Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy extended an offer to Former President Trump to visit Ukraine and even take him to the front lines, during his appearance Saturday at the Munich Security Conference. 

‘If Mr. Trump will come, I am ready even to go with him to the front line,’ Zelenskkyy said on Saturday, followed by applause from the audience. 

‘I think if we are in dialogue how to finish the war, we have to demonstrate people who are decision-makers, what does it mean — the real war. Not on Instagram — the real war,’ he continued. 

Zelenskyy noted that he had extended this same offer to Trump before, but that the visit ultimately depended on Trump. 

‘I invited him publicly but it depends on his wishes,’ Zelenskyy stated. 

Zelenskyy also commented that the invitation was open to candidates and officials in both parties, stating he was a proponent of bipartisan support. 

Trump, the current GOP frontrunner, has been vocal in his stance against sending additional aid to Ukraine. Just this past week, Trump called on Republicans to block a $95 billion package that would provide aid to both Ukraine and Israel. 

The White House recently criticized the former President’s remarks after a campaign speech in Conway, South Carolina where Trump encouraged Russia to do ‘whatever the hell they want’ to NATO members that did not meet spending guidelines on defense, calling them ‘appalling and unhinged.’

‘NATO was busted until I came along,’ Trump said during the speech. ‘I said, ‘Everybody’s gonna pay.’ They said, ‘Well, if we don’t pay, are you still going to protect us?’ I said, ‘Absolutely not.’ They couldn’t believe the answer.’

Zelenskky’s appearance at the Munich Security Conference comes as Russia’s war on Ukraine nears its second anniversary this month. Zelenskyy spoke on an ‘artificial deficit’ in ammunition as well as continued support from the international community. 

Zelenskyy also stood alongside Vice President Kamala Harris during a joint press conference where the Vice President pledged continued U.S. support of Ukraine.

Fox News’ Anders Hagstrom and Landon Mion contributed to this report. 

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito temporarily halted the Boy Scouts of America’s $2.46 billion settlement Friday following decades of sexual abuse claims after a group of claimants appealed. 

Alito issued the stay ‘pending further order of the undersigned or of the Court.’ The stay gives the court additional time to decide a February 9 request by the 144 abuse claimants seeking to block the settlement from moving forward. 

The claimants are a small group of the 82,000 who filed claims for payment in the Boy Scouts of America’s bankruptcy. They previously asked the Court to halt the organization’s bankruptcy settlement, arguing that the settlement unlawfully prevents them from pursuing lawsuits against other organizations that are not bankrupt, including churches that ran scouting programs and local Boy Scout councils. 

Retired bankruptcy judge Barbara Houser, the trustee in charge of administering the Boy Scouts settlement, said the order will suspend all work on the settlement, including ‘evaluating claims and mailing checks to abuse survivors,’ according to Reuters. More than 3,000 men have already been paid nearly $8 million by the settlement trust. 

‘This is an administrative stay only and is not a decision on the merits of the plaintiffs’ application for a stay of the plan,’ the Boy Scouts of America told Fox News Digital in a statement. 

‘As BSA’s brief in opposition to the stay application explained to the Court, the BSA plan has already been effective for ten months and will fully compensate all Scouting-abuse survivors. Staying that plan now would inflict severe harm on both the Scouting movement and Scouting-abuse survivors, many of whom have already waited decades for compensation and emotional closure,’ the organization said. ‘We look forward to the Court’s ruling soon on the stay application. We hope the Court will swiftly deny the application and permit the BSA plan’s settlement trustee to resume her work compensating survivors.’

‘They’ve waited a long time to be able to bring claims for their abuse in Scouting,’ Gillion Dumas, one of the lawyers whose firm is currently representing 69 of the claimants, told Fox News Digital. ‘They appealed the Boy Scout bankruptcy because the plan takes away their right to sue sponsoring organizations and local Boy Scout councils – organizations that caused their abuse and are not bankrupt. 

These claimants are excited about the Court’s order. While the order is temporary, it shows that the Supreme Court takes their appeal seriously,’ Dumas said. 

John Reeves, an attorney representing the claimants, told Fox News Digital that temporary stays such as the one issued by Alito only occur ‘in the most extraordinary of circumstances,’ thus demonstrating ‘how seriously he and the other justices are taking the claimants’ argument.’ 

‘Only the national Boy Scouts of America organization has declared bankruptcy, but its bankruptcy plan also discharges non-bankrupt Local Councils and Chartered Organizations from civil liability,’ Reeves said. ‘This is a blatant violation of the claimants’ due process rights. We look forward to further litigating this issue before the Court, and are cautiously optimistic that it will ultimately grant us a full, permanent stay of the bankruptcy plan.’

Fox News Digital has reached out to Dumas for additional comment. 

The bankruptcy deal was upheld by a federal judge in the U.S. District Court of Delaware last March. The plan would allow the Texas-based organization to continue operating while it compensated the sexual abuse claimants. 

The ruling rejected arguments claiming the bankruptcy plan was not proposed in good faith and that it improperly strips insurers and survivors of their rights. 

The Boy Scouts filed for bankruptcy in 2020 following the passing of several laws allowing accusers the opportunity to sue over abuse allegations that were decades old. The organization later reached a settlement that was approved in court in 2022. The settlement would pay between $3,500 and $2.7 million to abuse victims.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Ukrainian troops have withdrawn from the key battleground town of Avdiivka in the east of the country, which could pave the way for a Russian advance as the war nears its second anniversary. 

The withdrawal, announced as Ukraine faces acute shortages of ammunition with U.S. military aid delayed for months in Congress, aimed to save troops from being fully surrounded by Russian forces after months of fierce fighting, Kyiv said.

Most of the city’s pre-war population of 32,000 people has already left, and the town has been almost completely destroyed.

General Oleksandr Syrskyi, who took the helm of the Ukrainian military in a major shakeup last week, announced the withdrawal as a tactical move to save the lives of troops in a town that has been under heavy attack for months.

‘I decided to withdraw our units from the town and move to defense from more favorable lines in order to avoid encirclement and preserve the lives and health of servicemen.’

‘Our soldiers performed their military duty with dignity, did everything possible to destroy the best Russian military units, inflicted significant losses on the enemy in terms of manpower and equipment,’ he said.

Russia stepped up its offensive on Avdiivka in October and Ukraine’s position had been looking increasingly fraught for weeks.

The Third Assault Brigade, a prominent Ukrainian infantry assault unit, was rushed into the town to help reinforce troops this week as other Ukrainian forces pulled back from the southeast of the town. The unit described the fighting as ‘hell’ and said on social media that Ukrainian defenders had been outnumbered by Russian forces by a ratio of about six to 100 in some places.

The withdrawal is seen as a massive win for Russian President Vladimir Putin, and the biggest since Russia captured the city of Bakhmut in May 2023.

The timing is critical as Russia is looking for a morale boost ahead of the second anniversary on February 24 of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the March presidential election in Russia. It also comes in the wake of news that Putin critic and opposition leader Alexei Navalny has died at the age of 47.

It comes just days after National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said the town was at risk of falling into Russian control.

‘This is happening because Ukrainian forces on the ground are running out of artillery ammunition,’ Kirby said during a press briefing Thursday. 

‘Russia is sending wave after wave of conscript forces to attack Ukrainian positions, and because Congress is yet to pass the supplemental bill, we’ve not been able to provide Ukraine with the artillery shells that they desperately need to disrupt these Russian assaults.’

The United States is Ukraine’s biggest single supporter but some $60 billion for Kyiv is being held up by political disagreements among American lawmakers.

Earlier this month, all 27 countries of the European Union agreed on a €50 billion ($54 billion) financial aid package to Ukraine.

The withdrawal came a day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday made another trip to western Europe, hoping to press his country’s Western allies to keep providing military support.

Speaking at the Munich security conference on Saturday, Zelenskyy urged Western countries to help Ukraine defeat Putin, saying that the war poses a threat to the entire world.

‘How long will the world let Russia be like this? This is the main question today,’ Zelenskyy said.

‘Please, everyone in the world, do not ask Ukraine when the war will end. Ask yourself – why is Putin still able to continue it. Let’s not fear Putin’s defeat and the destruction of his regime. Let’s instead – work together to destroy what he stands for. It is his fate to lose, not the fate of the rules-based world order to vanish. And may our world, based on rules, never become the world of yesterday.’

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

The House of Representatives has just two more days in session before the first of Congress’ two government shutdown deadlines, putting lawmakers on a critically short timeline to reach a bipartisan deal.

House lawmakers ended their week on Thursday afternoon after leaders called off votes scheduled for Friday. 

Unless members have caucus or committee work to attend to, they are largely not expected back on Capitol Hill until Feb. 28 – two days before the March 1 deadline to fund some government agencies.

The remaining agencies must be funded by March 8.

‘We think we’re going to meet the deadlines,’ House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters on Wednesday when asked about the appropriations process.

He previously passed two short-term extensions of the previous year’s government funding agreement, known as continuing resolutions. Congress has passed three overall to keep the government open past the original Sept. 30 fiscal year deadline.

However, the spending fight has been a particularly divisive battle for Johnson’s thin House GOP majority, and it likely will not get easier. 

Last month, he and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., announced an agreement to set a discretionary spending topline of $1.59 trillion for the next fiscal year but would also honor an earlier side-deal of an added $69 billion. 

Johnson said he secured an extra $16 billion in cuts for this fiscal year to offset some of that.

However, GOP hardliners, including those in the House Freedom Caucus, have said they will not support anything above a total topline funding amount of $1.59 trillion. 

They have forced House floor proceedings to a grinding halt on multiple occasions by deliberately sinking their own party’s measures in protest of the bipartisan agreement.

The division, and his three-seat majority, will mean Johnson almost certainly needs to seek Democratic support in the House, even before reckoning with the liberal-held Senate.

Meanwhile, President Biden blasted House members on Friday for taking a two-week recess without bringing a $95 billion national security supplemental package to assist Ukraine, Israel and the Indo-Pacific to a vote, after it recently passed in the Senate.

The U.S. will have to decide how openly it wants to allow public access to artificial intelligence (AI), potentially impacting overall data protection policies, after Microsoft revealed state actors from rival nations used the tech to train their operatives. 

‘We’re either going to have to decide whether we’re going to keep these things open and easy to access for everybody, which means for bad and good actors, or we’re going to take a different tack,’ Phil Siegel, founder of the AI non-profit Center for Advanced Preparedness and Threat Response Simulation, told Fox News Digital. 

OpenAI, in a blog post written Wednesday, identified five state-affiliated ‘malicious’ actors: Chinese-affiliated Charcoal Typhoon and Salmon Typhoon, Iranian-affiliated Crimson North Korean-affiliated Sandstorm and Russian-affiliated Emerald Sleet and Forest Blizzard.

The post claimed the groups used OpenAI services to ‘query open-source information, translate, find coding errors, and run basic coding tasks.’ The two Chinese-affiliated groups, for example, allegedly translated technical papers, debugged code, generated scripts and looked at how to hide processes in different electronic systems. 

In response, OpenAI proposed a multipronged approach to combating such malicious use of the company’s tools, including ‘monitoring and disrupting’ malicious actors through new tech to identify and cut off actors’ activities, greater cooperation with other AI platforms to catch malicious activity and improved public transparency. 

‘As is the case with many other ecosystems, there are a handful of malicious actors that require sustained attention so that everyone else can continue to enjoy the benefits,’ OpenAI wrote. ‘Although we work to minimize potential misuse by such actors, we will not be able to stop every instance.’

‘By continuing to innovate, investigate, collaborate, and share, we make it harder for malicious actors to remain undetected across the digital ecosystem and improve the experience for everyone else,’ the company insisted. 

Siegel argued that these gestures, while well-meaning, ultimately will not prove effective due to the lack of current infrastructure to allow them to have the necessary impact. 

‘We’re going to have to decide whether this is a fully open system … or are we going to have it be like the banking system where there’s all these gates in the system that stop these things from happening,’ Siegel said. 

‘I am skeptical because the banks have a whole set of infrastructure and regulations behind them to make these things happen … and we don’t have that yet,’ he explained. ‘We’re thinking about it and working on it, but until that stuff is in place – this isn’t Microsoft’s fault or Open A’s fault or Google’s fault.’

‘We just have to move quickly to make sure that this stuff gets put in place so that they can know how they’re going to implement these types of things,’ he added. 

Microsoft, in a separate blog post, argued for some additional measures – namely ‘notification’ for other AI service providers to help flag relevant activity and data so they can immediately act on the same users and processes. 

Though ‘complementary defenses,’ Microsoft and OpenAI pledged to protect the valuable AI systems along with assistance from MITRE to develop countermeasures in the ‘evolving landscape of AI-powered cyber operations.’ 

‘The threat ecosystem over the last several years has revealed a consistent theme of threat actors following trends in technology in parallel with their defender counterparts,’ Microsoft acknowledged. 

Siegel suggested that the processes described would only account for some of the activity the malicious actors pursued – again, due to the lack of current systems in place to catch the full array of activity – since the hackers can use spycraft and even ‘other forms of technology’ to achieve their goals. 

‘There’s just work that has to be done, and I’m skeptical that Microsoft’s OpenAI can go and do that on their own without help from the government or other agencies that have already worked on technologies like that,’ Siegel said. 

The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a Fox News Digital request for comment by the time of publication. 

President Biden said on Friday, following news of the death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, that there is ‘no doubt’ it was a ‘consequence of something that Putin and his thugs did.’ 

Russian officials said Navalny reported feeling unwell following a walk at the penal colony where he was jailed in Siberia before losing consciousness and dying.  

‘Make no mistake, Putin is responsible for Navalny’s death. Putin is responsible,’ Biden told reporters at the White House. ‘What has happened to Navalny is yet more proof of Putin’s brutality. No one should be fooled, not in Russia, not at home, not anywhere in the world.’ 

‘The answer is, we don’t know exactly what happened, but there is no doubt that the death of Navalny was a consequence of something that Putin and his thugs did,’ Biden added.

‘People across Russia and around the world are mourning Navalny today, because he was so many things that Putin was not,’ Biden continued. ‘He was brave, he was principled, he was dedicated to building a Russia where the rule of law existed and where it applied to everybody. Navalny believed in that Russia, that Russia, he knew it was a cause worth fighting for and obviously even dying for.’ 

In 2021, President Biden, after meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva, Switzerland, was asked about what would happen if Navalny were to die in Russian custody. 

‘I made it clear to him that I believe the consequences of that would be devastating for Russia,’ Biden said at the time. 

When asked about that remark Friday, Biden said,That was three years ago andn the meantime, they faced a hell of a lot of consequences,’ referring to Russian troop losses in the war in Ukraine and international sanctions waged against their government. 

‘I just want to say ‘God bless Alexei Navalny,’’ Biden concluded. ‘His courage will not be forgotten.’ 

President Biden called for House Republicans to drop their impeachment inquiry against him, saying on Friday that it has been ‘an outrageous effort from the beginning.’ 

The president’s comments came after the indictment of FBI informant who alleged that Joe Biden and Hunter Biden had been paid millions of dollars in exchange for their help firing the Ukrainian prosecutor investigating Burisma Holdings.

‘He is lying, and it should be dropped,’ Biden said after a reporter asked about the indicted FBI informant.

House Republicans told Fox News Digital that their impeachment inquiry has much more evidence that does not rely on the indicted FBI source.

Special Counsel David Weiss charged Alexander Smirnov, 43, with making a false statement and creating a false and fictitious record during FBI interviews. 

According to the indictment, Smirnov gave ‘false derogatory information’ to the FBI despite ‘repeated admonishments that he must provide truthful information and that he must not fabricate evidence.’ 

The indictment says that Smirnov had told an FBI agent in March 2017 that he had had a phone call with Burisma’s owner concerning the firm potentially acquiring a U.S. company and making an initial public offering (IPO) on a U.S.-based stock exchange. 

In reporting this conversation to the FBI agent, Smirnov said that Hunter Biden was a board member of Burisma, though that was publicly known. 

In June 2020, Smirnov is accused of having told the FBI, for the first time, about two meetings he had had four to five years earlier, in which executives associated with Burisma had supposedly admitted that they had hired Hunter Biden to ‘protect us, through his dad, from all kinds of problems.’ 

During this meeting, the indictment alleges that Smirnov said the executives had paid $5 million to each of the Bidens while Joe Biden was still in office. The indictment alleges that Smirnov falsely claimed that the Bidens had been paid so that Hunter Biden, with his dad’s help, could take care of a criminal investigation being conducted by the then-Ukrainian Prosecutor General, Viktor Shokin, into Burisma. 

The allegations were recorded on an FBI FD-1023 form, which is used by FBI agents to record unverified reporting from confidential human sources. The form is used to document information as told to an FBI agent, but recording that information does not validate or weigh it against other information known by the FBI. 

The FD-1023 form containing the allegations last year became a key document in the House investigation into the Biden family’s business dealings.

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer and GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley were approached by a whistleblower last summer who alleged that the FBI was in possession of a document — an FD-1023 form, dated June 30, 2020 — that explicitly detailed information provided by a confidential human source alleging that Biden, while serving as vice president, had been involved in a multi-million-dollar scheme with a foreign national in exchange for influence over policy decisions.

On Friday, Biden was asked about the indictment of Smirnov—and whether it should bring the impeachment inquiry to an end.

‘He is lying, and it should be dropped,’ Biden said, referring to Smirnov’s allegations and the impeachment inquiry. ‘It’s just been a — it’s been an outrageous effort from the beginning.’

Hunter Biden’s attorney Abbe Lowell, earlier Friday, said the same: ‘For months we have warned that Republicans have built their conspiracies about Hunter and his family on lies told by people with political agendas, not facts. We were right, and the air is out of their balloon,’ Lowell said in a statement. ‘This is just another instance of Chairmen Comer and Jordan peddling falsehoods based on dishonest, uncredible allegations and witnesses.’

But Comer, who is leading the impeachment inquiry, said that the FBI’s FD-1023 form containing Smirnov’s is not being used in an impeachment inquiry against the president. 

The impeachment inquiry, he said, ‘is based on a large record of evidence, including bank records and witness testimony, revealing that Joe Biden knew of and participated in his family’s business dealings.’ 

‘We have over $30 million reasons to continue this investigation and not one of those reasons relies on the corrupt FBI or an informant. Bank records don’t lie,’ Comer told Fox News Digital on Friday. ‘Bank records and witness testimony reveal Joe Biden knew about and participated in his family’s business schemes, and he has repeatedly lied to the American people about these facts.’

Comer added: ‘The American people demand the truth and accountability for any wrongdoing. We will continue to follow the facts to propose legislation to reform federal ethics laws and to determine whether articles of impeachment are warranted.’

Coming up in the impeachment inquiry is testimony from the president’s brother, Jim Biden, on February 21, and a deposition of Hunter Biden on February 28. Both testimonies will take place behind closed doors. 

Smirnov is accused of repeating some of his false claims during an interview with FBI agents in September 2023, while changing other bits of information, and promoting a new false narrative after claiming to have met with Russian officials. 

If convicted, Smirnov faces a maximum of 25 years in prison.   

Fox News Digital’s Bradford Betz contributed to this report. 

Sens. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., reintroduced the Kids Online Safety Act with more than half of the Senate’s backing, including Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, suggesting that the bill will be filibuster-proof when it comes to the floor. 

On Thursday, Blackburn and Blumenthal announced that the revised bill had 62 senators on board, split evenly between both parties. If passed, it would be one of the largest Big Tech crackdowns in recent years, restricting content for minors that promotes substance abuse, the promotion of suicide, sexual exploitation and alcohol abuse. It would also mandate social media companies to implement certain controls to limit screen time, ban restrictive features and limit access to potentially harmful user profiles. 

‘This overwhelming bipartisan support for the Kids Online Safety Act—62 total co-sponsors, Democrats and Republicans—reflects the powerful voices of young people and parents who want Congress to act,’ lawmakers said in a joint statement. 

The fresh legislation comes just a few weeks after the CEOs of Discord, Snap, TikTok, X and Meta testified before a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing to discuss online child safety. It also addresses conerns raised by groups who opposed the legislation when it was first rolled out last year due to what they believed would be harmful to LGBTQ+ children. 

GLAAD, a nonprofit LGBTQ+ advocacy group, and the Human Rights Campaign both rescinded their previous opposition to the bill.

‘The recent watershed hearing with Big Tech CEOs showcased the urgent need for reform. With new changes to strengthen the bill and growing support, we should seize this moment to take action. We must listen to the kids, parents, experts, and advocates, and finally hold Big Tech accountable by passing the Kids Online Safety Act into law,’ lawmakers said. 

President Joe Biden urged lawmakers last year, when it was first introduced, to pass the bill. 

Schumer, who also faced pressure this month from hundreds of family members who blamed social media for the death of their children, said in a statement that he looks ‘forward’ to collaborate on a ‘bipartisan basis’ to advance the bill. 

The Kids Online Safety Act will require social media companies to design their products with the safety of kids and teens in mind, provide parents tools to protect their kids and give families more options for managing and disconnecting from these platforms.

I look forward to working on a bipartisan basis with Senators Blumenthal and Blackburn to advance this bill in the Senate,’

Earlier this month, the youngest victim whose relatives signed a letter to Schumer urging his support for the bill, was eight-year-old Lalani Erika Walton, of Texas. Her parents are suing TikTok and parent company, ByteDance, alleging the girl died of self-strangulation while participating in the viral ‘Blackout Challenge,’ which encouraged users to choke themselves with belts, purse strings or other similar items until passing out. 

Fox News’ Daniel Wallace contributed to this report. 

Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said that he does not have any plans to run for president or vice president in 2024.

Romney’s comment came after Democrat Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said he would pick either Romney or former Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman as a running mate if he jumped into the 2024 presidential race.

‘Hypothetically, if I was picking my running mate, really who I would ask right now is Mitt Romney,’ Manchin, who has left the door open to a third-party presidential run, told voters Thursday at the City Club of Cleveland breakfast forum. Manchin, however, added that he was not ‘not running for anything.’

Romney, a former Massachusetts governor who ran for the White House in 2008 and 2012, squashed the rumors and noted he would ‘certainly’ not be a vice president.

‘Well, that’s really presumptuous. I would be the president. He would be my running mate,’ Romney joked in a statement to Deseret News when asked about Manchin’s comment.

‘No, I’m not going to run for president,’ he added. ‘Certainly I’m not running for vice president. But (Manchin is) kind to say that. We’re good friends.’

After flirting with a third-party White House run for months, Manchin on Friday said he wouldn’t bid for the presidency.

‘I will not be seeking a third-party run, i will not be involved in a presidential run,’ Manchin announced during a speech in West Virginia.

Romney was the Republican presidential nominee in 2012, sparking rumors he might be considering a third run at the White House after deciding not to seek re-election in the Senate in 2024.

Romney also added that he will ‘not’ be voting for former President Trump if he is the 2024 GOP nominee.

Fox News’ Jamie Joseph contributed to this report.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., announced Friday that he will not be running for president, shooting down months of speculation that he would join the race on a third-party ticket. 

‘I will not be seeking a third-party run, I will not be involved in a presidential run,’ Manchin said. 

Manchin made the announcement during a speech at West Virginia University as part of his ‘listening tour’ that kicked off last month with his daughter’s campaign group ‘Americans Together’ — a movement that touts itself as the ‘moderate majority’ that rejects the ‘extremism in politics.’ 

‘I’m working with my daughter, working with people that we have around Americans Together and putting all my efforts toward that,’ he said Friday.

Manchin previously said he would not make a decision on whether he would run until after Super Tuesday on March 5. 

‘People are looking for options,’ Manchin said at the time. ‘And we’re going to be looking at that, too.’ 

On Thursday, Manchin said in a hypothetical run he would tap Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, or former Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman to be his vice presidential running mate, but later added he’s not ‘running for anything.’

‘Hypothetically, if I was picking my running mate, really who I would ask right now is Mitt Romney,’ Manchin told voters at the City Club of Cleveland breakfast forum Thursday.

Romney, a former Massachusetts governor who ran for the White House in 2008 and 2012, jokingly called Manchin’s remarks ‘presumptuous.’ 

‘I would be the president. He would be my running mate,’ Romney said in a statement to Deseret News when asked about Manchin’s comment.

Romney also announced last year that he would not seek re-election to the Senate when his term expires in 2025. 

‘No, I’m not going to run for president,’ he added. ‘Certainly I’m not running for vice president. But (Manchin is) kind to say that. We’re good friends.’

No Labels, the third-party effort that is on the ballot in several states and was rumored to be considering placing Manchin on a presidential ticket, said it is considering other potential candidates for a ‘unity ticket.’

‘No Labels has spent 14 years working to create a movement for America’s commonsense majority and we welcome Senator Manchin’s efforts to strengthen it,’ No Labels co-chairs former Sen. Joe Lieberman, Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr., and former North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory said in a joint statement.

‘No Labels is currently speaking with several exceptional leaders about serving on the presidential Unity ticket. We are continuing to make great progress on our ballot access efforts and will announce in the coming weeks whether we will offer our line to a Unity ticket.’

Fox News’ Aubrie Spady and Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report.