violence in the middle east exploding literally. reports of more than 100 dead as explosions rock a ceremony for a slain rainian general killed four years ago today, a top hamas leader taken out in beirut. containerships come under attack in the red sea and many companies say good-bye, we don t even want to be near the red sea. who leon panetta says we need to do to stop it. we are all over it. welcome. i m neil cavuto. let s get to it with jennifer griffin with the very latest at the pentagon keeping track of these developments and boy, they came fast and furious. well, absolutely, neil. the u.s. has pushed back on the allegations from iranian officials that they were involved in the twin bombings that killed more than 100 iranians making their way to the grave of general soleimani. the united states was not involved in any way. any suggestion to the contrary is ridiculous. we have no reason to believe that israel was involved in this explosion. today marks the fourt
new year the new record at our southern border bridge sources tell fox news there have been at 286,000 migrant encounters in december. about is the highest monthly total ever. meanwhile president biden is spending the week vacationing in the u.s. virgin islands. critics say should be here handling the border crisis with more urgency. hello welcome to fox news live i am rich edson eric shawn and arthel that will have the week off. molly: i am molly line by the president for us to usher in 2024 to the caribbean sun his poll numbers are underwater. a new fox news poll finds more than half of voters surveyed, 53% said 2023 was a bad year for them personally. two thirds said it was a bad year for the country. lucas and thomas what is traveling with president biden he is in sync st. croix with mon all of this, lucas also under the caribbean sun, to you for quickset is right. president biden bringing in the new year despite a record number of migrants on the southern border. molly
The biden administration diverted the flood of illegals to another location to keep them out of the camera shots during the house gop s visit to eagle pass. don t be fooled. they re still being released in 0 our country. our southern boreder is a disaster. take a look at this graphic here. cbp sources telling fox in december, there were more than 302,000 migrant encounters. the highest month ever recorded. you can see the previous years of december before that including a couple of years under president trump. his worst year in 2020 when he had 74,000 migrant encounters in december. back out here live. you look at the numbers. we have quadrupled what was trump had in a few years. neil: incredible. thanks, bill melugin. to jacqui heinrich at the white house on how the president is defending his actions at the border.
Jacqui? neil, just to harken back to bill s reporting. there were 302,000 migrant encounters in december. the highest total for a single month. the press secretary said last month what we re seeing at the border is not unusual. i asked her today if she stands by that statement. this is the answer i got. has removed folks who have been here illegally, who were not here on a legal basis. about 460,000 people that they ve been able to remove. that s what i said. early year we see ebbs and flows. that s what we re seeing at this time. i see that they reported 142,000 in all of fiscal year 2023. december had more than double that crossing in a single month. how is that really a consequence? since may 12th, dhs has removed and returned over 460,000 individuals who did not have illegal basis to be here.