Republican Rep. Wesley Hunt of Texas is calling for the complete and permanent abolition of diversity, equity and inclusion ideology, noting that he only wants to be judged based on his ‘character,’ ‘competence’ and ‘results.’

‘DEI should be abolished, permanently. I never want to be chosen, promoted, or rewarded because of how I look. I want to earn every opportunity on merit, through hard work, grit, discipline, and determination,’ the Army veteran declared in a post on X.

‘Equality means equal standards, not engineered outcomes. The dignity of achievement comes from effort, not entitlement. Judge me by my character, my competence, and my results. Anything less is an insult to everyone striving to be their best,’ he added.

Billionaire business tycoon Elon Musk heartily endorsed the lawmaker’s comments.

‘And this is how anyone of honor should be!’ Musk wrote when sharing Hunt’s post on X.

Hunt has previously expressed his disdain for DEI.

‘DEI should be DOA,’ he wrote in a May 2025 post on X. ‘America was built on merit, grit, determination, and hard work—not skin color, quotas, or political games. The promise of this nation is simple: we rise by the strength of our character, not the shade of our skin. I’ve lived by that truth—and it drives the left absolutely insane.’ 

The lawmaker, who has served in the U.S. House of Representatives since 2023, is running for U.S. Senate, challenging incumbent Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, who is up for re-election this year. Lone Star State Attorney General Ken Paxton is also aiming to unseat Cornyn in the Republican U.S. Senate primary.

As 2025 ends, tensions between China and Taiwan are higher — and more overt — than at any point in recent years, fueled by expanded U.S. military support for Taipei, increasingly bold warnings from regional allies, and Chinese military drills that look less like symbolism and more like rehearsal.

Beijing has spent the year steadily increasing pressure on Taiwan through large-scale military exercises, air and naval incursions, and pointed political messaging, while Washington and its allies have responded with sharper deterrence signals that China now openly labels as interference.

The result is a more volatile status quo — one where the risk of miscalculation has grown, even as most analysts stop short of predicting an imminent Chinese invasion.

A year of escalating pressure

China capped off 2025 with what it described as its largest Taiwan-focused military exercises to date, launching expansive drills in December that included live-fire elements and simulated island encirclement operations.

The exercises followed a familiar pattern seen throughout the year: People’s Liberation Army aircraft and ships operating closer to Taiwan with greater frequency, reinforcing Beijing’s claim of sovereignty while testing Taipei’s response capacity.

Unlike earlier shows of force, the late-year drills were widely interpreted as practice for coercive scenarios short of outright war — particularly a blockade or quarantine designed to strangle Taiwan economically and politically without triggering immediate global conflict.

Chinese officials explicitly tied the escalation to Washington’s actions, pointing to a massive U.S. arms package approved in December — valued at roughly $11 billion and described as one of the largest such sales to Taiwan in years — as proof of what Beijing calls ‘foreign interference.’

Chinese officials have been unusually blunt in their response.

‘Any external forces that attempt to intervene in the Taiwan issue or interfere in China’s internal affairs will surely smash their heads bloody against the iron walls of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army,’ China’s Taiwan Affairs Office said in a Monday statement. 

The arms package continued the U.S. push to strengthen Taiwan’s asymmetric defenses, including missiles, drones and systems designed to complicate a Chinese assault rather than match Beijing weapon-for-weapon.

Taipei welcomed the support but remained cautious in its public response, emphasizing restraint while warning that Chinese military pressure has become routine rather than exceptional.

Japan steps into the frame

One of the most consequential shifts in 2025 came not from Washington or Taipei, Taiwan, but from Tokyo.

In November, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi made unusually direct remarks linking a potential Taiwan contingency to Japan’s own security, suggesting that an attack on Taiwan could trigger collective self-defense considerations under Japanese law.

The comments marked one of the clearest acknowledgments yet from a sitting Japanese leader that a Taiwan conflict would not remain a bilateral issue between Beijing and Taipei.

China reacted angrily, accusing Japan of abandoning its post-war restraint and aligning itself with U.S. efforts to contain Beijing. The rhetoric underscored a growing Chinese concern: that any move on Taiwan would draw in a widening coalition of U.S. allies.

That concern has also been reinforced by U.S. treaty commitments to the Philippines, where Chinese and Philippine vessels clashed repeatedly in the South China Sea throughout the year, raising fears of a multifront crisis.

Washington’s deterrence gamble

For the United States, 2025 was defined by a balancing act — reinforcing Taiwan without triggering the very conflict Washington seeks to prevent.

In addition to the December arms package, U.S. officials repeatedly reaffirmed that peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait are vital U.S. interests, while avoiding any explicit shift away from long-standing strategic ambiguity.

The Pentagon’s annual report on China, released late in 2025, reiterated that U.S. defense assessments see the Chinese military developing capabilities that could enable it to fight and win a war over Taiwan by 2027 — a benchmark that has increasingly shaped U.S. and allied planning.

U.S. officials, however, have also cautioned that military readiness does not equal intent, warning against treating exercises or procurement timelines as a countdown clock to war.

Is an invasion coming?

The question hanging over the region — and Washington — is whether China is moving closer to launching a full-scale invasion of Taiwan.

The evidence cuts both ways.

On one hand, the scale and sophistication of Chinese military activity around Taiwan has grown noticeably, with drills emphasizing joint operations, rapid mobilization and isolation of the island. Beijing’s rhetoric has also hardened, portraying reunification as increasingly urgent and framing U.S. involvement as an existential threat.

On the other hand, an amphibious invasion of Taiwan would be among the most complex military operations in modern history, carrying enormous political, economic and military risks for China — whose armed forces have not fought a major war since its 1979 invasion of Vietnam.

Many defense analysts argue that Beijing has strong incentives to continue applying pressure through gray-zone tactics — cyber operations, economic coercion, legal warfare and military intimidation — rather than crossing the threshold into open war.

The December drills reinforced that view, highlighting blockade-style scenarios that could test Taiwan and its partners without immediately triggering a shooting war.

The road ahead

As 2026 approaches, the Taiwan Strait remains a flashpoint where deterrence and coercion are colliding more frequently and more visibly.

The most widely held assessment among U.S. and regional officials is that while the risk of conflict is rising — particularly as China approaches its 2027 military readiness goals — an invasion is not yet the most likely near-term outcome.

Instead, the danger lies in sustained pressure, miscalculation and crisis escalation, especially as more actors — from Japan to the Philippines — become directly implicated in the Taiwan equation.

For now, 2025 ends with no shots fired across the Taiwan Strait — but with fewer illusions about how close the region may be to its most serious test in decades.

President Donald Trump spent the first year of his second White House term signing a torrent of executive orders aimed at delivering on several major policy priorities, including slashing federal agency budgets and staffing, implementing a hard-line immigration crackdown and invoking emergency authority to impose steep tariffs on nearly every U.S. trading partner.

The pace of Trump’s executive actions has far outstripped that of his predecessors, allowing the administration to move quickly on campaign promises. But the blitz has also triggered a wave of lawsuits seeking to block or pause many of the orders, setting up a high-stakes confrontation over the limits of presidential power under Article II and when courts can — or should — intervene.

Lawsuits have challenged Trump’s most sweeping and consequential executive orders, ranging from a ban on birthright citizenship and transgender service members in the military to the legality of sweeping, DOGE-led government cuts and the president’s ability to ‘federalize’ and deploy thousands of National Guard troops.

Many of those questions remain unresolved. Only a few legal fights tied to Trump’s second-term agenda have reached final resolution, a point legal experts say is critical as the administration presses forward with its broader agenda.

Trump allies have argued the president is merely exercising his powers as commander in chief. 

Critics counter that the flurry of early executive actions warrants an additional level of legal scrutiny, and judges have raced to review a crushing wave of cases and lawsuits filed in response.

WINS:

Limits on nationwide injunctions

In June 2025, the Supreme Court sided with the Trump administration 6-3 in Trump v. CASA, a closely watched case centered on the power of district courts to issue so-called universal or nationwide injunctions blocking a president’s executive orders. 

Though the case ostensibly focused on birthright citizenship, arguments narrowly focused on the authority of lower courts’ ability to issue nationwide injunctions and did not wade into the legality of Trump’s order, which served as the legal pretext for the case. The decision had sweeping national implications, ultimately affecting the more than 310 federal lawsuits that had been filed at the time challenging Trump’s orders signed in his second presidential term.

Justices on the high court ultimately sided with U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer, who had argued to the court that universal injunctions exceeded lower courts’ Article III powers under the Constitution, telling justices that the injunctions ‘transgress the traditional bounds of equitable authority,’ and ‘create a host of practical problems.’

The Supreme Court largely agreed. Justices ruled that plaintiffs seeking nationwide relief must file their lawsuits as class action challenges. This prompted a flurry of action from plaintiffs in the weeks and months that followed as they raced to amend and refile relevant complaints to lower courts.

Firing independent agency heads 

The Supreme Court also signaled openness to expanding presidential authority over independent agencies.

Earlier in 2025, the justices granted Trump’s request to pause lower-court orders reinstating two Democratic appointees — National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) member Gwynne Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) member Cathy Harris, two Democrat appointees who were abruptly terminated by the Trump administration. It also suggested the Supreme Court is poised to pare back a 90-year-old precedent in Humphrey’s Executor, a 1935 ruling that prohibits certain heads of multi-member, congressionally created federal regulatory agencies from being fired without cause.

It is not the only issue in which the justices appeared inclined to side with Trump administration officials and either overturn or pare back Humphrey’s protections.

In December, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Trump v. Slaughter, a similar case centered on Trump’s attempt to fire a member of the Federal Trade Commission without cause. Justices seemed likely to allow the firing to proceed and to weaken Humphrey’s protections for similarly situated federal employees, though the extent that justices will move to dilute an already watered-down court ruling remains unclear.

The high court will also review another case centered on Trump’s ability to remove Federal Reserve Board Governor Lisa Cook early in 2026.

LOSSES:

Tariffs 

While it’s rarely helpful to speculate on how the Supreme Court might rule on a certain case, court watchers and legal experts overwhelmingly reached a similar consensus after listening to oral arguments in Learning Resources v. Trump, the case centered on Trump’s use of an emergency wartime law to enact his sweeping tariff plan. 

At issue in the case is Trump’s use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to enact his steep 10% tariffs on most imports. The IEEPA law gives the president broad economic powers in the event of a national emergency tied to foreign threats. But it’s unclear if such conditions exist, as voiced by liberal and conservative justices in their review of the case earlier in 2025.

Several justices also noted that the statute does not explicitly reference tariffs or taxes, a point that loomed large during oral arguments.

A ruling against the administration would deliver a major blow to Trump’s signature economic policy. 

Court watchers and legal experts said after arguments that a Trump administration win could be more difficult than expected, though each cautioned it is hard to draw conclusions from roughly two hours of oral arguments, a fraction of the total time justices spend reviewing a case.

Jonathan Turley, a law professor and Fox News contributor, said in a blog post that the justices ‘were skeptical and uncomfortable with the claim of authority, and the odds still favored the challengers.’

‘However, there is a real chance of a fractured decision that could still produce an effective win for the administration,’ Turley added.

Brent Skorup, a legal fellow at the CATO Institute, told Fox News Digital in an emailed statement that members of the court seemed uncomfortable with expanding presidential power over tariffs.

‘Most justices appeared attentive to the risks of deferring to a president’s interpretation of an ambiguous statute and the executive branch ‘discovering’ new powers in old statutes,’ Skorup said.

Birthright citizenship

The Supreme Court has agreed to review Trump’s executive order restricting birthright citizenship, one of the most legally consequential actions of his second term.

At issue is an executive order Trump signed on his first day back in office that would deny automatic U.S. citizenship to most children born to illegal immigrant parents or parents with temporary legal status, a sweeping change critics say would upend roughly 150 years of constitutional precedent.

The order immediately sparked a flurry of lawsuits in 2025 filed by dozens of U.S. states and immigrants’ rights groups. Opponents have also argued that the effort is an unconstitutional and ‘unprecedented’ one that would threaten some 150,000 children in the U.S. born annually to parents of noncitizens and an estimated 4.4 million American-born children under 18 who are living with an illegal immigrant parent, according to data from the Pew Research Center. 

To date, no court has sided with the Trump administration’s interpretation of the 14th Amendment, though multiple district courts have blocked the order from taking force.

While it’s unclear how the high court might rule, the lower court rulings suggest the Trump administration might face a steep uphill battle in arguing the case before the Supreme Court in early 2026.

The court said in early December it will hold oral arguments in the case in 2026, between February and April, with a ruling expected by the end of June. 

President Donald Trump warned early Friday that the U.S. would intervene if Iran started killing protesters. 

Writing on Truth Social, the president said if Iran shoots and ‘violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue.’ 

‘We are locked and loaded and ready to go,’ Trump said. 

Trump’s warning comes as demonstrations triggered by Iran’s deteriorating economy expand beyond the capital and raise concerns about a potential heavy-handed crackdown by security forces. At least seven people — including protesters and members of Iran’s security services — have been reported killed during clashes, according to international reporting.

Some of the most severe violence has been reported in western Iran, where videos circulating online appeared to show fires burning in streets and the sound of gunfire during nighttime protests. 

The unrest marks Iran’s most significant protests since 2022, when the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody sparked nationwide demonstrations. Officials say the current protests have not yet reached the same scale or intensity, but they have spread to multiple regions and include chants directed at Iran’s theocratic leadership.

Iran’s civilian government under reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian has signaled a willingness to engage with protesters, but the administration faces limited options as the country’s economy continues to deteriorate. Iran’s currency has sharply depreciated, with roughly 1.4 million rials now required to buy a single U.S. dollar, intensifying public anger and eroding confidence in the government.

State television reported the arrests of several people accused of exploiting the unrest, including individuals it described as monarchists and others allegedly linked to Europe-based groups. Authorities also claimed security forces seized smuggled weapons during related operations, though details remain limited.

The demonstrations come amid heightened regional tensions following a 12-day conflict with Israel in June, during which the United States bombed Iranian nuclear sites. Iranian officials have since said the country is no longer enriching uranium, attempting to signal openness to renewed negotiations over its nuclear program to ease sanctions.

However, talks have yet to resume, as both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have warned Tehran against reconstituting its nuclear capabilities — adding further pressure on Iran’s leadership as protests continue.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump spent much of 2025 attempting what had eluded his predecessors: personally engaging both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in an effort to bring an end to the war in Ukraine. From high-profile summits to direct phone calls, the administration pushed for a negotiated settlement even as the fighting ground on and the map changed little.

By year’s end, the outlines of a potential deal were clearer than they had been at any point since Russia’s full-scale invasion, with U.S. and Ukrainian officials coalescing around a revised 20-point framework addressing ceasefire terms, security guarantees and disputed territory. But 2025 also made clear why the war has proven so resistant to resolution: neither battlefield pressure, economic sanctions nor intensified diplomacy were enough to force Moscow or Kyiv into concessions they were unwilling to make.

The Trump administration’s push for a deal

The year began with a high-profile fallout last February between President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, when the Ukrainian leader stormed out of the White House after Trump told him he did not have ‘any cards’ to bring to negotiations with Russia.

Frustrated by the pace of talks after promising to end the war on ‘Day One’ of his presidency, Trump initially directed his ire toward Zelenskyy before later conceding that Moscow, not Kyiv, was standing in the way of progress.

‘I thought the Russia-Ukraine war was the easiest to stop but Putin has let me down,’ Trump said in September 2025.

That frustration had already surfaced publicly months earlier as Russian strikes continued despite diplomatic engagement. ‘He talks nice, and then he bombs everybody in the evening,’ Trump said in July.

Trump’s outreach to Russian President Vladimir Putin culminated in a high-profile summit in Alaska in August, though additional meetings were later called off amid a lack of progress toward a deal.

Still, Trump struck a more optimistic tone toward the end of the year. On Sunday, after meeting Zelenskyy at Mar-a-Lago, the president said the sides were ‘getting a lot closer, maybe very close’ to a peace agreement, while acknowledging that major obstacles remained — including the status of disputed territory such as the Donbas region, which he described as ‘very tough.’

Trump said the meeting followed what he described as a ‘very positive’ phone call with Putin that lasted more than two hours, underscoring the administration’s continued effort to press both sides toward a negotiated end to the war.

Where negotiations stand now

By the end of 2025, the diplomatic track had narrowed around a more defined — but still contested — framework. U.S. officials and Ukrainian negotiators have been working from a revised 20-point proposal that outlines a potential ceasefire, security guarantees for Ukraine, and mechanisms to address disputed territory and demilitarized zones.

Zelenskyy has publicly signaled openness to elements of the framework while insisting that any agreement must include robust, long-term security guarantees to deter future Russian aggression. Ukrainian officials have also made clear that questions surrounding occupied territory, including parts of the Donbas, cannot be resolved solely through ceasefire lines without broader guarantees.

Russia, however, has not agreed to the proposal. Moscow has continued to insist on recognition of its territorial claims and has resisted terms that would constrain its military posture or require meaningful concessions. Russian officials have at times linked their negotiating stance to developments on the battlefield, reinforcing the Kremlin’s view that leverage — not urgency — should dictate the pace of talks.

The result is a negotiation process that is more structured than earlier efforts, but still far from resolution: positions have hardened even as channels remain open, and talks continue alongside ongoing fighting rather than replacing it.

Russia’s territorial pressure — and Ukraine’s limited gains

Even as diplomacy intensified in 2025, the war on the ground remained defined by slow, grinding territorial pressure rather than decisive breakthroughs. Russian forces continued pushing for incremental gains in eastern and southern Ukraine, particularly along axes tied to Moscow’s long-stated objective of consolidating control over territory it claims as Russian.

Russian advances were measured and costly, often unfolding village by village through artillery-heavy assaults and sustained drone use rather than sweeping offensives. While Moscow failed to capture major new cities or trigger a collapse in Ukrainian defenses, it expanded control in parts of eastern and southern Ukraine, maintaining pressure across multiple fronts and keeping territorial questions central to both the fighting and any future negotiations.

Ukraine, for its part, did not mount a large-scale counteroffensive in 2025 comparable to earlier phases of the war. Ukrainian forces achieved localized tactical successes, at times reclaiming small areas or reversing specific Russian advances, but these gains were limited in scope and often temporary. None translated into a sustained territorial breakthrough capable of altering the broader balance of the front.

Instead, Kyiv focused on preventing further losses, reinforcing defensive lines and imposing costs on Russian forces through precision strikes and asymmetric tactics. With decisive territorial gains out of reach, Ukraine expanded attacks against Russian energy infrastructure, targeting refineries, fuel depots and other hubs critical to sustaining Moscow’s war effort — including sites deep inside Russian territory.

Russia, meanwhile, continued its own campaign against Ukraine’s energy grid, striking power and heating infrastructure as part of a broader effort to strain Ukraine’s economy, civilian resilience and air defenses. The result was a widening pattern of horizontal escalation, as both sides sought leverage beyond the front lines without achieving a decisive military outcome.

The result was a battlefield stalemate with movement at the margins: Russia advanced just enough to sustain its territorial claims and domestic narrative, while Ukraine proved capable of blunting assaults and imposing costs but not of reclaiming large swaths of occupied land. The fighting underscored a central reality of 2025 — territory still mattered deeply to both sides, but neither possessed the military leverage needed to force a decisive shift.

That dynamic would increasingly shape the limits of diplomacy. Without a major change on the battlefield, talks could test red lines and clarify positions, but not compel compromise.

Why talks stalled: leverage without decision

For all the diplomatic activity in 2025, negotiations repeatedly ran into the same obstacle: neither Russia nor Ukraine faced the kind of pressure that would force a decisive compromise.

On the battlefield, Russia continued to absorb losses while pressing for incremental territorial gains, reinforcing Moscow’s belief that time remained on its side. Ukrainian forces, though increasingly strained, succeeded in preventing a collapse and in imposing costs through deep strikes and attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure — demonstrating an ability to shape the conflict even without major territorial advances.

Economic pressure also reshaped — but did not determine — Moscow’s calculus. Despite years of Western sanctions, Russia continued financing its war effort in 2025, ramping up defense production and adapting its economy to sustain prolonged conflict. While sanctions constrained growth and access to advanced technology, they raised the long-term costs of the war without producing the immediate pressure needed to force President Vladimir Putin toward concessions.

Those realities defined the limits of U.S. mediation. While the Trump administration pushed both sides to clarify red lines and explore possible frameworks for ending the war, Washington could illuminate choices without dictating outcomes, absent a decisive shift on the ground or a sudden change in Moscow’s calculations.

The result was a year of talks that clarified positions without closing gaps. As long as pressure produced pain without decision, negotiations could narrow options and define boundaries, even if they could not yet bring the conflict to an end.
 

Lawmakers fought over Obamacare subsidies tooth and nail for the latter part of the year, and ultimately, neither side won.

Senate Democrats thrust the government into the longest shutdown in history in an effort to refocus the narrative in Congress on healthcare, and Republicans agreed to talk about it in the open. And both Republicans and Democrats got a shot to advance their own, partisan plans. Both failed.

Now, the subsidies are set to expire on Wednesday, sending price hikes across the desks of tens of millions of Americans that relied on the credits. 

When lawmakers return on the first week of January, healthcare will be front of mind for many in the Senate. But any push to either revive, or completely replace, the subsidies may, for a time, take a backseat to the government funding fight brewing ahead of the Jan. 30 deadline.

When asked if he was disappointed that lawmakers were unable to, at least in the short term, solve the subsidies issue, Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., was more concerned about people that would experience higher costs. 

‘I think who it’s most disappointing for are the people whose premiums are going to go up by two, three times,’ Hawley said. ‘So, it’s not good.’

Price hikes on premium costs will be variable for the roughly 20 million Americans that rely on them, depending on age, income and other factors. Broadly, a person’s out-of-pocket cost is expected to double with the credit’s lapse, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The nonpartisan healthcare think tank painted a broader picture of the disparate impact on premium cost increases in a report released late last month that, based on myriad factors, including where a person lives, their age range and where they sit above the poverty line, some could see price hikes as high as 361%.

While Senate Republicans’ and Democrats’ separate plans failed to advance — despite four Republicans crossing the aisle to support Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s, D-N.Y., plan — lawmakers are working together for a solution.

There are two plans with traction in the House. The GOP’s plan advanced on the floor earlier this month but doesn’t address the issue of the expiring tax credits. Then there is a bipartisan plan that calls for a three-year extension of the subsidies, similar to Senate Democrats’ plan, that is teed up for a vote.

The latter option, and its bipartisan momentum, has some Democrats hopeful that a three-year extension could get a shot in the upper chamber.

‘I’ll also say that the glimmer of hope is if we’re searching for a bipartisan deal that can pass the Congress, we don’t need to search any further than the three-year extension of the subsidies that’s going to pass the House of Representatives,’ Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, told Fox News Digital. ‘We don’t need a negotiation any further. That bill can pass, if it can provide relief to the taxpayers, and it can pass, then that’s our vehicle.’

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., however, has maintained a deeply-rooted position against just a simple extension of the credits.

He argued that a straight-up extension for three years would be ‘a waste of $83 billion,’ and lacks any of the reforms that Republicans desire, like reinstalling an income cap, adding anti-fraud measures, and reaffirming language that would prevent taxpayer dollars from funding abortions.

‘I mean, I think if nothing else, depending on if the House sends something over here, there would be a new vehicle available,’ Thune said. ‘And if there is some bipartisan agreement on a plan, then you know, it’s possible that we could — obviously it’d have to be something that we think the House could pass, and the president would sign.’

‘But I’m not ruling anything out, I guess is what I’m saying,’ he continued. ‘But you know, a three-year extension of a failed program that’s rife with fraud, waste and abuse is not happening.’

Senate Democrats are open to negotiating on a bipartisan plan, something that is already ongoing after Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, held a meeting with lawmakers before leaving Washington, D.C., earlier this month.

But Democrats are also making clear that they don’t want to budge on some of the Republicans’ demands.

‘Let’s put it this way, Republicans are asking to meet with me, and I’m telling them, I’ll listen, you know, I made it clear what I think is the only practical approach, and I’m certainly not going to go along with selling junk insurance,’ Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin used his New Year’s address to deliver a blunt message to the West and to his own troops: Russia is not backing down in Ukraine.

As 2026 arrived in Russia’s far eastern regions, Putin vowed victory in the nearly four-year war, praising Russian soldiers and framing the conflict as a fight for the nation’s survival — even as the United States ramps up diplomatic efforts aimed at ending the bloodshed.

‘We believe in you and our victory,’ Putin said in remarks broadcast nationwide and released by the Kremlin on Wednesday. Addressing troops directly, he congratulated ‘all our soldiers and commanders’ and pledged continued support for what Moscow calls its ‘special military operation.’

Putin cast the war as a struggle for Russia’s homeland, ‘truth and justice,’ signaling determination to press ahead despite mounting losses and international pressure.

In a separate message, ex-President Dmitry Medvedev — Putin’s security council deputy — said of victory in Ukraine: ‘I sincerely believe that it is near.’ Echoing Putin, he spoke of ‘our great and invincible Russia.’

The defiant tone comes as the war approaches grim milestones. On Jan. 12, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will surpass the 1,418 days the Soviet Union fought Nazi Germany in Europe during World War II. On Feb. 24, the conflict will enter its fourth year. Western estimates place the number of killed and wounded at more than 1 million — a figure the Kremlin disputes.

Putin’s rhetoric stood in sharp contrast to renewed diplomatic activity led by Washington.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with U.S. President Donald Trump at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Sunday, as the White House explores possible paths to end Europe’s largest land war since World War II.

After the meeting, Trump said Ukraine and Russia were ‘closer than ever’ to peace, while acknowledging that major obstacles — particularly territorial disputes — remain unresolved. Reuters separately reported that Trump and Zelenskyy discussed potential U.S. troop involvement as part of broader security guarantees, though no decisions were announced.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Escalating claims by Russia that Ukraine tried to hit a residence used by President Vladimir Putin with drones have been dismissed by a top military drone expert, who called the alleged attack ‘hard to fathom’ and tactically implausible.

Cameron Chell’s comments came as Moscow doubled down on accusations Kyiv has flatly denied, with the drone industry leader arguing the alleged strike announced Monday runs counter to Ukraine’s drone tactics.

Chell, the CEO and co-founder of Draganfly, a drone manufacturer that supplies to the U.S. Department of Defense and allied militaries, including Ukraine, said Russia’s claims lack credibility.

‘What really makes things usually very signature about Ukraine is that they are always incredibly clever about how they use drones,’ Chell told Fox News Digital.

‘They are clever from a cost perspective — let’s call it an efficiency perspective — but also very clever in their tactics,’ he added.

‘I find it hard to fathom that this drone attack even happened on Putin’s residence or that it was something that Ukraine orchestrated for a number of reasons,’ Chell said.

‘Based on the description of the alleged attack over the top of Putin’s residence, the drones would not have been launched from a very long distance away,’ he said.

‘This would have avoided up to 1000 km of air defense systems and then likely attacking one of the most heavily fortified air defense networks surrounding Putin’s Valdai residence.

‘The cost benefit analysis, not to mention the political analysis, also does not make sense,’ he added.

Chell’s comments came as Russia doubled down Tuesday on accusations that Ukraine attempted to strike a presidential palace in the Novgorod region using drones, allegedly to disrupt peace efforts.

Kyiv dismissed the allegation, with the timing also raising questions given the upbeat tone of a recent meeting between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Florida.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov claimed late Monday that 91 drones were intercepted en route to Putin’s residence on the shores of Lake Valdai.

His statement appeared to contradict earlier Defense Ministry tallies, which said 89 drones were shot down over eight regions, including 18 over Novgorod, later adding another 23.

Only after Lavrov spoke did the ministry allege that 49 drones intercepted over Bryansk, nearly 300 miles away, were also targeting Valdai.

Asked about wreckage, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it was ‘a matter for our military,’ while calling Zelenskyy’s denial and Western skepticism ‘completely insane.’

Peskov said Russia’s diplomatic stance would be toughened, and Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin vowed there could be ‘no forgiveness’ for Zelenskyy.

Chell said the story simply does not add up. ‘To attack Putin’s residence in the manner described would require much more sophisticated tactics than simply sending long-range, relatively slow-moving drones,’ he said.

Chell also noted that this was a night operation and therefore, it generally rules out accurate visual mapping navigation. 

‘Since the description of the attack also does not lend itself to the use of fiber optic communication, which requires a relatively close range launch point, these drones would likely have had to rely on GPS navigation,’ he explained.

‘This would easily have been thwarted in this area and the Ukrainians would have known this,’ Chell said.

Politically, Chell argued, Ukraine has nothing to gain. ‘They’re bold, but right in the middle of peace talks — when they need Trump on side — it makes no sense,’ he said. ‘Ukraine is just politically too smart to have done that.’

Zelenskyy on Monday also called the claim a complete fabrication, accusing Moscow of laying the groundwork for further attacks. 

Lavrov warned of retaliation but said Russia would continue talks with Washington.

Trump also said he learned of the alleged attack directly from Putin and was ‘very angry about it.’ Asked whether there was evidence, Trump replied, ‘We’ll find out.’

Fox News Digital has reached out to the Kremlin for comment.