Free Republic

A federal appeals court on Friday temporarily blocked President Trump from deploying Oregon National Guard troops to Portland after a judge issued a Temporary Retraining Order (TRO). The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily reinstated Judge Karin Immergut’s TRO on Friday after it halted an order issued by a three-judge panel from the court earlier in the week. President Trump previously called up hundreds of California National Guard Troops to Portland to circumvent the judge’s order blocking Oregon National Guard Troop deployment. Trump also activated up to 400 Texas National Guard troops for deployment to Oregon, Illinois and other states...

Mark Bashaw, the only member of the Armed Forces to be court-martialed for refusing to take the COVID shot, has been reinstated to the U.S. Army, promoted as if he'd never been discharged, and awarded back pay. Making the victory sweeter is the fact that he was prosecuted by none other than current Virginia congressman, then Colonel Yevgeny Semyonovich Vindman, the brother of Lieutenant Colonel Aleksandr Semyonovich Vindman, of Trump impeachment fame. Bashaw, a former USAF noncommissioned officer, had been commissioned into the Army's Medical Service Corps and was stationed at Aberdeen Proving Ground. He was charged in February 2022...

President Trump can deploy federal troops to restore order in Portland, Oregon, allowing the deportations to continue. That was the preliminary finding this week by the nation’s most liberal appellate division, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of... The three-judge panel reversed a district court judge who thwarted the military operation at the beginning of the month. Liberal pundits downplay the significance of this order by pointing out that the panel was stacked with two of Mr. Trump’s appointees.Although this is true, they omit an important fact. The jurists were deep-sixing the legal analysis of District Judge Karin J. Immergut, whom...

GENEVA (Reuters) -The U.N. weather agency plans to cut some posts and is reviewing its priorities as dozens of countries, including the United States, are late with their fees, a spokesperson said on Friday. The World Meteorological Organization, set up in 1951 to coordinate global data for weather forecasts, created a review task force this week during a meeting in Geneva aimed at improving early-warning systems for deadly climate disasters. Outstanding late payments to the WMO amount to around 48 million Swiss francs ($60 million) as of the end of August, a WMO document showed, equivalent to two-thirds of its...

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered an aircraft carrier strike group currently stationed in Europe to the Caribbean region amid a massive buildup of US military forces in the region. The Gerald R. Ford strike group and its associated air wing are being sent to “dismantle Transnational Criminal Organizations and counter narco-terrorism,” Pentagon Press Secretary Sean Parnell said in a statement posted on X. The Ford group docked near the harbor of Split, Croatia on October 21. That would leave the ships more than 5,000 miles from the Caribbean, meaning it would take days for the group to be in...

Former University of Alabama quarterback AJ McCarron, who helped lead the team to back-to-back national championships, announced Thursday that he is running for lieutenant governor of Alabama. McCarron made the announcement in a video posted to YouTube on Thursday. McCarron, a first-time candidate, described himself as a political outsider. He cited conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated in September, as his inspiration to "get off the sidelines." McCarron, who is running as a Republican, also stressed his 2016 endorsement of President Donald Trump. "Today, Alabama's conservative and cultural values are under attack from every direction. That's why Charlie Kirk's...

The court ruled that HHS exceeded its authority by redefining sex under Title IX to prohibit gender-identity bias because a statute can’t “be divorced” from the time and reason for its enactment. Afederal judge in Mississippi on Wednesday struck down a Biden-era Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rule that extended federal health anti-discrimination protections to transgender health care. Judge Louis Guirola Jr. of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi ruled in favor of a coalition of 16 GOP-led states that sued over the rule. The court ruled that HHS exceeded its authority by redefining...

FBI Director Kash Patel announced that the federal agency is “on the verge” of unmasking the intricate funding sources and command structure behind Antifa, a decentralized left-wing terrorist organization responsible for civil unrest and extreme acts of violence against political enemies Speaking to Just the News, Patel said that “there are indications that support for anti-American radical groups is coming from America’s enemies overseas,” and that the bureau is “following the money.” Furthermore, Patel indicated that funding is also coming from US nonprofits with IRS tax-exempt status. Investigations have been launched. “Look, the thing I can tell you is that...

The Democrats’ convenient case of political amnesia The party that happily weaponized the courts now claims to fear political prosecutions. Tough situation.Joe Scarborough just rediscovered the Constitution.On MSNBC, the “Morning Joe” co-host warned last week of the grave dangers of Donald Trump using government power against political enemies. Nodding journalists agreed. Scarborough cautioned that Trump and his team would face a “wicked cycle” of retaliation and retribution after leaving office if they pursued politically motivated prosecutions.One problem: Democrats already did exactly that.After years of weaponizing the law against Trump and his staff, the left now pleads for “restraint.” With Letitia...

“What do you expect when you sue the president?” Hearing that comment, some people may guess the comment was made by someone addressing one of President Trump’s political opponents who has been targeted for federal prosecution. That quote, though, is much older. It is from an IRS agent addressing officials of a conservative organization that was being audited during Bill Clinton’s presidency. This illustrates that the use of federal agencies to punish presidents’ enemies did not start with President Trump. The administration of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt used tax investigations against political opponents. Targeted individuals included publishers of newspapers that...

Key Points President Donald Trump pardoned Binance founder Changpeng Zhao one week after he commuted the prison sentence of former New York congressman George Santos. Zhao had pleaded guilty in 2023 to enabling money laundering while CEO of the huge cryptocurrency exchange. Zhao’s plea was part of a $4.3 billiion settlement Binance reached with the DOJ in 2023. ============================================================== President Donald Trump has pardoned Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, who had previously pleaded guilty to enabling money laundering while heading the cryptocurrency exchange, the White House said Thursday. “President Trump exercised his constitutional authority by issuing a pardon for Mr. Zhao,...

The Texas Education Agency will remove the Fort Worth Independent School District’s elected board members and may appoint a new superintendent to oversee its operations, Commissioner Mike Morath announced Thursday morning. The decision to assume control of the North Texas district follows months of speculation about how the state would respond to one of the Fort Worth campuses not meeting Texas’ academic accountability standards for five consecutive years. The district closed the sixth-grade campus at the end of the 2023-24 school year, but Morath indicated in the spring that state law still required him to intervene. Dallas’ local news station...

When world leaders convene in Belem, Brazil, next month for the United Nations COP30 climate talks it will mark ten years since the landmark Paris Climate Agreement to cut emissions enough to avoid the most catastrophic warming. But a pair of recent reports show that global action is not even close to meeting that goal. “None of the 45 global indicators that we track are on pace,” Kelly Levin, chief of Science, Data and Systems Change at the Bezos Earth Fund, said in a press briefing on the report The State of Climate Action 2025. The report assessed progress on...

The Minnesota Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that an athletic organization violated the state’s anti-discrimination law when it barred a transgender athlete from competing, culminating a six-year-long legal battle. Minnesota Supreme Court’s Chief Justice Natalie E. Hudson affirmed that a sport organization’s policy barring trans women from competing is “facially discriminatory and constitutes direct evidence of discrimination based on sexual orientation under the [Minnesota Human Rights Act’s] prohibition against discrimination in business and places of public accommodation.” The decision reversed a court of appeals ruling that had sowed doubt on whether the organization, USA Powerlifting, had made the decision to...

Aprominent Republican senator whose phone records were seized during the Biden administration declared Wednesday she will sue Justice Department and FBI officials who conducted the search on grounds they violated her personal civil liberties and her protections as a member of Congress. “The infringement is deep and wide,” Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., told Just the News. Blackburn said the 2023 grand jury subpoena of phone records violated her 1st and 4th Amendment protections of free speech and privacy, her separation of powers protections as a lawmaker and possibly the Stored Communications Act because her carrier Verizon retained and turned over...

When a public high school in Orange County, Florida, aired a weekly “Witchy Wednesday” religious video series on the schoolwide TV system, led by students and featuring detailed instructions on casting spells and performing rituals, including soul cleansing and moon worship, many parents were stunned. The school canceled the series after public outcry and intervention from Liberty Counsel, in which the legal group asked for equal time for Christian instruction. But the larger question remains: Why would a public school introduce spiritual practices rooted in witchcraft to impressionable young students, and what does this reveal about the direction of public...

A federal judge in Chicago just made a decision that’s raising eyebrows — and not just among immigration officers.In a move that’s already stirring debate nationwide, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Cummings ruled that ICE agents — yes, federal officers — can be arrested if they take migrants into custody at Cook County courthouses without a proper warrant. Let that sink in for a second. (snip) So, who’s actually in charge here — federal law enforcement… or local judges?And if ICE agents can be arrested for doing their jobs, what kind of message does that send to those who aren’t even...

PULSE POINTS❓WHAT HAPPENED: Over 515,000 illegal aliens have been deported since President Donald J. Trump returned to the White House in January, with the administration on track to break deportation records.👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: President Trump, Department of Homeland Security Secretary (DHS) Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Border Czar Tom Homan, and U.S. Immigration Enforcement (ICE) officials.📍WHEN & WHERE: Since January 20, across the United States.💬KEY QUOTE: “This is just the beginning,” said DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, adding, “Our agency was vilified and barred from doing its job for the last four years.”🎯IMPACT: The administration has...

Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson on Tuesday announced her office has completed its review of the state's voter registration list against citizenship data in the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ SAVE database. Nelson said she has identified over 2,000 potential noncitizens, who possibly voted illegally in recent state elections. The list of potential noncitizens have been turned over to local counties, who will conduct their own investigations into the eligibility of the identified voters. Those the state believes voted in a state election illegally will be referred to the Office of the Attorney General for prosecution. “Only eligible United...

U.S. District Court Judge Mary S. McElroy has issued an injunction preventing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) from redirecting $233 million in Homeland Security Grant Program funds, following a lawsuit by a coalition of Democratic-led states. The decision comes amid concerns that the reallocations have curtailed vital counterterrorism and emergency preparedness resources. Additional states are considering joining the litigation, citing potential impacts on national security funding, as the case progresses. McElroy said, “This sort of last-minute changing of the way the funding happens, and especially when it happens right in the wake...