The Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case challenging access to the abortion pill and its regulatory approval process on March 26, the court announced Monday. 

In December, the nation’s highest court agreed to consider appeals from the Biden administration and drug manufacturer Danco defending several moves by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) intended to make it easier to access and use the mifepristone pill in the wake of the overturning of Roe v. Wade last year.

In overturning Roe v. Wade in June 2022, the Supreme Court ruled in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization that the U.S. Constitution does not guarantee the right to an abortion and that the matter may be decided by the states.

In the aftermath, 14 states have banned abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with some exceptions, and two others have banned abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detected, which is around six weeks of gestation. 

The Biden administration and the maker of the drug mifepristone are asking the high court to reverse an appellate ruling that would cut off access to the drug through the mail and impose other restrictions, even in states where abortion remains legal. 

The restrictions include shortening from the current 10 weeks to seven weeks, the time during which mifepristone can be used in pregnancy. The nine justices rejected a separate appeal from abortion opponents who challenged the FDA’s initial approval of mifepristone as safe and effective in 2000.

Erin Hawley, counsel for the civil rights firm Alliance Defending Freedom challenging the Biden administration, accused the Biden administration of ‘defending the FDA’s reckless removal of the safety standards it originally deemed necessary for women who use abortion drugs.’

‘The FDA’s own label for these drugs says that roughly one in 25 women who take them will end up in the emergency room. The agency’s removal of in-person doctor visits and consistent, ongoing care has subjected more women to suffering severe, even life-threatening, medical conditions,’ Hawley said in a statement. 

‘Regardless of Americans’ beliefs about abortion, no one should be okay with the FDA leaving girls to take these high-risk drugs all alone,’ she added. 

The Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case called FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine on Tuesday, March 26 at 10:00 a.m. 

The Israeli military will not allow Israeli citizens to rebuild settlements in Gaza after the war against Hamas, Israeli Defense Secretary Yoav Gallant confirmed Monday.

Gallant confirmed this in a meeting with members of President Biden’s administration last week, according to a report from Axios. Israeli settlements in Gaza were originally dismantled in 2005 when Israel withdrew from the region, but hardline members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government have recently called for the settlements to be rebuilt.

Gallant met with U.S. Ambassador to Israel Jack Lew and assured him that the settlements would not return. He also said the 1-kilometer buffer zone Israel plans to establish in Gaza will also not be used for settlements. Gallant says the buffer zone is only for security purposes and will be temporary, according to Axios.

The assurances come days after several prominent Israeli officials attended a conference in Jerusalem calling for the return of settlements in Gaza. Three ministers who attended were from Netanyahu’s Likud Party.

Israel on Monday also provided the Biden administration with a new dossier with information about how staffers for a United Nations agency assisted or supported the Hamas terror attacks on Oct. 7.

The dossier alleges that 12 employees who worked with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) aided the attack in various capacities.

According to the dossier, seven U.N. staffers crossed into Israel on Oct. 7 while others were accused of ‘participating in a terror activity’ or coordinating vehicle movements.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the individuals who were alleged to have been involved in the attack are no longer employed. 

‘Of the 12 people implicated, nine were immediately identified and terminated by the commissioner-general of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini; one is confirmed dead, and the identity of the two others is being clarified,’ said Guterres.

He also said on Sunday that any U.N. employee who is found to have been involved in terror acts ‘will be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution.’

Fox News’ Lawrence Richard contributed to this report.

There are no second acts in American public life – but there are reruns. So, this year, like it or not, American voters appear to face a November choice between former President Donald Trump and current President Joe Biden.

More than just allowing debate moderators to address each opponent as ‘Mr. President,’ this would be the first election in over 100 years in which both major parties nominated candidates who had actual experience in the job. That is likely to dramatically affect the way each conducts their campaign.

In 1892, former President Grover Cleveland (D) ran against Benjamin Harrison (R) who had defeated him in the election of 1888. 

In 1888, even though Cleveland had successfully appointed a large number of judges to the courts, he was hampered by his unpopular effort to reduce tariffs designed to protect U.S. manufacturing. Despite winning the popular vote, the tariff issue caused him to lose several important manufacturing states–including Illinois (by 3 points), Indiana (by less than 1 point), New York (by 1 point), and Ohio (by 2 points)–and cost him the vote in the Electoral College. 

In 1892, however, the tariff issue worked against Harrison as voters tired of paying more for imported goods and he was seen as being too supportive of big business. His heavy-handed response to labor strikes was especially damaging with working-class voters.

Yes, in American politics, the names and the dates change, but the issues remain.

Typically, when an incumbent is running for reelection, voters get to choose ‘the devil they know’ or the ‘devil they don’t know.’ Insiders call them ‘referendum elections,’ in which the record of the incumbent is the main basis for voters’ decisions. The challenger matters, of course, but the main hurdle is presenting oneself as a plausible alternative should voters decide to ‘fire’ the incumbent. 

The last election, 2020, was a classic ‘referendum’ election. The incumbent (Donald Trump) was running – in the midst of the COVID pandemic – against a plain-vanilla former senator and vice president. It was an election that the incumbent (despite all the baggage acquired before and during the pandemic) came very close to winning.

Fast-forward four years – and we have two actual incumbents, with track records that the vast majority of likely voters have observed in real time.

Views of the first incumbent (Trump) are firmly held. While Democrats want voters to remember the economic trough brought on by COVID, almost all Republicans have  favorable memories of the Trump era. A recent YouGov/CBS News poll asked Trump supporters (representing roughly half of the 2024 electorate) why they were supporting him. Fully 97% of Trump supporters said ‘things were just better under Trump.’ In other words, essentially all Trump supporters view his presidency as just plain better.

One can reasonably argue that the last year of the Trump administration – with the pandemic resulting in lockdowns, historic job losses, a recession, enormous government spending to prop up the economy, combined with his refusal to accept the results of the election and his second impeachment – cast a shadow over Trump’s entire four-year term.

But that’s not how Trump supporters view his term. If one just looks at the three years from January 2017 through February 2020, the economy was growing, interest rates were low, inflation was essentially non-existent, and our involvement in overseas wars appeared to be ending. Indeed, the Trump supporters’ view of his presidency seems to take February 2020, just before public notice of the COVID-19 virus, as its endpoint.

The second 2024 ‘incumbent,’ Joe Biden, has not been as fortunate. A year ago, we posited that Biden’s reelection efforts depended less on his (lackluster) polling than on how things would turn out in four hot issue areas – the economy, efforts to counter the global impact of China, the war in Ukraine, and the Middle East. Biden’s fingerprints are all over each of them, and the public will judge the incumbent Biden based on how they look in the fall, just before the election. 

The difficulty for Biden is that all four areas remain challenging both in reality as well as in public perception.

Yes, inflation is down from the 2021 highs, but prices at the grocery store and the gas pump remain higher than they were when Trump was in office. Yes, Biden coaxed the Congress to help U.S. companies invest in high-tech chips, but China still seems to be making inroads in the global economy and continues to appear to be a threat to Taiwan. Yes, the efforts of the U.S. have helped Ukraine defend itself against Russian aggression,  but the war still appears to be at a stalemate. Yes, the Israel-Hamas war may be waning, but Iranian- backed Houti rebels and others remain a threat to U.S. interests and show no signs of backing down in the face of American attacks. 

Significantly, three of the four ‘open questions’ are foreign policy-based. And while it’s true that foreign policy rarely is decisive in American politics, actions on the foreign stage are highly dramatic and give US presidents an opportunity to demonstrate their skills … or failings. Jimmy Carter failed to secure the release of U.S. hostages in Iran. Conversely, Ronald Reagan effectively confronted the Soviet Union with his challenge to Mikhail Gorbachev to ‘tear down this wall.’ 

Recent presidents have managed small wins that nevertheless helped build the case for their seriousness and expertise. Barack Obama helped negotiate the Iranian nuclear deal and led the effort to kill Usama bin Laden, while Donald Trump opened a dialogue with North Korean dictator Kim Jung Un and helped broker a series of bilateral agreements between Gulf States and Israel.

Bottom line: While the verdict on the Trump incumbency is settled – with a large chunk of Americans concluding that ‘things were pretty good’ – Biden’s record remains incomplete. We don’t know how voters will view his economy, his efforts in the Mideast, whether Ukraine-Russia will remain a stalemate, and the extent to which China will remain a clear threat ten months from now.

But that’s the campaign we’ll be seeing: A race between two incumbents (all caveats about the actuary perils of assuming that Biden and Trump will be the major party candidates notwithstanding). And, in the highly polarized America of 2024, their focus needs to be less on campaigning against the other as highlighting and defending their own records. Their strategic focus needs to be reminding their respective partisan bases of the efficacy of their presidencies.

Trump’s current edge in the polls is based on the fact that his partisans have already concluded that ‘things were better’ under Trump. But Biden has an opportunity because his incumbency remains ongoing and he can use his presidency to make the case to skeptical supporters that he has done a good job. 

But the ‘known unknowns’ remain. Maybe they improve for Biden, and maybe they do not. If they improve, Biden could be one of the least expected two-term presidencies of all time. Or they could turn south and he can become this century’s Benjamin Harrison.

Daron Shaw is a member of the Fox News Decision Team.

House Republicans plan to hear testimony from several additional witnesses who did business with Hunter Biden this week as part of the ongoing impeachment inquiry against President Biden.

First up this week is Eric Schwerin, who is scheduled to appear on Tuesday after being subpoenaed last year by the House Oversight Committee for a deposition. The committee obtained bank records indicating Schwerin ‘had access to bank accounts’ that could be relevant to their probe.

Schwerin’s testimony comes after Fox News Digital first reported that Joe Biden, as vice president, used email aliases and private email addresses to communicate with Hunter Biden and his business associates hundreds of times – including with Schwerin. The communications came between 2010 to 2019, with the majority of email traffic taking place while Biden was serving as vice president.

The House Ways & Means Committee, which is co-leading the impeachment inquiry alongside the Oversight and Judiciary Committees, said 54 of those emails were ‘exclusively’ between Joe Biden and Schwerin. The House Ways & Means Committee describes Schwerin as ‘the architect of the Biden family’s shell companies.’

Schwerin, during a March 2023 meeting with the House Oversight Committee staff, explained that ‘he was not aware of any transactions into or out of the then-Vice President’s bank account related to business conducted by any Biden family member,’ a spokesperson for the Democrats on the committee told Fox News Digital. 

The White House has also cited Schwerin’s statement that Biden was not involved in his family’s business dealings when pushing back against Republicans’ impeachment inquiry. 

A person familiar with Schwerin’s role in handling then-Vice President Biden’s finances told Fox News Digital that Schwerin worked on Biden’s personal budget and helped coordinate with his tax preparers.

The individual also pointed to the frequency of Schwerin’s communications with Biden and his top aides and said it was ‘inevitable’ Rosemont Seneca business came up in conversations.

Meanwhile, the data shows direct emails between Schwerin and then-Vice President Biden increased during times when the vice president traveled to Ukraine.

The committee said the data shows Joe Biden and Schwerin exchanged five emails in June 2014 before the vice president’s trip to Ukraine that month.

After that trip and before Biden’s November 2014 trip back to Ukraine, he and Schwerin emailed 27 times.

Hunter Biden joined the board of Ukrainian natural gas firm Burisma Holdings in April 2014. 

Biden has acknowledged that when he was vice president he successfully pressured Ukraine to fire Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin. At the time, Shokin was investigating Burisma Holdings. During the same period, Hunter Biden held a highly lucrative role on the board, receiving thousands of dollars per month.

At the time, the vice president threatened to withhold $1 billion of critical U.S. aid if Shokin was not fired.

Biden allies maintain the vice president pushed for Shokin’s firing due to concerns the Ukrainian prosecutor went easy on corruption and say his firing was the policy position of the U.S. and international community. 

Meanwhile, the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees are also expected to hear testimony from Joey Langston on Wednesday.

Langston is said to have hosted fundraisers for Joe Biden and to have donated thousands of dollars to his political campaigns.

The committee says Langston, in 2008, pleaded guilty to participating in a conspiracy to attempt to influence a judge by providing the judge with ‘favorable consideration’ for a federal judgeship. Langston was sentenced to three years in federal prison and fined $250,000. The Mississippi state bar then disbarred him from practicing law, and in 2016, a federal judge denied his requests to have his ‘conviction for conspiring to bribe a judge thrown out,’ and to have his ‘record cleared.’ 

But the House Oversight Committee says it obtained bank records revealing that after Langston lost his appeal, his company, Langston Law Firm Consulting Inc., began making payments, totaling more than $200,000 to James and Sara Biden directly, and to their entity Lion Hall Group.

The committee says it is ‘interested in the nature and purpose of these payments, which totaled $187,000 while Joe Biden was serving as vice president.’

House Republicans hope the witnesses can provide information on whether, among other things, Joe Biden, as vice president and/or president ‘took any official action or effected any change in government policy because of money or other things of value provided to himself or his family, including whether concerns that Chinese sources may release additional evidence about their business relationships with the Biden family have had any impact on official acts performed by President Biden or U.S. foreign policy; abused his office of public trust by providing foreign interests with access to him and his office in exchange for payments to his family or him; or abused his office of public trust by knowingly participating in a scheme to enrich himself or his family by giving foreign interests the impression that they would receive access to him and his office in exchange for payments to his family or him.’

The expected testimonies come days after Hunter Biden business associates Mervyn Yan and Rob Walker appeared for their transcribed interviews before the committees, and weeks before the first son is set to take part in a closed-door deposition.

Hunter Biden defied his subpoena to appear for a deposition on Dec. 13, and was at risk of being held in contempt of Congress.

His attorneys and the committees came to an agreement last week that the first son will appear for a closed-door deposition on Feb. 28.

House Democrats, though, have blasted the impeachment inquiry, and have said witness testimony has not supported Republicans’ claims that Biden benefited from or was involved in his son’s business dealings. House Democrats are calling for the inquiry to come to an end.

The number of injured continues to climb after Iran-backed militias killed three U.S. service members and injured dozens more in an overnight attack on a military base in northeast Jordan. 

By late Sunday, the number of injured had climbed to 34 service members. This included at least eight personnel whose injuries warranted an evacuation from Jordan to higher-level care, though they were believed to be in stable condition. 

Fox News is told all service members are being fully evaluated for follow-on care. The number of injured was expected to fluctuate. 

The injuries mostly include traumatic brain injury, though the number of cases will likely go up as symptoms can take time to develop. 

Militant groups targeted the logistics support base located at Tower 22 of the Jordanian Defense Network. There are around 350 U.S. Army and Air Force personnel deployed at the base to counter ISIS. 

Out of respect for their families and per Defense Department policy, the identities of the service members are being withheld until 24 hours after their next of kin have been notified. 

The fatalities marked a major escalation after months of strikes by such groups against American forces across the Middle East since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.

Later Sunday, President Biden said that the U.S. ‘shall respond’ to the attacks. In a written statement, Biden said the U.S. ‘will hold all those responsible to account at a time and in a manner (of) our choosing.’

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said, ‘we will take all necessary actions to defend the United States, our troops, and our interests.’

Three American troops were killed and dozens more were injured in northeast Jordan Sunday in an attack that marked a major escalation of tensions in the region. 

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a loose coalition of Iran-backed militant groups, is claiming responsibility for the deadly attack. 

Per an analysis from the Pro-Israeli Washington Institute for Near East Policy, the ‘Islamic Resistance in Iraq,’ is not a singular unit per se but rather, an umbrella term used to tie the operations of various Iran-backed proxies in Iraq and Syria. 

The report determined that an umbrella term obscures responsibility, making it more difficult to determine who is exactly responsible for attacks on U.S. targets. 

IRAN-BACKED MILITIA KILLS 3 US TROOPS JUST WEEKS AFTER BIDEN SAID TEHRAN KNOWS ‘NOT TO DO ANYTHING’ 

It is believed that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) – plays a role in organizing the loose coalition. 

‘Iraqi armed groups tend to jealously guard their individual identities and the credit they derive (directly or via façade groups linked to them) from attacks, so their willingness to submerge these identities and even recant an individual group attack claim suggests that higher power is coordinating them,’ the Washington Institute report says. 

Many of the attack claims by the IRI brand have been published on the Telegram group called ‘al-Elam al Harbi’ or ‘The War Media,’ published on October 18, 2023, following Hamas’ deadly assault on Israel. 

IRI said Sunday’s attack on an installation known as Tower 22 in Jordan was in retaliation for Israel’s ongoing offensive in Gaza. It regards the U.S. as complicit, given its support of Israel.

Since Oct. 7, militia groups have struck American military installations in Iraq and Syria – with a mix of drones, rockets, mortars and ballistic missiles – at least 160 times.

President Biden said Sunday that the U.S. ‘shall respond.’ This after he blamed Iran-backed militia groups for the first U.S. fatalities after months of strikes by such groups against American forces across the Middle East amid the Israel-Hamas war.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

President Biden struck a confidant tone earlier this month when asked whether Iran would retaliate after the U.S. and its allies bombed Yemen in response to ongoing attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea by Iran-backed Houthi militants. 

The January 12 exchange came during the president’s visit to Emmaus, Pennsylvania to tout what he regards as the success of his administration’s economic policies. 

The president said he’d ‘already delivered a message to’ the Islamic Republic after the Yemen bombings. 

‘They know not to do anything,’ President Biden said, assuring that attacks on the Houthis would continue so long as they ‘continue this outrageous behavior.’ 

He declined to say whether the U.S. was in a ‘de facto proxy war with Iran.’ 

But just a little over two weeks later, three American troops were killed and dozens of others were injured in a drone strike in northeast Jordan near the Syrian border. Most, if not all, of those injured and killed were Army soldiers at a base known as Tower 22, which has been in support of the counter-ISIS mission for years, the official said.  

The president as well as Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin blamed Iran-backed militias for Sunday’s attack. A coalition of Iran-backed militant groups calling themselves the ‘Islamic Resistance in Iraq’ claimed responsibility. 

Later Sunday, President Biden said the U.S. ‘had a tough day in the Middle East,’ and vowed: ‘We shall respond.’ 

The troops’ death marked a major escalation of tensions in the region, after months of strikes by militia groups on American forces in the region in the wake of the Israel-Hamas war. 

President Biden said the United States ‘will hold all those responsible to account at a time and in a manner (of) our choosing.’

Secretary Austin said he was ‘outraged and deeply saddened’ by the fatalities and the injuries. 

‘These brave Americans and their families are in my prayers, and the entire Department of Defense mourns their loss,’ he said. ‘Iran-backed militias are responsible for these continued attacks on U.S. forces, and we will respond at a time and place of our choosing.’ 

He added: ‘The President and I will not tolerate attacks on American forces, and we will take all necessary actions to defend the United States, our troops, and our interests.’

The U.S. military base at al-Tanf in Syria is just 12 miles north of Tower 22. The Jordanian installation provides a critical logistical hub for U.S. forces in Syria, including those at al-Tanf, which is near the intersection of the Iraq, Syria and Jordan borders.

Since the war in Gaza began Oct. 7, Iranian-backed militias have struck American military installations in Iraq more than 60 times and in Syria more than 90 times, with a mix of drones, rockets, mortars and ballistic missiles. 

Scores of U.S. personnel have been wounded, including some with traumatic brain injuries, during the attacks.

The militias have said that their strikes are in retaliation for Washington’s support for Israel in the war in Gaza and have also said they aim to push U.S. forces out of the region.

The U.S. in recent months has struck targets in Iraq, Syria and Yemen to respond to attacks on American forces in the region and to deter Iran-backed Houthi rebels from continuing to threaten commercial shipping in the Red Sea.

Fox News’ Danielle Wallace, Liz Friden and The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on member countries to resume their funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), despite accusations from Israel that some of the group’s employees participated in Hamas’ bloody incursion late last year.

The U.S., Germany, U.K., Canada and at least five other countries have temporarily halted funding for the program. Israel released evidence showing that a dozen of the organization’s employees in Gaza had participated in the massacre of 1,200 Israeli citizens by Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7, 2023.

‘While I understand their concerns – I was myself horrified by these accusations – I strongly appeal to the governments that have suspended their contributions to, at least, guarantee the continuity of UNRWA’s operations,’ Guterres said in a statement on Sunday.

‘Of the 12 people implicated, nine were immediately identified and terminated by the Commissioner-General of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini; one is confirmed dead, and the identity of the two others is being clarified,’ he added. ‘Any UN employee involved in acts of terror will be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution.’

‘The abhorrent alleged acts of these staff members must have consequences. But the tens of thousands of men and women who work for UNRWA, many in some of the most dangerous situations for humanitarian workers, should not be penalized. The dire needs of the desperate populations they serve must be met,’ Guterres said.

The State Department under former President Trump cut ties with the UNRWA in 2018, but President Biden resumed the relationship shortly after taking office. He continued to increase spending for the organization, with funds exceeding $1 billion.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant praised the U.S. decision to suspend funding as ‘an important step in holding UNRWA accountable.’

‘At least a dozen UNRWA employees participated in the horrific attack conducted on Oct. 7: These are ‘humanitarian workers,’ with salaries paid for by international donations, with blood on their hands,’ Gallant said in a press release following the State Department’s announcement.

The funding cut follows growing allegations that started in December 2023 when an Israeli citizen taken hostage by Hamas said upon release that they had remained captive in the attic of a UNRWA teacher. Another hostage said a Gazan doctor – reportedly a pediatrician – helped hold another hostage captive for Hamas.

Fox News’ Timothy H.J. Nerozzi and Peter Aitken contributed to this report.