One of the world’s largest and most influential scientific societies held its annual conference last weekend, which a Fox News Digital review found was littered with examples of progressive messaging, criticisms of the Trump administration, and ‘woke’ workshops.

Attendees who showed up at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) event, held at the Phoenix Convention Center from Feb. 12-14, were immediately greeted at registration with identifier stickers that used gender pronouns such as ‘they/them,’ ‘xi/xer,’ ‘xe/xem,’ and other descriptors that critics have alleged have little to do with science and biology.

During the meeting’s opening night, shortly after a 10-minute hoop dance routine from traditional Native American dancers, AAAS CEO Dr. Sudip Parikh told the audience that it’s been a ‘hard’ and ‘tough year for science and scientists in this country.’

Parikh went on to blame DOGE for the ‘devastation’ of ‘some of our science agencies’ and the ‘president’s budget request’ that ‘cut science by half’ and, in his opinion, amounted to ‘forfeiting the future.’

‘What happened over the course of the last year is a rupture. We’re not going back, it’s not possible, too much damage has been done, too much has changed. There’s an entire generation of scientists that have a scar, a scar that is not going to go away,’ Parikh explained, adding that scars can ‘make us tougher’ and ‘become almost shields’ that ‘build resilience.’

Parikh told the crowd that he warned last year that Robert F. Kennedy Jr was the ‘wrong person’ for Health and Human Services secretary and said, ‘I still feel that way,’ which prompted laughter and applause from the crowd.

‘It’s going to take protests, it’s going to take politics, it’s going to take the ability to not speak gibberish, all of that has got to come together if we’re going to fight for the inheritance of the enlightenment to continue to make this world a better place,’ Parikh said.

Workshops at the event, which provided gender-neutral washrooms, included a session titled ‘Mao-Mei Liu: Nurturing Diversity in Science is Resistance,’ and another called ‘Investigating the Role of Race in Clinical Decision-Making.’

‘Who Gets to Belong? Disability, Power, and Participation in Higher Education,’ another workshop was called. 

Dr. Theresa A. Maldonado, a world-renowned expert in electrical engineering, delivered the president’s address at the conference and also lamented what a difficult year 2025 was for science and suggested climate change was responsible for the devastating southern California wildfires last year.

AAAS, the publisher of the highly respected Science magazine, posted several more videos over the course of the next few days, many including speakers who criticized the Trump administration and injected politics into discussions. 

‘Colonial Legacies, Climate Crises, and the Erosion of Mobility Choice’ was another workshop that scientists at the conference were offered and in an interview with ‘climate justice scholar’ Jola Ajibade, she explained how climate change has benefited a ‘few wealthy people’ while ‘low-income communities are displaced.’

‘At the center of my work is giving a voice but also bringing to the attention of everyone the impact of a slew of climate solutions, the impact of those solutions on low-income communities, on Black communities, on indigenous, on Latino communities as well,’ Ajibade explained, adding that she is focused on finding a ‘decolonial’ approach. 

Listed sponsors of the event included the Science Philanthropy Alliance, a group tied to the progressive consulting behemoth Arabella Advisors through the New Venture Fund, a nonprofit that pushes a variety of progressive causes. 

‘The whole thing that is sad for me is that when I attended these conferences in the first Trump administration there was plenty of liberal nonsense, but it still was a celebration of science and the achievements of the year, and you left excited,’ an event attendee told Fox News Digital.

‘This year felt like a funeral, with nothing but griping and moaning. Why would people want to keep coming back year after year with something like that? I suspect that is why their attendance greatly suffered this year compared to the pre-COVID years. Their constant pleas to keep politics out of science are completely undercut by their perpetual whining and endorsing utter craziness. They’re happy for science to be political, as long as it’s leftist.’

Additionally, as lawmakers in the United States continue to warn about the growing threat posed by China and what they believe is the CCP’s infiltration of top institutions in the United States — particularly in the medical and science fields — the AAAS conference opted to allow the Beijing-based research institute Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) to operate a booth at the event. 

The state-run Chinese academy, which has faced controversy over its ties to China’s government and military, has collaborated with a Chinese medical technology firm linked to a 2013 U.S. bribery case involving NIH-funded research. The company has also installed equipment in leading American research labs.

‘The AAAS says that their organization wants to ‘inspire’ future scientists and engineers, but session topics and material from their meeting actually discourage participants from relying on their effort and merit and turns the focus to race and ethnicity,’ Johnathan Butcher, acting director of the Center for Education Policy at the Heritage Foundation, told Fox News Digital. 

‘These are the very same kind of racist ideas inspired by DEI that have been prohibited in universities, state governments, and the federal government, because the ideas violate state and federal civil rights laws,’ Butcher added. ‘Policymakers should be aware of what this organization is doing and make sure the association is not promoting racial preferences in hiring, promotion or research awards in academia or anywhere else.’

In a statement to Fox News Digital, an AAAS spokesperson said, ‘A broad spectrum of the scientific enterprise attends the meeting. The topics covered were wide-ranging across scientific disciplines and are proposed by scientists. AAAS respects their First Amendment right to free speech.’

Senate Democrats have panned the GOP’s push for voter ID legislation as akin to segregationist laws from the Deep South, but the architect of the bill in the Senate says their arguments are detached from reality.

‘It’s paranoid fantasy,’ Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, told Fox News Digital. ‘These are absurd arguments. They should be ashamed to make them.’

Lee was responding to comments from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who has doubled down on his claim that the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act is ‘Jim Crow 2.0.’

The bill, which passed the House last week and has been introduced and championed by Lee in the Senate, would require photo ID to vote in federal elections, proof of citizenship to register and would mandate that states keep voter rolls clear of ineligible voters.

Schumer and his caucus plan to block the bill, arguing that it is a tool of voter suppression that would disproportionately harm poorer Americans and minority groups.

But Lee argued that providing identification or proof of citizenship is routine in everyday life — whether undergoing a background check to buy a firearm or filling out tax forms when starting a new job.

‘By their logic, it’s Jim Crow to require somebody to establish citizenship before taking a job with a new employer, and that’s insane,’ Lee said.

‘And so then they argue here, well, voting is so fundamental, and we have constitutional protections protecting our right to vote,’ he continued. ‘Well, we’ve got constitutional protections protecting our right to bear arms, and yet that doesn’t cause us to dispense with proving who you are and your eligibility to buy a gun. This has just been insane.’

Without Democratic support, however, the pathway to sending the legislation to President Donald Trump’s desk is complicated.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has vowed to bring the SAVE America Act to the floor, and Republicans have the votes to move it through its first key procedural hurdle. From there, Democrats can block it with the 60-vote filibuster, which Lee often refers to as the ‘zombie’ filibuster.

Eliminating the filibuster is out of the question for several of Lee’s colleagues, but Republicans are warming to reinstating a talking, or standing, filibuster, which would require Senate Democrats to make their case against the bill on the floor over hours of debate.

Trump has already suggested he would issue an executive order if the legislation fails, which Lee declined to speculate on without first knowing what exactly would be done.

But he noted that it was all the more reason to pass the SAVE America Act, given the ever-swinging political pendulum in Washington, D.C.

‘It’s still really critically important that we pass this law, because let’s assume that he issued such an order, and that it does most or all of what we needed to do here, that gives us protection for the moment, to whatever degree he’s able to do that through an executive action,’ Lee said. ‘But we need something that can last longer than he’s in office.’

An 88-year-old billionaire businessman and former Victoria’s Secret chief is the latest person to fall within the House Oversight Committee’s investigative crosshairs.

The crimes of late billionaire sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein are well-known, having gained new media attention in recent months after Congress forced the Department of Justice (DOJ) to disclose millions of pages of documents.

But less is known about the figures who operated within Epstein’s orbit and how they helped him get the vast international sphere of influence he enjoyed before finding himself in a Manhattan jail awaiting trial, where he killed himself in 2019.

Leslie ‘Les’ Wexner, founder of L Brands, the former chief of Victoria’s Secret, is one of those figures, having been named a co-conspirator of Epstein in a recently uncovered FBI document from 2019.

Wexner is the founder of L Brands, formerly known as The Limited, which included Victoria’s Secret, Bath & Body Works, and Pink. He also helped found Abercrombie & Fitch, a clothing brand that was once popular among teens in the U.S.

Wexner has never been charged with crimes related to the late financier, and a spokesperson for the mogul told Fox News Digital that the ‘Assistant U.S. Attorney told Mr. Wexner’s legal counsel in 2019 that Mr. Wexner was neither a co-conspirator nor target in any respect.’ 

But documents released by the DOJ allege that Wexner was one of the key players in how Epstein built his wealth and later ran his illicit empire.

One file from 2013 that appears to have been in the possession of the Southern District of New York (SDNY) titled ‘Jeffrey Epstein Source of Wealth,’ said Wexner ‘became a well-known client’ of Epstein’s financial management firm in 1987.

At the time, Wexner was identified as the founder and chairman of the Ohio-based women’s clothing brand The Limited.

‘Since all but one of his financial clients are anonymous, it has been speculated that much of Epstein’s lavish lifestyle was once financed by Wexner,’ reads the document, which appears to be an email. Wexner’s spokesperson declined to comment on the allegations.

That paper also noted that Wexner sold his massive Manhattan townhouse — reported to be the largest private residence in the New York City borough — to Epstein.

A 2019 FBI witness statement from a man who purported to be Wexner’s bodyguard from 1991 to 1992 said Wexner ‘sold his mansion in New York to Epstein for $20.’

The same witness statement alleged that ‘Epstein got all of his money from Wexner.’

A 1998 document obtained by Fox News Digital, however, shows Wexner sold his home to Epstein for a $20 million price tag. Half was paid via cashier’s check, while the other half was covered by a promissory note, the record shows.

Epstein’s Manhattan mansion was raided by the FBI in July 2019 as part of the federal sex trafficking investigation. There, law enforcement officials found vast troves of evidence, including photos of partially or fully nude women and girls, including ones who appeared to be minors.

The DOJ’s unsealed indictment against Epstein also said it was one of the places where he ‘enticed and recruited, and caused to be enticed and recruited, dozens of minor girls… to engage in sex acts with him, after which he would give the victims hundreds of dollars in cash.’

Wexner reportedly bought the mansion in 1989 for $13.2 million before selling it to a corporation partially controlled by Epstein for an ‘undisclosed amount,’ according to Business Insider. It was then reportedly transferred to a U.S. Virgin Islands-based company controlled by Epstein for $0 in 2011.

The home was reportedly valued at $77 million at the time of the raid, making it a massive portion of Epstein’s wealth.

A heavily redacted email chain from July 2025 that appears to show witness statement summaries, with the subject line, ‘RE: Epstein – Cellmate Interview,’ also said, ‘Steve Scully stated Wexner was #1 on Epstein’s speed dial.’

Steve Scully appears to be a reference to a former IT contractor who lived and worked on Epstein’s private island of Little St. James from 1999 through 2005. Wexner’s spokesperson declined to comment on Scully’s claim.

Wexner even signed a document in 1991 giving Epstein vast control over his finances via power of attorney, according to the New York Times. That document gave Epstein the power to sign checks, borrow money, and buy or sell real estate on Wexner’s behalf, the report said.

A letter Wexner wrote to his nonprofit, the Wexner Foundation, in August 2019 said that while he did give power of attorney to Epstein, their relationship ended soon after the 2007 federal investigation first began into the late financier in Florida.

‘[B]y early fall 2007, it was agreed that he should step back from the management of our personal finances. In that process, we discovered that he had misappropriated vast sums of money from me and my family. This was, frankly, a tremendous shock, even though it clearly pales in comparison to the unthinkable allegations against him now,’ the letter said.

‘With his credibility and our trust in him destroyed, we immediately severed ties with him. We were able to recover some of the funds. The widely reported payments Mr. Epstein made to the charitable fund represented a portion of the returned monies. All of that money — every dollar of it — was originally Wexner family money.’

But other documents released by the DOJ allege that Epstein and Wexner’s relationship went further than financial management.

An FBI witness statement by Robert Morosky, a former executive for Wexner’s fashion brand, said, ‘He had information regarding the use of ‘Limited’ brand aircraft used in the 1990s to transport young girls from Mexico to the U.S.’

‘Morosky did not wish to give any additional information at that time; however if someone would like to pursue this information he could be reached on his personal cellular phone,’’ the statement said.

It’s unclear if the lead was ever pursued, but a spokesperson for Wexner told Fox News Digital, ‘The allegation is false. Mr. Morosky was terminated from the company in 1987 and therefore in no position to know anything about the use of Limited planes in the 1990s.’

A witness statement from 2020, with the identity of the female witness redacted, said she claimed to have ‘often’ seen Epstein and Wexner together.

She ‘stated that often Wexner would have models who could not have been over 18 years old do private viewings for him and Epstein. She said the models would be wearing [swimsuits] and some were in lingerie,’ the document read.

Wexner’s spokesperson declined to comment on those claims and called her account of seeing the pair together ‘vague.’

The female witness said she ‘would help with getting people to work at parties at Wexner’s compound in catering and other positions,’ and that ‘anyone who went to work there had to have a full background check and there were certain areas of the house where they could not go without an approved escort.’

However, there was no indication of what years or period of time her claims are focused on.

A source with knowledge of company procedures argued the situation could not have happened, however. Model fittings always involved teams of 15 to 20 professionals and Epstein was never a part of that, the source maintained.

Wexner is scheduled to appear before the House Oversight Committee in Ohio on Wednesday morning.

Fox News Digital reached out to Wexner’s attorney for comment on the deposition and on the aforementioned claims.

The Vatican will not join President Donald Trump’s newly formed Board of Peace, its top diplomatic official said Tuesday, signaling reluctance from the Holy See to take part in the post-war initiative.

Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin said the Holy See ‘will not participate in the Board of Peace because of its particular nature, which is evidently not that of other States,’ the Vatican’s official news outlet reported.

The Board of Peace, which was chartered in January and includes nearly 20 countries, is tasked with managing recovery efforts in the Gaza Strip after the Israel-Hamas war.

While responding to questions about Italy declining to join the board, Parolin said ‘there are points that leave us somewhat perplexed,’ adding that ‘there are some critical points that would need to find explanations.’

‘The important thing is that an attempt is being made to provide a response,’ he said. ‘However, for us there are certain critical issues that should be resolved.’

Parolin continued, ‘One concern is that, at the international level it should above all be the UN that manages these crisis situations. This is one of the points on which we have insisted.’

Pope Leo, the first U.S. pope, received an invitation to join the peace board in January.

Leaders from 17 countries participated in the initial charter signing ceremony in Davos, Switzerland, in late January, including presidents and other senior government officials from Latin America, Europe, the Middle East and Central and Southeast Asia.

Israel formally joined the board last week ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s meeting with Trump at the White House.

Several other countries were also invited by the White House, including Russia, Belarus, France, Germany, Vietnam, Finland, Ukraine, Ireland, Greece and China.

Poland and Italy on Wednesday said they would not join.

Trump announced Sunday that board members have pledged more than $5 billion in aid for Gaza.

The president said the funding would be formally pledged during a meeting Wednesday in Washington, D.C.

Fox News Digital’s Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report.