Free Republic

Former Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton warned Marc Elias, her former 2016 campaign lawyer who was infamous for peddling ex-MI6 spy Christopher Steele's "dirty dossier," about the acute threat posed by Republicans and Donald Trump to the US democracy.Hillary Clinton has once again evoked the specter of "Russian collusion" and warned the audience of Marc Elias' "Democracy Docket" podcast that Donald Trump's role model is no one but Russian President Vladimir Putin. According to Clinton, the danger of a Trump victory to the US democracy is acute, given that Republicans would do whatever it takes to win the 2024 elections,...

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russian special services and law enforcement agencies are identifying people behind last month's Crocus City Hall terror attack near Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday. "Russian special services and law enforcement agencies continue to investigate, to look into the details of this despicable crime. They are identifying people behind it, including those who commissioned the attack, sponsors and organizers," Putin told the 12th International Meeting of High Representatives for Security Issues in the Russian city of St. Petersburg via a video message. None of those guilty of the attack shall escape just retribution, the president...

The former Fox News anchor and conservative media personality divulged that he had set up an official Telegram channel for his Tucker Carlson Network, encouraging the public to “keep an eye on the announcements there.” The channel has already attracted more than 150, 000 subscribers.Speaking with Tucker Carlson, Russian-born IT entrepreneur and co-founder of the Telegram social network Pavel Durov focused on a variety of topics, including his visit to the United States. The 39-year-old revealed that he was closely watched and monitored by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) during his time in the country. “We got too much...

BUDAPEST (Sputnik) - Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on Tuesday accused Brussels of violating freedom of speech after local authorities prevented a conference of right-wing European politicians from taking place in Belgium's capital. Earlier on Tuesday, the mayor of Brussels' Saint-Josse-ten-Noode municipality, Emir Kir ordered the shutdown of the National Conservatism Conference (NatCon) "to guarantee public security." Orban was scheduled to participate. "The Belgian police decided to shut down the [National Conservatism] conference in #Brussels, just two hours after it started. I guess they couldn't take free speech any longer. The last time they wanted to silence me with the...

Iran launched a large-scale missile and drone attack into Israel overnight Saturday targeting military and intelligence sites in response to an Israeli attack on its Damascus Embassy compound April 1. Prime Minister Netanyahu has threatened to “hurt” Iran, while President Biden has reportedly said the US won’t assist in an Israeli counterattack.Israel’s war cabinet has reportedly failed to reach a consensus on when and how to respond to Iran’s weekend missile and drone barrage, with Israeli media reporting that US pressure has complicated planning. “There will be a response,” an anonymous Israeli official was quoted as saying by Israel Hayom....

MOSCOW, (Sputnik) - At least nine Iranian missiles have hit two of Israel's airbases during the recent attack, damaging infrastructure, ABC News reported on Sunday, citing an unnamed senior US official. Five ballistic missiles struck Israel's Nevatim airbase, damaging a C-130 military transport aircraft, a runway and storage facilities, while four more missiles hit an Israeli airbase in the Negev desert but without any significant damage reported. On Saturday night, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps launched over 300 drones and missiles at Israel in its first-ever direct attack on Israeli territory, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said. The attack came...

The Russian Investigative Committee announced on Tuesday that it has opened a criminal case against high-ranking officials from the US and other NATO countires for financing terrorism following the deadly Crocus City Hall attack in Moscow. "It has been established that the funds received through commercial organizations, in particular the Burisma Holdings oil and gas company that is operating in Ukraine, have been used over the past few years to carry out terrorist acts in Russia, as well as abroad, in order to eliminate prominent political and public figures and cause economic damage," the committee declared. Moreover, the committee is...

Anti-government protests in Budapest bear a strong resemblance to external powers' actions that are aimed at rocking "undesired" governments, some observers argue.Thousands of Hungarian protesters marched in Budapest over the weekend to express their dissatisfaction with Prime Minister Viktor Orban. Peter Magyar, called by the American state-funded media outlet Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty a "rising challenger" to the Hungarian prime minister, led the rally. He announced the creation of a coalition of liberals, conservatives and fragmented opposition leaders to run against Orban in the European Parliament (EP) election in June. "Step by step, brick by brick, we are taking back...

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - An earthquake on the eastern coast of the United States on Friday and a total solar eclipse on April 8 represent signals from God for the country to repent, US Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene said on Friday. “God is sending America strong signs to tell us to repent. Earthquakes and eclipses and many more things to come,” Greene said in a statement via social media platform X. Greene said that she prays the US listens to such signals. Earlier on Friday, a magnitude 4.8 earthquake hit occurred near New York City. The geological event resulted in ground...

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that there is every reason to believe that the main goal of the perpetrators of the terrorist attack in Crocus City Hall was to cause harm to Russia's unity. "In this regard, of course, judging by the ongoing investigation, we have every reason to believe that the main goal of the perpetrators of this bloody, terrible terrorist act in Moscow was precisely to cause harm to our unity. No other goals are visible, they simply do not exist," Putin said at the XII Congress of the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Russia. The shooting...

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - Independent US presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in an interview for CNN that President Joe Biden poses a bigger threat to democracy than his main opponent and predecessor Donald Trump. "I can make the argument that President Biden is the much worse threat to democracy, and the reason for that is President Biden is the first candidate in history – the first president in history that has used the federal agencies to censor political speech, so to censor his opponent," Kennedy Jr. said in the interview on Monday. Kennedy supported his claim by noting that...

In 2023, Oakland, California was the site of 14,554 motor vehicle thefts, an all-time high for the city. With increases in burglaries and robberies as well, violent and property crimes are higher in Oakland than they have been since the early 1990s.The California city of Oakland has approved a plan to install 480 surveillance cameras equipped with automatic license plate readers in an effort to fight rising crime in the city. Most of the cameras, 290, will be deployed inside the city while the remaining 180 will be placed on freeways. The cameras will provide law enforcement with the ability...

Security is tight in Russia’s North Caucasian federal district following the deadly terrorist attack on the Crocus City Hall concert venue near Moscow on March 22.A temporary counterterror operation (CTO) regime has been lifted in Dagestan’s capital Makhachkala and the city of Kaspiysk in Russia’s North Caucasian federal district. CTO Regime in Makhachkala, KaspiyskThe introduction of the regime in the cities was announced by the National Antiterrorism Committee's (NAC) operational headquarters earlier on Sunday. "On March 31, 2024, the head of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) for the Republic of Dagestan decided to introduce a counter-terrorist operation regime within...

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The government of the United Kingdom will not want to extradite WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to the United States as long as he could still face the death penalty there, Lord Richard Balfe, a Conservative member of the UK Parliament's House of Lords, told Sputnik. On Tuesday, the High Court of Justice in London ruled that Assange has a real prospect of success on three of the nine grounds of appeal. The court asked the US government to provide assurances that the WikiLeaks founder would be able to claim the First Amendment of the US Constitution, which...

TORZHOK, Russia (Sputnik) - Statements about alleged plans of Russia to attack Europe after Ukraine are nonsense, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said. During a working visit to the Russian town of Torzhok in the Tver Region on Wednesday, Putin met with military pilots. "What is being said that we are going to attack Europe after Ukraine - it is utter nonsense and intimidation of own population just to beat the money out of them, out of their people. Especially against the backdrop of the fact that the economy is shrinking and living standards are falling. It is obvious, and...

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Monday that the terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall concert venue near Moscow had been committed by radical Islamists. "We know that the crime was committed by the hands of radical Islamists, whose ideology the Islamic world itself has been fighting for centuries," Putin said. Even though Russia knows who carried out the terrorist attack in the Crocus concert hall, but the mastermind behind it is still in question, and we need to find out whether radical Islamists really decided to strike at the country, the Russian president said. "In...

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been engaged in a legal struggle in the UK against being extradited to the US, where he faces 17 counts of espionage and one charge of computer misuse, possibly resulting in a prison term of up to 175 years. However, there apparently may be a way to cut short this protracted London court case. The US government, according to The Wall Street Journal, is exploring the option of offering WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange a plea deal. The Justice Department is contemplating the possibility of dropping the 17 current charges against him under the Espionage Act....

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The US Maritime Administration (MARAD) has advised vessels under the US flag to turn off automatic identification systems (AIS) transponders while crossing the southern part of the Red Sea, the Bab al-Mandab Strait and the Gulf of Aden amid attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels. "US-flagged commercial vessels transiting the Southern Red Sea, Bab el Mandeb Strait, and Gulf of Aden with AIS transponders on are at increased risk of targeting by adversarial actors. US-flagged commercial vessels operating in these areas are strongly advised to turn off their AIS transponders, unless vessel Masters believe that doing so would...

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - France will propose a ceasefire in the Ukraine conflict for the duration of the Olympic Games in Paris, French President Emmanuel Macron said, adding that Paris is ready to react if the conflict escalates, but will not initiate aggression. "We will ask for it," Macron said in an interview with Ukrainian TV channels when asked if he would offer Russia a ceasefire for the duration of the Olympics. The Paris Olympics will be held from July 26 to August 11. He also said he was ready to discuss proposals to de-escalate the conflict in Ukraine with Russian...

Canadians got their first rude awakening about the limits to their constitutional freedoms during the Freedom Convoy protests in February of 2022, when, in a crackdown on truckers objecting to draconian Covid restrictions, the Trudeau government invoked the Emergencies Act, allowing authorities to jail organizers and seize their bank accounts. Sweeping “online safety” legislation in Canada proposed Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government threatening penalties up to life imprisonment for speech crimes, and real sentences for thought crimes, have civil rights groups sounding the alarm. The legislation, known as the Online Harms Act (Bill C-63), was tabled by Justice Minister...