Free Republic

He has gone against the will of the voters, arbitrarily ending the death penalty for vicious killers If the California GOP had a pulse, they’d file recall papers tomorrow

Dozens of people were charged Tuesday in a scheme in which wealthy parents allegedly bribed college coaches and other insiders to get their children into some of the nation's most selective schools. Below is a list of the suspects: William Rick Singer, 58, of Newport Beach, Calif., owner of the Edge College & Career Network and CEO of the Key Worldwide Foundation, was charged in an Information with racketeering conspiracy, money laundering conspiracy, conspiracy to defraud the United States, and obstruction of justice. Mark Riddell, 36, of Palmetto, Fla., was charged in an Information with conspiracy to commit mail fraud...

HOLY FATHER, The nation has recently seen much pain and suffering, yet we hold steadfast that this has come to pass in order that we may know Your intent for U.S. As You have told us, from this we will see something new to be born showing Your love and your power; that all is written and will be seen in Your time. We pray that what we have seen will bring this nation together once again. Please continue to teach us that only by being united shall we stand. To stand separately will only cause us to perish. As...

Gov. Gavin Newsom is putting a moratorium on the death penalty in California, sparing the lives of more than 700 death-row inmates. Newsom plans to sign an executive order Wednesday morning granting reprieves to all 737 Californians awaiting executions – a quarter of the country’s death row inmates. His action comes three years after California voters rejected an initiative to end the death penalty, instead passing a measure to speed up executions. Newsom says the death penalty system has discriminated against mentally ill defendants and people of color. It has not made the state safer and has wasted billions of...

Her code name was “Hedgehog,” an homage to a “tough animal that even a lion would hesitate to bite,” as a friend once said. And like a hedgehog, which appears cute and nonthreatening but can roll into a tight ball deploying dangerous quills when challenged, Marie-Madeleine Fourcade had an unexpected tough side. The young French woman headed one of the most important resistance networks during World War II and oversaw the collection of crucial intelligence that helped turn the battle’s tide. And yet she remains virtually unknown — in large part, because of her gender. “Nobody really remembers her, and...

And, parent unrest is starting to surface Short-notice wildcat teacher sick outs during Kentucky’s current legislative session have already caused a lot of pain for Kentucky parents. On several recent occasions, parents in a number of Kentucky school districts have received a less-than-24-hour notice that schools were being cancelled so teachers could go and fuss at legislators in Frankfort. In consequence, such things as arranging baby sitting and providing for students’ lunches suddenly became a parent problem. ... Talk about disruption! And, parents are not happy. ... For sure, parents are beginning to question the sick outs. The Courier-Journal just...

Athletic coaches at USC, UCLA and Stanford got the boot Tuesday after federal prosecutors announced more than 50 people have been indicted in a college admissions bribery scandal. Coaches were among those charged with racketeering conspiracy for allegedly accepting bribes in exchange for admitting students as athletes, regardless of their ability. UCLA says its soccer coach Jorge Salcedo has been placed on leave pending a review and will have no involvement with the team. The university said in a statement Tuesday it’s a “potential victim of a fraudulent scheme” but that it’s not aware of any student-athletes who are under...

A guest lecturer at Boston University last week told students that it is “dangerous” for white students to not see race. According to a report from The College Fix, University of Washington Professor Robin DiAngelo that it is “dangerous” for white people to say that they see people as individuals. DiAngelo spent a significant portion of her lecture addressing the “issue” of non-minorities who say that they are “colorblind.” DiAngelo says that others might say instead that they were “taught to treat everyone the same.” All of these individuals, DiAngelo argues, hold “dangerous” attitudes that have been shaped by society’s...

Several Democratic donors were among those charged Tuesday in a federal crackdown on a nationwide fraudulent college admissions conspiracy. "Dozens of individuals involved in a nationwide conspiracy that facilitated cheating on college entrance exams and the admission of students to elite universities as purported athletic recruits," according to the Department of Justice. Documents unsealed Tuesday in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts show fraud extending to Yale, Georgetown, and other American universities. .....Of the 50 people charged in the college scandal, the Washington Free Beacon found only one gave consistently to Republican candidates. Mossimo G. Giannulli,...

The “pro-life” side won a major victory from the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals today, but the biggest victor was the Constitution. Eleven of the 17 judges participating in the decision ruled that an Ohio law keeping state funds from organizations that perform nontherapeutic abortions does not run afoul of the constitutional abortion privilege created under the 1973 Roe v. Wade case and its progeny. The judges noted that the law still permits women to obtain abortions, but just not to force taxpayers to handle the bill. For the majority, Judge Jeffrey Sutton wrote that tax-funded state governments are...

President Donald Trump pointed to media bias against first lady Melania Trump on Monday, in an exclusive interview with Breitbart News. “If Ivanka Trump were a Democrat or a liberal democrat, even better, she’d be the toast of the world,” the president said. “Same thing with our great first lady, who people love by the way. If our first lady, if I were a Democrat instead of a Republican, she’d be Jackie O times twenty. Instead, they go after her.” Trump was referring to President John F. Kennedy’s wife Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis — frequently nicknamed “Jackie O” after she became...

National Guard troops helped with the arrest of 23,034 illegal immigrants and the seizure of more than 35,000 pounds of drugs in the roughly six months they were deployed to the border in fiscal 2018, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The more than 23,000 people arrested were "deportable" noncitizens, DHS said. The operation, dubbed "Guardian Support," also led federal law enforcement to more than 6,100 people who were later turned back, the data said. Because guardsmen are military personnel and not law enforcement officers, they cannot apprehend people. CBP officers and Border Patrol agents apprehended thousands as a...

A total of 4,316 non-citizens were arrested at the northern U.S. border in fiscal 2018, and 2,245 of those were 'Mexican citizens'. Mexican nationals are able to fly to Canada 'without a visa'... the uptick in arrests on the northern border makes it the highest level since 2011. Illegal immigration at both the northern and southern borders increased last year. Of the eight Border Patrol sectors on the northern border, the Detroit sector saw the most arrests at 1,930. Vermont's Swanton sector finished second with more than 700 apprehensions. Part of #USBP Maine’s area of responsibility includes the “North Maine...

Omar received the third largest percentage of the vote among the 140+ newly elected Gopher State U.S. Representatives since statehood It is no secret that Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District has one of the largest Democratic partisan tilts in the Midwest, so when state Representative Ilhan Omar won the DFL primary last August the question was not whether she would win the general election but how much support would she receive. In the end, Omar won 78.0 percent of the vote – besting GOP nominee Jennifer Zielinski by 56.3 points. Omar’s performance ranks third on the all-time list for newly elected...

All Detectives Sorted by Detective Last Name Adams detective of Coronado 9 Dan Adams – Portrayed by Rod Cameron A former United States Navy intelligence officer turned private detective in the TV series Coronado 9. (Directed by Dann Cahn) • TV series: 1960‑1961. Addison detective of Moonlighting (with Mattie Hayes) David Addison – Portrayed by Bruce Willis A fast-talking P.I. who partners with Mattie in the TV series Moonlighting. (Created by Glenn Gordon Caron)

Holly Alvarado realized she might be pregnant while standing in the middle of a Walmart near Grand Forks Air Force Base, where she was stationed in 2009. Alvarado, then 22, was struggling to afford the supplies, like socks, underwear, and boots, she would need for at least six months in the Middle East. She had emptied her apartment of most belongings except for the sleeping bag she crawled into at night and crammed the rest in a storage unit, an expense that would grow over time. Alvarado had two weeks left in North Dakota before pre-deployment training began in Texas....

Former Vice President Joe Biden maybe be reconsidering his harsh criticisms over President Donald Trump’s cuts to Medicare. The Trump administration unveiled its budget proposal for 2020. As IJR previously reported, the budget aims to decrease the annual deficit and secure the final funding needed to complete the southern border wall. As part of Trump’s proposed budget, the administration decided to keep cuts proposed by the Obama Administration when it comes to Medicare. According to a report by Axios, Trump’s team proposed cutting around $800 billion over ten years, with the majority of the spending cuts coming from renegotiations of...

WASHINGTON, DC – Senate Republicans are preparing to reinterpret Senate Rules in coming weeks to reduce the number of hours required to confirm presidential nominations, responding to Democrats’ unprecedented obstruction of President Trump’s nominees for both the judiciary and the Executive Branch. Under Senate Rule XXII, debate on any matter can continue indefinitely. This is called a filibuster, when senators are deliberately continuing debate for the purpose of preventing a vote – unless three-fifths of senators (60) vote to break the filibuster by invoking cloture. Once cloture is invoked, further debate is limited to 30 additional hours, then a final...

Hollywood actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin and a slew of chief executives are among 50 wealthy people charged in the largest college cheating scam ever prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice, federal officials said Tuesday. Those indicted in the investigation, dubbed "Operation Varsity Blues," allegedly paid bribes of up to $6.5 million to get their children into elite colleges, including Yale, Stanford, Georgetown and the University of Southern California, federal prosecutors said.

There are more than 1.7 million illegal aliens from Central America and Mexico who have deportation orders or pending deportation orders that have yet to be deported from the United States. Documents obtained by the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) reveal that there are roughly 1.74 million illegal aliens from Central America and Mexico that continue living in the U.S. despite orders to be deported. The federal data found that there are nearly 645,000 illegal aliens from Central America and Mexico who have final orders for deportation and about 1.1 million illegal aliens from Central America and Mexico with pending...