LAS VEGAS, NV – Former President Trump suggested that he could win up to half of the Jewish vote in the 2024 election as he criticized Jewish Americans who don’t support him in his showdown with Vice President Kamala Harris.

“We’re probably around the 50 percent mark,” Trump said on Thursday in live-streamed comments as he addressed the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual leadership meeting in Las Vegas, Nevada.

And the former president and GOP nominee claimed, without evidence, that Israel “will no longer exist” if Harris wins the White House in November’s election.

Trump addressed the group of Republican Jewish leaders, donors, and activists, days after the bodies of six Israeli hostages, including Israeli American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, were recovered in Gaza. The hostages were taken by Hamas last October during an attack on Israel that ignited the eleven-month-long war in Gaza.

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The Harris campaign, responding to Trump’s address, pointed to the former president’s past criticism of Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu for congratulating Biden on his 2020 election victory over Trump.

“Donald Trump has made it obvious he would turn on Israel in a moment if it suited his personal interests, and in fact he has done so in the past,” Harris national security spokesperson Morgan Finkelstein wrote in a statement. “Meanwhile, the Vice President has been incredibly clear: She has been a lifelong supporter of the State of Israel as a secure, democratic homeland for the Jewish people.”

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While supportive of Israel’s right to defend itself, President Biden’s relationship with Netanyahu has grown increasingly strained during the current war. On Monday, the president said he didn’t think the Israeli leader was doing enough to help foster a hostage deal with Hamas.

The vice president has aimed to balance her support for Israel – which she spotlighted last month during her address at the Democratic National Convention – with her acknowledgment of the high civilian death toll caused by Israel’s military offensive in Gaza. While Republicans are unified in support of Israel, many progressives in the Democratic Party have been vocal in their criticism of Israel’s war with Hamas.

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks onstage during the first day of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center on August 19, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois.   (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

Trump, who has repeatedly questioned how Jewish Americans could vote for the Democrats, reiterated “I don’t understand how anybody can support them — and I say it constantly — if you had them to support and you were Jewish, you have to have your head examined.”

“Who are the 50 percent of Jewish people that are voting for these people that hate Israel and don’t like the Jewish people?” Trump asked as he once again charged that the Democrats “have been very bad to you.”

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Ari Fleischer, a Republican Jewish Coalition board member, spotlighted the rising Jewish support for GOP presidential candidates as he spoke with reporters following Trump’s speech.

Fleischer, a longtime Republican strategist, former White House press secretary and Fox News contributor, said that former President George H.W. Bush won 11% of the Jewish vote in 1992, but that his boss, former President George W. Bush, won 25% of the Jewish vote in his 2004 re-election. Trump won approximately 30% of the Jewish vote four years ago.

GOP presidential nominee former President Trump, takes aim at Vice President Kamala Harris as he speaks in a livestreamed address to the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual leadership meeting, on Sept. 5, 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada  (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)

Fleischer wouldn’t predict what percentage of the Jewish vote Trump would capture this year, but said it could near 50% in some battleground states, as they consider casting Republican ballots.

“The ears of the Jewish community are open this cycle more than previously, because of the events around the world and what we see in America,” Fleischer said. “It’s one thing for it to be theoretical, it’s now physical. It’s palpable on the American street.”

He added that “what’s changed in this cycle is this palpable sense of fear because of what’s happening in America, because of what’s happening on campuses, because of what happened in Israel on October 7, and every day since…the American Jewry has never had their ears more open to potentially voting Republican than in this cycle.”

Republican Jewish Coalition CEO Matt Brooks told reporters that the group’s political arm has beefed up its data operations by building what he touted as “the only real viable voter file of Jewish voters in the country” to turnout the vote.

“We have quietly been building under the radar over the last several years. We have been putting staff and deploying resources,” Brooks shared. “So we now have staff in Nevada, we have paid staff in Georgia, we have paid staff in Michigan, we have paid staff in Pennsylvania and in Arizona. And we have been doing this quietly since the last election, building up to this moment.”

Brooks said the group is spending millions of dollars on digital and TV ads, direct mail, phone calls and door knocking and other canvassing efforts to get out the vote – what he described as “the whole gamut.”

Miriam Adelson, the billionaire GOP donor, speaks at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual leadership meeting, in Las Vegas, Nevada on Sept. 5, 2024.  (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)

Trump was introduced at the gathering by Miriam Adelson, the billionaire Republican megadonor, who along with her late husband, casino magnate Sheldon Adelson were major backers of the Republican Jewish Coalition.

Adelson, who is currently helping bankroll a super PAC that supports Trump, called him “our best friend” and added that she’s “eagerly awaiting for him to enter the White House and to save the Jewish people.”

Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.

Congressional Republicans are claiming vindication after Hunter Biden pleaded guilty to nine federal tax-related charges on Thursday – and warning President Biden not to pardon his son.

Rep. Warren Davidson, R-Ohio, told Fox News Digital that he believes the plea “absolutely” affirms the accusations and findings GOP lawmakers have levied against the First Family since before President Biden took office.

“It’s also vindication for the whistleblowers,” he added, accusing Hunter Biden’s defenders of trying to “wreck their careers.”

He said of the president potentially pardoning him, “I think it would be an abuse of that power for the President to do that, but I think a lot of people will be surprised if Joe Biden doesn’t.”

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The White House has said multiple times that the president will not pardon his son, but that has not stopped Republican-led skepticism from pouring in.

It comes after a bombshell House GOP report, which the White House has pushed back on, that accused the president of committing “impeachable offenses” by allegedly helping enrich himself and his family through foreign deals.

Meanwhile, House Ways & Means Chairman Jason Smith, R-Mo., whose committee is one of three that was investigating Biden via impeachment inquiry, similarly said the guilty plea upheld the testimony of whistleblowers who came to his panel.

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“Hunter Biden’s decision to plead guilty once again affirms the integrity of the IRS whistleblowers who recommended these exact charges over two years ago before being stonewalled by the Biden-Harris Justice Department. Had Joseph Ziegler and Gary Shapley not come forward, putting their reputations and careers at great risk in the process, Hunter Biden would have received a sweetheart plea deal for merely two misdemeanors,” Smith told Fox News Digital.

Smith added as a veiled warning, “It remains to be seen whether President Biden will abuse the power of his office to ensure his son avoids the consequences of his felony tax crimes.”

A court sketch depicts Hunter Biden as he appears in federal court in Los Angeles, California on Thursday, September 5, 2024.  (Bill Robles)

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., who also co-led the probe, said, “Hunter Biden is finally admitting the obvious: he didn’t pay taxes on income he received by selling access to his father, Joe Biden.”

A member of that committee, Rep. Pat Fallon, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital, “We also can’t let Hunter Biden’s plea deal distract from the fact that he was the bag man in the Biden family’s influence peddling scheme that saw them amass some $27 million by selling political access to ‘the big guy,’ Joe Biden.”

“For more than a decade, Hunter and his associates enriched themselves at the expense of the American people. By all means, Hunter needs to be held to account, but this is by no means the end when it comes to equal justice under the law,” Fallon said.

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Biden and his allies have consistently pushed back on accusations levied by House Republicans, dismissing them as misrepresentations and political attacks.

But that has not convinced GOP lawmakers like Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., who warned Biden not to pardon his son.

House Republicans have been investigating President Biden for years. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

“Hunter Biden’s bait-and-switch stunt is a clear effort to avoid a messy trial that would reveal his father’s role in the family’s corrupt business dealings. Americans will once again witness the Bidens’ corruption go unpunished as President Biden will likely pardon his son on his way out of the Oval Office,” Biggs said.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters on Thursday that “no,” Hunter Biden would not get a presidential pardon from his father, hours before he entered his guilty plea.

Biden himself said in June that he would “abide by the jury’s decision” when asked if he would pardon his son.

The NFL kicks off the season Thursday, and former President Trump appears to be rooting for the same team as Taylor Swift this fall.

The day before the Kansas City Chiefs’ home game against the Baltimore Ravens, the current Republican presidential nominee appeared to be going all in on the Chiefs. Trump praised quarterback Patrick Mahomes and his wife, Brittany, and predicted a return to the Super Bowl for the defending champs.

“I want to thank beautiful Brittany Mahomes for so strongly defending me, and the fact that MAGA is the greatest and most powerful Political Movement in the History of our now Failing Country,” Trump wrote Wednesday on Truth Social.

“With Crime and Illegal Immigration totally out of control, INFLATION Ravaging all Americans, and a World that is laughing at the stupidity of our hapless ‘leaders,’ it is nice to see someone who loves our Country, and wants to save it from DOOM. What a great couple – See you both at the Super Bowl!”

Brittany Mahomes, an owner of the NWSL’s Kansas City Current and a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, reportedly “liked” and later “unliked” an Aug. 13 Instagram post by Trump highlighting the Republican Party’s platform. She gave the same like/unlike treatment to a comment that simply said “TRUMP-VANCE 2024” on one of her Instagram posts, according to TMZ.

It is unclear whether this activity from weeks ago is the “strong defense” that Trump mentioned in his post.

As for Trump’s indirect reference to Patrick Mahomes, the three-time Super Bowl champion doesn’t seem likely to endorse any presidential candidate this year.

“I don’t want to pressure anyone to vote for a certain president,” Mahomes told Time magazine in April. “I want people to use their voice, whoever they believe in. I want them to do the research.”

Swift became the Chiefs’ most famous fan when she started dating star tight end Travis Kelce last year. The pop superstar appeared to become close friends with Brittany Mahomes, as the two were seen together at football games and numerous other social outings.

Swift famously endorsed President Biden in 2020 but has yet to do so this year for Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris. Last month, Trump shared a fake image on Truth Social that falsely suggested that Swift had endorsed him.