Free Republic

Speaker John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, is taking on a new and formidable immigration policy director, a sign that he could be more serious about passing immigration legislation than his critics suggest. Rebecca Tallent, who currently serves as director of immigration policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, will join Boehner’s staff on Wednesday. Before joining the BPC, Tallent held several senior staff positions with Sen. John McCain, including chief of staff. During her time with McCain, she helped the Arizona Republican draft a handful of immigration overhaul measures, including the last big push McCain made with the late Sen. Edward M....

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) has hired Rebecca Tallent to work on immigration reform. She is currently the immigration policy director at the Bipartisan Policy Center. "The Speaker remains hopeful that we can enact step-by-step, common-sense immigration reforms -- the kind of reforms the American people understand and support," said Michael Steel, a spokesman for Boehner. "Becky Tallent, a well-known expert in this field of public policy, is a great addition to our team and that effort." According to her BPC bio, Tallent has worked as a policy aide on immigration and energy issues to Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-AZ) and...

Past experience in Idaho, northeastern Oregon and Washington state illustrate that it's time to take gray wolves completely off the federal list of endangered species. The West’s wolf problem started in 1995 and 1996. That’s when 66 wolves from Canada were reintroduced in Idaho and Yellowstone National Park. Those wolves multiplied and spread into Wyoming, Utah and Oregon. They also took up residence in Washington state and Montana, where other wolves from Canada already lived. Today at least 1,674 wolves live in 321 packs within the region, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. That’s in addition to the...

Officials removed a man with an unspecified infectious disease - possibly tuberculosis - from a US Airways Express flight with 70 passengers on board shortly after it landed in Phoenix over the weekend, authorities said on Monday. The unidentified man was removed from Flight 2846 from Austin, Texas, when it landed on Saturday after the airline received an alert from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention regarding a passenger known to have an infectious disease, a spokesman for the airline said.

For over five years, a consistent media claim has been that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin hurt Republican presidential nominee John McCain in 2008 and that he would have fared better with anyone else on the ticket besides her. A recent study by political science professors at Bradley University debunks this claim concluding instead that Palin was a net plus for McCain including with independents and moderates. The first serious study on this matter was conducted by University of Central Florida political science professor Jonathan Knuckey and was published in Political Research Quarterly in April 2011: Using data from the...

Mark Levy • Herald/Review Private Zachary Wilson, with Bravo Company, 40th Expeditionary Signal Battalion, enjoys a Thanksgiving meal at the Thunderbird Dining Facility Wednesday on Fort Huachuca. Wilson is spending his first Thanksgiving away from his family. The 20-year-old soldier from St. Louis, Mo., was eating his Thanksgiving meal Wednesday — actually a pre-holiday feast — at the Thunderbird Dining Facility. Turkey and dressing, along with ham, cole slaw, another salad and banana pudding was the spread he choose for his meal, which he declared to be “pretty good.”But like many young GIs, no Thanksgiving or Christmas meal will be “like mom’s,� he said.Assigned to...

Illegal immigrant held in Arizona 'choked and stomped his cellmate to death so he could stay in custody because he likes it in prison' Arizona authorities say a prison inmate who was in the U.S. illegally killed his cellmate because he wanted to remain behind bars. The Pinal County Sheriff's Office has recommended that prosecutors charge 43-year-old Roberto Venegas-Fernandez with first-degree murder in the November 16 killing of 55-year-old Michael Patrick McNaughton Both men were prisoners of the U.S. Marshals Service, which has said they were from the San Diego area and housed at a Corrections Corp. of America prison...

An example of the tension between Western Democrats and the Obama administration surfaced Monday when Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper told a rural audience that Washington bureaucrats are pushing a “slanted version” of the sage-grouse issue to political decision-makers. Mr. Hickenlooper, a Democrat who’s running for re-election in 2014, said Interior Secretary Sally Jewell is receiving one-sided advice from staff at the Fish and Wildlife Service over the issue of whether to place the Gunnison sage grouse on the endangered-species list. “She has an open mind, right, she’s not well-versed in this issue, and she recognizes that,” said Mr. Hickenlooper in...

PHOENIX — Attorneys for four Arizona groups involved with voter registration are trying to get a federal judge to kill a bid by Secretary of State Ken Bennett to require proof of citizenship from all who register to vote. Nina Perales of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund said the U.S. Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that Arizona cannot enforce its documentation requirement on those who use a registration form from the federal Election Assistance Commission. Perales said  Bennett’s lawsuit “is essentially trying to make an end run around the U.S. Supreme Court decision.” But Bennett...

An investigative report from an Arizona television station reveals illegal aliens routinely are marching across a classified military base in order to enter the U.S., and the military’s perspective is that it’s not the Department of Defense’s responsibility to chase down invaders. The report comes from KVOA-TV in Tucson, which reported that the fort, which is the home to the U.S. Army Intelligence Center and the U.S. Army Network Enterprise Technology Command, is having hundreds, perhaps thousands, of illegal aliens come across its 73,000 acres. The site is located in the Huachuca Mountains only a few miles from the border...

John McCain goes off about U.S. foreign policy under ObamaWhen it comes to foreign policy, the Obama administration is really mucking things up. At least that is how Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., sees it. For a guy who went head-to-head against Obama in the 2008 presidential election, it's been tough to sit back and watch the president bungle diplomatic relations in his second term. From Egypt to Iran, McCain singled out Secretary of State John Kerry, the former Massachusetts senator with whom he served, as the major liability. "This guy has been a human wrecking ball," McCain said during the...

FORT HUACHUCA — Gobble, gobble, gobble, gobble, gobble, gobble! In the talk of genus Meleagris: “Its time for the Turkey Bowl.” The annual touch football game will again see the Orange team of Signal Corps soldiers face off against the team wearing Military Intelligence Corps Blue. The winning team will have bragging rights for a year — along with a token trophy — until the next game in November 2014. While advertised as a touch football game, the event has been known to occasionally include some penalty causing touch football plays, like tackling an opponent carrying the ball. Going on...

Wildlife lovers clamoring to bring gray wolves to Colorado may want to pay attention to those wooden outhouse-style structures in rural Catron County, New Mexico. They’re called “kid cages,” and they’re built to protect children waiting at school bus stops–from wolves. “The wolf issue is an example, especially with the kid cages, about how you’re putting the interest of wildlife over the interests of human beings,” said filmmaker David Spady. “Every American should be concerned about seeing kids in cages and wolves out wandering around freely.” Spady’s remarks came during a Tuesday screening of his film, “Wolves in Government Clothing,”...

An elite group of unmanned aerial systems operators, support and maintenance staff will now call Fort Huachuca their home after an activation ceremony Tuesday morning. A brief ceremony held in Hanger 1 at Libby Army Air Field celebrated the official transfer of Echo Company, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, to this Southern Arizona post for the next two years. The company consists of 150 hand-picked soldiers and 12 UAS vehicles, which will train for eventual deployment to Afghanistan sometime early next year. “This is a key day in our history,” Col. John Evans, Jr., Regiment Commander, told an audience of...

TUCSON - How secure are U.S. military installations? You would think the answer is: very. But, as the News 4 Tucson Investigators uncovered, one installation, right here in southern Arizona, continues to face potential outside security risks, and the problem doesn't seem to be getting any better. Fort Huachuca is only 15 miles north of our state's border with Mexico. The Army post covers more than 73,000 acres. In many parts, the terrain is steep and rugged. Much of the work that goes on at Fort Huachuca is classified but, as the News 4 Tucson Investigators learned, keeping people who...

Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina has an 89.12 lifetime rating from the American Conservative Union and has been in Congress since 1995. Yet the Republican fixture on Capitol Hill will face four primary challengers next year, all of whom accuse him of not being a true conservative. Graham, who is much in the mold of his friend, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., is known for often reaching across the aisle on important legislative issues. One notable example of this is his being a member of the bipartisan Gang of Eight immigration reform group this year. Before being elected to the...

A federal court tonight has thrown out a case brought by the family of Brian Terry, the Border Patrol agent who was killed in a firefight on the Arizona-Mexico border in December 2010. Sharyl Attkisson reports that money already awarded to the family precludes this sort of case from proceeding.

"...Please Arizona, Quit Working Against Us. You can do Better than this. John McCain is serving a six year term that doesn’t end until 2016. His career in which he has earned the title of “maverick” was built by betraying the fundamental principles upon which the Republican Party was founded and his name adjoins legislation sponsored and co-authored by the most odious of leftist Democrat legislators. John McCain has earned the right to retire as a recalled US Senator. Not all states enable their voters to do this but ... continued (couldn't post all material here due to charts, video...

Obama said Thursday that what’s good for illegal immigrants is also good for people who are losing their health insurance because of Obamacare, saying he’ll use prosecutorial discretion to let companies continue to offer health plans that violate his law. It’s the latest example of the White House trying to work around Congress and instead take action on its own, and in this case it comes as Mr. Obama seeks to stop a wholesale abandonment of his health law by Democrats who have watched the rocky rollout. ... That immigration policy, known by its acronym of DACA, has proved controversial...

PHOENIX -- PHOENIX (AP) — A high school football player in Arizona died from an injury suffered in the fourth quarter of a blowout playoff game loss, serving as another tragic reminder of the dangers of head trauma in youth sports. Hopi High School senior Charles Youvella died of a traumatic brain injury Monday at a hospital, the Arizona Interscholastic Association said. He was injured Saturday in Hopi's 60-6 loss to Arizona Lutheran in a first-round playoff game. Youvella scored his team's only touchdown in the game. The death attracted national attention after Arizona Cardinals star wide receiver tweeted a...

It’s sad that Maverick’s taking this idea just seriously enough that he’d think to mention it to another human being. He’s 77 years old, ran a famously chaotic campaign in 2008 before getting crushed on election day, and would face a much stronger, younger field in the primaries than he did last time. That he forced me just now to devote even half a second of thought to how he might stack up against the 2016 contenders is frankly embarrassing, and something for which I’ll never forgive him. It’s like watching a 60-year-old pitcher announce that he’s thinking of coming...

Many communities across the U.S. have problems getting reimbursed for sending ambulances to pick up patients, but for one community along the U.S.-Mexico border, the delinquent party is the federal government, which the city of Nogales says owes it hundreds of thousands of dollars for picking up immigrants. The Arizona city billed the federal government for hundreds of ambulance sorties dispatched to calls from federal agents when they find someone injured, but the government has paid less than 20 cents on the dollar — leaving Nogales to bear the burden of more than $250,000 in the past fiscal year alone.

The Democratic National Committee is launching Spanish-language online ads and robocalls targeting Republicans on the government shutdown, it announced Thursday. The effort is the third phase of a broader campaign this week that has been hitting Republicans in their home states, including House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), as well as early voting states Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada. The Spanish-language calls and Twitter, Facebook and Google ads launching Thursday will target Latino voters in...

A facebook group dedicated to criticizing 'ugly' babies proves that bullying is not just an act of teenagers. The private facebook group, which has since been removed, is composed of grown women around the country who grab photos of toddlers from other mothers' facebook pages without approval and post them online for criticizing. The group was originally designed to trade and sell children's clothing but took a nasty turn. One mother, Melissa Anetucci, of Palm Beach, Fla. has made it her mission to fight against the self-proclaimed 'mean girls group' and to expose their wildly inappropriate behavior. She began posting...

John McCain voted yea WASHINGTON, D.C., November 7, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – This afternoon the Senate approved a bill that could force business owners who adhere to traditional values to hire homosexuals, bisexuals, and those who do not dress in accordance with their biological sex or face litigation. The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) passed following a bipartisan 64-32 vote. Supporters say it would forbid “workplace discrimination� against homosexuals and transgender employees and job-seekers. But critics say, like the HHS mandate, its religious exemption is unduly narrow and would force employers – including Christian schools and nurseries – to violate their consciences....

Nashville, TN – Today, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham introduced the Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Act. The legislation currently has 33 cosponsors – but Senator Alexander is not one of them. Conservative Senate candidate Joe Carr called on Senator Alexander to change his stance and add himself as a co-sponsor. “I’m strongly pro-life and believe it’s imperative the Senate pass this important piece of legislation. When Senator Graham announced his co-sponsors and Senator Alexander’s name was missing, I was disappointed. I am hoping Senator Alexander will change his stance and add himself as a co-sponsor. This legislation is too...

SIERRA VISTA — A number of events connected with Veterans Day will begin Friday. At noon Friday, the groundbreaking for a chapel on the Southern Arizona Veterans’ Memorial Cemetery will take place. Funds for the chapel had to be privately raised, as neither the federal government nor the state, which operates the cemetery, could use taxpayers’ funds for the project. The cemetery’s nonprofit foundation was able to raise more than $200,000 in 15 months, meaning if the weather cooperates, the chapel could be dedicated on Memorial Day in 2014. Fundraising to obtain another $50,000 continues in order to furnish the...

<p>PHOENIX - A man's house burned to the ground, but that wasn't his only shock -- because two weeks later, he received a bill for almost $20,000 from the private fire department that tried to fight it.</p> <p>One state lawmaker says fire coverage in rural areas of Arizona is a mess and he says there needs to be oversight.</p>

A married undercover cop in Arizona began an affair with the drug dealer she was investigating only to out herself and two other colleagues while the pair lay in bed according to a police report. Tempe Police Detective Jessica Dever-Jakusz, 38, met her drug-dealer lover in June of 2013 after buying narcotics from him undercover and by August she was having regular sex with him at his home. But on October 10th, after one of their trysts, Dever-Jakusz - who is married to a police officer - revealed that she was working undercover to arrest him at the same time...

A heated battle is taking place in Arizona between the fledgling solar industry and APS, the state’s largest energy company, which enjoys a state-granted near-monopoly over energy. In sunny Arizona, it is peculiar that solar energy is being portrayed as the bad guy. Since Arizona is a Republican-dominated state, APS is sneakily buying up influential Republicans, both directly and indirectly, to perpetuate its crony capitalism. The Washington Post refers to these Republicans as “some of the best pollsters and consultants money can buy.” The spin goes like this, “stop subsidizing the solar industry.” The word “subsidy” is used to scare...

FORT HUACHUCA — America’s defense depends on a continuously strong military, but proposed cuts concern a noted actor who has performed for military and civilian audiences in the states and overseas. Since his portrayal of Lt. Dan Taylor in “Forrest Gump” nearly 20 years ago, Gary Sinise has become involved in numerous military-affiliated activities, establishing a musical group named after his character in the movie — the Lt. Dan Band. On Sunday afternoon, the band performed on the post’s Warrior/Sentinel Field but before taking the stage to entertain the audience — and after a warm-up session — he spoke with...

No witnesses saw the gruesome end of a road-rage clash between Scottsdale lawyer David Appleton and ex-rodeo cowboy Paul "Tom" Pearson in the dark parking lot of a CVS Pharmacy on the evening of November 10, 2011. As Appleton tells it, speaking publicly for the first time about the incident, the "moment of truth" came as he flailed against the seat belt of his blue Toyota FJ Cruiser, his neck firmly in the grasp of the bigger man reaching through the driver's-side window with his left hand. "He used an expert chokehold," says Appleton, now 61. "He had big hands,...

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) gave the clearest indication that proponents of comprehensive immigration reform may make their final--and strongest--push to get legislation passed next year after House Republicans make it through their primaries. “I think conventional wisdom is that time is not on our side,” McCain told reporters on Monday after an event in Chicago. “But there are a number of members of Congress who have primaries and when those primaries are done, they may be more inclined to address the issue of comprehensive immigration reform.” President Barack Obama has urged Congress to pass immigration reform legislation this year. House...

Brad Moore and his wife, Kat, spent three years selling gourmet wieners out of a trailer before expanding Short Leash Hot Dogs this year into a 50-seat restaurant in downtown Phoenix. The Moores still use that trailer – plus a food truck added later – but Brad said he’s happy to also be where customers always can find him. And working in air-conditioned comfort is a plus. “At some point you just want to get out of the heat and the summertime,” he said. Moore, who also is chairman of the Phoenix Street Food Coalition, said the transition to a...

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — A federal judge on Monday sentenced former U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi to three years in prison for convictions on public corruption, money laundering and other charges, capping a corruption case prosecutors said began more than a decade ago. U.S. District Judge David C. Bury also sentenced Renzi co-defendant James Sandlin to 18 months in prison, and ordered both men to pay fines. They are to begin their prison terms in January

CHANDLER, AZ - Four boys have been arrested and booked into a juvenile detention center for brutally beating a kitten to death earlier this month, police said. Sgt. Joe Favazzo, spokesman for the Chandler Police Department, said surveillance video turned into authorities, depicts six boys repeatedly abusing a young kitten. The incident occurred on Oct. 14, but wasn’t reported to police until the next day. According to police, the six boys – between the ages of 7 and 12 years old -- initially start to play with the playground equipment. It shows that they have a small dog and a...

Passing immigration reform is a way for Republicans to get on a positive agenda and regain some of the approval of the American people, Sen. John McCain said Tuesday during a town hall in Tucson. He said the prospects of passing comprehensive immigration reform this year are still strong despite some Republicans saying the government shutdown and the way it was handled by President Obama affected any chance for compromise. But “the same people that said that are the people that oppose immigration reform. They are just trying to find another reason,” McCain said after the town hall meeting attended...

If there is a country Saudi Arabia and Iran despise more than Israel, it’s each other. When it comes to Syria, Iran’s most prominent ally, the prospect of removing Bashar al-Assad has a pavlovian effect on the Saudis. ... Putin beat Barack Obama and John Kerry like a couple of drums. While Obama saw an opportunity to spin a resounding defeat into an opportunity to back down under the guise of a diplomatic stalemate as the preferred option, there were consequences. One of those consequences involves Saudi Arabia’s anger with the U.S. for not dealing with Assad. Consequences aren’t necessarily...

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is visiting Phoenix amid calls for her resignation after the clunky rollout of insurance exchanges under the new federal health care law. She will go to a health center to talk with "navigators" who have been trained to educate people about enrolling for coverage.

Arizona on Wednesday executed its second death-row inmate in two weeks, a man convicted of a pair of deadly robberies that left six dead in Tucson. Robert Glen Jones Jr. was given a lethal dose of pentobarbital at 10:35 a.m. and was pronounced dead 17 minutes later in the execution chamber at the state prison in Florence. It took execution technicians about 30 minutes to find usable veins in Jones, a former drug user. At one point, Jones jokingly said, "Shooting dope. Free up one of my hands and I'll find it for you."

(VIDEO) Marine Blaine Cooper calls out John McCain on his treason for aiding and abetting the enemy of the United States.

While people like Piers Morgan, Barack Obama and Dianne Feinstein continue to push fear-mongering over guns, a recent story makes the point that guns are not evil, but rather a good deterrent to evil. This couldn't be more apparent than at a recent party that took place in Arizona, where a citizen who was carrying his weapon probably saved everyone at the party from a gunman with a rifle. 10-things-not-to-do-when-carrying-concealedA 27-year-old man got into an argument at with some party goers. After a time, the man was asked to leave, and he did. A short while later he returned. Armed...

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Tuesday that he is considering running for another term in 2016, when he would be 80 years old. "I'm seriously thinking about maybe giving another opportunity for you to vote for or against me in a few years from now," McCain said on KFYI-AM in Phoenix. "I'm seriously giving that a lot of thought."

GOP Congressman no longer open to immigration deal, citing Obama's winner-take-all approach to governance. Rep. Ted Poe (R-TX), the vice chairman of the House Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security, has changed his mind and now opposes any efforts to grant amnesty to America’s at least 11 million illegal immigrants. Poe said his stance is a specifically a result of President Barack Obama’s style of dealing with congressional Republicans during the recent government shutdown and debt ceiling battles. "The President has proven over the last few weeks that ‘negotiating’ means conservatives must give in and that it's his...

Video at link. Arizona is defying a federal order to eliminate apartments for deaf seniors at a housing complex built specifically -- for the deaf. "I think it's about the most ridiculous thing I've heard in a while," said Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., who attempted to negotiate the impasse. "There are a lot of stories of out-of-control regulators, but this just seems to be going to the extreme." A 2005 federal study found that the U.S. had virtually no affordable housing for the deaf. So the federal government helped build Apache ASL Trails, a 75-unit apartment building in Tempe, Ariz.,...

This is a story of a mass shooting that might have been if not for the efforts of a concealed carrier. However, don’t expect to see this story on the national news since there were no fatalities. Several guests, in their 20′s and 30′s were attending a party at a Glendale, AZ home when one of the guests, identified only as a 27 year old male, got into an altercation with several people at the home. The 27 year old was asked to leave, which he initially did. However, shortly thereafter, the 27 year old returned, this time armed with...

The Talk Shows October 20th, 2013 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Roy Blunt, R-Mo.MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu; Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew; Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Tom Coburn, R-Okla.FACE THE NATION (CBS): Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Mark Warner, D-Va. THIS WEEK (ABC): Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.; Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas; former Gov. Jeb Bush, R-Fla.STATE OF THE UNION (CNN): Cruz; Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

PHOENIX - It's called the Great Shakeout Earthquake Drill. Even though earthquakes are not common here in Arizona, they do happen. And today the Red Cross wanted to make sure everyone is ready just in case. Kids are learning to drop to the floor, cover themselves and hold on at Tumbleweed Elementary. "There are three steps, one you drop to the ground, number two cover, get under your desk, and three hold on to your desk," says student Thomas Harris. "You hold on to your desk until the principal announces over the intercom that we're all clear," says student Erica...

The George Soros-funded National Immigration Forum (NIF) is organizing a “fly-in” of what it calls conservatives from across the country aimed at lobbying House Republicans for an amnesty bill. ... NIF is planning to organize the fly in with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg’s FWD.us, and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Partnership for a New American Economy. ... The event will take place on Oct. 28, coinciding with President Barack Obama’s and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s renewed push against House Speaker John Boehner for amnesty. Now that Obama, Reid, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi...

PHOENIX — Get sent to jail in Arizona’s Maricopa County and you’ll be experiencing some serious life changes. And for those who eat meat, that includes going vegetarian. County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is no stranger to controversy. Over the years, he has made seemingly countless numbers of national headlines. As recently as August, the five-time elected sheriff was in the news after announcing that his deputies would be required to carry firearms at all times, even while off duty. Arpaio’s latest move is a plan to transition all of his inmates in the county’s eight jails to a vegetarian diet....