Reel back to June 2021. House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green, R-Tenn., did not yet wield the committee gavel. But he had questions about COVID-19, which gripped the planet.

‘For most of the pandemic, anyone who raised questions about the origin of the virus was dismissed as a crazy conspiracy theorist,’ opined Green on the House floor.

Many were even reluctant to dip into the idea that COVID-19 could have come from a lab in China in 2021.

Rep. Raul Ruiz, D-Calif., is a doctor and the top Democrat on the House panel investigating the start of the pandemic. Some Republicans touted the lab leak theory. Yet Ruiz was careful to note that the concept was far from proven. The Department of Energy and FBI suggested a lab leak was the culprit. But most U.S. intelligence agencies suspected the virus emanated from nature.

‘They do not strongly with high confidence say that this was a lab leak,’ said Ruiz at a July 2023 hearing. ‘But we heard that they do from the other side. That’s a lie.’

Like Green, Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., argued in 2023 that Democrats ‘accused everyone who believes that there was a lab leak to be a conspiracy theorist.’ 

But the theory of a lab leak potentially sparking the pandemic no longer flits around the fringes. 

The House COVID committee unearthed a message last year from Dr. David Morens – an associate of Dr. Anthony Fauci. Fauci was the public face of the pandemic response. He just retired as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).

Morens wrote that ‘Tony doesn’t want his fingerprints on origin stories.’

In an appearance on Fox in January 2023, Fauci declared that ‘the evidence points very strongly, very strongly to this being a natural jump from an animal species to a human.’

But Fauci may have tempered those views.

‘I’ve also been very, very clear and said multiple times that I don’t think the concept of there being a (lab) leak is inherently a conspiracy theory,’ said Fauci to the House coronavirus committee this month. ‘What is a conspiracy is the kind of distortions that it was a lab leak and I was parachuted into the CIA like Jason Bourne and told the CIA that they should really not be talking about a lab leak.’

In 2020, Fauci cited an article from the British scientific magazine Nature when talking about what caused the pandemic. The House COVID committee is scrutinizing communications between Fauci and the essay’s authors just before the item went to print. Some Republicans accuse Fauci of trying to use the article to shield criticism about a possible lab leak.

The Senate probed the origins of the pandemic at a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing this week.

‘Today we are here to examine one of the most critical and debated questions of our time,’ said Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who has long been suspect of what the government said about what fueled the pandemic.

‘Just like the Hunter Biden laptop story, the experts said this was disinformation,’ snapped Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., about the lab leak concept.

Tulane Medical School Dean Dr. Robert Garry co-authored the 2020 article in Nature. Garry argued it wasn’t plausible for a lab leak to trigger the pandemic. 

‘So you’re saying that (idea) came to you overnight?’ questioned Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo.

‘There was new data,’ replied Garry.

‘Like a revelation from God? Overnight? ‘I’ve figured it out, and now I can definitely rule it out. It’s amazing!’ Is that what happened?’ countered Hawley.

‘It’s just the scientific method,’ responded Garry. 

Garry holds firm that he believes the pandemic started in nature. But he concedes some of the science evolved. 

That’s why Republican senators chided Garry about the article, leaning on a zoonotic origin of the pandemic.

‘That is scientific misconduct and fraud,’ charged Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis. ‘The reason the American public legitimately don’t trust scientists and health agencies because people like you, you bear that responsibility for violating the public’s trust from your scientific misconduct. And fraud.’

‘It was not fraud,’ countered Garry. ‘We didn’t put anything in that paper that we didn’t believe was true. The conclusions of that paper have held up very well. In fact, there’s been an abundance of scientific evidence that has come forward since then to support all the conclusions, everything we wrote in that paper. So, there’s no fraud.’

But even other scientists upbraided Garry. 

‘This is the most egregious form of scientific misconduct. Publishing a paper where you know the conclusions are untrue,’ alleged Dr. Richard Ebright of Rutgers University.

Still, questions linger about what went down in Wuhan, China. That’s the site of the Wuhan Institute of Virology. It’s close to the Wuhan wet market. That’s the locale some identify as the geographic center of the pandemic. 

‘It’s one jump from one animal to one human. The most likely place that happens is in a laboratory,’ said Steven Quay of Atossa Therapeutics and a former Stanford University faculty member. ‘The Wuhan Institute (of) Virology. That’s where I’d look.’

However, China is seemingly impenetrable when it comes to providing western investigators data about the pandemic.

‘The Chinese government may never fully disclose all the information they have about the initial COVID-19 outbreak,’ said Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chair Gary Peters, D-Mich., who called the hearing.

Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., is advocating a 9/11-style commission to investigate the origins of COVID. Marshall also raised the possibility of classifying COVID-19 as a bioweapon. The Kansas Republican framed this in the context of national security.

‘What did the U.S. do to contribute to (this) and how do we keep this from happening again?’ asked Marshall.

Some senators acknowledge that the start of COVID many remain a stumper.

‘We might be 98% or something. But we’ll always be a little uncertain,’ said Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah. 

And like much of the pandemic, that uncertainly seems to be the only thing we do know for sure.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong Un signed a mutual aid pact on Wednesday, bringing the two nations closer than ever since the fall of the Soviet Union.

The pact, which both leaders emphasized is a landmark agreement between the countries, reportedly covers defensive security, humanitarian relief, trade and investment concerns.

Putin thanked Kim on Wednesday for North Korea’s ‘unwavering support’ of the ongoing invasion of Ukraine.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday claimed Putin’s visit was part of a desperate attempt to maintain international allies despite the increasingly drawn out invasion.

‘We’ve seen […] Russia try, in desperation, to develop and to strengthen relations with countries that can provide it with what it needs to continue the war of aggression that it started against Ukraine,’ said Blinken.

He added that the U.S. will ‘do everything we can to cut off the support that countries, like Iran and North Korea, are providing.’

Kim has been enthusiastic about building associations with Russia and China in order to build international legitimacy despite his country’s dismal human rights record.

The hermit country has worked to supply munitions and other military resources to the Russian military since the beginning of the war against Ukraine. Weapons baring marks that indicate North Korean manufacturing have been recovered by the Ukrainian military.

Putin last visited North Korea in 2000, when the hereditary dictatorship was under the control of Kim’s father, Kim Jong Il.

North Korea, officially known as the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, was founded in 1948 with direct influence from Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

The Kim family — sometimes referred to as the Mount Paektu bloodline — is the hereditary dictatorship of the country founded by communist revolutionary Kim Il Sung. 

North Korea operates under the state ideology of Juche, a quasi-communist worldview founded on a cult of personality and enthusiastic nationalism.

The high price of tobacco in Gaza has given rise to a cigarette smuggling industry that now threatens United Nations aid convoys, according to a new report from the Wall Street Journal.

Cigarettes can cost as much as $25 each in the war-torn region, and gangs have found ways to smuggle them in as contraband alongside aid deliveries. One group of Palestinian men demanded entry to a U.N. warehouse last week to secure a stash of cigarettes they knew was inside, according to the Journal.

The smuggling operation only enhances the dangers for aid convoys operating in Gaza, which have already faced mobs of Palestinians stopping them in their tracks.

Demand for cigarettes skyrocketed in early May when Israeli forces seized control of the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt. They closed the border to virtually all trade, cutting off a previously steady flow of tobacco products into Gaza.

Opportunists then began smuggling the product into the region via the aid packages coming in to United Nations facilities from all over the world.

The danger has contributed to aid groups’ refusal to make deliveries beyond the Gaza border. Over 1,000 truckloads worth of aid are still sitting just within Gazan territory at the Kerem Shalom crossing with Israel, according to the Journal.

‘This is threatening to undermine everything we’re trying to do,’ a U.N. official told the outlet.

President Biden’s administration sought to facilitate aid delivery by constructing a temporary pier on the Gaza coast last month. The effort soon met disaster, however, as weather rendered it unusable in a matter of days.

The U.N. also announced on June 10 that it would halt food distribution at the pier due to security concerns. The U.S. spent roughly $320 million on building the structure.

Rocket attacks struck two warehouses holding aid delivered to the pier in early June, contributing to the pause in delivery. The Biden administration has said it is committed to the maintenance of the pier moving forward.

It’s hard to tell who needs who more.

Former President Trump or House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La.

It’s too early to say if Mr. Trump will return to the White House next January. But he needs assistance from Capitol Hill if he’s going to accomplish anything.

And it’s a jump ball at best to determine which party might control the House. Johnson is certainly the odds-on favorite to retain the Speakership if Republicans hold the House. But it’s about the math. Eleven Republicans voted alongside an effort in early May by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., to remove Johnson. That won’t work for Johnson if the GOP only maintains a slim majority. But an edict by a potential President-elect Trump in January 2025 could save the day for Johnson if he’s struggling to round up the votes for Speaker on January 3 – the Constitutionally-mandated day to begin the 119th Congress. 

Fox is told that former President Trump needs party unity. That could be the key to legislative success should Mr. Trump return to the White House for a 2.0 launch.

He would need help from the Hill. 

Johnson made his second pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago to huddle with former President Trump in as many months this week. He brought with him Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., Chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC). That’s the organization devoted to electing Republicans to the House.

‘We will not waste a moment. We will be working on a very aggressive agenda to fix all the great problems facing this country right now,’ said Johnson ahead his visit to southern Florida.

The meeting came just days after former President Trump visited House and Senate Republicans in separate meetings on both sides of Capitol Hill. It marked the first time Mr. Trump had crept anywhere close to the Capitol since the riot three-and-a-half years ago.

‘Unity is strength and the division is an invitation for your opponents to beat you. So I think he sees the advantage of unity,’ said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Tex., of Mr. Trump.

It’s worth noting that Cornyn could serve as either Senate Majority or Minority Leader next year. Current Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has a strained relationship with former President Trump. 

Measuring draperies? Unclear. But the former President and Congressional Republicans are sharpening their 2025 legislative agenda.

‘Securing the border!’ said Rep. Kat Cammack, R-Fla., on Fox.

‘We’ve got to bring down energy costs,’ declared Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., on Fox.

‘The world is a tinderbox,’ said Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y.

The former President is already making promises. Some of which might not entail Congressional action.

‘On day one of my new administration, we all begin the largest deportation operation in American history,’ warned Mr. Trump.

Another priority is renewing the expiring Trump-era tax cuts.

Such a project likely requires the Senate use a special budgetary process to sidestep a filibuster. It’s known as ‘reconciliation.’ The Senate can only deploy this parliamentary tool on bills which don’t deal directly with policy – but focus on tax or fiscal issues. Senate Republicans used budget reconciliation to greenlight the tax cuts in late 2017. 

Budget reconciliation always requires that legislation approved under this special set of rules not add to the deficit. It is unclear how re-upping the tax cuts won’t contribute to the national debt. This may require some fancy bookkeeping.

Even so, former President Trump is likely to have narrow majorities in the House and Senate – if Republicans prevail. That’s why GOPers must stick together.

‘[Former President Trump] and I speak frequently about the election cycle, of course, and how we can complete the mission of restoring him to the White House and growing the House majority and winning the Republican majority in the Senate,’ said Johnson.

But critics claim there’s no agenda at all. It’s just about former President Trump. 

‘The Constitution doesn’t matter to them. None of it matters to them. The only thing that matters is the pursuit of power,’ opined Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., who is running for the Senate.

Democrats are banking on tying former President Trump to vulnerable Republicans facing competitive re-elections in battleground states or districts.

‘They’re going to have to defend this approach that they’ve taken over the next several months in advance of November before the American people,’ said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y. 

‘With November fast approaching, Republicans continue to show the American people where they really are with MAGA extremists and not with the majority of America,’ said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

President Biden and Democrats have long telegraphed their electoral strategy. They will run against three opponents this fall: Republicans. Former President Trump. And now, the Supreme Court. 

That’s why Democrats are escalating attacks on conservative Supreme Court justices in light of controversies about the conduct of justices and controversial rulings about guns and abortion.

‘It appears that [Supreme Court] Justice [Samuel] Alito is an insurrectionist sympathizer, joined by his right wing buddy, [Supreme Court Justice] Clarence Thomas,’ claimed Jeffries.

Democrats accuse Thomas and Alito of questionable ethics.

They ding Thomas for taking lavish getaways on the dimes of GOP megadonors.

‘He has done it 60 times. He was a vacation-taking fiend. My Lord!’ thundered Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., on the Senate floor.

The left targets Alito for flying controversial flags at his homes.

‘I believe the legacy of the [Chief Justice John] Roberts Court will be one of unchecked corruption and absolute politicization,’ said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. 

An attorney for Thomas says ethics rules don’t require him to report such trips – so long as donors don’t have business before the Court. 

Alito says his wife flew the flags. 

Republicans contend the Democrats’ complaints are camouflage for what really needles left.

‘Democrats don’t like the fact that the justices were making certain decisions,’ said Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo.

So, progressives are trying to curb powers of the Court.

‘I’m for term limits for members of Congress. Senators. Supreme Court justices. Let’s get some new blood in there,’ said Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif.

One Democrat demands that Chief Justice Roberts penalize associate justices.

‘He can say that Justice Alito no longer writes majority opinions. He can say that Justice Alito no longer presides over a circuit,’ said. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.

Republicans are appalled by the ultimatums.

‘They want the Supreme Court to become subservient to the Congress,’ said Cornyn.

Top Republicans say the attacks are just politics.

‘This is an election year. And they’re trying to make much ado about nothing,’ said Johnson. 

But Democrats don’t seem to disagree when it comes to an electoral strategy.

‘Democrats in election after election after election, since the fall of Roe v. Wade in 2022, are winning,’ said Jeffries.

So, ahead of the election, former President Trump needs Congressional Republicans. Those same GOP lawmakers need him. But Democrats have their needs, too: former President Trump and the rightward tilt of the Supreme Court.

Former First Lady Melania Trump will ‘most certainly’ have an influence on who her husband selects as a running mate for the 2024 presidential election, according to one former White House insider.

‘Mrs. Trump will most certainly speak her mind when it comes to which person she thinks would be best to serve alongside her husband as he attempts to take back the White House,’ the source, who previously served as an aide to Trump during his presidency, told Fox News Digital.

‘Whether or not Trump takes her advice when selecting his running mate will be determined later down the road. It’s safe to assume, though, based on what I’ve seen in the past, that she will be upfront and candid about whether certain people are fit to serve as vice president,’ the source said of Melania.

Should she make clear who she believes fits the bill best, it won’t be the first time Melania influenced her husband’s thinking when it comes to his vice presidential pick.

In her 2018 book, ‘First in Line: Presidents, Vice Presidents and the Pursuit of Power,’ Kate Andersen Brower noted that Melania played a pivotal role in ensuring a ‘clean’ and ‘safe’ candidate was chosen to serve as Trump’s running mate in the 2016 election.

‘That meant no affairs and no messy financial entanglements. In short, it meant no drama. She realized her husband had enough of that already,’ Brower noted at the time.

Though they now have a troubled relationship marred by the results of the 2020 presidential election, Trump ultimately selected former Vice President Mike Pence to serve as his running mate for both the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections.

Brower said Melania was ‘decidedly in Pence’s corner’ due to his record of having ‘absolutely no skeletons.’

Though it is still unclear who Trump will select as his running mate for the 2024 presidential election, which is less than five months away, a report published last week touted the former president and first lady’s relationship with North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and his family.

The Puck report highlighted Melania’s relationship with Burgum’s wife, Kathryn, and pointed to how she ‘worked with Melania on multiple occasions, including on building recovery-friendly workplaces’ during Trump’s presidency.

The report also highlighted how the Burgums were invited to the White House to celebrate the signing of the First Step Act criminal justice reform initiative, an issue the outlet said is ‘particularly important to Kathryn.’

Additionally, the outlet noted how the two couples ‘bonded’ with one another at Mar-a-Lago for an Easter brunch this year.

It is not yet known whether Melania will speak on Burgum’s behalf as the former president weighs his options in the crowded contest for vice president, but she’s had success in offering suggestions to her husband in the past.

Petitioning the former president on particular topics was something the former first lady is said to have done often, typically on issues dealing with public perception and trust.

‘There were definitely times when he sought Mrs. Trump’s counsel, and those occurrences were typically dealing with what I’d consider to be public perception,’ the former White House insider told Fox. ‘He knew when not to also. He wouldn’t usually seek her advice on issues that he had specific knowledge about — like the economy, business, trade and other dealings of the sort.’

‘She is in many ways, I think, like Nancy Reagan behind the scenes,’ the source added. ‘Though she wasn’t seen by the public each day, she played roles in several decisions that were made for the better regarding public perception, trust, and advocacy during the Trump presidency.’

Speaking to Fox News’ Aishah Hasnie at the Washington, D.C., headquarters of the Republican National Committee last week, Trump said he has ‘sort of a pretty good idea’ of who his vice presidential running mate will be.

His decision, however, isn’t expected to be made public until this summer’s Republican National Convention, which is slated to take place in Milwaukee, Wis., from July 15 to 18.

Longtime House Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., won his Tuesday night primary and is on track to clinch his 12th term in the House of Representatives this November.

Cole, who currently serves as chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, was facing a crowded GOP led by opponent Paul Bondar. Bondar is a political outsider and a businessman who has poured millions of his own dollars into the race.

The senior Republican has represented Oklahoma’s 3rd congressional district since January 2003. The district encompasses part of Oklahoma City and the city of Norman.

Cole had been expected to get at least a plurality of the vote, given his deep ties to Oklahoma GOP politics, but his reputation for working across the aisle has earned him challenges from his right flank.

Bondar has tried to style himself as a more conservative alternative to Cole, bashing the congressman for being willing to work with Democrats on issues like government funding and Ukraine aid. Cole’s campaign has in turn styled Bondar as a carpetbagger trying to buy the race. 

Cole also came into the Tuesday election armed with an endorsement from former President Trump, who won the district by double digits in 2020.

‘Tom Cole is a fantastic Representative for Oklahoma’s 4th Congressional District. As Chairman of the POWERFUL Appropriations Committee, Tom is fighting hard to Secure the Border, Stop Migrant Crime, Strengthen our Military/Vets, Support our Great Law Enforcement, and Protect our always-under-siege Second Amendment,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social in May. 

‘He has almost always voted with me, including on both Impeachment Hoaxes. Tom Cole has my Complete and Total Endorsement – He will not let you down!’

In addition to supporting Trump, Cole has also been a staunch ally of House GOP leadership. He previously served as head of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), House Republicans’ campaign arm, and before taking the Appropriations Committee gavel he served as the top Republican on the House Rules Committee.

Other Republican hopefuls who ran to unseat Cole on Tuesday night are Nick Hankins, Rick Harris and Andrew Hayes.

The House Ethics Committee announced on Tuesday that it needs to further review allegations against Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., involving sexual misconduct, illicit drug use, and accepting improper gifts.

The committee also accused Gaetz of being uncooperative with its probe and said it had ‘difficulty in obtaining relevant information’ from him.

Gaetz has been under a years-long House investigation, spurred by the Department of Justice (DOJ), looking into reports in early 2021 that he had a relationship with an underage girl. The DOJ declined to charge Gaetz in 2023.

The bipartisan committee, led by Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss., rarely releases such lengthy public statements.

But its investigation into Gaetz, which kicked off in April 2021, has attracted widespread media attention – which the panel noted.

‘There has been a significant and unusual amount of public reporting on the Committee’s activities this Congress. Much of that reporting has been inaccurate,’ the committee said, without elaborating on whether it was talking about the Gaetz matter specifically.

The committee also noted that Gaetz denies all allegations. 

‘Based on its review to date, the Committee has determined that certain of the allegations merit continued review. During the course of its investigation, the Committee has also identified additional allegations that merit review,’ the committee said.

House investigators are delving further into accusations Gaetz ‘engaged in sexual misconduct and illicit drug use, accepted improper gifts, dispensed special privileges and favors to individuals with whom he had a personal relationship, and sought to obstruct government investigations of his conduct.’

It said it’s no longer reviewing accusations ‘that he may have shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor, misused state identification records, converted campaign funds to personal use, and/or accepted a bribe or improper gratuity.’

When reached for further comment, Gaetz’s office pointed Fox News Digital to a Monday night X post criticizing the investigation.

He lashed out against the House Ethics Committee in the social media post, calling on the panel to instead work with him on cracking down on lawmakers who profit off the stock market.

‘The House Ethics Committee has closed four probes into me, which emerged from lies intended solely to smear me. Instead of working with me to ban Congressional stock trading, the Ethics Committee is now opening new frivolous investigations,’ Gaetz said. ‘They are doing this to avoid the obvious fact that every investigation into me ends the same way: my exoneration.’

He then took aim at former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., whose ouster Gaetz triggered late last year.

‘This is Soviet. Kevin McCarthy showed them the man, and they are now trying to find the crime. I work for Northwest Floridians who won’t be swayed by this nonsense and McCarthy and his goons know it,’ Gaetz said.

A spokesperson for McCarthy declined to comment on Gaetz’s post when reached by Fox News Digital.