North Korean leader Kim Jong Un displayed a new long-range intercontinental ballistic missile at a military parade in Pyongyang that included foreign leaders on Friday. 

The yet-to-be-tested Hwasong-20 was described by the state-owned Korean Central News Agency as having the ‘most powerful nuclear strategic weapons system.’

The government also displayed shorter-range ballistic, cruise and supersonic missiles at the military parade, which marked 80 years since the founding of the Worker’s Party.

Kim said at the parade that the military ‘must continue to evolve into an invincible force that eliminates all threats.’

The foreign dignitaries at the parade included Chinese Premier Li Qiang, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, and Vietnam’s Communist Party chief To Lam. 

Kim also met with Medvedev on Friday, who praised the sacrifice of North Korean soldiers fighting with Russia in Ukraine. 

Kim said he hoped to strengthen ties with Russia and work together toward common goals. 

Last summer, Kim’s sister Kim Yo Jong warned the U.S. to not attempt to restart talks centered around denuclearization, adding that Pyongyang would view any attempt to pressure North Korea to denuclearize as ‘nothing but a mockery.’ 

‘If the U.S. fails to accept the changed reality and persists in the failed past, the DPRK- U.S. meeting will remain as a ‘hope’ of the U.S. side,’ Kim Yo Jong said, referring to the nation by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report. 

President Donald Trump is in ‘excellent overall health,’ the president’s doctor said in a memorandum after a follow-up evaluation at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Friday. 

Earlier this week, the White House announced that Trump, 79, would undergo a ‘routine’ semiannual physical on Friday. 

The president also met with troops while at the hospital in Bethesda, Maryland. 

‘President Donald J. Trump successfully completed a scheduled follow-up evaluation at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center,’ Navy Capt. Sean P. Barbabella, the physician to the president, wrote in a memorandum to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt. 

Barbabella said that the visit was part of an ongoing health maintenance plan that included ‘advanced imaging, laboratory testing and preventative health assessments conducted by multidisciplinary team of specialists.’ 

He added, ‘Comprehensive laboratory studies performed in conjunction with the visit were exceptional, including stable metabolic, hematologic and cardiac parameters.’

In his summary, Barbabella said Trump, ‘remains in exceptional health, exhibiting strong cardiovascular, pulmonary, neurological, and physical performance.’ 

Barbabella also said Trump also received updated COVID-19 and flu shots in preparation for international travel. 

‘President Trump continues to demonstrate excellent overall health,’ he wrote, adding that his cardiac age was found to be ‘approximately 14 years younger than his chronological age. He continues to maintain a demanding daily schedule without restriction.’ 

The medical checkup will be Trump’s second this year. He had a similar exam in April, during which his physician stated that he ‘remains in excellent health.’

In July, the president was diagnosed with a vein condition known as chronic venous insufficiency. At the time, Leavitt said Trump had noticed ‘mild swelling’ in his lower legs and was evaluated by the White House medical unit.

Chronic venous insufficiency occurs when veins in the legs struggle to allow blood to flow back up to the heart.

Leavitt attributed the bruising on the president’s hand to ‘frequent handshaking and the use of aspirin.’

The government shutdown is poised to enter a third week, and Democrats still appear to be struggling in the search for a cohesive messaging strategy.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., received a barrage of GOP-led attacks on Thursday after he told Punchbowl News, ‘Every day gets better for us’ in reference to the shutdown dragging on.

Meanwhile, House Democrats’ group selfie taken on Sept. 29, just before the shutdown, received criticism from both sides of the aisle. Former Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., who’s become a fierce critic of the GOP since leaving office, wrote on X, ‘These selfie things need to stop guys. Honestly, the democrats were great at social media but social media moved on from them. The kitschy, goofy ‘choose your fighter’ type stuff needs to stop.’

Democrats have been fighting to center the discussion on healthcare, and their argument that any deal to reopen the federal government must at least include an extension of COVID-19 pandemic-era enhanced Obamacare subsidies that are set to expire at the end of this year.

And while polls show that Americans overwhelmingly do support extending the subsidies, surveys taken of the government shutdown have been more mixed, with a significant number of Americans blaming both parties.

A new Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Wednesday showed 67% of Americans believe Republicans deserve ‘a fair amount or a great deal of blame’ for the shutdown, compared to 63% for Democrats.

A New York Times/Siena poll taken on the eve of the shutdown showed that Democrats had a similarly thin edge over the GOP in the shutdown fight, but that 65% of people did not believe Democrats should shut down the government if their demands were not met.

‘Democrats keep choosing the wrong fights, including the shutdown fight. At best, the shutdown will give them a political draw where the public will blame both parties,’ Julian Epstein, a former Democratic staffer for the House Judiciary Committee, told Fox News Digital.

‘But they will not get a game change out of this conflict, and the risk for them is the longer it goes on, the public will see it’s the Democrats who are narcissistically voting to shut down the government after losing the election.’

During an appearance on ‘Real Time With Bill Maher’ earlier this month, CNN political commentator and former Obama administration appointee Van Jones said Democrats ‘do the wrong thing at the wrong time for the right reason.’

Jones said he was in favor of extending the Obamacare subsidies but argued that it may have been folly for his party to pick that fight over the shutdown before people even got notice of their premiums potentially rising.

‘I get it, the base is upset … ’Please do something, do anything,’ but the ‘something’ probably shouldn’t be throwing a bunch of people out of work in the federal government and crushing the American government’s ability to function right before the pain was about to start,’ he said.

And it’s not yet clear if Democrats have an agreed-upon roadmap for how to navigate the shutdown yet.

Late last week, just before Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., announced that the House would be out of session for another week while Republicans’ funding bill stalled in the Senate, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., unequivocally told Fox News Digital that ‘yes,’ he would call all House Democrats back to Washington to draw a contrast between the two sides.

He walked that back somewhat on Monday, however. When asked by Fox News Digital if he would still call the full caucus back, Jeffries said, ‘We have a caucus meeting at 6 p.m. today. We’ll have a House Democratic Caucus leadership meeting, that’s the full leadership, tomorrow. And I expect a strong presence of House Democrats throughout here in Washington.’

What he did not specify, however, was that the 6 p.m. caucus meeting was virtual.

At another press conference this week, Jeffries called a one-year Obamacare subsidy extension compromise bill ‘laughable’ despite it getting support from 11 members of his own Democratic caucus.

He walked those comments back again, ‘If anything is presented to us, of course, the caucus will consider it in good faith.’

But Republicans have also garnered their share of public criticism for shutdown messaging as well.

President Donald Trump’s aggressive rhetoric on federal employee layoffs put congressional Republicans in a difficult position earlier this month, though Trump has since softened his language and not yet carried out those firings.

The White House’s depiction of Jeffries in a sombrero on multiple occasions has also been panned as racist by critics.

Mike Nellis, a Democratic strategist and founder of campaign consulting firm Authentic, said Democrats were doing the right thing in focusing on health care while criticizing Republicans’ messaging.

‘I think that focusing on the health care subsidies, which are undeniably popular, has been a really smart thing for Democrats to do,’ Nellis told Fox News Digital.

‘I think that the Republicans have played right into their worst tendencies on this, which is, much of their messaging is aggressively online-focused. The sombrero stuff is mildly funny. But then they went all in on it, and they don’t have a good answer to the health care subsidies.’

Nellis also argued that Republicans’ touting of a ‘landslide’ electoral victory has set them up for a larger share of the blame.

‘When you create the conditions where you talked about the mandate that you have and the government shuts down on your watch, you’re responsible for the government shutdown,’ he said.

Still, he said he would grade Democrats with a ‘B, B minus’ on their messaging, adding that it’s ‘not perfect.’

‘Maybe the answer is … Republicans are losing the shutdown fight, rather than Democrats are winning it,’ Nellis said. ‘But I mean, I just think we’ve got a lot more right than a lot more wrong, which is the first time you can say that in quite a while.’

The Nobel Committee awarded this year’s peace prize to Maria Corina Machado amid calls for President Donald Trump to receive the award in the wake of his brokering a historic deal between Israel and Hamas. 

Machado, a Venezuelan opposition leader, was described as a ‘brave and committed champion of peace’ by Joergen Watne Frydnes, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

‘She is receiving the Nobel Peace Prize for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy,’ Frydnes said.

Trump has received several high-profile nominations since returning to office. However, the committee’s deadline for nominations was Jan. 31, meaning he could be eligible for next year’s prize.

During a Cabinet meeting on Thursday, Trump was asked about the Nobel Peace Prize, but did not comment on the award in his response. Instead, he focused on the possibility of addressing Israel’s Knesset.

Earlier this week, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a group representing the families of hostages and terror victims formed after Oct. 7, appealed to the committee on Trump’s behalf.

‘In this past year, no leader or organization has contributed more to peace around the world than President Trump. While many have spoken eloquently about peace, he has achieved it. While others have offered empty promises, he has delivered tangible results that have saved countless lives,’ the forum wrote in a letter to the committee dated Oct. 6.

‘He has not merely spoken of peace — he has delivered it,’ the forum added.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Trump in July during a visit to Washington, D.C., that he had nominated the president for the Nobel Peace Prize. Netanyahu handed the letter he sent the committee to Trump when he told him the news.

‘The president has already realized great opportunities. He forged the Abraham Accords. He’s forging peace, as we speak, in one country and one region after the other,’ Netanyahu said. ‘So, I want to present to you, Mr. President, the letter I sent to the Nobel Prize committee. It’s nominating you for the peace prize, which is well-deserved.’

Weeks prior to that meeting, the U.S. and Israel carried out major operations that destroyed Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, as both countries warned a nuclear Tehran would be a threat to the world.

Trump was nominated for the award in the past but was not selected. Notably, U.S. Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., nominated Trump for the prize in 2020 when he brokered the Abraham Accords, normalizing relations between Israel and Arab nations.

Had he won, Trump would have become the fifth U.S. president to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Previous laureates include former President Barack Obama, former President Jimmy Carter, former President Woodrow Wilson and former President Theodore Roosevelt.

Fox News Digital’s Greg Wehner and Caitlin McFall contributed to this report.

Nothing woke America up to the realities of gender ideology quicker than the photo of Riley Gaines standing next to her National Championship opponent, a 6’1′ male towering over her with his broad shoulders and smoldering grin. You felt it in your bones – this isn’t right. 

The moment sparked a nationwide campaign to try and convince everyday Americans that this feeling was not just instinct; it was internalized bigotry and evidence that there was noble, progressive work still to do. Only one problem. It was all a lie. And recent admissions show that not even the top Democratic leaders believed what they were selling.  

Just five years ago, I was a freshman in college, testifying in my dorm room about a bill that stated men cannot compete on women’s sports teams. ‘Politics are crazy,’ I thought, ‘Why do I even need to testify on something so obvious?’ 

I quickly learned of my own naivety when the bill did not pass in my very conservative state. ‘This isn’t a real issue,’ they insisted while I, a female athlete who had previously competed against a man, sat in front of them. There was clearly much more to this problem than I realized.

When the spotlight on the issue grew, it was somehow immediately deemed partisan. The issue was linked to the Democrats’ pro-LGBTQIA+ position, which they had insisted was the civil rights issue of our time, and now it was squarely at odds with something plainly unjust. But they were in too deep. 

At every turn, those who tried to find solutions to the problem of men in women’s sports, including traditionally far-left organizations like Women’s Liberation Front, found themselves up against the powerful political operatives of the Democratic Party. Though the ties between LGB and T were fading, the radical left insisted that to be pro-gay or pro-woman, you had to also stand for men in women’s sports. Democrats obliged.

In some ways, this makes sense. If the Democrats acknowledge that sex exists in sports, then what does this mean to other parts of their agenda that rely on sex-denying ideology? The crusade to abolish sex is one that spans decades, and they are not about to budge now. So, they doubled down, even redefining ‘sex’ as ‘gender identity’ wherever they could, including in landmark pro-woman legislation like Title IX, and they continued to label anything contrary as ‘extreme’ through the 2024 election. 

Concerned Women for America LAC exit polling suggests this issue played an outsized role in the election, and the Democrats paid the price with a resounding loss in both chambers of the federal government and the White House. Voters did not buy the lie that their concerns were merely internalized bigotry. And at least some Democrats are finally ready to face the music and speak more openly about it.

The Democrats’ highest-ranking figure has finally addressed one of the biggest political flops of modern history, and while her confession is unsurprising, it should shake the party to its core. 

In her recently released book about her presidential candidacy, former Vice President Kamala Harris admits that she, too, shares concerns: ‘I agree with the concerns expressed by parents and players that we have to take into account biological factors such as muscle mass and unfair student athletic advantage when we determine who plays on which teams, especially in contact sports.’ 

But she added, ‘There was no way I was going to go against my very nature and turn on transgender people.’

And there it is. Tension unmasked. When reality collides with allegiance, the Democrats choose allegiance.

The highest leaders of the party know they were ignoring the real, reasonable and consequential concerns of millions of women. Abandoning women and their safety was a calculation worth making in their eyes. 

Harris is not alone. California Gov. Gavin Newsom has publicly admitted that this is ‘an issue of fairness – it’s deeply unfair.’ Yet, his state is one of the worst offenders of women’s rights in this area.

On this Worldwide X/X Day (Real Women’s Day), the good news is that some party members are choosing reality and abandoning ship. Just a few weeks ago, 10 House Democrats voted, for the first time, for a National Defense Authorization Act amendment that would keep men from competing on women’s athletic teams at service academies. Just a few months ago, most of these same members refused to vote for a bill with similar protections. 

As we hope this issue joins the parade of failed civil rights attacks of times gone by, voters and candidates alike should heed the warning. Never stand for a lie. Truth is our only sure foundation. Policy must be based on reality.

We know wrong when we see it. It is instinctive, and often clearly on display, like that photo of Riley Gaines’ medal being given to a male.