Free Republic

**snip**Sources described an investigation that has widened to focus on possible financial crimes, some unconnected to the 2016 elections, alongside the ongoing scrutiny of possible illegal coordination with Russian spy agencies and alleged attempts by President Donald Trump and others to obstruct the FBI investigation. Even investigative leads that have nothing to do with Russia but involve Trump associates are being referred to the special counsel to encourage subjects of the investigation to cooperate, according to two law enforcement sources....the President's attorney, Jay Sekulow, said, "President's outside counsel has not received any requests for documentation or information about this. Any...

Trey Gowdy takes testimony from Attorney General Loretta Lynch regarding the use of email, particularly non-government email. Loretta makes a clear statement about Federal employees using private email.Loretta has a credibility problem. Elizabeth Carlisle has a credibility problem.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali was schedule to present a paper on radical Islamic terror at the National Security Counsel before being blocked by H.R. McMaster and his recently appointed Senior Director of Counter-Terrorism, Mustafa Javed Ali. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who was in town to present her work to the Senate, was also prohibited from visiting the President during her White House visit, where she was allowed to meet with select members of the NSC in an informal setting. ... McMaster has refused to call out radical Islamic terrorism in the past, and tried to stop President Donald Trump from visiting the...

A three judge panel on the D.C. Court of Appeals has struck down the District of Columbia “may issue” concealed carry law. The District of Columbia bans the open carry of firearms. With its law banning the concealed carry of firearms except in exceptionally rare cases, it has effectively banned the carry of weapons outside the home.The three judge panel of the D.C. Court of Appeals ruled the law to be an unconstitutional infringement on the right to bear arms.From foxnews.com: D.C. requires gun owners to have a “good reason” to obtain a concealed carry permit. The U.S. Court...

Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh appears to have dropped a bombshell in audio released Tuesday – pointing out that the DNC emails obtained by WikiLeaks stopped pouring in after the mysterious murder of DNC staffer Seth Rich in 2016. In the audio, Hersh also claims an FBI report described to him by an insider confirms that Rich, the DNC voter-expansion data director, had taken some emails to WikiLeaks and requested payment for a full trove of DNC emails during the presidential campaign. In fact, the latest DNC email released by WikiLeaks was dated May 18, 2016 – just weeks before Rich was...

Republicans are questioning their ability to govern following seven months of constant turmoil capped by the dramatic failure in the Senate to advance ObamaCare repeal. ... In public, Republican lawmakers for the most part have sought to avoid blaming the steady stream of White House distractions and controversies for their legislative record. Privately, staff and members are more forthcoming. ... "We're horrified by the drama coming out of the White House," said a Republican senator who requested anonymity to comment frankly on the administration.

[snip]It has been a lucrative month for former President Barack Obama’s longest-serving senior adviser[Valerie Jarrett] — she sealed a book deal with publishing house Viking in early July and joined the popular ride-hailing company Lyft on Monday. It has been a lucrative month for former President Barack Obama’s longest-serving senior adviser — she sealed a book deal with publishing house Viking in early July and joined the popular ride-hailing company Lyft on Monday.Logan Green, co-founder and CEO of Lyft, called Mr. Obama’s confidante “one of our country’s foremost leaders and a distinguished public servant, and a natural fit for our...

Derek Harvey was the key figure when it came to the Middle East. He was against the Iran Deal and the funding of Palestinian Authority terror. He called out Islamic Jihad. He tried to force out the Obama holdovers running our foreign policy. And now he's gone. McMaster's purge at the NSC continues. Flynn's people get forced out and replaced with establishment zombies. The Obama holdovers continue to run foreign policy. The swamp is now in full control of the NSC. This one is a really big win for McMaster. And a great loss for America. It will set back...

"The election of Donald Trump is really a kind of class rebellion against people like us, educated professionals who live in cities, who have cosmopolitan views about things," Zakaria said. [snip]"He [Trump} knew that the election of a black president had stirred a kind of ugly racial animus. A small subset but he knew how to get them" Zakaria said.

On July 10, 2016, 27 year-old Democratic staffer Seth Conrad Rich was murdered in Washington DC about a block from his apartment. The killer or killers took nothing from their victim, leaving behind his wallet, watch and phone.

Detectives leading the Seth Rich murder investigation agreed to meet with Capitol Hill investigators to discuss evidence surrounding the alleged hacking of Democratic National Committee emails during the 2016 presidential election, a private eye claims. But the Metropolitan Police Department canceled its meeting with House investigators on the Hill just hours before it was scheduled to take place, according to former Washington, D.C., homicide detective Rod Wheeler. “I’ve been following the arrest of Awan – this is a guy whose name came up a couple of times in my investigation as someone that I should look at,” he said in...

Americans living in and around the area where DNC staffer Seth Rich was brutally murdered on July 10, 2016, have mixed feelings on whether speculation surrounding Rich’s slaying is the stuff of conspiracy theories or evidence that the unsolved crime warrants a federal investigation. Seth Rich (middle) with friends (Photo: Facebook)On June 12, WND visited Lou’s City Bar – a bar in the Columbia Heights area of northwest Washington, D.C., that Rich frequented and where he spent his final hours drinking before he was shot to death near his home. After requesting to speak to the manager of the bar...

In a major development in the ongoing effort to restore the Second Amendment in Washington, D.C., the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued an opinion on Tuesday that would effectively require D.C. officials to make concealed carry licenses available on a “shall-issue” basis. The court’s decision comes in the combined cases of Wrenn v. D.C. and Grace v. D.C. Following the landmark case of District of Columbia v. Heller, which recognized a Second Amendment right to have operable handguns in the home for self-defense, the District retaliated by banning carrying of firearms outside the...

The U.S. Capitol itself follows a sanctuary city policy that protects illegal immigrants from being turned over to deportation agents, a Republican congressman said Friday, announcing new legislation to scrap that policy. Rep. Steve King, Iowa Republican, said Capitol Police don’t have clear permission to handle immigration violations, so they often don’t bother to check the legal status of those they arrest for other offenses in the Capitol complex. That leads to bizarre situations where illegal immigrants proudly proclaim their unauthorized status in the U.S., while protesting or blockading offices. They are processed and released without being turned over to...

A Secret Service special officer on Tuesday afternoon accidentally shot himself and is hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries, according to the agency. A news release from the Secret Service said a special officer assigned to the Washington field office accidentally discharged his weapon while on duty. The incident has been referred to the Office of Professional Responsibility for further review. Editor's note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly identified the special officer involved in the incident as a "Secret Service agent," which is a different position. We regret the error and have pasted the full statement from the Secret...

A federal appeals court on Tuesday struck down a District of Columbia gun-control measure that the court said is essentially an outright ban in violation of the Second Amendment.

State Department Lawyers Removing References to ISIS ‘Genocide’ Against Christians, Other Religious Minorities.. full title. ... Obama holdovers in State Department's legal office are responsible, critics say. The State Department's top lawyers are systematically removing the word "genocide" to describe the Islamic State's mass slaughter of Christians, Yazidis, and other ethnic minorities in Iraq and Syria from speeches before they are delivered and other official documents, according to human rights activists and attorneys familiar with the policies. Additionally, Democratic senators are delaying confirmation of Mark Green, Trump's pick to head the U.S. Agency for International Development who has broad bipartisan...

A federal appeals court has blocked enforcement of a strict concealed-carry law in the nation’s capital that required gun owners to prove a “good reason” in order to obtain permits allowing them to carry handguns for self defense. In a 2-1 decision, U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has ordered lower courts to issue permanent injunctions blocking enforcement of the D.C. law. In rejecting the city’s law, the court ruled that while the Second Amendment allows for some limits on gun possession it does now allow for “bans on carrying in urban areas like D.C. or bans on...

A Georgetown University law professor recently claimed that “ALL white people are racist” and “ALL men are sexist.” “Yes, ALL white people are racist. Yes, ALL men are sexist. Yes, ALL cis people are transphobic,” Adjunct Professor Preston Mitchum stated in a recent tweet, saying “we have to unpack that. That’s the work.”

A whistleblower is making some of the same complaints against the Obama administration over its record of providing congressionally mandated payouts to nuclear workers as Barack Obama did about the George W. Bush administration's. Obama, when he was a senator in the middle of his White House bid, admonished the Bush Labor Department over complaints of bureaucratic bungling and intentional efforts to deny or drag out payouts to workers who lost their health building the nation's Cold War nuclear arsenal. [snip] Obama went on to say in the interview that he found it "deeply troubling" that the Bush administration would...