Free Republic

While Hillary Clinton loyal aide Huma Abedin was reportedly sidelined in the final stretch of the 2016 presidential campaign as a result of Abedin’s husband’s child-porn scandal, she was potentially an even greater liability than known. It turns out Anthony Weiner wasn’t the only family member under investigation. In fact, the U.S. Justice Department has been actively prosecuting two other Abedin family members – for conspiracy, wire fraud and securities fraud – and she along with the State Department, where she previously worked for Clinton, are mentioned in the federal case, court records show. Other documents reveal the same allegedly...

Virginia Democrat Sen. Tim Kaine gave the FBI his approval to investigate Catholic parishes in his own state on Monday. When asked by a local ABC affiliate about the FBI’s Richmond division infiltrating Catholic communities to spy on the church for alleged extremism, Kaine called the revelations a misunderstanding. “I think the key is communication,” Kaine told ABC13. “If the FBI has a concern like that, then go to the church leaders and say, ‘Hey look, we have a concern and we don’t want your members to get unwittingly caught up in something.'”Former FBI Special Agent Kyle Seraphin blew the...

GAO has no option other than to find that President Biden’s pause of the border wall funds is unlawful and should issue an opinion stating the Biden administration has broken the law.Last Congress, many Democrats, including Rep. John Yarmuth, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, claimed the Trump administration’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) broke the law when it paused the obligation of funds to Ukraine for 50 days to determine the best use for them. On the very first day of his administration, however, President Biden directed that funding specifically appropriated to build the wall along the...

(p. 26) The decision by the Corporation and the U.S. Attorney to cut out OIG and agree to this Settlement Agreement was injurious to the Federal government as a whole and specifically to the Corporation and the hard-working and dedicated staff of the Office of Inspector General. First, the settlement sends the signal that acceptance of a grantee or its principal as “responsible” can be purchased in a monetary settlement, overriding all evidence of wrongdoing previously found to warrant a suspension, without the presentation of any contradicting evidence. Settlement Agreements are supposed to settle the liability of the grantee and...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell put out a press release on the Friday before Christmas touting of his efforts to secure a $4.99 million federal grant from the Natural Resources Conservation Service to The Nature Conservancy “to support the conservative of private lands” in Kentucky. “Senator McConnell contacted the NRCS in support of TNC’s application,” said the release. […] McConnell’s press release also quoted Will Bowling, who is the director The Nature Conservancy’s Central Appalachian Project. Bowling expressed his gratitude to McConnell for securing his group this multi-million-dollar grant of taxpayer money. …

POLL: Should the federal government deny grants to sanctuary cities? Yes No

WASHINGTON DC, September 10 (C-Fam) A second source has come forward to confirm earlier Friday Fax reporting that the Obama administration intends to force Catholic and other Christian groups to accept LGBT applicants in hiring. The source, who insists upon anonymity, described a meeting held for department and agency heads at the Old Executive Office Building next to the White House where they were informed of the change in policy. An official from the Obama administration told the group that they would be required to add “sexual orientation and gender identity” to hiring guidelines for grant recipients, just the same...

The House will vote this week on legislation that would deny funding to “sanctuary cities” that have policies designed to shelter illegal immigrants from deportation. Sanctuary cities largely refuse to cooperate with federal immigration policies. Such laws have come under heavier scrutiny in the wake of Kathryn Steinle's death last month in San Francisco. Steinle, 32, was fatally shot while walking with her father along San Francisco's waterfront. The police have charged Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, an illegal immigrant with a history of felony convictions who had been deported five times, with the crime. Legislation authored by Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.)...

Republican lawmakers are criticizing a new policy at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) that forces states to acknowledge climate change in order to receive some federal disaster funds. The policy, set to take effect next March, requires state governors to address the role of climate change in their disaster-mitigation plans in order to qualify for federal disaster-preparedness grant money. A group of Republican senators are questioning the change in a letter to FEMA Director Craig Fugate, arguing that the new policy will complicate the bureaucratic process of applying for mitigation assistance and force state leaders to adopt an ideological...

Top Illinois politicians say a multimillion-dollar institute bound for Chicago will be the nation’s flagship research site for digital manufacturing. Democratic U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Gov. Pat Quinn on Sunday publicly heralded Chicago’s selection by the Defense Department as the site of one of two manufacturing institutes. …

For the Baby Boomers, born under the halo of victory in World War II, and into the 1950s, one of the key themes was the promise of Science. Electrical power–courtesy of splitting the atom–would be so plentiful that consumers would simply pay a flat monthly fee, and the discovery of the structure of DNA meant (somehow, although this was never fully explained) that a cure for cancer was just beyond the horizon. The successful rollout of the Salk/Sabin polio vaccines would further demonstrate the great humanitarian power of Science, and its unblemished search for Truth. However, as the 1960s played...

The GSA scandal obscures a broader problem: the shell game of federal largesse.The General Service Administration’s abuse of the taxpayer credit card in its cynically extravagant 2010 Las Vegas conference has drawn justified bipartisan outrage. But however instructive such discreet incidents of government waste are—illustrating the contempt with which some members of the federal bureaucracy view the taxpayer—they are a sideshow compared with a far larger fiscal sinkhole: the mundane practice of federal grant-making. It’s bad enough that the Education Department, for example, spews out a constant flood of misguided regulations, which usually embody the view that schools and universities...

Every once in a while I come across an article that sheds light on what a boondoggle the green initiatives of the Obama Administration are. The latest evidence comes as General Motors tries to prove high consumer demand for the Chevy Volt as it tries to meet its goal of 10,000 vehicles sold in 2011. The Orlando Sentinel reports that the town of DeLand, FL is buying five Chevy Volts. That is not the disturbing part of the story. The article reports that the town is using taxpayer money it has received from a $1.2 million federal grant that...

The McCain campaign has been brutally attacking JD Hayworth for appearing in an informercial on how to apply for government grants. Hypocritically, McCain's own Senate website prominently features a lengthy list of government grants to apply for. It is disturbing that due to the $5 million war chest the McCain campaign already had when it came into the Senate race, plus threatening people away who dare to support Hayworth, that the McCain campaign has been able to divert attention in the race to the 1% difference Hayworth shares with Senator Jim DeMint, the most conservative member in all of Congress....

Every cloud has a silver lining. It is an ill wind that blows no good. Every crisis is an opportunity. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Even the brontosaurus-sized governmental monstrosity Obama is getting ready to cram down our throats has an upside. Those clowns in Congress are getting ready to throw a lot of money up in the air; a Boy Scout-like person (thrifty, prepared, wise, all that) will grab some of it. Hypocritical? Yes. But why stand on principal? If they’re wasting it, why not let them waste it on you? A friend of mine is in...

Re: Many environmental groups are using their tax-exempt IRS registered 501(c)(3) charitable organizations as fraudulent front operations for the Democrats-Soros Shadow Party~FlA. Environmental groups are simply Democrat political machines with millions of dollars in contributions and expenditures each year for the purpose of raising more money to pursue their agenda. ~ Sen. James Inhofe Mr./Madam President, I rise today to shed some light on a subject that is very important to me in my oversight duties as Chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee. Earlier this year, the Environment and Public Works Committee held an oversight hearing where the...

Charity charged with funneling funds to Iraq Columbia Islamic group, now defunct, is accused of sending $1.4 million during Hussein’s reign. By MARK MORRIS The Kansas City Star A defunct Columbia charity and five officers and associates have been charged with illegally sending more than $1.4 million to Iraq while Saddam Hussein was in power. The 33-count federal indictment, unsealed Wednesday in Kansas City, is the latest assault on a charity that in 2004 was designated a supporter of global terrorists, including Osama bin Laden, al-Qaida and Hamas. At its core, the indictment alleges the Islamic American Relief Agency-USA solicited...

The Department of Education has announced that $21.6 million were being given in charter school grants. “Three organizations—the KIPP Foundation, the Charter School Development Corporation, and the Local Initiatives Support Corporation—will receive a total of $21.6 million for three grants through the Charter Schools Facilities Grants program,” Secretary Spellings announced. The Department of Education released a preliminary breakdown of the grants. “The KIPP Foundation in San Francisco, Calif., has been awarded a $6.8 million grant; The Charter School Development Corporation in Washington, D.C., has been awarded a $6.6 million grant; The Local Initiatives Support Corporation in New York, N.Y., has...

Minority colleges and universities would be able to apply for $250 million a year in federal technology grants, according to a bill that's up for a vote Wednesday. The House Science committee is scheduled to consider the measure, which would award $1.25 billion over a five-year period in a broad grant program that would fund nearly any type of computer hardware or software. Cash would be doled out by the Commerce Department. Funds may go to any "computer and communications equipment and software that facilitates the transmission of information in a digital format." That definition could include everything from computers...

The president of two San Diego-based Somalian organizations pleaded not guilty yesterday to lying about taking money from a group linked to terrorists. Community leaders and his family said they were mystified by the charges. Omar Abdi Mohammed, 41, a teacher's assistant in a San Diego elementary school, was described by prosecutors in federal court as a shadowy figure who collected more than $351,000 from a group accused of financing international terrorism. Prosecutors have refused to say what they believe Mohammed did with the money, but they said in court that, in addition to the $351,000, he also received $1,700...