Free Republic

Kidnapped Ukrainian children are being sent to Russian “re-education” camps — where they are kept in prison-like conditions, forced to watch Russian propaganda, beaten and subjected to sexual violence, according to parents and activists. Inessa Vertash, 43, hasn’t seen her 15-year-old son, Vitaliy, in five months — ever since he left on what was supposed to be a two-week trip to a camp at the urging of his school teacher. It was billed as a retreat to escape the fighting. “I told her I wanted to think about it but she said there’s nothing to think about, they were leaving...

Fumbling blindly through cratered farms, the troops from Russia’s 155th Naval Infantry Brigade had no maps, medical kits or working walkie-talkies, they said. Just a few weeks earlier, they had been factory workers and truck drivers, watching an endless showcase of supposed Russian military victories at home on state television before being drafted in September. One medic was a former barista who had never had any medical training. Now, they were piled onto the tops of overcrowded armored vehicles, lumbering through fallow autumn fields with Kalashnikov rifles from half a century ago and virtually nothing to eat, they said. Russia...

A Russian military aircraft secretly transported the cash and three models of munition - a British NLAW anti-tank missile, a US Javelin anti-tank missile and a Stinger anti-aircraft missile - to an airport in Tehran in August, the source told Sky News.

CAR TROUBLE A blonde pushes her BMW into a gas station. She tells the mechanic it died. After he works on it for a few minutes, it is idling smoothly. She says, “What's the story?” He replies, “Just crap in the carburetor.” She asks, “How often do I have to do that?” SPEEDING TICKET A police officer stops a blonde for speeding and asks her very nicely if he could see her driver’s license. She replied in a huff, “I wish you guys would get your act together! Just yesterday they took my license away and now today you expect...

Ana Navarro told her co-host Friday on ABC’s “The View” that actor Jussie Smollett’s fake hate crime story “read believable” to many people. Smollett was found guilty of five of six counts of felony disorderly conduct for filing a false police report. Co-host Joy Behar said, “Yesterday former Empire star Jussie Smollett was found guilty of orchestrating a fake hate crime, he had told police he was jumped and beaten by men shouting homophobic slurs and claimed they put a noose around his neck. Two brothers who were also, his trainers testified that he paid them to help stage the...

A new book says Sens. Cotton and McConnell plotted to undermine Trump's election fraud claims.Journalist David Drucker described how both privately maneuvered to ensure Trump didn't steal the election.Cotton brought forward a plan to announce that he opposed Trump's efforts to overturn the election, Drucker said.Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell secretly plotted with Sen. Tom Cotton, to prevent other senators from working with former President Donald Trump to reverse Joe Biden's election victory, a new book has claimed. A book by journalist David Drucker, an excerpt of which was published by Vanity Fair, describes how Sen. Cotton and McConnell worked...

CNN’s Don Lemon faces a credible sexual assault allegation that will soon land in court, reports Fox News. The suit stems from a credible allegation made by Dustin Hice, who says that in July of 2018, at Murf’s Backstreet Tavern in Sag Harbor, Lemon “put his hand down the front of his own shorts, and vigorously rubbed his genitalia, removed his hand and shoved his index and middle fingers in Plaintiff’s mustache and under Plaintiff’s nose.

Anthony Scaramucci thinks he knows when Donald Trump will decide not to run for president again. And, according to “The Mooch,” it’s only seven months away. "He’s gonna drop out of the race because it’s gonna become very clear. Okay, it’ll be March of 2020. He’ll likely drop out by March of 2020. It’s gonna become very clear that it’s impossible for him to win,” the former (short-lived) White House communications director said in an interview with Vanity Fair published Friday.

President Donald Trump late last week told the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria that he could have several months to pull 2,000 troops out of Syria, backtracking on his initial order for a full and rapid withdrawal within 30 days, The New York Times reports. The report came after Trump tweeted that “we’re slowly sending out troops back home.” U.S. officials told the Times the conversation between Trump and Lt. Gen. Paul J. LaCamera took place during the president’s surprise trip to Iraq.

U.S.—Reacting with disgust to the 4.1% second-quarter GDP growth figure released Friday, the nation’s Democrats united to slam President Donald Trump for America’s booming economy. “The U.S. economy is on fire. This is totally unacceptable and, wouldn’t you know, typical of Republican policy,” Nancy Pelosi said at a press conference. “What happened to the good ol’ days, when decent Americans couldn’t find a job for the life of them? Drive down Main Street in small-town America these days and all you see are ‘Now Hiring’ signs. I’ve got one word for you, Donald Trump: despicable.” Pelosi’s staff also confirmed the...

The pastor of a Melbourne, Florida, church who attended President Trump’s rally in his hometown over the weekend is claiming “demonic” activity and vitriol were palpable at the event, traumatizing his 11-year-old daughter. “I have been in places and experiences before where demonic activity was palpable,” wrote Joel Tooley, pastor of the First Church of the Nazarene in Melbourne. “The power of the Holy Spirit of God was protecting me in those moments and was once again protecting me and my daughter in this moment.”

A small group of high-profile conservatives who vociferously opposed Donald Trump's candidacy for president and never fell in line are facing anxious times now that the self-declared vengeful Trump has taken the reins of the most powerful government in the world, The Atlantic reports. Conservative talk radio host Glenn Beck, who says Trump is "dangerously unhinged" and has appointed some "disturbing people" to his inner circle, said he lives in fear of death threats he's received from the president's supporters. As a result, he now travels with two bodyguards. "It is not fun," Beck said. "I don't cherish it, but...

According to a bombshell new report, the First Lady and Barack Obama are sleeping in separate White House bedrooms. She’s preparing to move his clothes and personal things out of their million-dollar house in Chicago, the Voice of Russia reports. "The smart money says the marriage is doomed," a source close to the President said. "Barack and Michelle have had a rocky go for years and mainly stayed together for their daughters and his political career. But now Michelle is mad as hell. She feels violated in front of the whole world. She’s met with divorce lawyers and told Barack...

Herman Cain acted swiftly to put an end to speculation over the story about sexual-harassment claims during his tenure at the National Restaurant Association. After a few hours of confused response, Cain admitted that he had been accused, but falsely, of inappropriate conduct. He claimed that an investigation of those accusations showed at the time that they were “baseless,” and he seemed surprised by the news that the trade group settled the claims. “I hope it wasn’t for much,” Cain told Fox News, “because nothing happened”: “I have never sexually harassed anyone, but yes, I was falsely accused while I...

Testifying in the case against Philadelphia sandwich proprietor Joey Vento, who as owner of Geno’s Steaks purportedly discriminated against non-English speaking patrons by posting a “Speak English” sign at his South Philadelphia shop, University of Pennsylvania professor Camille Charles insisted that business owners have an obligation to be multi-lingual. “No one should be humiliated by being asked to use English or by being misunderstood for speaking a foreign language,” Charles argued. Pointing out that the number of foreign-born residents living in the South Philadelphia neighborhood near Geno’s grew more than 200 percent between 1980 and 2000, the sociology professor said...