Free Republic

Allen H. Weisselberg, a longtime top executive at Donald J. Trump’s family business who was indicted on tax charges last summer, is nearing a plea deal with prosecutors from the Manhattan district attorney’s office but would not cooperate with a broader investigation into Mr. Trump, according to two people with knowledge of the matter. His plea deal, if finalized, would bring prosecutors no closer to indicting the former president but would nonetheless brand one of his most trusted lieutenants a felon. On Monday, Mr. Weisselberg’s lawyers and prosecutors met with the judge overseeing the case, according to a court database....

The Biden administration has decided that most Americans should get a coronavirus booster vaccination eight months after they received their second shot, and could begin offering third shots as early as mid- to late September, according to administration officials familiar with the discussions. Officials are planning to announce the administration’s decision as early as this week. Their goal is to let Americans who received the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines know now that they will need additional protection against the Delta variant that is causing caseloads to surge across the nation. The new policy will depend on the Food and Drug...

Fed up with work stress, Guo Jianlong quit a newspaper job in Beijing and moved to China’s mountain southwest to “lie flat.” Guo joined a small but visible handful of Chinese urban professionals who are rattling the ruling Communist Party by rejecting grueling careers for a “low-desire life.” That is clashing with the party’s message of success and consumerism as its celebrates the 100th anniversary of its founding. Guo, 44, became a freelance writer in Dali, a town in Yunnan province known for its traditional architecture and picturesque scenery. He married a woman he met there. “Work was OK, but...

The Trump Organization is expected to be hit with criminal charges as soon as next week by Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance’s office in a case that Trump attorneys say is tied to tax-related conduct, multiple people familiar with the matter tell NBC News. “It looks like they are going to come down with charges against the company, and that is completely outrageous,” Ron Fischetti, an attorney for the Trumps, said after the development was first reported by The New York Times. "I’ve been practicing for over 50 years, and I’ve never seen a case like this." Danny Frost, a...

Federal health agencies on Tuesday will call for an immediate pause in use of Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose coronavirus vaccine after six recipients in the United States developed a rare disorder involving blood clots within about two weeks of vaccination, officials briefed on the decision said. All six recipients were women between the ages of 18 and 48. One woman died and a second woman in Nebraska has been hospitalized in critical condition, the officials said. Nearly seven million people in the United States have received Johnson & Johnson shots so far, and roughly nine million more doses have been...

The EU’s drug regulator is reviewing reports of rare blood clots in four people who received Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine and has expanded its inquiry into AstraZeneca’s shot to include reports of a bleeding condition. Of the four serious cases of clotting and low platelets, three occurred in the US during the rollout of J&J’s vaccine from its Janssen pharmaceuticals unit, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) said on Friday, adding that one person had died and one case was reported in a clinical trial. It was the first news of EMA’s inquiry into the J&J vaccine.

Rep Matt Gaetz is expected to be indicted within the next few weeks as former Florida official and friend Joel Greenberg is believed to have turned on the congressman in the sex trafficking investigation against him, a source close to the probe tells DailyMail.com. Greenberg, who was elected Seminole County Tax Collector in 2016, is currently in jail awaiting trial after being slapped with a string of charges last year including sex trafficking a minor between the age of 14 and 17. Earlier this week Gaetz was revealed to be under investigation for allegedly engaging in a sexual relationship with...

The Times has reviewed receipts from Cash App, a mobile payments app, and Apple Pay that show payments from Mr. Gaetz and Mr. Greenberg to one of the women, and a payment from Mr. Greenberg to a second woman. The women told their friends that the payments were for sex with the two men, according to two people familiar with the conversations. In encounters during 2019 and 2020, Mr. Gaetz and Mr. Greenberg instructed the women to meet at certain times and places, often at hotels around Florida, and would tell them the amount of money they were willing to...

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) allegedly showed fellow lawmakers on the House floor photos and videos of naked women he said he had sex with, according to a new report from CNN. The new report is not related to the DOJ investigation. It seems Gaetz’s colleagues in the House are using the opportunity of the scandal to leak details about his alleged behavior as a congressman. The sources, including two people directly shown the material, said Gaetz displayed the images of women on his phone and talked about having sex with them. One of the videos showed a naked woman with...

Workers at a Baltimore plant manufacturing two coronavirus vaccines accidentally conflated the vaccines’ ingredients several weeks ago, ruining about 15 million doses of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine and forcing regulators to delay authorization of the plant’s production lines. The plant is run by Emergent BioSolutions, a manufacturing partner to both Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca. Federal officials attributed the mistake to human error. The mixup has halted future shipments of Johnson & Johnson doses in the United States while the Food and Drug Administration investigates. Johnson & Johnson has moved to strengthen its control over Emergent BioSolutions’ work to avoid...

Representative Matt Gaetz, Republican of Florida and a close ally of former President Donald J. Trump, is being investigated by the Justice Department over whether he had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old and paid for her to travel with him, according to three people briefed on the matter. Investigators are examining whether Mr. Gaetz violated federal sex trafficking laws, the people said. A variety of federal statutes make it illegal to induce someone under 18 to travel over state lines to engage in sex in exchange for money or something of value. The Justice Department regularly prosecutes such cases,...

A Goochland County man suffered a severe reaction after getting his COVID-19 vaccine and VCU doctors believe it was a direct result of the shot. Richard Terrell got the one-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine earlier this month. He suffered a severe rash that spread over his entire body and turned his skin red. The 74-year-old was admitted to the hospital and spent five days at VCU Medical Center. Terrell was released from the hospital and is now sharing his vaccination story as he recovers from the comfort of his Goochland home. He tells 8News that he’s still very weak and...

Researchers may have found an explanation for the rare but serious blood clots reported among some people who received AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine. They believe the phenomenon is similar to one that rarely occurs with a blood thinning drug called heparin, called heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT). In HIT, the drug triggers the immune system to produce antibodies that activate platelets, which cause blood to clot. Drugs other than heparin can cause clotting disorders that strongly resemble HIT, and researchers suspect that in rare cases, the AstraZeneca vaccine may be another such trigger. Four previously healthy individuals who got the AstraZeneca shot and...

Gov. Ron DeSantis is pushing for more than $106 million to go toward his initiative to expand civics education in Florida schools. DeSantis said Wednesday at North Collier Regional Park in Naples he wants to "make Florida the national leader in civics education." DeSantis urged the Florida Legislature to take up his proposal this session and allocate funds available through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security, or CARES, Act. During his announcement Wednesday, DeSantis took on critical race theory and "unsanctioned narratives," stating they will not be in Florida's curriculum. Critical race theory holds that American institutions are inherently...

President Joe Biden says that Donald Trump should not receive intelligence briefings even though they typically have been given to previous former presidents. In his first sit-down interview with a network since becoming president, Biden told CBS Evening News anchor Norah O’Donnell that he doesn’t think Trump should receive the briefings his “erratic behavior unrelated to the insurrection,” referring to the Jan. 6 siege on the Capitol. “You’ve called him an existential threat. You’ve called him dangerous. You’ve called him reckless,” O”Donnell said at one point in the interview. “Yeah, I have. And I believe it,” Biden said. O’Donnell then...

In December, pharmacists made the happy discovery that they could squeeze an extra vaccine dose out of Pfizer vials that were supposed to contain only five. Now, it appears, the bill is due. Pfizer plans to count the surprise sixth dose toward its previous commitment of 200 million doses of Covid vaccine by the end of July and therefore will be providing fewer vials than once expected for the United States. And yet, pharmacists at some vaccination sites say they are still struggling to reliably extract the extra doses, which require the use of a specialty syringe. “Now there’s more...

The devastating fall and winter wave of coronavirus infections that is causing so much misery across the U.S. appears to have finally peaked, according to several researchers who are closely tracking the virus. While another surge remains possible, especially with new, more infectious variants on the horizon, the number of new daily infections in the current wave appears to have hit a high in the past week or two and has been steadily declining in most states since, the researchers say. "Yes, we have peaked in terms of cases," says Ali Mokdad, who has been tracking the pandemic at the...

Biden is proposing a $15,000 first-time homebuyer tax credit, which could be accessed immediately by the buyer, thereby serving as down payment assistance. The FHA could also reduce its monthly insurance premiums under the new leadership.

In late December, scientists in California began searching coronavirus samples for a fast-spreading new variant that had just been identified in Britain. They found it, though in relatively few samples. But in the process, the scientists made another unwelcome discovery: California had produced a variant of its own. That mutant, which belongs to a lineage known as CAL.20C, seemed to have popped up in July but lay low till November. Then it began to quickly spread. CAL.20C accounted for more than half of the virus genome samples collected in Los Angeles laboratories on Jan. 13, according to a new study...

California’s state epidemiologist is urging a halt to more than 300,000 coronavirus vaccinations using a Moderna vaccine version because some people received medical treatment for possible severe allergic reactions. Dr. Erica S. Pan on Sunday recommended providers stop using lot 41L20A of the Moderna vaccine pending completion of an investigation by state officials, Moderna, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the federal Food and Drug Administration. “Out of an extreme abundance of caution and also recognizing the extremely limited supply of vaccine, we are recommending that providers use other available vaccine inventory,” Pan said in a statement. She said...