did that to our anthem last week when the teams first met. when asked about this moment, team usa forward said he didn't like it and then seconds after that he started the first of three consecutive fights in the first nine seconds of the game. keep in mind these players couldn't play in the olympics. they have been waiting to represent their country and tonight is going to be a great game. send it back to you. >> bill: nate, you know what mom says. mom says bring home a winner. it's on you. >> hey, i'm bringing the best mojo that i possibly can. >> dana: that was great to be with you and shannon bream takes you through the next hour in for "the faulkner focus." >> shannon: pick it up here with

a fox news alert. president trump is expanding his crackdown on illegal immigration. last night he signed an executive order telling all federal departments and agencies to end all federally funded programs that benefit illegal immigrants. i'm shannon bream in for harris today on "the faulkner focus." homeland security committee reports the u.s. spent more than $450 billion in your tax money to care for illegal immigrants and gotaways over the span of nearly three years. illegal immigrant apprehensions at the southwest border dropped by more than 35,000 from december to january this year. kristi noem has also deputized 600 state department employees as immigration officers. she praised the president's actions on the border crisis. >> we have a president that puts america first and has closed the border, has secured it and is allowing us to deport people in

record numbers and we're deporting dangerous criminals. we're getting them out of the country. every day we're saving lives because of the work we're doing. >> the administration has designated eight latin american gangs like tren de aragua and ms-13 as foreign terrorist organizations. that move aims to go after drug trafficking and migrant smuggling. republican senator ashley moody with this. >> biden basically ceded control of the border over to the cartels. so our country was looking more and more like cartel territory. deadly drugs, gang violence, taking over full apartment complexes. it was out of control. guess what? the parents came home. the grown-ups are back. it is time to take back control of this nation. president trump said he would do it. he is fulfilling that promise. >> shannon: national correspondent griff jenkins has more. >> good morning. this new executive order is

music to border officials ears who side that free stuff like federal benefits are a major pull factor or incentive driving illegal immigration. now this order is telling every department and agency to root out and cut off any program providing benefits to illegal migrants. vice president vance just spoke about this at cpac moments ago. watch. >> so many of our issues come back to the border. if you take 30, 40 million illegal aliens, you take medicare fraud, social security fraud. why are we taking the people's social security payments and giving it to illegal aliens? we know that is happening in the united states of america today. we have to stop it. >> let me show you what he is talking about. over the next ten years current spending would include tens of billions for obamacare rick medicaid, tax credits, food stamps, you see it there. that now will likely end. this as the federation for

american immigration reform says taxpayers have been spending already over 180 billion annually and every new illegal immigrant costs about $130,000. the order also mandates and prevents welfare eligibility verification that's important. recall back in 1996 when clinton signed a law to banwell fair abuse barred immigrants from receiving benefits. under biden when they got paroled they qualified for some. that will likely end. expect a legal battle over part of the order that cuts off federal funding to sanctuary cities and local entities. shannon. >> shannon: thank you very much. here is a closer look at that 1996 law signed by president clinton that griff referenced there. with several exceptions it banned immigrants, including illegals, from receiving federal benefits like food assistance, supplemental security income. medicaid and children's health

insurance programs. phil holloway, former assistant district attorney and legal advisor to the georgia sheriff's department. >> great to be with you. we've seen a lot of lawfare 3.0 as i like to call it so far in this administration. most of that is proverb laos. the litigation that we can expect to come on the basis of this executive order is clearly frivolous. the president, all he is doing is ordering federal agencies to comply with that 1996 law that as you mentioned was signed into law by non-other than democrat president bill clinton. so this has federal statutory backing. this executive order is on solid legal grounds. a long time coming. it is a shame that the general public has to be reminded that it is the law of the land that taxpayer dollars are not supposed to be wasted in this fashion. >> shannon: some of this may be

also money that's flowing to so-called sanctuary cities or states that do get federal money. the president was clear in the executive order. day one or two he didn't want that money flow to continue. now this executive order spelling out additional language as well. i remember in the years covering the supreme court years ago when arizona came and fought at the supreme court because they wanted the power as a state to do more about handling immigration and the court said no, this is a federal purview. it is for the executive branch. now we have states and localities saying we won't cooperation. >> we have a lot of problems with that. now we see with all of this lawfare 3.0 federal district courts, which by the way are not even mentioned by the constitution. they are created by congress. these executive functions of the presidency are being invaded by the federal courts.

what it is going to take, i think, is the supreme court of the united states to say look, we need these article iii judges, the d.c. district judges and elsewhere, we need them to stay in their article iii lane. we can't have a system of governance where the courts get to substitute their judgment for that of the president of the united states. we have judicial review. that's fine. if the president or congress steps outside of the constitution federal courts have the legitimate power of judicial review. it doesn't mean, shannon, the judges get to simply substitute their judgment for that of the president because they do not like his policies. i'm afraid that's what we are seeing happening. >> shannon: many of those may turn on what the supreme court ultimately decides. they can't take every one of the cases filed but common threads here. interesting to see what they do when these things get to their level. i want to get to this as well. talk that some of these immigration raids have been undermined potentially by leaks

going out from inside. this is what kristi noem said about poll graphing people who work at dhs. >> i have suspicions. we have different tools to use. one of those is insuring that we're using polygraphs to look at all of our people involved in the operations to make sure they're telling the truth on what they have done in the past that may have jeopardized some of our operations. the department of homeland security is a law enforcement agency. so this is one of the authorities that i have and i will use it to make sure that we find those who have done this nefarious activity and that it will no longer be tolerated. >> shannon: how tricky is this? you have scores of people who may or may not agree the current administration is doing. these leaks can be detrimental in trying to carry out the raids they're doing. >> they can be deadly. from my days wearing a uniform

and going on the execution of search warrants and other types of raids operational security is absolutely critical. you can't have too many people with knowledge of this because you can't afford the leaks because lives are on the line. on the broader point in the first trump administration, his entire administration was plagued by leaks by bureaucracies who did not agree with the president's policies. this time around you are seeing the efforts to still do those leaks but you are also seeing the administration like secretary noem and others cracking down on those leaks and doing what they can to try to prevent them so this administration can implement the policy goals. >> shannon: a quick comment from you on this. civil rights organizations are using the courts to go against president trump's policies. the groups are suing the administration over a series of executive orders going after d.e.i. programs and they say these orders are discriminatory,

illegal. this by the way brings the total number of lawsuits against the trump administrations to 79 as far as we can track led by democrats, labor unions and progressive organizations. alina habba says this. >> the president is used to being under siege with lawfare and radical left judges. this lawfare is part of the reason i believe we won. i truly do. i think it is desperate. i think it is not in the interests of the american people. we will not be defying orders. we'll fight them in court. >> shannon: the supreme court could rule any minute on this first case against the president to his second term. dillinger sued the trump administration after being fired this month. waiting to find out if the supreme court will get involved while it is playing out getting the job back or no. it is just the latest twist, bill. >> we saw in the last few years the left was able to find courts and judges that were willing to

do their bidding if you will in the first round of lawfare and so this is simply a continuation. they will try the same playbook to see if it works now that the president is back in office. but look, when he wants to eliminate d.e.i. and these other programs of that nature, what he is trying to do is trying to move back to a place of merit-based success versus people being promoted and otherwise on the basis of their gender and race. it is basically a merit-based system versus one based on race and gender and other factors. what the president is trying to do is essentially eliminate discrimination. it is rich that the left is proceeding in the courts on that basis. >> shannon: we'll see how they succeed or don't. thank you for your time. great to see you. right now the senate is holding a procedural vote to break a filibuster to advance kash patel's nomination as f.b.i. for the full floor vote.

if they get to the majority now we expect the senate to confirm him later this afternoon. we're tracking it for you. also today very somber, a day as the bodies of four hostages murdered by hamas are returned to israel. among them the two youngest captives and their mother. plus president trump holding onto steady job approval numbers one month after his inauguration and a tornado of action. >> the american people have seen through the nonsense. they want someone who is working for them and that's why donald trump won.

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>> shannon: it is one month since president trump returned

to the white house. three new polls show his job approve all numbers have remained steady. a big partisan divide. overwhelming majority of republicans approve of the president's job. very few democrats do. independents approval falls in the mid 30s to low 40s. cnn data analyst with a big picture take on things. >>at what has happened in february of 2025. look at this. republicans, there are more republicans in the electorate than democrats. republican plus two. so donald trump and the republicans have remade the electorate. turned some people over from being democrats or independents to become republicans. new folks entered the electric yacht more republican leaning. republicans are behind donald trump, all of a sudden you get a winning recipe you break the normal rules of politics and give donald trump the positive net approval rating. >> shannon: let's bring in power

panel. welcome to you both. doug, let's start there. you crunch the numbers all the time. what do you make of these showing that essentially the gop has a fresh makeover and new resurgence under president trump. >> i think that's right. we are a polarized country, shannon, as we saw in the election and that polarization continues today. i think the broader message, though, is that the trump policies have broad support across the electorate beyond his approval numbers and there is a desire for change, which my party, the democrats, candidly hasn't responded to. so i think he is off to a fast start. doing relatively well with independents, who he won. these numbers reflect, i think, a clear sense of progress and

achievement for the president in the first month or so of his administration. >> shannon: you've seen the polling that shows. people described him as tough, ambitious, getting things done and doing what he said he would do during the campaign. you also have democrats who say people out there don't get it. we have congresswoman crockett who within the last day said people aren't educated enough that democrats aren't sharing their message well enough. what people really prefer is joe biden because she says then they could sleep at night. >> i think this is so sad today, shannon. they have underestimated americans and the american dream. president trump continues to overperform. remember politics is all about addition. we don't look at the subtraction today. president trump increased his base in the democrat party and independents because democrats lost their messaging. left americans behind as we had the 40 year highest inflation in the country and refused to close

down the border. what puzzles me today, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again. democrats should be saying doge, you are successful and cut fraud, waste and abuse and helping americans in my district. instead they have turned their backs on the american people and that's why we kicked them out of the white house, the house and the senate. we will continue to see victories. >> shannon: what about that? i talk to a number of democrats and don't seem -- why not join forces instead of standing up and the optics of you fighting for things i don't want my tax dollars spent on that? >> shannon, i couldn't agree more with what you are saying. i think on things like cutting waste, fraud and abuse, immigration reform, my party should join republicans and look for bipartisan solutions.

as you say, correctly, they can take some of the credit. now, democrats aren't going to agree with everything that donald trump and elon musk do. but you can say look, i want to cut government but protect medicare, medicaid, social security, the department of education. i want to maintain nato. you can say those things as a democrat all the while recognizing that there is a broad desire for change, for reducing the size of government, reducing the level of expenditure and most of all tackling inflation so that the american people can afford their quality of life. >> shannon: okay. get this. gallup's new survey shows american's approval of congress has jumped 12 points since january. 29%, does not sound good but marks the highest rating since may of 2021. it has not been above 20% for

two years after president trump too office. voters approve of republicans in congress far more than than they do of democrats. only 21% voters approve of the way democrats are handling their job compared to 40% for republicans. so i want to bring you in on that point. 29%. none of us would be happy if that's the job approval rating we had. it is good for congress. they are moving in the right direction. >> we need to see a lot more from this congress and what president trump is demanding. 29% on a report card my mother would be very angry at me. we need to look at the 90 to 100% mark. how do you get there? one big, beautiful bill like president trump said that incorn rates tax cuts for middle america. we need to see those cost savings. making sure we continue to secure that border. legislation is going to add security. president trump can only do so far with executive orders. we have need to make every single change he is doing permanent so that these executive orders are not all for

nothing and this will lie on republicans whether we win or lose, it will be on congress's level. they are the only ones that can make the change permanent. >> shannon: a heavy lift on the hill. if this stuff stays on the books that's the way you have to do it. great to see both of you. thank you. >> thank you so much. >> thank you. >> shannon: the bodies of four hostages have been returned to israel by their hamas kidnappers and murders. among them a mother and two toddlers. they were the youngest israelis taken hostage by hamas october 7th. unimaginable grief as israelis have lined the streets to show their respects as the caskets of the bibas families were transported to the forensic institute in tel aviv. mike huckabee said this. >> just heartbreak for this family who had to wait over 500

days to know the disposition of their loved ones. these people have no bounds of decency, none whatsoever. hamas has really demonstrated in every single day why they cannot remain in any part of control not just of gaza but anywhere. >> shannon: greg palkot is live in tel aviv, israel as this plays out. hello, greg. >> we cannot underscore more how somber this day is here in israel. hamas for the first time in months of conflict releasing on their own slain israeli hostages. all part of the current phase of this cease-fire agreement. the highest profile as you noted the family of 32-year-old mother and wife shiri bibas and her two

sons. the husband and father was also captured but released alive earlier this month. hamas claimed without evidence the family was killed in an israeli air strike. for the nation, the plight of the bibas family embodied the suffering of all the hostages. we saw that today. remains of 83-year-old man was also transferred. he was a retired journalist and important peace activist aiding palestinians in gaza with, for example, medical care. after another propaganda display early this morning in gaza by hamas, including staged poster militants, crowds, the coffins containing the bodies were brought by the red cross to an idf military location draped with israeli flags and a brief religious service was held. remains are now at israel's forensic center for final confirmation. in the past hour or so, shannon,

we received word that 83-year-old man has been formally identified. further israeli prime minister's office is saying he was, in fact, murdered by a militant group in gaza. netanyahu saying revenge would be taken against these murders. president herzog asked for forgiveness today on behalf of israel to the hostages and families. shannon, six living hostages are set to be released on saturday and four more deceased handed over next week. still talks regarding phase two, the next phase after the one we're in right now, that does have a promise of more hostages as well, have not really started. that could be the very difficult one and maybe the insur mountable one. it will take a lot of work. back to you. >> shannon: greg palkot. thank you very much. president trump's pick tore f.b.i. director kash patel

inching closer to confirmation. senate voting to advance his nomination for a final vote this afternoon. completion of the trump cabinet is getting closer. democrats pointing the finger over recent plane crashes and member of the mainstream eid yeah getting stiff armed by delta ceo for trying to blame the president. >> they fired employees of the faa. do those cuts worry you and does that impact the safety? >> the cuts don't affect us, gale. ervice is our business, but our mission is to honor and serve patriots. patriot mobile gives back to organizations that defend our god given rights and freedoms. with dependable nationwide coverage on all three of the major u.s. based networks. you get the same great service with a higher calling. go to patriot mobile dot com now and make an impact every time you use your cell phone.

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all of this is teeing up a full confirmation vote set for this information for patel. democrats are fighting to the bitter end. they held a news conference this morning continuing to ro test. >> my senate republican colleagues are willing willfully ignoring red flags about mr. patel. >> he is a yes man for president trump. already undermining the critical bureau he wants to lead. >> kash patel, mark my words, will cause evil in this building behind us and republicans who vote for him will rue that day. >> shannon: senior congressional correspondent chad pergram on the hill with a lot of breaking news there, chad. >> good morning, shannon. three breaking stories on capitol hill. you referred to the kash patel procedure vote on the floor trying to break a filibuster here. there are 37 yays to break the filibuster. confirmation vote comes this afternoon. we don't think he will have a

problem getting confirmed. susan collins, republican senator from maine voted in favor of continuing the filibuster and put out a statement a few minutes ago saying she was opposed to kash patel. she says mr. patel's recent political profile undermines his ability to serve in the apolitical role of f.b.i. director. you mentioned mitch mcconnell. we don't know how he will vote on kash patel. he has kept his cards close to the vest on all these nominees. sometimes he will vote to overcome the filibuster and vote no later on. it was a year ago at this time that mcconnell announced he would step down from his leadership post as the senate minorly leader. the longest serving party leader of all time. he would finish his seventh term in early 2027. we're watching to see how he will vote on this procedural matter today and how he will vote on the kash patel nomination later on.

then we think that he will take the senate floor and address his retirement here. he is 83 years old. suffered from a number of health issues. he said when he decided to step down there are a lot of faults that i have when he announced he was stepping down from leadership. reading the political tea leaves is not one of them. some people thought he might have had trouble maybe continuing to serve as the republican leader in the senate had he stood for re-election in the republican conference last fall. back to you. >> shannon: we'll check back with you as you continue to track all of these stories and the patel vote we think this afternoon 1:45? >> senate time, things around here aren't exactly swiss. >> shannon: chad, thank you so much. we've got another aviation disaster. two small planes colliding midair near the regional arizona

airport killing at least two people. the fifth flight indent since the beginning of the year. the delta airlines flight that made a crash landing in toronto. everyone survived despite the jet being flipped upside down. the left blaming president trump for flight disasters saying it is about recent f.a.a. cuts. the ceo of delta shutting down that allegation. >> the trump administration recently fired many employees of the f.a.a. administration. do these cuts affect you? >> the cuts do not affect us, gail. i've been in close communication with the secretary of transportation. i understand that the cuts at this time are something that are raising questions but the reality is there are over 50,000 people that work at the f.a.a. the cuts i understand were 300 people and in non-critical safety functions. the trump administration has committed to investing deeply in terms of improving the overall

technologies used in the air traffic control systems and modernizing the skies. >> shannon: the blame from democrats continues. >> as soon as trump takes over they start firing f.a.a. employees. so instead of fixing the problem, they are creating a new crisis at f.a.a. with people being let go, with everybody looking over their shoulder instead of doing the job to keep us safe they are creating chaos at f.a.a. >> mark meredith at the white house with more. >> the recent string of aviation crashes including the one last month has lawmakers from both parties looking at the state of america's aviation system. today there is a hearing looking at president trump's nominee to be the under secretary of transportation. normally a hearing like this wouldn't generate much interest and not even generate the headline. after this week's deadly regional jet crash not fatalities in canadien the issue

of aviation safety is front and center. few hundred workers let go from government roles in f.a.a. sean duffy says none of those who were released were air traffic controllers. today trump's nominee vowed if confirmed to keep safety a top priority. >> we cannot fall down on the job and these recent disasters are just a horrible reminder that we need to be constantly vigilant. we have a zero tolerance for commercial air disasters. >> zero tolerance. american public is paying attention. associated press polling people asking them what they think about the state of aviation right now. 28% saying very safe. when you combine it is very and somewhat safe 65%. democrats arguing public whats a right to be concerned. >> the skies are secure and safety is a top priority. sadly, i can't say that the actions we're seeing from this

administration does any of that. >> we have seen the administration's officials including transportation secretary duffy push back quite a bit on that. in california meeting with air traffic controllers. later today looking to see if he responds. >> shannon: mark meredith at the house, joining me on the phone. a former navy pilot. thank you for your time. i want to start by asking you a question about the arizona crash. two people died. a regional airport and does not have an active air traffic control tower. i get this is a feature of some smaller airports. how does that work? >> good morning, shannon. thank you for having me on. you are right. the airport in arizona where it occurred is an uncontrolled field meaning there is no air traffic tower. no controllers at the airport. so the controlling is done by the pilots themselves. there is a common frequency that

they use and talk to one another. i would say i'm on the ground taxiing to runway 12 to take off. others would say i'm down wind landing. that sort of thing so they can deconflict. see and avoid. vfr flying out of the airport they have to watch out for each other. that's the way it works and works that way at many, many more airports in the country than actually controlled airports. >> shannon: so then we have the issue of the larger more commercial airports where we have questions about air traffic corals. we know covid hit that hard trying to maintain the workforce, recruit, retain. and there have been a lot of questions about funding for that, congress's role in that. but nearly everybody agrees regardless of what caused it that we are under staffed when it comes to protecting our airports and making these careers as stress free as possible. no way they are going to be. what do you make of where we are

now with air traffic control staffing? >> well, i think the f.a.a. has said they're understaffed and requesting more funding and training new controllers or taking on new controllers as quickly as they can. so it is a priority and should be a priority certainly. the 14,000 or so controllers work long hours. it is a very stressful job, as you can imagine. we never as many qualified top personnel as we can get for that very important job. >> shannon: sean duffy says it is about outdated system saying they need an urgent upgrade. no longer rely on outdated code that hasn't changed since the clinton administration. we must move past the bureaucracy delays. he is calling for major upgrades. some of it may involve musk and

some of his engineers or people who have ideas about improvements. >> it certainly may. i saw secretary duffy's statement about that this morning. i think he has nailed it on the head. we do have to improve technology that's in use in the f.a.a. government wheels turn slowly. they have been in a next generation air traffic program for about 20 years now working on improvements. they have made improvements. we do have more precise data and processing information than we've ever had but we're also controlling more airplanes than we've ever had. and that's where the rub is. air traffic is up 40% in the last 15 years so we do need to improve and improve quickly. i think he is on the right track. >> shannon: randy, navy pilot.

as was my brother. hats off for your service to our country. >> appreciate it. thank you for calling. foundation for aviation safety is all over this every day so we appreciate the time. >> shannon: thank you, randy. the trump administration putting american companies on notice. the eeoc warning employers there will be consequences if they use anti-american bias in their hiring decisions. plus republican lawmakers calling out democrats' alarmism over doge. >> it is kind of a little bit sad when you think about the fact they are so committed to their hatred for donald trump and elon musk that they can't even bring themselves to acknowledge the good in rooting out waste, fraud, abuse and corruption. >> shannon: officials and lawmakers finding millions in questionable government spent. the savings keep coming. jason rantz weighs in. he is next. have a lucky charm when you ride, right?

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is >> i think it's unfortunate they are trying to lampoon what musk and the doge team is doing and unfortunate they are being fear mongerers with the american people. >> shannon: scott bessent called

out democrats' outrage. republicans are pointing to millions spent on things like this. >> it was your estimation that $241 million was spent for transgender animal testing? >> yes. that's i would say the floor, not the ceiling. >> shannon: republican congressman crane posting a response insane, right? congresswoman kat cammack said this on "the faulkner focus" yesterday. >> why do we need a study to study the effects of cocaine on sea bass? i don't know. why do we need to be spending billions of dollars on overhead rather than actual research and development? i don't know. these are things that americans look at when they are trying to balance their budget and sit around the kitchen table and pay bills and say why do i have to do this but the dang federal government doesn't? >> shannon: house republicans pointed to millions spent on

sesame street programming in iraq, las vegas pickleball project and tens of thousands for break dancing. jason rantz joins us live. so great to see you. my break dancing could use tens of thousands worth of lessons but i am not sure the government has to pay for it. >> you are right. the more we focus on what is being cut and really what has been spent on the more the american people support these moves. it is such a mistake to go after doge and go after elon musk when what it is he is doing is, in fact, popular. we all look at our own individual budgets and we say this is wasteful spending for us. we can't make it work. so we expect that of the government especially at times where people are still struggling.

this is so beyond silly. we know what it is they're doing on the left. they are going after musk because they have ineffective going at donald trump. thinking making this new boogieman out of elon an that he will steal your money. they think it will stick. it highlights the work they're doing which in turn gets more support. >> shannon: here is housing and urban development secretary on his department's push to get rid of waste. >> $260 million in savings here at hud working with orb doge task force. today we're announcing we cut $4 million in d.e.i. contracts here at hud, which were supposed to be for culture transformation and mindset thinking and subscription services. so we want to announce today we're working hard and we'll cut $4 million in d.e.i. focused

contracts. >> shannon: a few million here and there doesn't sound like much against the trillions in debt we have. we are starting to talk in billions that doge says it has found. >> yeah. so to get to the 1 trillion you have to have millions and billions and make the cuts and they add up. >> shannon: senator mitch mcconnell announced he won't run for re-election. stay with us. we want to dip in. >> during my time in the senate i've only really answered to two constituencies. the republican conference and the people of kentucky. over the years, the first group trusted me to coordinate campaigns, to count votes, to

steer committees, to take the majority and on nine occasions to lead our conference. serving as the republican leader was a rare and yes rather specific childhood dream. just about a year ago, i thanked my colleagues for their confidence, which allowed me to fulfill it. to the distinguished members of this body i have had the privilege to lead and i remain deeply, deeply grateful. today, however, it is appropriate for me to speak about an even deeper allegiance and even longer standing gratitude. seven times my fellow people in

kentucky have sent me to the senate. every day i'm humbled by the trust they place in me to do their business right here. representing our commonwealth has been an honor of a lifetime. i will not seek this honor an eighth time. my current term in the senate will be my last. i've been a student of history my entire life. i can't remember the last time that i didn't have a stack of biographies or political memoirs on my night stand. i know well how tempting it can be to read history with a sense of determinism and saying that

somehow notorious failures were inevitable. at crowning triumphs were pre-destined. and in either case that lives and careers followed orderly paths. this, of course, isn't how things work. and i've never had to look further than my own life to recognize it. i've never lost sight of the fact that without my mother's devoted care, a childhood encounter with polio could have turned out a lot worse. unless my father had taken a job in the bluegrass state, my interest in politics might have run a course somewhere else.

if it weren't for an 11th hour outside the box idea on the campaign trail, my senate career would have been over before it began. or that if not for the people of kentucky, time and again, agreeing that leadership delivers and elected me to send back here. it would have been someone else from somewhere else taking that seat at the table where i have had a chance to work, strategies, fight, and win. i grew up reading about the greatness of henry clay but there were times when the prospect of etching my name into

this desk and this chamber felt like more of a long shot than making it to the major leagues. i got a front row seat to the greatness of senator john sherman cooper from kentucky as an intern in his office. in so many moments in my early career the idea of following in his footsteps felt more distant than the moon. so the only appropriate thing to take away today, apart from a healthy dose of pride, is my immense gratitude for the opportunity to take part in the business of the senate and the nation.

gratitude to the people i represent, kentucky's families and farmers and miners and service members and small business owners. gratitude to loyal friends, dedicated volunteers, and talented staff who helped me serve much better. gratitude to this institution that has repaid my devotion so generously over the years and to so many colleagues who have become great friends. gratitude for my family's support and in particular my ultimate teammate and confidentiant of the last 32 years, elaine east leadership

and wise counsel have made her the most efficient cabinet official in modern history. on top of all that her devotion to me and kentucky is a lot more than i deserve. when i arrived at this chamber, i wasn't coming with a governor's statewide executive experience or a house member's appreciation for washington dynamics. i knew my hometown of louisville and i had spent the previous few years working hard to learn what mattered to folks all across the rest of the commonwealth. >> shannon: mitch mcconnell announces he won't seek re-election next year. his long career will will wrap up early that year in 2027 when somebody else takes his change. "outnumbered" is next.