s made it his life’s work to sow doubt and discourage parents from getting their kids life-saving vaccines,’ Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the panel, charged in his opening statement.

Moments later, as Kennedy delivered his own opening comments and said ‘news reports have claimed that I am anti-vaccine or anti-industry. I am neither. I am pro-safety,’ a protester shouted out ‘you lie.’

The heckler was led out of the hearing room by Capitol Police, as was a second protester minutes later.

And another protester was spotted in the audience holding a sign reading, ‘Vaccines Save Lives, Not RFK JR.’ 

Democrats on the committee repeatedly pointed to Kennedy’s controversial vaccine views, including his repeated claims in recent years linking vaccines to autism, which have been debunked by scientific research.

They also spotlighted Kennedy’s service for years as chair or chief legal counsel for Children’s Health Defense, the nonprofit organization he founded that has advocated against vaccines and sued the federal government numerous times, including a challenge over the authorization of the COVID vaccine for children.

In his opening statement, which Fox News exclusively obtained ahead of the hearing, Kennedy spotlighted that ‘I believe vaccines play a critical role in healthcare. All of my kids are vaccinated. I’ve written books about vaccines. My first book in 2014, the first line of it is ‘I am not anti-vaccine’ and last line is ‘I am not anti-vaccine.’’

But he quickly faced a grilling from Democrats.

Wyden led off his questioning of Kennedy, the scion of the nation’s most storied political dynasty, by spotlighting a scathing letter from the nominee’s well-known cousin, Caroline Kennedy, which accused him of being a ‘predator’ and urged lawmakers to reject the nomination.

The senator also pointed to past Kennedy vaccine comments in podcasts, including one from 2020 when he said he ‘pay anything’ to be able to go back in time and not vaccinate his kids.

‘Are you lying to Congress today when you say you are pro-vaccine? Or did you lie on all those podcasts?’ Wyden asked.

Pushing back in a very heated exchange, Kennedy claimed that statements he made on podcasts have ‘been repeatedly debunked.’

And he vowed that he would do nothing to prevent Americans from obtaining certain vaccines.

‘I support the measles vaccine. I support the polio vaccine. I will do nothing as HHS Secretary that makes it difficult or discourages people from taking anything,’ Kennedy emphasized.

The next Democrat to question Kennedy, Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado, accused him of peddling half-truths, peddling false statements.’

Benett grew heated as he asked Kennedy about other past comments, asking, ‘Did you say Lyme disease is a highly likely militarily engineered bioweapon?’

‘I probably did say that,’ Kennedy answered.

And Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, who has known Kennedy for decades – dating back to their days as law school students at the University of Virginia, told his friend ‘frankly, you frighten people.’

If confirmed, Kennedy would have control over 18 powerful federal agencies overseeing the nation’s food and health, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The 71-year-old Kennedy launched a long-shot campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination against President Joe Biden in April 2023. But six months later, he switched to an independent run for the White House.

Kennedy made major headlines again last August when he dropped his presidential bid and endorsed Trump. While Kennedy had long identified as a Democrat and repeatedly invoked his late father, former Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, and his late uncle, former President John F. Kennedy – who were both assassinated in the 1960s – Kennedy in recent years built relationships with far-right leaders due in part to his high-profile vaccine skepticism.

Trump announced soon after the November election that he would nominate Kennedy to his Cabinet to run HHS.

In the two months since Trump’s announcement, it’s not just Democrats who’ve raised questions about Kennedy’s confirmation. Social conservative Republicans took issue with his past comments in support of abortion rights.

‘My belief is we should leave it to the woman. We shouldn’t have the government involved, even if it’s full term,’ Kennedy said as he ran for president. 

But since endorsing Trump, Kennedy has walked back his stance on abortion. And in an exchange Wednesday with Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, Kennedy declared ‘I agree with President Trump that every abortion is a tragedy.’

Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, a former two-time Democratic presidential candidate, argued that Kennedy made a ‘major U-turn’ on abortion.

Kennedy was also questioned about how he would reform Medicare and Medicaid, the massive government health care programs used by millions of older, disabled, and low-income Americans.

‘I don’t have a broad proposal for dismantling the program,’ Kennedy said of Medicaid.

And he said that President Trump hadn’t asked him to cut the program but rather ‘asked me to make it better.’

Kennedy, whose outspoken views on big pharma and the food industry have also sparked controversy, vowed that ‘if confirmed, I will do everything in my power to put the health of Americans back on track.’

While Democrats may find common ground with Kennedy’s aim to shift the focus of the agencies he would oversee toward promotion of a healthy lifestyle – including overhauling dietary guidelines and take aim at ultra-processed foods – and getting to the root causes of chronic diseases, Kennedy lamented that they oppose him because he’s Trump’s nominee.

Now they’re against me because anything that President Trump does, any decision he makes, has to be lampooned, derided, discredited, marginalized, vilified,’ Kennedy argued.

With Republicans controlling the Senate by a 53-47 majority, Kennedy can only afford to lose the support of three GOP senators if Democrats unite against his confirmation. During Wednesday’s hearing, no Republicans appeared to oppose the nomination.

Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina appeared to lean into the Democrats’ attacks on Kennedy, asking ‘I got a real quick question for you: Are you a conspiracy theorist?’ 

Kennedy answered that it ‘is a pejorative that’s applied to me mainly to keep me from asking difficult questions of powerful interests.’

GOP Sen. Steve Daines of Montana, a chemical engineer, spotlighted that there are several Republican doctors on the committee.

‘We believe in science. I’m thankful that you do, too,’ Daines said.

Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, a physician who said he had a ‘frank conversation’ with Kennedy about immunizations when they met earlier this month, didn’t ask about vaccines during the committee hearing. Instead, he kept his questions to federal healthcare programs, including Medicare.

Meanwhile, GOP Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin took aim at Democrats on the committee for what he claimed was ‘hostility on the other side… I’m disappointed with it.’

The hearing ended three and a half hours after it began, with Kennedy departing the committee room to cheers from supporters.

The Senate will vote Wednesday on whether to confirm former Rep. Lee Zeldin to head the government’s leading agency on environmental rules and regulations.

President Donald Trump tapped Zeldin, who previously served as a congressman from New York’s 1st Congressional District from 2015 to 2023, to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under his administration. During his tenure in Congress, Zeldin, an Army Reserve lieutenant colonel, launched a campaign for governor in New York, when he trailed only five percentage points in the largely Democratic state.

Zeldin underwent a confirmation hearing earlier this month, when he was questioned on climate change by members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

The Senate held a cloture vote for Zeldin on Wednesday afternoon, which ended the debate over his nomination. The chamber will now proceed to a final floor vote. 

If confirmed on Wednesday, Zeldin will head the agency that surveys environmental issues, provides assistance to wide-ranging environmental projects, and establishes rules that align with the administration’s views on environmental protection and climate change. 

During his confirmation hearing, Zeldin pledged that if confirmed, he would ‘foster a collaborative culture within the agency, supporting career staff who have dedicated themselves to this mission. I strongly believe we have a moral responsibility to be good stewards of our environment for generations to come.’

The latest round of voting comes as Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., continues to advance the confirmation process to push through Trump’s Cabinet nominees.

President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Commerce Department, Howard Lutnick, told senators the argument that tariffs cause inflation is ‘nonsense’ during a confirmation hearing on Wednesday.

‘The two top countries with tariffs, India and China, do have the most tariffs and no inflation,’ Lutnick noted. 

‘A particular product’s price may go up,’ he conceded, while arguing that levies would not cause broad inflation. ‘It is just nonsense to say that tariffs cause inflation. It’s nonsense.’ 

Lutnick testified before members of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee ahead of an impending committee and full Senate floor vote to confirm him to the Cabinet position. 

Inflation, which ticked as high as 9.1% in June 2022 under the Biden administration, became a defining issue in the 2024 election as Trump promised to bring household prices back down. 

Lutnick also said he prefers ‘across-the-board’ tariffs on a ‘country-by-country’ basis, rather than ones aimed at particular sectors or products. 

‘I think when you pick one product in Mexico, they’ll pick one product. You know, we pick avocados, they pick white corn, we pick tomatoes, they pick yellow corn. All you’re doing is picking on farmers.’

‘Let America make it more fair. We are treated horribly by the global trading environment. They all have higher tariffs, non-tariff trade barriers and subsidies. They treat us poorly. We need to be treated better,’ Lutnick went on. ‘We can use tariffs to create reciprocity.’

He said Trump, a longtime friend, was of a ‘like mind’ that tariffs need to be simple. ‘The steel and aluminum had 560,000 applications for exclusions,’ said Lutnick. ‘It just seems that’s too many.’ 

Trump recently signed an executive order directing the Commerce Department and the Office of the US Trade Representative to conduct a review of U.S. trade policy and tariff models, with a focus on China. Trump has said he intends to impose a 25% tariff on goods from Canada and Mexico on Feb. 1 amid concerns of mass migration and drug trafficking. He also said he would increase tariffs on China by 10%. 

Lutnick also sounded off about Europe treating the U.S. industry unfairly. 

I think our farmers and ranchers and fishermen are treated with disrespect overseas,’ he said.

‘Europe, for example, comes up with all these sort of policies, that our ranchers can’t sell steak. If you saw European steer and an American steer, it’s laughable. The American steers are three times this size. The steaks are so much more beautiful.

‘But they make up this nonsensical set of rules so that our ranchers can’t sell there.’ 

Lutnick said Chinese tariffs ‘should be the highest.’ 

‘But the fact that we Americans cannot sell an American car in Europe is just wrong. And it needs to be fixed,’ he said,

‘While they’re an ally, they are taking advantage of us and disrespecting us. And I would like that to end.’ 

His comments echoed those of Trump last week. 

‘The European Union is very, very bad to us,’ he said. ‘So they’re going to be in for tariffs. It’s the only way… you’re going to get fairness.’

The governments of Mexico, Canada and nations in Europe have prepared a list of their own U.S. imports that will face tariffs in a tit-for-tat trade war if Trump follows through on taxing their own goods as they’re brought into the U.S. 

Kaja Kallas, the European Union’s top diplomat, said Monday that European nations should unite to use their collective economic force against the U.S. if needed. 

‘As the United States shifts to a more transactional approach, Europe needs to close ranks,’ she said at a news conference in Brussels. ‘Europe is an economic heavyweight and geopolitical partner.’

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., was blasted by conservatives on social media on Wednesday over his contentious line of questioning toward President Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary nominee, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

‘Frankly, you frighten people,’ Whitehouse told Kennedy while seemingly linking Kennedy’s skepticism of some vaccines to the first case of measles in Rhode Island since 2013. 

Americans are going to need to hear a clear and trustworthy recantation of what you have said on vaccinations, including a promise from you never to say vaccines aren’t medically safe when they, in fact, are, and making indisputably clear that you support mandatory vaccinations against diseases where that will keep people safe,’ Whitehouse said. ‘You’re in that hole pretty deep.’

Whitehouse, who attended law school with Kennedy where the two were friends, used the majority of his time to list concerns about Kennedy, allowing the HHS hopeful a small window at the end to address the line of questioning.

Whitehouse’s comments quickly drew criticism from conservatives on social media. 

‘Sen. Whitehouse (D-RI) beginning his confirmation ‘questioning’ of RFK Jr. by saying ‘I’m very experienced, so you’re just going to have to listen,’  then talking for 7 minutes nonstop is such a perfect picture of why Democrats are failing around the nation right now,’ Daily Signal columnist Tony Kinnett posted on X. 

‘You know what would be good?’ columnist John Podhortez posted on X. ‘Sheldon Whitehouse going away forever to an island. And not Rhode Island, which isn’t an island. More like St. Helena.’

‘Whitehouse delivers a droning monologue then tells RFK he’s out of time, can respond in writing,’ National Review senior writer Dan McLaughlin posted on X. 

‘What a jacka–,’ Twitchy.com editor Samantha Janney posted on X. ‘RFK Jr. should ask Sheldon about his membership at multiple whites-only clubs.’

Fox News Digital reached out to Whitehouse’s office for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

Opposition to Kennedy’s nomination has been fierce, with advocacy groups running ad campaigns urging senators to vote against his confirmation mainly due to his past skepticism of some vaccines. 

‘I want to make sure the Committee is clear about a few things. News reports have claimed that I am anti-vaccine or anti-industry. Well, I am neither; I am pro-safety,’ Kennedy said in his opening statement in front of the Senate Finance Committee.