Politics

(ITALY) — President Joe Biden touted on Thursday several new major U.S. commitments for Ukraine that were announced this week, including a 10-year bilateral security agreement, sanctions to disrupt Russia’s war machine, and a sign-off from the G7 on a $50 billion loan backed by frozen Russian assets.

Biden, in during a press conference in Italy with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said the collective efforts by the G7 show that Russian President Vladimir Putin “cannot wait us out, he cannot divide us, and we’ll be with Ukraine until they prevail this war.”

On the bilateral agreement, Biden said the goal is to “strengthen Ukraine’s credible defense and deterrence capabilities for the long term.”

He reiterated his position that American troops will not fight in Ukraine, but the United States would provide them with weapons.

Zelenskyy called it a “historic day” after signing the “strongest agreement between Ukraine and the U.S. since our independence.”

“This is an agreement on security and thus on the protection of human life. This is an agreement on cooperation, and thus on how our nations will become stronger. This is an agreement on steps to guarantee sustainable peace. And therefore, it benefits everyone in the world because the Russian war against Ukraine is a real, real global threat,” Zelenskyy said.

Zelenskyy was asked what his contingency plan is if the next U.S. president does not follow through with this agreement, but he suggested that as long as Americans support Ukraine, so will the American president.

“If the people are with us, any leader will be with us in this struggle for freedom,” he said.

Highlighting the frozen Russian assets, Biden said the plan that’s been agreed to by the G7 is another reminder for Putin that “we’re not backing down.”

“Collectively, this is a powerful set of actions and will create a stronger foundation for Ukraine’s success,” Biden said.

After Biden recently signed off on Ukraine using American weapons to strike in parts of Russia, limiting use to areas near the Russian-occupied Kharkiv region, he was asked if he would consider expanding those parameters to allow for longer-range strikes; he said his policy is still against that.

“It makes a lot of sense for Ukraine to be able to take out or combat what is coming across that border. In terms of long, long-range weapons, longer-range weapons into the interior of Russia, we have not changed our position on that sort,” he said.

Zelenskyy was asked about how long the supplemental support from the U.S. and other nations will get him on the battlefield. He said it’s not a matter of how long the aid lasts, but, more importantly, how long unity among nations will last.

“I think the question has to be, for how long the unity will last? The unity in the United States, together with the European leaders — how these or those elections will influence this unity?” Zelensky said, via translation

“It seems to me that we should look on this exactly this way: to preserve unity, to preserve the integrity of the world, the integrity of the democratic world. Because if Ukraine does not withstand, the democracy, many countries will not be able to withstand, and I am sure of that,” he added.

For his part, Biden pledged that Ukraine will “have what they need.”

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(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden said Thursday he would not issue a presidential sentence commutation for Hunter Biden following his conviction earlier this week on federal gun charges.

ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Selina Wang reported that Biden was asked about the issue following his press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Italy, where the two announced a new security agreement.

Reporters shouting over music pressed Biden, “Would you commute Hunter’s sentence?” and “Mr. President, do you plan on commuting your son’s sentence?”

The president answered with a “no.”

The exchange occurred one day after the White House declined to rule out a commutation.

Hunter Biden was found guilty last week on three felony counts related to his purchase of a firearm in 2018 while allegedly addicted to drugs. It marked the first time the child of a sitting U.S. president was criminally convicted.

President Biden has expressed love for his son while committing to respecting the trial’s outcome and repeatedly ruling out a pardon.

During the news conference with Zelenskyy on Thursday, Biden was asked by an Associated Press reporter if he believed his son “was able to get a fair trial.”

“Do you believe the Justice Department operated independently of politics?” the reporter asked.

Biden began his response by stating he was “extremely proud” of his son.

“He has overcome an addition. He is one of the brightest, most decent men I know,” he said. “And I am satisfied that I’m not going to do anything — I said I’d abide by the jury decision and I will do that, and I will not pardon him.”

Hunter Biden, in a statement after the verdict was handed down, said he was grateful for the support he received during the weeklong proceeding. Biden family members, including first lady Jill Biden, packed into the courtroom — though President Biden never made an appearance as he was overseas to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day.

“I am more grateful today for the love and support I experienced this last week from Melissa, my family, my friends, and my community than I am disappointed by the outcome,” Hunter Biden said on Tuesday. “Recovery is possible by the grace of God, and I am blessed to experience that gift one day at a time.”

Abbe Lowell, Hunter Biden’s attorney, said they respected the jury process but will “continue to vigorously pursue all the legal challenges available to Hunter.”

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(WASHINGTON) — Even as the U.S. Supreme Court upheld access to the abortion pill mifepristone in a unanimous decision on Thursday, former President Donald Trump has yet to disclose his own abortion pill policy.

For months, Trump has teased that he’d release policy details pertaining to the issue soon, but that moment has yet to come.

Trump has been vague when it comes to reproductive rights as he himself acknowledges the importance of not alienating voters with his position in order to win elections. However, his comments come in an election year as abortion and contraception access remain key issues for many voters headed into November’s election.

Trump’s campaign pushed back, saying that the former president has been “very clear.”

“He supports the rights of states to make decisions on abortion, and supports exceptions for abortions in cases of rape, incest, and life of the mother,” Trump campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.

When the unanimous decision came down Thursday morning, the former president was meeting with congressional Republicans, but sources said he did not mention the ruling directly. Instead, he spoke of the Supreme Court’s overruling of Roe v. Wade in June 2022 — a landmark decision that he takes credit for.

“We did that — it was an incredible thing, an incredible achievement. We did that. And now the states have it, and the states are putting out what they want. It’s the will of the people,” Trump said previously of the court’s vote to overrule Roe v. Wade.

On the Supreme Court decision, Trump campaign Senior Adviser Danielle Alvarez said, “The Supreme Court has unanimously decided 9-0. The matter is settled.”

Trump has said abortion restriction decisions should be up to the states and insisted he believes in three exceptions: rape, incest and to save the life of the mother.

He has not said if he personally favors a certain number of weeks into pregnancy at which state-level bans should take effect, though he has publicly criticized a six-week ban in Florida and, more recently, talked privately about the idea of a national 16-week ban with exceptions, sources told ABC News in February.

Earlier this week, Trump spoke at the Life & Liberty Forum hosted by the Danbury Institute, an organization that says it promotes Judeo-Christian values and opposes abortion — where he did not mention abortion.

Trump told the group he’d stand by their side and vaguely told the anti-abortion group they would make a “comeback” if he’s reelected.

“These are going to be your years because you’re going to make a comeback like just about no other group,” Trump said to the group.

Last month, Trump faced backlash as he tried to walk back comments he made suggesting he’s open to restricting contraceptives.

“Well, we’re looking at that and we’re going to have a policy on that very shortly,” Trump said during an interview with Pittsburgh TV station KDKA-TV. “And I think it’s something you’ll find interesting and it’s another issue that’s very interesting.”

Again, in late April, during an interview with TIME, Trump said he would have a statement out in two weeks explaining his position on mifepristone; however, when pressed on when the delayed announcement would be revealed, campaign sources told ABC News it would happen soon.

President Joe Biden has been more clear on the issue. Biden has made abortion a key issue in what is expected to be a tight race, and Vice President Kamala Harris has capitalized on the issue on the campaign trail.

Biden has blamed Trump for the spread of abortion bans since the end of Roe v. Wade, encouraging voters to support reproductive rights — and him — in November.

“[Trump is] wrong, the Supreme Court was wrong. It should be a constitutional right in the federal Constitution, a federal right, and it shouldn’t matter where in America you live,” Biden said in a speech in April. “This isn’t about states’ rights, this is about women’s rights.”

Democratic National Committee press secretary Emilia Rowland emphasized the stakes of the election, specifically toward reproductive freedoms. She said in a statement that the Supreme Court’s decision on Thursday “does not change the fact that because of Trump, millions of women in states across the country cannot access the health care they need,”

Biden on Thursday reminded voters that the fight for women’s reproductive freedom is not over.

“Today’s decision does not change the fact that the fight for reproductive freedom continues,” Biden said in a statement. “It does not change the fact that the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago, and women lost a fundamental freedom.”

Leavitt, with the Trump campaign, said “Joe Biden does not have any good policy of his own, so his failing campaign peddles lies about President Trump’s views in a dishonest attempt to fear voters into supporting him.”

ABC News’ Rachel Scott, Jay O’Brien, John Parkinson, Benjamin Siegel and Lauren Peller contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — When Donald Trump meets with Republican senators Thursday in Washington, he will come face-to-face with Mitch McConnell for the first time in three-and-a-half years.

In fact, the former president and Senate Minority Leader have not spoken to each other since Dec. 15, 2020.

That was the day that McConnell gave a speech on the Senate floor congratulating Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on their 2020 election victory.

As I described in my book, “Betrayal,” Trump was so enraged by McConnell’s speech that he called his office minutes after it was over.

McConnell later told me that Trump yelled at him in an expletive-ridden rant, insisting he had not lost the election.

When Trump finally stopped yelling, McConnell said to him, “Well, the Electoral College is the final word.”

Trump then hung up — and that was the last time the two men spoke to each other.

Two months later, McConnell voted “not guilty” in Trump’s impeachment trial, but in a speech immediately following the vote, he offered a searing condemnation of Trump’s actions on and before the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of Trump’s supporters — and suggested the former president should be prosecuted.

“Former President Trump’s actions preceding the riot were a disgraceful dereliction of duty,” McConnell said. “The House accused the former president of, quote, ‘incitement.’ That is a specific term from the criminal law.

“Let me put that to the side for one moment and reiterate something I said weeks ago: There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day,” he continued.

“The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president. And their having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories, and reckless hyperbole which the defeated president kept shouting into the largest megaphone on planet Earth.”

Asked on Wednesday about his meeting with Trump on Thursday, McConnell said he would support the Republican “nominee.”

“I said three years ago, right after the Capitol was attacked, that I would support our nominee regardless of who it was — including him,” McConnell told reporters. “I’ve said earlier this year, I support him — he’s earned the nomination by the voters all across the country. And of course, I’ll be at the meeting tomorrow.”

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(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden reminded voters that the fight for women’s reproductive freedom is not over despite the Supreme Court’s decision on regulation of the abortion pill mifepristone on Thursday, which preserved access to the medication nationwide.

“Today’s decision does not change the fact that the fight for reproductive freedom continues,” Biden said in a statement. “It does not change the fact that the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago, and women lost a fundamental freedom.”

The Supreme Court decision and Biden’s comments come in an election year where abortion is a key issue for many voters. Both Biden and his opponent, former President Donald Trump, have worked to address abortion as they campaign.

Biden said that although the decision means that “women can continue to access” mifepristone, he pointed to other laws to show that the fight for access to reproductive freedoms is ongoing.

“Women are being turned away from emergency rooms, or forced to go to court to plead for care that their doctor recommended or to travel hundreds of miles for care,” Biden said in the statement. “Doctors and nurses are being threatened with jail time, including life in prison, for providing the health care they have been trained to provide.”

He said that this efforts was part of an “extreme and dangerous agenda” from Republican elected officials to “ban abortion nationwide.”

“The stakes could not be higher for women across America,” Biden said.

The Biden campaign stressed that the state of abortion rights in America remains on shaky ground.

“Here’s the reality: this case, brought on by Donald Trump’s allies, was only one tactic in a broader, relentless strategy to strip away access to reproductive freedom everywhere in this country,” campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez told reporters on a press call hours after the Supreme Court’s decision.

Chavez Rodriguez and Mini Timmaraju, president and CEO of Reproductive Freedom for All, stressed that a second Trump presidency would threaten reproductive rights.

“Let me be clear: this attack on medication abortion is only possible because Donald Trump overturned Roe v. Wade,” Timmaraju said, referring to the former president’s appointment of conservative justices who voted in 2022 in favor of striking down the federal protection for abortion.

Trump said in April that abortion should be decided by the states. He has not said if he personally favors a certain number of weeks into pregnancy at which state-level bans should take effect, though he has publicly criticized a six-week ban in Florida and, more recently, talked privately about the idea of a national 16-week ban with exceptions, sources told ABC News in February.

Biden also vowed that he and Vice President Kamala Harris will fight for abortion rights.

“We will continue to fight to ensure that women in every state get the health care they need and we will continue to call on Congress to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade in federal law — that is our commitment,” Biden said.

Harris said a vote for Biden is a vote for reproductive freedom.

“The contrast is stark: While Trump relentlessly attacks reproductive freedoms, President Biden and I will never stop fighting to protect them,” Harris said in a statement. “Americans have repeatedly made it clear they want more freedom, not less, and they will make their voices heard at the ballot box once again this November.”

Mifepristone is the first pill taken in a two-drug regimen for medication abortion, which is the most common method of abortion in the country.

The court’s ruling means mifepristone will remain available under preexisting conditions, which include allowing women to receive the medication by mail and without any in person dispensation requirement.

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(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday ruled a group of doctors lacked legal standing to challenge the Food and Drug Administration’s regulation of the abortion pill mifepristone, preserving access to the medication nationwide.

The unanimous opinion was authored by Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

The case put abortion access back in the spotlight for the court after its conservative majority voted to overrule Roe v. Wade in 2022.

“Plaintiffs are pro-life, oppose elective abortion, and have sincere legal, moral, ideological, and policy objections to mifepristone being prescribed and used by others,” Kavanaugh wrote in the ruling. “Because plaintiffs do not prescribe or use mifepristone, plaintiffs are unregulated parties who seek to challenge FDA’s regulation of others.”

“Plaintiffs advance several complicated causation theories to connect FDA’s actions to the plaintiffs’ alleged injuries in fact. None of these theories suffices to establish Article III standing,” he concluded.

Mifepristone is the first pill taken in a two-drug regimen for medication abortion, which is the most common method of abortion in the country.

The court’s ruling means mifepristone will remain available under preexisting conditions, which include allowing women to receive the medication by mail and without any in person dispensation requirement.

Though President Joe Biden said the decision “does not change the fact that the fight for reproductive freedom continues.”

“Women are being turned away from emergency rooms, or forced to go to court to plead for care that their doctor recommended or to travel hundreds of miles for care,” Biden said in a statement. “Doctors and nurses are being threatened with jail time, including life in prison, for providing the health care they have been trained to provide. And contraception and IVF are under attack.”

The case’s lead plaintiff, the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, argued on behalf of anti-abortion rights doctors that those regulations were unsound. The Biden administration defended the FDA’s process in court as being supported by science and decades of safe use.

But much of the March 25 arguments centered on the question of standing, and the court concluded the pill’s challengers “failed to demonstrate that FDA’s relaxed regulatory requirements likely would cause them to suffer an injury in fact.”

“For that reason, the federal courts are the wrong forum for addressing the plaintiffs’ concerns about FDA’s actions,” Kavanaugh wrote. “The plaintiffs may present their concerns and objections to the President and FDA in the regulatory process, or to Congress and the President in the legislative process.”

Drug maker Danco, which fought to defend the pill, said the ruling was a huge win for the pharmaceutical industry which had warned against courts overriding the judgment of scientists and experts at FDA.

The court “maintained the stability of the FDA drug approval process, which is based on the agency’s expertise and on which patients, healthcare providers and the US pharmaceutical industry rely,” a Danco spokeswoman Abigail Long, said in a statement.

Abortion opponents decried the decision as “deeply disappointing.”

“It is a sad day for all who value women’s health and unborn children’s lives, but the fight to stop dangerous mail-order abortion drugs is not over,” said Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America policy director Katie Daniel.

Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Erin Hawley, who argued before the court on behalf of the doctors, also expressed dismay that the justices did not dive into the merits of the case.

Hawley said the group “will continue to advocate for women and work to restore commonsense safeguards for abortion drugs.”

ABC News’ Alexandra Hutzler contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — Donald Trump is making a rare appearance in Washington on Thursday to lay out his second-term agenda to Republican lawmakers as he continues to stress party unity in the wake of his historic felony conviction and a month from becoming the party’s official nominee.

The former president is just blocks away from the U.S. Capitol to attend a slate of meetings with GOP allies.

First, he is huddling with House Republicans at the Capitol Hill Club, campaign and House leadership aides confirmed to ABC News. Later, he will meet with Senate Republicans at the National Republican Senatorial Committee headquarters, where he will hold a news conference afterward.

During the meetings, campaign officials say Trump will lay out his policy plans on immigration, entitlement programs and the economy.

“Looking ahead at the policies that will save the nation such as Trump’s commitment to no impact on seniors with any cuts to Social Security or Medicare, policies that actually secure our borders and make our communities safe again, and an America first foreign policy that reclaims peace through strength and world leadership, and economic policies of lower taxes that reignite the vibrant trump economy we had just a few years ago,” a campaign official said.

Trump’s last visit with Republicans happened while he was president in September 2020, when he gave remarks at the same members-only Republican club.

Trump has stayed off the U.S. Capitol campus entirely since he left office shortly after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack. The closest he’s come is when he met the executive board of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters near the Capitol building on Jan. 31.

House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell are both expected to attend the Thursday meetings between their caucuses and Trump.

While Johnson and Trump have worked together on key issues since Johnson’s rise to the speakership last fall, it will be the first time since 2020 that McConnell and Trump meet face-to-face.

McConnell and Trump have a rocky relationship, heightened after McConnell recognized President Joe Biden’s victory in the wake of Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

McConnell, asked on Wednesday if he plans to “confront” Trump about their disagreements, dodged the question and repeated his usual support for the Republican “nominee.”

“I said three years ago, right after the Capitol was attacked, that I would support our nominee regardless of who it was — including him,” McConnell told reporters. “I’ve said earlier this year, I support him — he’s earned the nomination by the voters all across the country. And of course, I’ll be at the meeting tomorrow.”

Johnson has openly embraced Trump, who was crucial in supporting him when he faced the threat of being ousted threat by conservative GOP House hard-liners, saying coordination with Trump is important heading into November’s election and a potential second Trump presidency.

“I think it’s important for the country, to have us, to have close coordination,” Johnson said at a news conference on Wednesday. “I believe he’ll have, can be, the most consequential president of the modern era, because we have to fix effectively every area of public policy.”

At that news conference, Johnson also told ABC News he supports a bill that would allow current or former presidents to move state charges against them into federal court — a measure aimed at showing support for Trump after being found guilty in his hush money trial in a New York state court.

“I think that’s an idea that makes sense. It makes sense to most Republicans, and I think almost everyone will be in favor of that. And that’s what we’re talking about and trying to move some of this forward,” Johnson told ABC Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott.

However, not every Republican is set to fully welcome back Trump when he comes to the nation’s capital.

Sens. Susan Collins, Mitt Romney and Lisa Murkowski, who have been vocal Trump critics, have blamed previous conflicts as a reason for why they couldn’t attend the meeting with Trump.

All three voted with Republicans to impeach Trump for his actions related to Jan. 6.

The group of political meetings comes as Trump is scheduled to be in Washington D.C. to participate in a moderated discussion at a quarterly meeting of the Business Roundtable, a group consisting of more than 200 CEOs. Business Roundtable spokesman Michael Steel said the group invited both presumptive presidential nominees, but with Biden overseas to attend the G7 summit, White House Chief of Staff Jeff Zients is slated to appear.

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(WASHINGTON) — Donald Trump is set to make a rare appearance in Washington on Thursday to lay out his second-term agenda to Republican lawmakers as he continues to stress party unity in the wake of his historic felony conviction and a month from becoming the party’s official nominee.

The former president will be just blocks away from the U.S. Capitol to attend a slate of meetings with GOP allies.

First, he is expected to huddle with House Republicans at the Capitol Hill Club, campaign and House leadership aides confirmed to ABC News. He will then meet with Senate Republicans at the National Republican Senatorial Committee headquarters, where he will hold a news conference afterward.

During the meetings, campaign officials say Trump will lay out his policy plans on immigration, entitlement programs and the economy.

“Looking ahead at the policies that will save the nation such as Trump’s commitment to no impact on seniors with any cuts to Social Security or Medicare, policies that actually secure our borders and make our communities safe again, and an America first foreign policy that reclaims peace through strength and world leadership, and economic policies of lower taxes that reignite the vibrant trump economy we had just a few years ago,” a campaign official said.

Trump’s last visit with Republicans happened while he was president in September 2020, when he gave remarks at the same members-only Republican club.

Trump has stayed off the U.S. Capitol campus entirely since he left office shortly after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack. The closest he’s come is when he met the executive board of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters near the Capitol building on Jan. 31.

House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell are both expected to attend the Thursday meetings between their caucuses and Trump.

While Johnson and Trump have worked together on key issues since Johnson’s rise to the speakership last fall, it will be the first time since 2020 that McConnell and Trump meet face-to-face.

McConnell and Trump have a rocky relationship, heightened after McConnell recognized President Joe Biden’s victory in the wake of Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

McConnell, asked on Wednesday if he plans to “confront” Trump about their disagreements, dodged the question and repeated his usual support for the Republican “nominee.”

“I said three years ago, right after the Capitol was attacked, that I would support our nominee regardless of who it was — including him,” McConnell told reporters. “I’ve said earlier this year, I support him — he’s earned the nomination by the voters all across the country. And of course, I’ll be at the meeting tomorrow.”

Johnson has openly embraced Trump, who was crucial in supporting him when he faced the threat of being ousted threat by conservative GOP House hard-liners, saying coordination with Trump is important heading into November’s election and a potential second Trump presidency.

“I think it’s important for the country, to have us, to have close coordination,” Johnson said at a news conference on Wednesday. “I believe he’ll have, can be, the most consequential president of the modern era, because we have to fix effectively every area of public policy.”

At that news conference, Johnson also told ABC News he supports a bill that would allow current or former presidents to move state charges against them into federal court — a measure aimed at showing support for Trump after being found guilty in his hush money trial in a New York state court.

“I think that’s an idea that makes sense. It makes sense to most Republicans, and I think almost everyone will be in favor of that. And that’s what we’re talking about and trying to move some of this forward,” Johnson told ABC Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott.

However, not every Republican is set to fully welcome back Trump when he comes to the nation’s capital.

Sens. Susan Collins, Mitt Romney and Lisa Murkowski, who have been vocal Trump critics, have blamed previous conflicts as a reason for why they couldn’t attend the meeting with Trump.

All three voted with Republicans to impeach Trump for his actions related to Jan. 6.

The group of political meetings comes as Trump is scheduled to be in Washington D.C. to participate in a moderated discussion at a quarterly meeting of the Business Roundtable, a group consisting of more than 200 CEOs. Business Roundtable spokesman Michael Steel said the group invited both presumptive presidential nominees, but with Biden overseas to attend the G7 summit, White House Chief of Staff Jeff Zients is slated to appear.

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(WASHINGTON) — When Donald Trump meets with Republican senators Thursday in Washington, he will come face-to-face with Mitch McConnell for the first time in three-and-a-half years.

In fact, the former president and Senate Minority Leader have not spoken to each other since Dec. 15, 2020.

That was the day that McConnell gave a speech on the Senate floor congratulating Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on their 2020 election victory.

As ABC News chief Washington correspondent Jonathan Karl described in his book, Betrayal, Trump was so enraged by McConnell’s speech that he called his office minutes after it was over.

McConnell later told Karl that Trump yelled at him in an expletive-ridden rant, insisting he had not lost the election.

When Trump finally stopped yelling, McConnell said to him, “Well, the Electoral College is the final word.”

Trump then hung up — and that was the last time the two men spoke to each other.

Two months later, McConnell voted “not guilty” in Trump’s impeachment trial, but in a speech immediately following the vote, he offered a searing condemnation of Trump’s actions on and before the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of Trump’s supporters — and suggested the former president should be prosecuted.

“Former President Trump’s actions preceding the riot were a disgraceful dereliction of duty,” McConnell said. “The House accused the former president of, quote, ‘incitement.’ That is a specific term from the criminal law.

“Let me put that to the side for one moment and reiterate something I said weeks ago: There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day,” he continued.

“The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president. And their having that belief was a foreseeable consequence of the growing crescendo of false statements, conspiracy theories, and reckless hyperbole which the defeated president kept shouting into the largest megaphone on planet Earth,” McConnell said.

Asked on Wednesday about his meeting with Trump on Thursday, McConnell said he would support the Republican “nominee.”

“I said three years ago, right after the Capitol was attacked, that I would support our nominee regardless of who it was — including him,” McConnell told reporters. “I’ve said earlier this year, I support him — he’s earned the nomination by the voters all across the country. And of course, I’ll be at the meeting tomorrow.”

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(WASHINGTON) — After a congressional hearing on Wednesday on safety concerns over the V-22 Osprey, during which a military leader said the aircraft will remain under safety restrictions until 2025, grieving families of fallen service members voiced frustration over unanswered questions and demanded accountability in an interview with ABC News.

Lawmakers on the House Oversight subcommittee on national security pressed Pentagon witnesses on the deadly history of the aircraft throughout the hearing.

“The total number of fatalities that I’m tracking is 54 fatalities … and 93 injuries,” said Vice Adm. Carl Chebi, head of U.S. Naval Air Systems Command, which oversees the Osprey for the entire U.S. military.

After a string of fatal V-22 crashes between 2022 and 2023, Chebi decided to ground Osprey flights to give time for investigators to identify potential problems and come up with safety recommendations. The military lifted the flight ban in early 2024, after instituting several new protocols and restrictions.

In June 2022, five Marines were killed after a clutch problem caused a failure in the right engine of their V-22 during a training flight over Glamis, California, a military investigation found. Some of the changes that came out of Chebi’s safety stand-down were designed to address this problem, both by giving flight crews updated protocols on how to handle clutch problems and by preventatively replacing key parts before they could become too worn.

But on Wednesday, Chebi said that the risk posed by the clutch problem will not be eliminated until a redesign is completed, which could take more than a year, and he will not lift the restrictions on Osprey flights until then.

“I will not certify the V-22 to return to unrestricted flight operations until I am satisfied that we have sufficiently addressed the issues that may affect the safety of the aircraft. Based on the data that I have today, I’m expecting that this will not occur before mid 2025,” he said.

Chebi said he has also ordered a comprehensive review of the Pentagon’s Osprey program, which will take another six to nine months to be completed.

Several family members of Marines killed in the 2022 tragedy traveled to attend Wednesday’s hearing, and could be seen holding photos of their deceased loved ones in their seats directly behind the witnesses.

“The families submitted some questions that we had hoped to be answered,” Amber Sax, wife of Capt. John Sax, told ABC News after the hearing. “Not all of them were answered. I would say the majority actually were not, unfortunately.”

Sax would also like answers from the companies that make the Osprey. And she’s not alone.

Last month, she and family members of the other Marines killed in the 2022 catastrophe filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit against Boeing, Rolls Royce and Bell Textron, which are each involved in producing the aircraft.

The companies have said they can’t comment on pending litigation.

“We have many questions for them that we hope that they will answer and that will come to light,” Sax said. “And I believe that they’re the people that should be sitting in those seats next time.”

“We don’t want someone else to have to go through what we’ve been going through for the last two years now. Something has got to change. Something definitely has to change,” said Michelle Strickland, mother of Lance Cpl. Evan Strickland, who was 19 when he was killed in the crash.

Evan’s father agreed.

“We stand together as families to hold accountable those that owe us answers,” said Brett Strickland. “We have to be their voice, because they no longer have one.”

While the military has other aircraft that could possibly take on the missions currently carried out by the V-22, the Osprey stands out for its ability to take off and land vertically like a helicopter, but also fly fast like a conventional airplane by changing the angle of its propellers.

Timothy Loranger, an attorney at Wisner Baum representing the families, echoed lawmakers who advocated the military prioritize safety by using helicopters to replace Ospreys, until more problems have been worked out.

“They should, as they were asked, consider grounding the aircraft, using some alternative platform like the CH-53 [helicopter] or something else that they know is reliable,” Loranger said.

The Gold Star families who spoke to ABC News after the hearing opened up about the strong character of their lost loved ones.

“He was kind, he was so genuine … he had such a zest for life. Everything was like an adventure to him … He was just so genuine and just a pure spirit,” said Michelle Strickland of her son.

His father spoke about with the lengths to which the young Marine would go to for his friends, from walking miles in the dark to be there for someone after a breakup, to “just lightening the mood a little bit with this goofiness.”

Amber Sax said of her late husband, “John grew up with a love for flight. He loved his family very deeply. He loved his country very dearly.”

The family members are not trying to get rid of the Osprey their loved ones flew; they just want it to fly at its best.

“A few short months before losing John, we celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary by getting an ultrasound to see our youngest daughter, who went on to arrive three months after his passing,” Sax said in written testimony submitted to the House Oversight subcommittee ahead of Wednesday’s hearing.

Just after the hearing, she told ABC News, “I want to be able to take my daughters to an air show someday — John loved going to air shows, and he would have taken them if he were here — and I want them to be able to see an Osprey flying and say ‘That’s flying because my daddy and other brave people made it safer for them to fly.'”

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