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EXCLUSIVE- Freedom Caucus Rep. Lauren Boebert is expected to send a shot across the bow of House Republican leadership in her Saturday CPAC speech, demanding a potential GOP majority aggressively enact several conservative priorities.

“Myself, and fellow warriors in the House Freedom Caucus, we’re ready for battle,” Boebert, R-Colo., plans to say in a speech Saturday at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas, according to a copy obtained by Fox News.

The remarks suggest she may withhold support from Republicans seeking election to the House leadership should Republicans win the majority, including current Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy, who plans to run for speaker

“I wish I could tell you that I had full faith in GOP leadership in both the House and Senate to defund the deep state and to hold the Biden regime accountable,” she’s expected to say. “But I don’t. I’ve been disappointed too many times.

HOUSE REPUBLICANS PREP FIGHT AGAINST DEMS’ SOCIAL SPENDING AND TAX BILL AS SENATE MOVES TO PASS

“And any member of Congress, from freshmen to those in leadership, who won’t fight with me to end medical tyranny, secure the southern border and fire Anthony Fauci, they will not have my support. Not in their re-election and certainly not for speaker,” Boebert’s speech continues.

“The Freedom Caucus fired John Boehner, ran off squishy Paul Ryan and we will not tolerate another GOP speaker that works with Democrats more than Republicans.

“House Republicans must stop funding tyranny. I will not vote to fund a government that mandates the COVID vaccine while allowing our country to be invaded by millions of unvaccinated aliens. End the vax mandate for our hospital workers and service members, build the wall or I’m voting to shut down Biden’s bureaucrats.”

HOUSE GOP LEADER KEVIN MCCARTHY MEETS WITH CAUCUS ON ‘COMMITMENT TO AMERICA’ MIDTERM STRATEGY

Boebert added, “Any bill that funds tyranny while our country is being invaded, my Freedom Caucus allies are a no, and I’m a hell no.”

The salvo comes as Republicans are widely expected to take a majority in the House of Representatives in the midterm elections.

That will aid Republicans seeking to block liberal policies proposed by President Biden and to investigate his administration with committee subpoena power. But it could also highlight divisions within the party when GOP leaders are forced to work with Biden and a possible Senate Democratic majority on must-pass bills to fund the government, raise the debt limit and more.

GOP firebrands like Boebert and her fellow Freedom Caucus members often aim to use their leverage on those bills to implement what they say are key conservative policies. Top Republicans, like former House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, often see the caucus as a thorn in their side.

“What Nancy Pelosi and other sane Democrats — the ones who’ve been around long enough to know how things work — are dealing with from AOC and her Squad reminds me a lot of what I had to deal with during my days as Speaker from the far-right kooks of the Tea Party or the Freedom Caucus or whatever they were calling themselves,” Boehner wrote in his book, “On the House.”

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The Freedom Caucus will wield a lot more leverage if the GOP is in the majority. And Boebert is expected on Saturday to take a veiled shot at top Republicans, like McCarthy, R-Calif., demanding support in implementing the Freedom Caucus’ priority policies.

In addition to Boebert, Kimberly Guilfoyle and former President Donald Trump are scheduled to speak at CPAC.

Fox Nation is a sponsor of CPAC 2022.

Republicans are sharpening their knives while the Senate prepares to hunker in for a long weekend as Democrats deploy a special process to pass the party’s sprawling health care, tax and climate plan without buy-in from across the aisle.

Republican leaders smoked over the Democratic effort at a press conference on Friday, one day before the Senate is prepared to begin consideration of the plan, while taking aim at Sens. Joe Manchin (DW.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz. ), two key centrist holdouts, for backing the effort.

“So, what will vote-a-rama be like?” Sen. Lindsey Graham (RS.C) told reporters on Friday, referring to the voting marathon senators are set to be subjected to in the next few days as part of the process Democrats are using to pass the bill. “It’d be like hell.”

“They deserve this. As much as I admire Joe Manchin and Sinema for standing up to the radical left at times, they’re empowering legislation that will make the average person’s life more difficult,” Graham said.

Graham, along with Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), also threatened not to vote for a critical funding measure ahead of a September deadline, when government funding is set to lapse, over the effort.

Democrats are using a complicated procedure known as budget reconciliation to try to pass the party’s Inflation Reduction Act, a massive package that would advance key pieces of President Biden’s legislative agenda.

The procedure, which Republicans used to pass former President Trump’s signature tax law in 2017, will allow Democrats to pass a bill in the 50-50 Senate with a simple majority, bypassing the usual 60-vote threshold.

But to pass the bill using the maneuver, Democrats have to jump through a series of hoops before they bring the bill to the floor for a vote. That includes what’s known as vote-a-rama — an often lengthy and messy voting marathon in which senators can offer a series of amendments for a chance to influence legislation before a final vote on the overall bill.

Republicans have been strategizing in recent days on how to make Democrats feel as much pain as possible during the coming voting session, promising to line up tough votes for the party that could be used as ammunition for the coming campaign season.

During the recent press conference, Sen. John Barrasso (Wyo.), a member of Republican leadership, said the GOP will be focusing specifically on areas like “energy, inflation, border and crime.”

Many Republicans have been keeping their cards close to the vest on what amendments they plan to bring up during the voting marathon.

Pressed by The Hill on Thursday about which ones he’ll offer, Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) declined to divulge, saying he wants “it to be a surprise.”

“My colleagues will all have plenty of time to read my amendments,” Kennedy said. “But I don’t believe in leading with my chin.”

Republicans have expressed hopes at attaching some of their amendments to the overall bill, despite their overwhelming opposition to the package, in the event it could make the legislation tougher to pass in the House.

Still, there is concern among GOP members around the chances Democrats will introduce a “wraparound” amendment, which could allow for erasure of all amendments adopted during the session.

Sen. John Thune (SD), the No. 2 Senate Republican, acknowledged the issue during the press conference on Friday, questioning whether Manchin and Sinema would vote for such an amendment.

“Because they both said that they won’t vote after they felt like, in the American Rescue Plan, they voted for a wraparound amendment and felt like they were misled by their leadership at the time that they would never vote for one of those again ,” Thune said.

The Hill has reached out to the offices of Manchin and Sinema for comment.

Former President Donald Trump’s “worst day” came this week when his White House counsel Pat Cipollone was subpoenaed by federal investigators, one former Watergate prosecutor said.

Nick Ackerman, who served as an assistant special Watergate prosecutor, said that Tuesday’s subpoena marked “the worst day for Donald Trump.”

Cipollone has been ordered to testify in front of a grand jury as part of the Justice Department’s investigation into the activities leading up to the January 6, 2021, Capitol Riot. He has already been interviewed by the House committee investigating the attack, but Ackerman said the federal subpoena will be much more damning to Trump.

“I think that the Department of Justice is going to get a lot more information from Pat Cipollone,” the former prosecutor told MSNBC’s The Beat on Wednesday. “If he thought that he was his worst experience—going before the committee—he is in for a major surprise when he appears before that grand jury.”

So far, Cipollone has been the highest-ranking White House official to be subpoenaed by the Justice Department. Marc Short, former Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff, and Greg Jacobs, Pence’s former chief counsel, have also reportedly testified to a grand jury in recent weeks.

Ackerman said that unlike the House panel, federal investigators won’t let the former Trump lawyer cite executive privilege over conversations he had with Trump in his final days in office.

“They allowed him to claim attorney-client privilege. None of this is going to go anywhere with the feds,” Ackerman said. “He is going to claim privileges with individual questions. They will take him to a court judge, who is going to order him to testify and tell him there is no privilege.”

The former Watergate prosecutor said Cipollone could try to appeal those rulings, but he added that the investigation would move much swifter than the House committee’s hearings have this summer.

“Pat Cipollone is going to be talking more before the grand jury,” he said.

Even though the House panel allowed Cipollone to claim privilege over certain discussions to get him to testify, the former White House counsel’s testimony still provided the lawmakers with information for the panel to build its case against Trump.

Corroborating the accounts of other former Trump officials, Cipollone said that the Trump legal team’s plan to seize voting machines was “a terrible idea for the country.”

“There is a way to contest elections, you know, that happens all the time,” Cipollone said in the interview. “But the idea that the federal government could come in and seize election machines? I don’t understand why we even have to tell you that’s a bad idea for the country. It’s a terrible idea.”

Cipollone also told the committee that he believed that Trump should have granted the election in December 2020 and that he supported former Attorney General Bill Barr’s conclusion that there was no evidence of election fraud.

Hundreds of staff members and guests were stuck in a National Park after monsoonal weather caused major flooding that prevented them from escaping Friday morning, park service officials said.

Heavy rains pushed dirt and debris onto the roads around Death Valley National Park, making them impassable and forcing officials to close the park. The National Park Service (NPS) said the decision trapped 500 staff and 500 visitors inside.

“There are approximately 500 visitors and 500 staff currently unable to exit the park. No injuries to staff or visitors have been reported,” the National Park Service said in a statement Friday.

“On August 5, 2022, unprecedented amounts of rainfall caused substantial flooding within Death Valley National Park. All roads into and out of the park are currently closed and will remain closed until park staff can assess the extensiveness of the situation,” the statement added .

CALIFORNIA, ARIZONA RESIDENTS FORCED TO EVACUATE AS WILDFIRES BURN

The California Department of Transportation said clearing the roads would take several hours, pending cooperative weather, the statement added.

“Approximately sixty cars, belonging to visitors and staff, are buried in several feet of debris at the Inn at Death Valley,” NPS said. “The flood waters pushed dumpster containers into parked cars, which caused cars to collide into one another. Additionally, many facilities are flooded including hotel rooms and business offices.”

“The Cow Creek Water system, which provides water to the Cow Creek area for park residents and offices, has failed. Park staff have identified a major break in the line due to the flooding which is being repaired. The remainder of the line is being inspected,” the statement added.

According to NPS, the amount of rain the park experienced Friday, 1.46 inches, was about 75% of the amount of rain the area typically receives in a year.

It also nearly matches the daily record of 1.47 inches set on April 15, 1988.

CALIFORNIA FIREFIGHTERS ARE HELPED BY FAVORABLE WEATHER IN FIGHT AGAINST FOREST FIRES

Friday’s park closure comes after flash floods on Monday disrupted travel on some roads along Highway 190, near the Death Valley National Park.

“Remember: turn around, don’t drown!” the Death Valley National Park warned visitors.

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All park roads remain closed as of Friday. Also, the Sunset, Texas Spring, and Stovepipe Wells Campgrounds were closed.

Emergency services and the California Department of Transportation are continuing to assess the situation.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

As eastern Kentuckians continue to search for missing loved ones, muck out their homes and prepare for more rain, they are beginning to ask who could be at fault for this past week’s deadly flooding and whether it was a natural disaster or one caused by the coal mines that have drastically reshaped and scarred the landscape.

Compacted dirt, destroyed mountaintops and deforestation in eastern Kentucky have often been left ignored by the coal companies that mined there, despite legal requirements that they attempt to return the land to its natural state when mining concludes. In recent decades, that spurned responsibility has, at times, turned heavy rains into floods and caused local residents who once counted on mining for jobs and prosperity to bring litigation against their former employers in Appalachian courtrooms.

Lawyers who have pursued these cases in the past said it is still too early to pursue a case in the most recent flooding, as studies need to be conducted and claimants contacted, but interest in holding someone to account for the lost homes and at least 37 dead is growing.

“It may be too early to tell, but I’ve received a couple phone calls already,” said Ned Pillersdorf, a Kentucky lawyer in Prestonburg who has successfully sued coal companies for flood damage in the past. “No one is denying the amount of rain we had — it truly was a 1,000 year event — but did the strip mines contribute? Absolutely.”

Kentucky, particularly the eastern mountains, are littered with abandoned coal mines. Many are a result of strip mining or mountaintop removal mining, the latter a method in which mining companies use explosives to blast off a mountain’s summit to get to the coal inside.

Pillersdorf, whose home was flooded, noted that the areas worst hit in his county are the ones closest to the strip mines.

“It is obviously just a clear slam dunk in terms of corporate irresponsibility,” said Alex Gibson, the executive director of Appalshop, the culture and education center in Whitesburg that was hit by more than 6 feet of water. “And of how we can predict an outcome and ignore all the signs along the way until the tragedy happens and then act like, ‘Yeah, but we didn’t see it coming. It was God’s work.'”

The Kentucky Coal Association, which represents the state’s mining operations, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The loss of the natural ridge lines, vegetation and trees, and the cracks in the mountains that are largely owned by companies often funnels rainwater into the thin valleys, or low-lying hollows, where most eastern Kentuckians make their homes.

Without these natural protections, regional flooding has grown as climate change brings new levels of precipitation up from the Gulf Coast to Appalachia.

“They’re saying it’s a natural disaster, but I’m sorry. This is a disaster that was made by a whole bunch of mining that’s been going on for the past 40 years,” said Jack Spadero, the former director of the National Mine Health and Safety Academy who has testified as an expert witness in numerous coal mine lawsuits in recent years.“It has changed the landscape of eastern Kentucky dramatically.”

‘Like pulling teeth’

The Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977, or SMCRA, was a federal regulation that was supposed to prevent coal companies from leaving abandoned mines behind. The law required mine owners to reclaim the land and return it to its natural form as much as possible. In the ensuing 45 years, many companies have avoided that work and many states in the region, like Kentucky, turned a blind eye to it.

Now, there are more than 2,800 entries for Kentucky in the national inventory of known-abandoned mine land, according to a Department of Interior database, and much of it is located in the state’s eastern hill country. Experts also said that the number in the inventory is likely a conservative figure and that recent coal company banks have made it more difficult to pursue accountability.

SMCRA required every state to enforce the financial responsibility and claim obligation of the coal mine operators in their state. While some states required mining companies to pay claim costs upfront, others — like Kentucky — allowed them to put up a bond for the potential costs. In the past, small companies in Kentucky were allowed to create a pooled fund, while larger ones were able to self-bond, but the majority were done through a third party.

“There are surety companies that are holding these bonds, which are woefully inadequate to do the real claim work, but many are even fighting to turn over those bonds, so it’s like pulling teeth,” said Joe Childers, who has litigated cases for vulnerable Kentuckians against major energy companies for more than 40 years. “In the meantime, nothing gets done. The hillsides are scarred, they’re not reclaimed and you get a rain event like last week and you have terrible flooding. And it was totally exacerbated by the lack of proper regulation.”

Since 2013, Kentucky requires companies to pay into a single bond pool through what essentially serves as a tax on a certain amount of acreage or coal tonnage. But the difference between the liabilities that were left behind and the trust fund the state created in 2013 has grown significantly.

John Mura, a spokesperson for The Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet, said by email that the state agency was “engaged right now organizing cabinet aid” to the affected areas and declined to comment further.

About 408,000 Kentuckians live within one mile of abandoned mine land, the regional think tank Ohio River Valley institute estimated last year, and it will cost nearly $1.2 billion to remediate it. As of 2020, the Kentucky fund had about $52 million in it, according to a state report.

Kentucky spent a little more than $1.5 million from its claim fund, according to the 2022 executive budget. The state is expected to receive an additional $75 million this year as part of President Joe Biden’s infrastructure law, which dedicated $11.3 billion toward abandoned mine claim over the next 15 years. Last year, the state received $9 million from the federal government.

The new sum is huge, but “it’s just a drop in the bucket” to address the need for communities across Appalachia, said Sarah Surber, a public health professor at Wayne State University who has studied environmental justice issues in the region and practiced law there for more than a decade.

“How do you prioritize [the funding]?” she said. “You have so many that have been left abandoned or sitting in limbo, you have more coal mine company bankruptcies anticipated, so how do you decide what mines get reclaimed and what does that mean for communities and their protection in terms of pollution and flooding issues?

Lawsuit challenges

Kevin Thompson, an attorney whose work earned national attention for challenging powerful coal CEO Don Blankenship, said the images he saw out of Kentucky this past week gave him flashbacks to the 2009 King Coal case he worked on in West Virginia and the photographs he took of the days after the flooding that happened there.

That case brought 20 low-income families against four powerful companies that Thompson argued were responsible for two flooding incidents that washed away people’s homes.

A jury in Minnesota ruled on Friday that a pharmacist did not commit discrimination when he did not fill an emergency contraception prescription for a woman after her prior contraceptive method failed, according to the gender advocacy group Gender Justice.

A jury in Aitkin County found that a pharmacist’s decision not to provide an emergency contraception prescription to plaintiff Andrea Anderson after citing his “beliefs” did not constitute discrimination.

According to court documents, Anderson went to the only pharmacy located in her town to retrieve a prescription of emergency contraception after another method failed, but the pharmacist there rejected her request.

The filing further claims that she would later have to drive more than 100 miles in total in order to get her morning after pill after having several pharmacies reject her request.

Anderson was awarded $25,000 over emotional harm caused by the initial pharmacist who rejected to fill the prescription.

“I can’t help but wonder about the other women who may be turned away,” Anderson said in a statement.

“What if they accept the pharmacist’s decision and don’t realize that this behavior is wrong? What if they have no other choice? Not everyone has the means or ability to drive hundreds of thousands to get a prescription filled.”

The legal director for Gender Justice, which is representing Anderson, said it plans to appeal the decision.

“To be clear, the law in Minnesota prohibits sex discrimination and that includes refusing to fill prescriptions for emergency contraception,” Gender Justice Legal Director Jess Braverman said in a statement. “The jury was not deciding what the law is, they were deciding the facts of what happened here in this particular case.”