The Trump administration unveiled new sanctions on Wednesday against an Iranian-linked Swedish gang that coordinated an attack on the Israeli Embassy in Stockholm in January 2024, according to the Treasury Department. 

The sanctions freeze assets for members and those affiliated with the Foxtrot Network, a transnational criminal organization that the Treasury Department said is one of the most ‘prominent’ drug trafficking organizations in the region. The sanctions also single out and target the group’s fugitive leader, Rawa Majid. 

‘Iran’s brazen use of transnational criminal organizations and narcotics traffickers underscores the regime’s attempts to achieve its aims through any means, with no regard for the cost to communities across Europe,’ Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent said in a Wednesday statement. ‘Treasury, alongside our U.S. government and international partners, will continue to hold accountable those who seek to further Iran’s thuggish and destabilizing agenda.’

In addition to trafficking drugs, the Foxtrot Network is a criminal organization that conducts violent acts, including shootings, contract killings and assaults, and is responsible for increased violence in Sweden. It is notorious for employing teenagers to conduct these violent acts, according to the Treasury Department. 

Iran has increasingly utilized criminal networks to conduct attacks targeting the U.S. as well as attacks against Jewish and Israeli targets in Europe, the Treasury Department said. 

For example, the agency accused Iran of colluding with the Foxtrot Network to conduct an attack on the Israeli Embassy in 2024 after Swedish officials identified a ‘dangerous object’ believed to be an explosive device at the embassy. While security forces neutralized the device, Sweden’s security police moved to investigate the attack as a ‘terrorist crime,’ according to Reuters. 

The Treasury Department also said on Wednesday that Majid has coordinated with the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security, which is already under U.S. sanctions, and faces charges in Sweden pertaining to narcotics and firearms trafficking. 

The White House referred Fox News Digital to the Treasury and State Department’s statements on the sanctions. 

The sanctions against Majid and the Foxtrot Network align with President Donald Trump’s maximum pressure campaign against Iran, which he reinstated in February through a series of sanctions aimed at sinking Iran’s oil exports.

Trump signaled Friday a nuclear deal with Iran could emerge shortly, and he revealed that he sent a letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to push for Tehran to agree to a nuclear agreement. Otherwise, he said Tehran could count on facing military consequences. 

‘I would rather negotiate a deal,’ Trump told Fox Business in an interview Sunday. ‘I’m not sure that everybody agrees with me, but we can make a deal that would be just as good as if you won militarily.’ 

‘But the time is happening now, the time is coming up,’ he said. ‘Something is going to happen one way or the other. I hope that Iran, and I’ve written them a letter saying I hope you’re going to negotiate, because if we have to go in militarily, it’s going to be a terrible thing for them.’

On March 7, Fox Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo asked President Donald Trump, ‘There are reports now that Russia says it will help the United States negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran. What kind of a deal with Iran do you want to do? You’ve said they cannot have a nuclear weapon.’ Trump made his position clear: ‘There are two ways Iran can be handled: militarily, or you make a deal.’  

He went on to call Iranians ‘great people’ suffering under what he described as an ‘evil’ regime that shoots protesters in the streets. Trump then revealed that he had sent an ultimatum-style letter to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, seeking a diplomatic settlement to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear state rather than resorting to military action.  

Iran’s supreme leader rejected the letter, disappointing regime officials who hoped Trump’s willingness to talk could ease their economic collapse. He warned that the U.S. wouldn’t stop at nuclear negotiations but ‘raise new demands, including restrictions on defense capabilities and international influence,’ a clear reference to the IRGC’s missile program and its terror proxy network.  

Khamenei’s stance mirrored Russian diplomat Mikhail Ulyanov’s warning that Trump shouldn’t expand nuclear talks to include Iran’s missile program or regional activities, calling it unrealistic to kill three birds with one stone.  

Russia’s strategy for helping the U.S. to negotiate with Iran seems clear — allow a U.S.-Israel strike to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities, easing international pressure. Once the regime survives, Russia regains control, exploiting Iran’s wealth for decades to come. But, how much influence does Moscow truly have over Tehran? 

On June 12, 1989, a week after Khamenei became supreme leader, U.S. Ambassador to Kenya Smith Hempstone, appointed by President George H.W. Bush, warned in the Observer-Reporter: ‘Unfortunately if Khamenei remains in power and seeks an opening to the outside world, he is more likely to look to the Soviet Union than to the US. He is a graduate of Moscow’s Patrice Lumumba university.’  

On February 5, 2010, Russia’s State TV confirmed Khamenei as a ‘notable alumnus’ in a special program marking the 50th anniversary of this training center. Dr. Ilan Berman, appointed to the RFE/RL Board of Directors by Trump’s administration in February 2025, reinforced this back in 2001, stating: ‘Interestingly, many of Iran’s hardest hardliners were trained in the Soviet Union’ including ‘Iran’s spiritual leader, the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was himself a graduate of the USSR’s training academy for third-world anti-Americans, Patrice Lumumba University.’  

With Russian President Vladimir Putin, a former high-ranking KGB officer, in power, Moscow continues its Soviet-era strategy, using Muslim proxy groups against the U.S. and Israel. 

Russia’s influence over Iran is undeniable — Putin effectively controls the regime. In March 2021, leaked audio from Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, revealed that Putin ordered IRGC commanders, including Qasem Soleimani, to send troops to Syria and disrupt the nuclear feal, fearing improved U.S.-Iran relations.  

Under Trump’s successful maximum pressure policy, according to New York Times, ‘Iran Signals Openness to Limited Nuclear Talks With U.S.,’ following Russia’s guidance. However, history proves that once pressure eases, the Islamic regime resumes funding terror proxies with petrodollars, attacking Israel and U.S. allies, and plotting assassinations — including against Trump, his family, and officials, even after his presidency, as seen over the past four years.  

In the Oval Office, Trump stressed urgency: ‘We’re down to the final moments … Something’s going to happen very soon … We have a situation with Iran, and something’s going to happen very soon. Very, very soon, you’ll be talking about that pretty soon, I guess.’  

Khamenei’s stance mirrored Russian diplomat Mikhail Ulyanov’s warning that Trump shouldn’t expand nuclear talks to include Iran’s missile program or regional activities, calling it unrealistic to kill three birds with one stone.  

At the same time, Israel confirmed a joint drill of F-15 and F-35 fighter jets with a U.S. B-52 bomber — likely signaling a possible joint strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.  

U.S.-Israel cooperation under Trump is preparing to neutralize Iran’s nuclear program, the IRGC’s missile arsenal, and its terror proxy network — a mission already underway post-October 7th.  

But if the regime survives and sanctions ease, Iran could access $100 billion annually to rebuild even stronger. Failure to act leaves Iran as a pawn of Russian oligarchs to ‘Build Back Better’ their terror networks and nuclear facilities. 

A baby products manufacturer is challenging a new federal regulation as overly broad and contrary to President Donald Trump’s agenda of reigning in three-letter agencies and commissions. 

New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA) filed suit Thursday in Washington, D.C. against the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) over a new federal safety standard for infant support cushions. NCLA, on behalf of Heroes Technology, says the commission misinterprets the term ‘durable’ in the provision to include items not previously covered by the standard, like cushions and other such products. 

NCLA argues that the CPSC previously only included items that fell squarely within the accepted definition of ‘durable’ as delineated by congressional statute – cribs, for example, as well as high chairs, swings and other products.

‘We think that this is a pure case of statutory construction that guides agency authority and over here they step their bounds,’ Kara Rollins, Litigation Counsel at NCLA, told Fox News Digital. 

Rollins said that, via the provision in question, the commission is ‘shortcutting and bypassing really important procedural checks, evidentiary requirements in order to push out a regulation faster.’

NCLA had previously sent CPSC a letter requesting a stay of the rule, saying that it ‘establishes an arbitrary and ineffective safety standard.’ NCLA sought ‘postponement and reconsideration’ in light of one of Trump’s executive orders ordering all executive agencies and departments to halt issuing new rules and regulations pending review and approval. 

‘The president has said to these agencies, ‘You must do X’, and it’s not clear that they’re actually following through with what’s required of them,’ Rollins said. 

Rollins said that the rule not only affects Heroes Technology but also extends to ‘thousands of manufacturers [and] thousands of manufacturing jobs’ both in and outside the U.S.

‘It’s emblematic,’ Rollins said of the broader implications of the rule. ‘When an agency is not held to account, when it’s not held to the standards set out by the statute, or is independent and doesn’t answer to the president in its own mind, then these sorts of self-aggrandizements tend to occur.’

Rollins said that while the rule applies to a specific sector of businesses and products, ‘there’s not really anything that stops it from sort of infiltrating further unless there’s a check on their power.’

‘And one thing we’re very clear on is that it’s not that we don’t think our clients’ products can’t be regulated or shouldn’t be regulated, but how Congress said they should be regulated,’ Rollins said. ‘Congress said if you’re a durable infant good, everything else has to go through the process, and it’s our view that it should have went through the other process.’

Rollins and NCLA argue that infant cushions such as the ones in the case should undergo a separate process that ‘is more onerous, more rigorous, requires more data, more fact-finding.’

The suit comes as the Trump administration works to reel in the administrative state via executive orders, directives and legal challenges. In February, Trump signed one order in particular that requires federal agencies to evaluate all of their regulations that could violate the Constitution as the administration continues to prioritize slashing red tape. 

The administrative state was previously dealt a blow by the Supreme Court in 2024 when it overturned the Chevron doctrine. 

In the landmark decision, Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, the Supreme Court effectively scaled back administrative power by holding that ‘Courts must exercise their independent judgment in deciding whether an agency has acted within its statutory authority.’ The doctrine previously gave deference to an agency’s interpretation of a federal regulation. 

Fox News Digital’s Diana Stancy contributed to this report. 

Dr. Mehmet Oz, President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, will face questions in front of the Senate Committee on Finance Friday morning. 

Following the hearing, the committee will schedule a vote to send Oz’s nomination to the full Senate, where approval is likely, considering the Republican majority.

If confirmed, Oz would be in charge of nearly $1.5 trillion in federal healthcare spending. Medicare, a federal healthcare program for seniors aged 65 and up, currently provides coverage for about 65 million Americans, according to the Center for Medicare Advocacy. Medicaid, which assists people with low incomes, covers roughly 72 million Americans, according to Medicaid.gov.

A former heart surgeon who saw his fame rise through his appearances on daytime TV and 13 seasons of ‘The Dr Oz Show,’ Oz later transitioned into politics, launching an unsuccessful bid for Pennsylvania’s open Senate seat in 2022. He ultimately lost to John Fetterman, then the state’s lieutenant governor. Oz graduated from Harvard and received medical and business degrees from the University of Pennsylvania. 

Oz is expected to be grilled by Democrats during the hearing over his financial ties to a myriad of healthcare-related companies, several of which pose potential conflicts of interest for the potential CMS director.

Oz has committed to divesting many of his financial interests that pose the most obvious risk of impropriety, such as his hundreds of thousands of dollars in stock in United Health Group, a major private health insurer. He also said that if he were confirmed, he would forfeit the nearly $25 million in stock options he obtained as an advisor to a company selling health and beauty supplements.

As the administrator of CMS, Oz would make decisions related to how the government covers procedures, hospital stays and medication within the federal healthcare programs, as well as the reimbursement rates at which healthcare providers get paid for their services. 

On Thursday, Trump’s pick to lead the NIH and FDA, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya and Dr. Marty Makary, respectively, were approved in committee and will now face impending votes by the full Senate.