losing on religious liberty, you can't pray in your home in california, can't have more than a certain number. barrett comes on the court, it shifts. and imagine without constitution loving justices. >> harris: a busy hour of breaking news. a couple things we'll be watching for, obviously as all the reaction on capitol hill to the announcement that the minority leader of the senate, leader of republicans is going to step down, mitch mcconnell, will stay on as senator and on the record under oath behind closed doors between the oversight committee in the house and the president's son hunter biden. all of it on fox news. stay glued. "america reports" now. >> i stand before you today, mr. president, and my colleagues, to

say this will be my last term as republican leader of the senate. i'm not going anywhere any time soon. however, i'll complete my job, my colleagues have given me until we select a new leader in november and they take the helm next january. >> john: as you've been following, breaking news in the past 30 minutes. mitch mcconnell stepping down from his leadership post this november and with that, welcome to our wednesday edition of the program. i'm john roberts in washington. sandra, big news in just the last little while. >> sandra: another breaking news afternoon. sandra smith in new york. eight-term senator announcing during remarks on the senate floor moments ago he will continue to serve on capitol hill but he's giving up his leadership position within the republican party that he has held since 2007. >> john: chad pergram is live on

capitol hill with more. chad, you were saying just in the last hour that he is the longest serving republican leader ever. >> longest serving eithe majority or minority leader. both parties. never been anybody who has served in leadership longer than him, many others, bob dole, mitch mcconnell either the majority leader or minority leader longer than anybody. here is what will happen. he's not leaving the senate right away, and will not leave the leadership post right away. this fall, and typically what happens in the senate after the election, internal leadership election and the first three people you should probably look at, john cornyn, john barrasso, and john thune, the three johns, they have been preparing quietly, mitch mcconnell just turned 82, he had some health episodes last year and some people started to worry about his health. he's had his differences with the presumptive republican

nominee, former president trump, and even this morning there were some senators talking about they didn't like his leadership style. mitch mcconnell, someone who always seems to know where the votes lie, he always seems to be able to read the politics. just about a week and a half ago, they passed the supplemental international aid package for ukraine and taiwan and israel, and mitch mcconnell did not get a majority of his conference voting for that, as i always say, it's about the math. he wanted to get border security into this bill at the behest of his conference and had to back away from that. it's been clear for a while that mitch mcconnell has not been fully aligned with his conference. listen. >> believe me, i know the politics within my party at this particular moment in time. i have many faults. misunderstanding politics is not one of them. >> mitch mcconnell said that you know, he's been here since 1985,

at first president reagan was the president, didn't even know his name, called him senator o'donnell, kind of a funny moment. but mitch mcconnell in rather touching remarks, he does not show his emotions very often. he plays his cards close to his vest, kind of wept a little bit and teared up and very emotional leaving the senate floor a bit ago. quoted from the book of ecclesiastes that says for all times there is a season and for mitch mcconnell he said it is time to go. listen. >> but father time remains undefeated. i'm no longer the young man sitting in the back hoping colleagues would remember my name. >> now, just this morning there was some criticism leveled at senator mcconnell, we hear on a day-to-day basis, certain conservatives in the republican conference don't like his leadership style, think he should be more supportive of former president trump. i didn't like how he handled the supplemental spending bill for

ukraine, and also taiwan and israel here, and so this is very reflective of what we have heard, some of this criticism this morning. this is josh hawley, the republican senator from missouri. >> mitch mcconnell is the least popular politician in america either party. symbol of everything that's wrong with washington. >> mitch mcconnell said in his remarks it was clear his contributions were coming closer to an end than the beginning. there was a moment yesterday that we tried to figure out, it was after the white house meeting, remember, you had the big four congressional leaders, speaker of the house, chuck schumer, the majority leader, jeffries and mitch mcconnell all go to the white house and in between the democratic and republican press conferences we don't see this in person very often, we know they talk on the phone and their aides talk from time to time. but mitch mcconnell and chuck schumer briefly spoke in the hallway just around the corner from all the reporters and chuck schumer came over to the microphone and i said what did you talk about?

i was asking him who his favorite reporter was in washington. which is not me, by the way, in that case. but to see that moment, you know, that was very interesting to have the two of them talking in the hall and maybe mcconnell might have been giving them a head's up. but on capitol hill, no one had a head's up. i ran into john cornyn, the republican senator from texas coming out of a leadership meeting shortly before mcconnell spoke on the floor, he's one of the people who might be on the short list to succeed mitch mcconnell as the leader of the republican party be they in the majority or the minority in the fall and he said he wasn't even aware of this. again, keep in mind, when they have this leadership election in the fall, it's not like speaker of the house where the entire house votes. this is something internally and mcconnell had a challenger last time around, rick scott, the republican from florida. >> john: chad pergram with the in-depth report on mitch

mcconnell stepping down. chad, we thank you. we'll stand by for any more news out of this. sandra. >> sandra: bring in white house correspondent jacqui heinrich live on the north lawn. what are you hearing there? >> sandra, we haven't gotten word from the white house in terms of a statement or remarks from the president on this news. we also don't know if the president got a head's up yesterday, you had the big four congressional leaders meeting with the president at the white house to fund the government, push ukraine aid forward and the other battles on capitol hill. biden and mcconnell have a long relationship. biden was in the senator 36 years and in times of trouble whenever either of them has had any kind of personal issue, illness, or i think mcconnell, when he was ill last year or the year before, they share words of support for each other even though they don't ideology see

eye-to-eye. it's unclear at this point whether the president got any head's up yesterday or had a chance to talk with the minority leader privately before this news came out this morning which as chad mentioned was a big surprise. what else is unclear with this announcement, obviously mcconnell is going to remain in his post until november when republicans can select a new leader and then they would take the helm in january. but does that change sort of who the white house needs to speak to when they have to pick up the phone and call someone in the senate republican conference to get this done, that person has long been mitch mcconnell. they don't often make them their first phone call but because they see eye-to-eye on a lot of issues like ukraine aid, even if there are disagreement on the way to get it done, or some of the other, you know, political issues surrounding it, on the issues that need action

typically biden and mcconnell have been able to get an agreement and speak to each other and you kind of heard that out of the reporting yesterday in the big four meeting, some reporting that johnson was alone in the ukraine aid discussion and the other folks in the room were kind of ganging up on him in the fight. interesting to know if the white house will redirect their focus to whoever seems to be the likely successor or if that would be a joint conversation in terms of the legislative discussions that they need to have. but this is a very long relationship and it will be a change for biden if he wins a second term and you don't have mcconnell in a leadership position in the senate because it will be a whole different relationship than the one he's been able to rely on for this long. we are awaying any statement. i would be surprised if we didn't get one, i expect we will, the president is doing a roundtable on crime and we will be in the room able to shout some questions at him so

hopefully we'll have some more to give you in short order, guys. as of right now, nothing from the white house on this big and surprising news. >> sandra: so jacqui, a couple things. the president did not originally have it on his schedule today, very well could have been planned, but we were made aware very last minute just before he went out to marine 1 that i was going for his annual physical. he's returned from that to the best of my understanding, and now we do await him in this roundtable and set to deliver remarks, jacqui, at 1:30. >> that's right. in terms of the physical, you know, we know that there was a little bit more planning than it seems like because they had to do an early call time to get the pool here at the white house sooner than they would normally be here. so there was some level of communication so people would be in place to be able to track the president's movements, but the white house certainly did not advertise what that movement was going to be, and interesting

timing that it's happening on the same day that hunter is testifying on capitol hill, you might wonder, did they plan this because they wanted to distract what whatever might be happening over there and how it would reflect on the president or good time to slip it into the news cycle, but the remarks the president is giving are on crime. he's going to try to make the case that the last year of the trump administration was the highest number of murders ever recorded, and that his administration has improved crime. but in the room you are going to have police chiefs and commissioners from sanctuary cities and you know, you've got migrant crime becoming a huge issue as immigration is now the top voter concern and one of the issues that these police chiefs face is sanctuary city policies don't allow them to enforce federal immigration laws. case in point, the murder of laken riley, the young nursing student in georgia allegedly murdered by a venezuelan migrant

arrested in new york and then released before ice got a detainer on him. that blows back to the president's border policies and the policies of sanctuary states and cities. so unclear how compelling a case he can make that his record on crime is better than trump's. i suppose he's going to look at the numbers and say that's the evidence people need to look at, but anecdotally, when you have families and communities experiencing high levels of crime and especially experiencing high levels of migrant crime when you've got record numbers at the border and this is the achilles heel of this administration, unclear if it's a winning argument but he's going to try to make it. >> sandra: jacqui heinrich on the breaking news at the white house, flag us if you get any response to the news on mitch mcconnell and of course we'll be waiting for the president's remarks at 1:30. thank you so much, jacqui. >> john: for more on the mitch mcconnell news, bring in katie pavlich, fox news contributor

and town hall.com editor. it's clear mitch mcconnell was not the most popular person, even among the republican party. sort of made light of it in his speech saying that he was going to step down, saying i still have enough gas in the tank to thoroughly disappoint my critics and will do so with all the enthusiasm they have become accustomed. did not give an indication he was not going to stay after november or after at least the new congress is sworn in, what do you think? >> his senate term is up in 2016, he has to make the decision whether he's going to run again for that position. he's going to see out the year, get republicans to november. and he has a long history, obviously, of republican politics in the senate making moves that have greatly benefitted the conservative movement, republican power. supreme court, of course, is one of those, kept merrick garland off the supreme court when barack obama nominated him at the end of his term. and helped replace justice ginsburg with amy coney barrett

two months before the election when donald trump nominated her for the seat on the supreme court, and packing the federal court system with conservative justices they believe will follow the constitution in a way more long-term than a presidency or senate terms are. but you are right, things do change over the course of a long career. >> john: to go from being the leader to just another senator. >> maybe, nancy pelosi has done it in the house, from speaker to a senator in the house, but listened to father time being undefeated, may be an indication where he's headed in terms of his senate career after he leaves his position of leadership in november. >> sandra: and chad pergram telling us to now look at barrasso, thune, cornyn, the names on the short list to fill his shoes, katie. >> well, we are going to see a big debate about who they think would be the next leader in the

senate. there will be some very magnifying of what republicans are looking for in terms of the split you are seeing in the party. it is true mitch mcconnell does have some differences with president donald trump. there is republican election coming up. and the leader of the republicans and also for the democrats is not just someone who does business in the senate, but also has to keep in mind how they are able to win races around the country to solidify to get the agenda through. look at the way it played out in the house with the new speaker, probably see something similar, see people like senator josh hawley wanting real changes when it comes to leadership given that mitch mcconnell has been in place so long. a big debate and i'm sure we'll be covering every second here in washington. >> john: as you point out, term does not end until 2026, why do you think he pulled the trigger now? do you think it was health problems, just got fed up with the process? i mean, you don't give up 17 years of leadership unless you've got a compelling reason to do it.

>> i'm sure there will be a lot of speculation whether this was about the trump factor, right, of course that plays some kind of role. but mitch mcconnell has had some very serious health issues over the course of the past year and election after an election is a good time to bow out of a big position like this. gives him time to be in influential for the rest of the year as republicans try to take back the white house and finish up business in the senate. but you know, in terms of timing, i don't have any insight exactly why he decided to make this decision. there was not a head's up to fellow senators as jacqui reported, we are not sure if president biden was given a head's up. >> john: cornyn didn't even know. >> lots of different reasons why he chose this moment but he's had a long career and may have just been the best time to make the announcement. >> john: eight months to figure it out. >> sandra: marc thiessen, big news. your reaction. >> big news.

look, mitch mcconnell will go down in history not only as one of the longest serving senate majority leaders but one of the greatest conservative leaders in our country's history and you just need to look at the role he played in absolutely transforming the judiciary. when we look at all the supreme court decisions that have come down recently in favor of conservatives defending the right to life, defending gun rights, defending free speech, defending religious liberty, we owe that to donald trump in part but also to mitch mcconnell. mitch mcconnell is the one who held merrick garland off the supreme court and then shepherded in three conservative supreme court justices that donald trump nominated. that was not a foregone conclusion that that would have happened. it was his maneuvering in the senate, his masterful handling of senate procedure that allowed us to put these judges on the supreme court. justices on the supreme court. and also he transformed the

circuit courts. the supreme court hears about 80 cases a year. circuit courts hear 60,000 a year, many of those don't get to the supreme court, the law is decided on that level and he transformed the judiciary. these are huge things and then also he saved the united states senate in the 2022 midterms. he spent $238 million raised and spent on seven senate races that held the democratic onslaught to just one seat. so if we can take -- if we are in position to take back the senate majority, republicans are, this coming election, it's because mitch mcconnell held the line and saved so many senate races. >> john: so why then, marc, do you think, same question i asked katie, do you think he chose now to do it as opposed to serving out the rest of his term? >> i think it's just time. he had a fall about a year ago and he really has not been quite the same. he's -- we have seen a couple

times where he's frozen in front of the cameras and struggled. he seems better now than he was a few months ago, he's recovering, which is good. but i think he's doing something which a lot of our other leaders can't seem to bring themselves to do, recognize that it's time to exit the stage. joe biden is about the same age as mitch mcconnell. they are the same age and joe biden is going for four more years in the white house. he is in no position to serve four more years in the white house and he doesn't seem to realize it whereas mitch mcconnell realizes that he doesn't have four more years to be the republican leader, that it's time to pass on the torch to a new generation of leaders, and step aside and he's doing -- one of the things that great statesmen do is recognize when it's time to step aside and he's showing the kind of character that joe biden will not. >> sandra: all right, marc thiessen, on the breaking news mitch mcconnell stepping down as the senate gop leader. marc, good to talk to you a

second time today. thanks. >> great to be with you. thanks. >> john: republicans and democrats sparring on capitol hill over the highly anticipated deposition of hunter biden. just in a 45-minute break right now. will the gop-led committees get the answers that they have waited months to receive? we'll have much more on all of this coming up with jonathan turley, democratic congressman jared moskowitz and kerri urbahn. >> sandra: and the star witness in the fani willis case said he could not recall key information while on the stand. what we did learn from that riveting testimony, plus this. >> john: a pro-palestinian mob at u.c. berkeley forcing jewish students to flee. we will speak with two students at that event coming up. g fuzzy! then go to america's best!

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>> obviously this is a big day. we are deposing hunter biden because he's a key witness in our investigation of president joe biden. our committees have unearthed substantial evidence of president biden and his family's corruption. >> we are still waiting for our republican friends to articulate what they think the high crime and misdemeanor is. >> the american people are not buying what the democrats and corporate media are selling. >> i think that our colleagues would do best at this point to fold up the circus tent. >> sandra: fox news alert, live to capitol hill. they have been taking a lunch break in the deposition of hunter biden, these are the democrats up right now. dip in and listen to raskin for a few seconds. >> running on empty, comedy of errors from the beginning, and

hunter biden has been very clear that his father was not involved in any way in his businesses, derived no profit from his businesses and rendered no official favors or benefits to his businesses and no one has laid a glove on any of those statements. so this is essentially where we are. we are pouring over lots of emails and texts to try to torture out some meaning that doesn't exist there, but to my mind hunter biden, who is now completely sober and in recovery, is an excellent and lucid witness. he of course is a graduate of georgetown and yale law school and has had very effective answers to the wild inuendo and conspiracy theories over the last several months and i understand why hunter biden wanted to be able to testify in

public because i think he would answer all of the questions that the public has based on all this propaganda to everybody's satisfaction and i understand why our republican colleagues didn't want him to testify in public. so with that, i don't know if any of the other members had anything that they wanted to add or we can open up to questions at this point. >> mr. raskin. -- [indiscernible] >> well, we have been hearing about the speaker phones in public settings for a long time now, and the suggestion is that when hunter biden was a private citizen and joe biden was a private citizen and hunter biden was having lunch with friends and his father said hello, or if he got on a speaker phone to say hello, or to extend greetings to someone there is something

illicit about that and hunter biden explained i think to the people in the room on a bipartisan room people do that, people say hey, dad, will you say hello to my friends. mom, will you say hello to my colleagues here dropping in, and that was it. so it was a matter of some amusement that there was all kind of paranoid suspicion cast upon this practice of putting your mom or dad on the speaker phone. >> can i add one thing on that. >> just on -- >> sandra: so we are going to continue to monitor, these are the democrats there on capitol hill as there's a lunch break in the deposition of hunter biden who is currently on capitol hill being questioned by the republican-led committees. raskin for his part calls this an embarrassing spectacle. we'll continue to monitor that and get some reaction here from the gop. all right. fox team coverage, jonathan

turley with legal analysis, but first david spunt is live on capitol hill. what's been going on inside there, david? and what are we hearing from republicans as they step out? >> well, republicans say it's been quite interesting. they say hunter biden has been incredibly defiant but interestingly enough, they claim that hunter biden has not used his fifth amendment right of protecting himself from self-incrimination, meaning that he is answering questions and this is coming from people that are not fans of hunter biden, matt gaetz from florida and nancy mace, they say hunter biden is answering questions fairly extensively, we thought that was interesting. but clearly this is going to be a long day. i want to read part of a statement, an opening statement that hunter biden read in open, the open hearing today. he said for more than a year your committees have hunted me

and your partisan political pursuit of my dad. you have trafficked in distortion and sensationallism all the while ignoring the clear and convincing staring you evidence staring you in the face. you do not have evidence to support the baseless and maga motivated conspiracies about my father because there isn't any. sandra, john, republicans want to know about any potential connections between president biden and those business deals because this impeachment inquiry is about president biden. here is congresswoman nancy mace from south carolina. >> we'll see, you know, how he responds to all the allegations and the evidence is there. the evidence is there. so i'm real curious to see what he says and how many times he perjures himself. >> and we are curious, too, and will be getting a transcript in the coming days, depending how long this goes today. i'm told it will take a little while to return that transcript back, and the other question out

there, will there be a public hearing. hunter said he would talk in front of the public, give a statement in front of cameras for millions to watch around the globe and right now it's not clear if that's even still on the table when i asked members of both parties. sandra, john. >> sandra: and by the way, nancy mace will be joining us on this program coming up. david spunt, thank you. john. >> john: jonathan turley, constitutional law attorney and fox news contributor. what hunter biden said, i did not involve my father in my business, not while i was a practicing lawyer, not in my investments or transactions, domestic or international, not as a board member and not as an artist, never. that's pretty much word for word what jim biden said when he was testifying last week. any reason to believe either one of them? well, you'll notice he does not say my father did not know about my business activities as he was flying on air force two, for

example. previously contradicted his father who maintained throughout the campaign he had no knowledge of his son's business dealings. most of us believe that is now patently false. but you'll notice the nuanced language in all of this. i think that the democrats did a disservice to themselves by coming out too quickly, you know. they came out in about an hour after the deposition had started after hunter biden read that statement, so he had barely cleared his throat when they came out and said ok, well, there's nothing here. and it left a lot of us sort of chuckling. made it seem like he could pull out the severed head of viktor shokin and they would say thank you for being so forthcoming, we can move along now. it was just a bizarre and i think a really a badly-timed effort. so we have to see how he answers some of these very specific questions. >> sandra: really interesting and as far as what we are hearing from hunter himself,

this is hunter's statement on his dad's involvement. obviously at the center of all of this. i did not involve my father in my business, not while i was a practicing lawyer, not in my investments or transactions, domestic or international. not as a board member and not as an artist, never. you know, talking to kerri kupec this morning and you as well, jonathan, we go back to the very central question that is, well, what was he doing in exchange for these massive amounts of money? what services was he offering? >> remember, this is the person who sent the whatsapp message that my father sitting next to me and effectively saying he's not going to be happy unless you send me a huge amount of money. now, that seems a rather direct effort at using your father's name to elicit money from foreign sources. in addition to that, there are plenty of emails where joe biden is referenced where the same

figures giving money to the bidens and the biden family thanked him for arranging meetings with his father. and i think the democrats would be in better position if they acknowledged the obvious, which is this was an influence peddling operation. hunter biden himself says that he was in the middle of addiction. why were people giving you millions of dollars in areas you know nothing about. the obvious answer, he was influence peddling. bidens have been alleged to be influence peddlers for a long time. i've been writing about this family for about ten years. there's no surprise there. you can contest whether there is impeachable evidence here but emphasize something else. the fact that joe biden did not get direct payments is not a defense to the classic type of case of bribery or some of these corruption crimes. the courts have repeatedly said that money going to family members is viewed as a benefit to the principal in actual

criminal cases so that's a bit nonsensical if you are talking about corruption. >> john: you mentioned the whatsapp message, bears repeating to remember what it was that hunter said here, he said i'm sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled. tell the director, this is of cefc, that i would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand and now means tonight and if i get a call or text from anyone other than you, sdang or the chairman, i will make sure the person sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge you will regret not following my direction. i'm sitting here waiting for the call with my father. he has since tried to say all of that was taken out of context but lord knows how you do that. yeah, i can't imagine the context you would put that in.

i mean, you juxtapose that with what representative raskin just said, that you know, he would just bring his dad to dinner on occasions and this was just mom or dad calling in to say howdy. that message does not exactly sound like a father being used just to have a friendly hello. and the question is, if he put it in writing in this message, how many times was this message conveyed verbally, that's what usually happens in washington, it's moronic to put that in writing in the social media forum. and one of the reasons the democrats doth protest too much when they say let's stop all this questioning, there's nothing here to see. there's obviously corruption here. that's what influence peddling is. it's a form of corruption. and the question for the public is did president biden know

about that corruption, did he know his brother and his son were influence peddling. i think the evidence is considerable that he did know, including from articles appearing during that time. >> sandra: just want to note that sometimes we were able to track down some lawmakers in the hallways there as this is going on or taking a break or stepping out. they are pooling all the camera and all those moments with the democrats and the republicans for the safety of the president's son there on capitol hill today, so that's why we wait for them to step in front of the microphone. we'll keep monitoring, and jonathan, great to see you. thanks so much. >> john: thanks, professor. >> sandra: and now we are waiting remarks from president biden who is set to speak any moment now about efforts to address the nation's growing crime crisis. the president is hosting a roundtable discussion with police chiefs who he says benefitted from his policies. we are going to take you there live once everything is underway.

>> john: hundreds of anti-israel student protestors breaking down the door at berkeley on monday night, preventing an israeli speaker from addressing jewish students. william is live in los angeles, he's been following the story. how large was that protest? >> about 200 people, john, and waiting for an estimate from the university, a few thousand dollars of damage, but by smashing those windows and b blake -- breaking into a playhouse, they are called their classmates dirty jews and spit on them. at least two jewish students said they were physically assaulted and police had to evacuate the students in underground tunnels for their own safety. the university moved it from an auditorium to a smaller venue but protestors reached that site as well to prevent the event from taking place.

the scheduled speaker was a former legal adviser and now belongs to a think tank. the chancellor condemned the protests saying the attack on the building and the event was attack on the fundamental values of the university which are also essential to maintain open inquiry and inclusive society, bedrock of a democratic nation. the university claimed the size of the crowd and potential for violence had no recent precedent. but jewish students say they have been targeted and harassed on campus for months with no intervention by the administration. >> i think what we are seeing right now is the normalization of antisemitism, not just at u.c. berkeley, not just cornell, harvard, but across the world. >> so a spokesman for the university condemns the antisemitic expression as hate speech, but said it's also first amendment protected, john, however disrupting event, denial

of free speech right is punishable and investigation is underway. back to you. >> john: william, we'll be talking to a couple of students there as well coming up in the next few minutes. sandra. >> sandra: hunter in the hot seat. will his testimony help or hurt republican's impeachment inquiry efforts. we'll ask florida democrat jared moskowitz, he was in the closed door deposition. and he will join us in moments. >> john: plus, immigration rising as the top of concerns. will biden's visit to the texas border bring any real change. we'll ask brandon judd coming up. >> joe biden's administration allows people in, then when they do something seriously wrong, some kind of crime, he never deports anyone. [dramaticlly beat] introducing, ned's plaque psoriasis. he thinks his flaky red patches are all people see.

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>> john: turning back to capitol hill where the president's son is sitting for a closed door deposition with house lawmakers. one of those lawmakers joins us now. bring in florida democratic congressman jared moskowitz. good to see you as always. people have different opinions about all of this and where it's going. let me ask you straight out. do you have any doubt that hunter biden was trading on the family name and selling influence to entities overseas? >> yeah, no, thanks for having me. listen, you know, there are some things that hunter biden has done that he in this deposition has said he's going to accept responsibility for. what i do think is clear not just from the months of information but so far in the four hours of deposition is that joe biden had nothing to do with hunter biden's business dealings and no evidence linking it to joe biden. by the way is the purpose of the deposition. we are here on the impeachment

inquiry. not here on the impeachment of hunter biden, we are here on the impeachment inquiry of his dad, joe biden and so are fa in -- so far no new evidence that you have not already had we have not discussed in the public discourse and there's no evidence linking anything hunter did to joe biden. >> sandra: but the point is, do you have concerns? there's a money trail and the question is, what was hunter biden doing to receive these very large sums of money? >> oh, listen, i think the american people have concerns about hunter biden. he obviously has issues with the gun charge and the tax charge, so concerns about what hunter biden has done. he talked about his challenges of addiction and mistakes he's made. if hunter biden could be impeached they would have done that by now. we are here on the impeachment of joe biden, not what this inquiry is about. and again, there is no evidence

linking hunter biden's behavior and business dealings to his father joe biden. >> john: well, after lunch break he'll be back in there, i assume you will be, too. i want to move on to another big topic the president is going to be talking about in the next hour, and that is crime in america. we still have not heard from the president directly about the heinous murder of laken riley on the university of georgia campus. allegedly at the hands of a man who entered this country illegally in september of 2022. and then was paroled into the country. do you believe this president has to do more, particularly in the area of who is being paroled into this country to get a handle on what appears to be increasing crime among illegal immigrants? >> yeah, let me be crystal clear on this. what happened in the laken riley situation is unacceptable in this country. right? that gentleman, as soon as he was picked up on the child

endangerment charge should have been deported. idea that he was detained and released to commit another crime is ridiculous. this is a failure of the sanctuary policy, it's not something that i support, it's why i support mayor adams saying the changes need to be made immediately. government sometimes is reactive. you are talking to someone who attended marjory stoneman douglas and watched 17 people go to school and not come out of the building and we made changes to the law. we have to be proactive here. we have to fix the issues at the border. there was a bipartisan deal to try to do that, that died. and so yes, these are consequences of the failures going on at the border. about you we are not going to fix those unless we have a bipartisan solution to what's going on. but yes, these -- these migrant crime issues where someone is getting picked up and then released and then committing a second crime, these people need to be deported as soon as they are arrested. >> sandra: congressman, part of the problem, part of the problem is this man walking freely to

then kill this 22-year-old girl, he was crossing over the border at a time when your party was saying our borders are closed, our borders are secure. this administration was saying things are better than they were in the previous administration. there was an insistence that everything was fine. so, now your party is crying crisis and it's republicans' fault. where were democrats then? >> well, both things can be true, right? one thing can be true, which is first of all, illegal immigration has been happening in all sorts of administration's, going on for decades, did not just start now. another thing true which is republicans have been talking about it the last couple years and democrats were a little late to the party. another thing can be true, there was a bipartisan bill to fix it and donald trump killed it because he wants the issue for his campaign. all of those things can be true simultaneously. it doesn't have to be an and/or. that being said, i'm for doing more at the border. i'm for making sure we have a secure border if we have to close the border to do that, so be it.

what i'm not for is my grandparents came here escaping the holocaust. people were escaping persecution. illegal and released, they must immediately be deported for sure. period. >> john: yeah. congressman, we'll let you get back into the testimony which is supposed to be resuming any moment now, and thank you for joining us. appreciate it. >> sandra: appreciate you joining us. thank you. and now we are awaiting president biden's remarks on fighting crime, we are told, by this white house. but will he address the outbreak of violence by illegal migrants like the murder of that nursing student laken riley. we will be speaking to the father of a 25-year-old man who was killed while riding his bicycle by an illegal immigrant. that father will react coming up. veteran homeowners, car payments are getting out of control. get a newday 100

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>> sandra: fox news alert, live to the white house, the shot is up now where the president has just entered the room. he's going to be delivering remarks on his actions to fight crime and make our communities safer there in the state dining room. just announced he would be making the remarks earlier today.

you have been writing about this. >> i hope he talks about this awful laken riley case. i don't think there's been a comment from him yet. a lot of people are concerned, even democrats, in the previous segment looking at the situation people coming in, not just costing money in terms of expenses, welfare benefits but a complete collapse in public safety, people who are engaged in all kinds of mayhem, people engaged in drunk driving. this is a severe situation. a lot of people are very concerned about this and this is probably an opportunity for biden to try to do the right thing on illegal aliens. i doubt he will, but a great opportunity if he wants to pivot and get on the right side of this issue. >> sandra: to your point, you are hearing more and more democrats sound the alarm on the growing crime crisis in the country, more from the mainstream media about this. people are scared, scared about what they are seeing as far as illegal immigrants carrying out brutal, gruesome crimes like there in georgia. we heard from the mayor there

earlier talking about how they are stepping up safety concerns. bottom line with that issue, that's sort of putting band aid on the problem, right. it was not addressing the bigger issue and that is these undocumented immigrants coming over the border and then just getting lost in the system. what else do you hope ho hear from the president here? >> i would like to hear him say what he's going to do to shut the border down. go to the u.s. embassy, fill out a visa application, after we vetted you we will let you in. rather than now, running across the border, not screened, and unfortunately the people are informal criminals, or venezuelan gangs what are engaged in organized crime. joe biden in an effort to reverse everything about trump has created a miserable, frankly deadly situation in this country and like to hear him say he's going to reverse course. i don't think he will do that, but it would be nice to see him do that.

>> sandra: sadly some of the rising crime statistics in places like chicago and new york has had companies and residents fleeing to what they perceive as safer areas of the country. quick break, we'll be right back with the president's remarks.

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