Free Republic

SEATTLE — Seattle's new Mayor-elect Katie Wilson is addressing the public regarding her election and upcoming role as mayor on Thursday afternoon. After thanking her family, campaign team, volunteers, and canvassers, Wilson criticized the large amounts of money poured into her opponents' campaigns. "They might have the money, we had the people," Wilson triumphantly continued. "The working people of our city are tired. They are ready for something new, something more hopeful and just and equitable.” Wilson also listed what she wants to achieve as mayor. "I want everyone in this great city of ours to have a roof over...

Michele Weiss has made history as the first female Orthodox Jewish mayor in the United States, winning decisively as a Republican in a heavily Democratic Cleveland suburb after building a reputation for fiscal responsibility and bipartisan cooperation over 15 years on the city council. Weiss, a mother and grandmother who has lived in University Heights for 28 years, will take office in January after rising from volunteer work with the League of Women Voters to vice mayor, championing environmental sustainability and municipal infrastructure along the way.

Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) is reportedly considering a run for California governor — a possible foil to frontrunner Katie Porter. Two anonymous sources close to the congressman told MSNBC that he has been considering a play for the Golden State governor’s mansion with a possible announcement as early as next week. “Swalwell declined to comment when reached by MSNBC, but a source close to the congressman, who asked to remain anonymous to discuss the private discussions, said Swalwell allies had asked him to run ‘to fill a “fighter/protector” role’ in the mold of Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom,” reported MSNBC. Should...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Jessica Sweet spent the federal government shutdown cutting back. To make ends meet, the Social Security claims specialist drank only one coffee a day, skipped meals, cut down on groceries and deferred paying some household bills. She racked up spending on her credit card buying gas to get to work. With the longest shutdown ever coming to a close, Sweet and hundreds of thousands of other federal workers who missed paychecks will soon get some relief. But many are left feeling that their livelihoods served as political pawns in the fight between recalcitrant lawmakers in Washington and...

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., gave his thoughts on what he considers to be a divide in the Democratic Party amid fallout from the longest government shutdown in U.S. history in an interview Thursday on "Will Cain Country." One impact of the shutdown, according to the senator from Louisiana, is the potential political shakeup within the Democratic Party that will land at the feet of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. "Senator Schumer gambled, and he lost," Kennedy said. "He’s kind of walking around now looking like a guy who just lost his luggage." "I think his testicles are on back order...

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — Hundreds of top economists and other experts, including former U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, called on Friday for the world to set up an independent international panel on income and wealth inequality. The call in an open letter came before the Group of 20 summit in South Africa next weekend, when a report on global inequality chaired by Nobel Prize-winning American economist Joseph Stiglitz is due to be presented to world leaders. That report, which was released this month, said that the world is facing an inequality emergency as well as a climate emergency,...

Every autumn, news feeds get flooded with stories about climate change. That’s because around this time each year, global leaders gather to discuss collective efforts to limit our emissions of planet-warming gases, released primarily from oil, gas and coal. Some of the information coming out of the COP30 conference is bleak. But it’s not just COP. Climate stories can be difficult to consume year-round, whether it’s about natural disasters, victims of heat waves or sea level rise or new studies about global warming impacts. “When you throw a ton of scary facts and information at people, their nervous system shuts...

The grandstanding over Tucker Carlson’s interview with Nick Fuentes is exhausting The American right has a problem: it can’t stop talking about itself. Commentators, academics and journalists of what used to be called a “conservative” persuasion all tend to think that their ideas are tremendously interesting. And, in the way a difficult child becomes argumentative when he or she isn’t getting attention, they fight. They fear irrelevance and so they fall out with each other and take sides in order to prove to themselves that they have something worth saying. Things become messy and nasty and everybody gets carried away...

There’s a lot of ill-suppressed glee among Republicans right now, along with recriminations among Democrats, about the resolution of the longest government shutdown ever. Eight Democratic senators were able to undercut a few hundred of their colleagues by ending a filibuster against a bill to reopen government, exhibiting both weakness and disunity. (Though there’s no telling how many holdouts privately agreed with the “cave.”) Worse, Democrats failed to secure an extension of Obamacare premium subsidies they repeatedly demanded. So were Republicans the “winners” and Democrats the “losers” in the shutdown saga? Maybe now, but maybe not later. As the New...

Justice Department leaders later tied to agency special counsel Jack Smith shut down an FBI investigation tied to possible campaign finance violations carried out by Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign when it used cutouts to fund the opposition research firm Fusion GPS and British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s anti-Trump dossier, emails released Thursday appear to show. Iowa GOP Sen. Chuck Grassely, said his Judiciary Committee, which made public the messages, describes them as “internal emails” and an “electronic communication” from the FBI “exposing” the “refusal” by DOJ leaders “to open a criminal investigation into potential campaign finance violations committed by Hillary Clinton...

Washington — Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania has been hospitalized after a fall near his home, which caused minor injuries to his face, his spokesman said in a statement posted on social media. Fetterman fell to the ground after feeling light-headed, which was due to a ventricular fibrillation flare-up, the statement said. Ventricular fibrillation is a type of irregular heartbeat. Fetterman is remaining at the hospital for observation so doctors can "fine-tune" his medications. "During an early morning walk, Senator Fetterman sustained a fall near his home in Braddock," his spokesperson said. The statement continued: "Out of an abundance of...

The subcommittee is continuing to probe how two pipe bombs were planted on Jan. 6 outside both the Democratic and Republican Party headquarters. The House's select subcommittee on January 6th on Thursday released new surveillance camera video during the alleged timeframe when a pipe bomb was discovered outside the Democratic National Committee building in Washington, D.C., on the day of the 2021 Capitol Hill riot. “The moments before and after the discovery of the pipe bomb at the DNC are an important aspect of our investigation as we continue to try and unravel the events surrounding the planting of these...

The acclaimed star said actors from the South are often passed over for roles in Hollywood.Key Points Billy Bob Thornton faced prejudice in Hollywood for being Southern. asting directors wanted exaggerated Southern accents, rejecting authentic portrayals. Thornton says stereotypes against Southerners still persist but lessen with stardom. Actor Billy Bob Thornton said he faced prejudice upon arrival in Hollywood because he’s Southern and believes it still exists today. The acclaimed actor and Arkansas native, 70, who skyrocketed to fame in the film Sling Blade, went on to score an Academy Award nomination for his role in A Simple Plan. He...

Fact-challenged, lefty Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett got put in her place on live TV by CNN anchors after she falsely tried to blame Republicans for redacting the name of one of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims in a newly released email. The email in question was part of a tranche of 23,000 pages of documents from the convicted pedophile’s estate released by Republicans on the House Oversight Committee this week after Democrats published a smaller batch in which they chose to redact the name of deceased victim Virginia Giuffre. Republicans later revealed the omitted name in the 2011 email was Giuffre, and...

The Indonesian government's hallmark programme to provide free meals to combat malnutrition in the country has contributed to nearly half of food poisoning cases this year, an official told lawmakers on Wednesday (Nov 12). Thousands of people have been sick since the much-hyped billion-dollar scheme of President Prabowo Subianto was launched in January, with critics calling for its suspension over hygiene concerns. Dadan Hindayana, head of the national BGN agency which oversees the programme, told parliament that more than 11,000 people suffered from food poisoning across Indonesia since the launch, including over 600 who were hospitalised. Out of 441 recorded...

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), who is leading the effort to force a vote on the full release of the files tied to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, said he is hopeful the number of Republicans backing the measure “could snowball.” “I’ve already had a couple Republicans tell my office privately that they’re going to vote for it,” Massie told CNN’s Manu Raju outside the Capitol on Wednesday. “And I think that could snowball,” he added. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Wednesday he will call a vote on the measure next week, speeding up the process after a discharge petition garnered...

Three failed asylum seekers who arrived in the UK on small boats have appeared in court charged with gang raping a woman on Brighton beach. Two Egyptians and an Iranian Kurdish man are accused of dragging the 33-year-old woman onto the stone beach before subjecting her to a horrific ordeal. The three migrants appeared at Lewes Crown Court in East Sussex today where a trial date was set for next year. symbol

Donald Trump is pleading with Republicans not to release the Epstein files. The president called at least two of his congressional allies on Tuesday in an effort to get them to remove their names from a discharge petition that will force a vote on releasing details of the investigation into the pedophilic sex trafficker and his associates. That included a “very early wakeup call” to Representative Lauren Boebert, and phone tag with Representative Nancy Mace, The New York Times’s Annie Karni reported Wednesday. Trump has since met with Boebert, a White House official confirmed to CNN, though the meeting did...

The Trump Organization requested 184 foreign workers to work across various company properties, a record number that has increased over the years. The company sought to hire workers through H-2A and H-2B visas for temporary positions at Mar-a-Lago, two golf clubs and at Trump Vineyard Estates in Charlottesville, Va., according to data from the Department of Labor.

Sara Sharif was tortured to death by her father after a catalogue of blunders by authorities who missed bruises under her hijab as they feared causing offence, a report reveals today. The ten-year-old was beaten to death by Urfan Sharif after the risk posed by the serial domestic abuser was ‘overlooked, not acted on and underestimated by almost all professionals’ despite his 16-year history of attacking women and children, according to a damning safeguarding review. In acts of brutality described by a judge as the worst crime he had ever encountered, Sara suffered over 100 injuries when she was tied...