Free Republic

Gulf War veteran Chris Crowley turned himself in to authorities yesterday after a politically tainted warrant was issued for his arrest. By Jacob Engels South Florida is buzzing after State’s Attorney candidate Chris Crowley turned himself in on charges of running an illegal raffle during his campaign for the 20th judicial circuit . . .. The arrest comes just weeks after Crowley exposed his opponent for having deep family ties to the radical terrorist organization known as the Palestinian Liberation Organization or PLO. The PLO has murdered thousands of innocent civilians and is recognized as one of the most deadly...

Florida officials are requesting answers from the Senate Intelligence Committee after Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) claimed this week that the state's election systems had been "penetrated" by Russian hackers ahead of the 2018 midterms. Florida Secretary of State Ken Detzner (R) sent a letter Thursday to committee chairman Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) requesting information about remarks Nelson made the previous day in which he claimed that hackers had "already penetrated certain counties in the state." "They have already penetrated certain counties in the state and they now have free rein to move about," Nelson had said during an interview with...

A border lawmaker had drawn up a plan to pay for the wall in part by fining Mexico and other countries $2,000 for every illegal immigrant caught crossing into the United States.Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs, who has made is mark on Washington in just his first term, is pushing a plan that includes the tax on illegals and other ways to pay for the border wall demanded by President Trump.With up some 400,000 illegal immigrants being apprehended at the border yearly, his tax could raise $800 million a year. Immigration groups claim that an equal amount of illegal immigrants get...

A border state Republican congressman is introducing a bill that would effectively use foreign funds to help pay for President Trump's planned wall on the Mexican border. Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona authored House Resolution 6657, which would establish a separate U.S. Treasury account to "hold deposits to be used to secure the southern border of the United States." Republican Reps. Scott Des Jarlais of Tennessee, Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Matt Gaetz of Florida and Paul Gosar of Arizona have signed on as co-sponsors. Biggs said in a statement obtained by The Washington Examiner that "even with a Republican-controlled...

A Florida restaurant decided to cancel its DirecTV NFL package over the controversy about players kneeling during the national anthem to protest social injustices. Curtis West, who co-owns Beef O’Brady’s in Brooksville with his wife Janet, told FOX13 Tampa Bay on Monday there will be no NFL games shown because of the “disrespect” the players have shown. “Last year, with the kneeling and the disrespect to our veterans and our flag and our country, I was very upset,” West told the station. The restaurant will save more than $5,000 by canceling its package and instead will offer veterans 40 percent...

Russian operatives have "penetrated" some of Florida's voter registration systems ahead of the 2018 midterms, U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson said Wednesday, adding new urgency to concerns about hacking. The state, however, said it has received "zero information" supporting his claim. "They have already penetrated certain counties in the state and they now have free rein to move about," Nelson told the Tampa Bay Times before a campaign event in Tampa. He said something similar a day earlier in Tallahassee but declined to elaborate. "That's classified," the Democrat said Tuesday. He is facing a re-election challenge in November from Gov. Rick...

he Senate Leadership Fund super PAC ripped Florida Sen. Bill Nelson (D.) as "no longer dealing from a full deck" on Wednesday in its latest attack on the 75-year-old lawmaker as out of touch and confused. The group, which boosts Senate Republicans, highlighted a Tampa Bay Times article pointing out Nelson criticized his 2018 opponent, Gov. Rick Scott (R.), for lobbying the Environmental Protection Agency in 2010 to delay a new set of stricter water standards. The catch: Nelson wrote the EPA before Scott did to make a near-identical request:

Thankfully, a heroic citizen with a permit to legally carry a concealed handgun was able to save countless lives in Florida Saturday when he shot a gunman who opened fire on a back-to-school event attended by over 150 students at a park in Titusville, Florida.

Confident talk in Washington that swaggering Republicans will fatten their majority in the Senate to a filibuster-proof 60 seats in the fall elections is shifting to nail-biting whispers the Democrats could take charge and install Sen. Chuck Schumer as leader. Already fretting odds that the House will turn Democratic and that potential Speaker Nancy Pelosi will open impeachment proceedings against President Trump, a path to a Democratic Senate is beginning to emerge based on historical statistics and the anti-Trump sentiment in some areas of the country. Geoffrey Skelley, associate editor of the University of Virginia Center for Politics’ Larry Sabato...

Two men disagreed about politics on Facebook. When things got heated, one showed up with a Glock and an AR-15 and shot the other in the thigh and buttocks, police said. Call it extreme unfriending.

Troublemaker: The “Rev.” Al Sharpton, like all of his race-baiting colleagues, long ago ceased to be a useful force for change in America. That’s because long ago — in the 1960s — our country adopted a series of civil rights laws and regulations cementing the Constitution’s promise of equal treatment and justice for all. But in 2018 Sharpton continues to pretend like our country has made no progress at all when it comes to civil rights, so every time there is an incident involving a black man killed by a white person, he has to show up and needlessly stir...

MIAMI - Federal officials said a construction company did not do enough to protect its workers before a concrete barrier collapsed and killed two men along Interstate 95 in February. "This tragedy could have been prevented if the employer had ensured that adjoining structures were shored, braced or underpinned to avoid a collapse," said Condell Eastmond, with the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Atlanta-based Archer Western Construction Inc. faces up to $33,000 in fines. OSHA officials also said the work site was not properly inspected for hazards. The Florida Highway Patrol said Abel Orlando Zuniga-Fajardo, 37,...

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — A newly released transcript shows Florida school shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz spat out “kill me” and then cursed as he sat alone in a sheriff’s interrogation room just hours after the massacre that left 17 dead. Broward sheriff’s Detective John Curcio had just left Cruz alone to get him some water when the 19-year-old suspect made that exclamation.

Plastic straws may soon be contraband in Hallandale Beach. All five commissioners gave initial approval to a citywide ban shortly after midnight Thursday.

Full title..........................Moms arrested after 11 children found in 'filthy' New Mexico compound with armed Muslim 'extremists,' cops say............................The three mothers of the 11 malnourished children found living in a filthy New Mexico compound were arrested and charged Sunday along with two men described as armed Muslim “extremists” after authorities raided the property in search of a 4-year-old boy. snip Authorities raided the compound Friday as part of their search for 4-year-old Abdul-Ghani Wahhaj, who vanished last December. Abdul-Ghani’s mother reported her son missing after Wahhaj took the boy, who turned 4 on Monday, to the park in Clayton County, Ga.,...

An armed bystander stopped a potential mass shooting after a gunman opened fire on a crowd at a back-to-school event at a Florida park. Police issued a statement saying that one of the vendors, who had a legal concealed carry permit, quickly pulled out his gun and shot the gunman, who survived but suffered life-threatening injuries. Thanks to the vendor's quick reaction, the only person injured was the shooter. “We are extremely grateful that nobody else was injured in this incident” said Deputy Chief Todd Hutchinson. “This suspect opened fire at a crowded public park, this could have been so...

Good Morning/Afternoon, MEGAWELCOMEToTheDogsAndCatsDAYSOfSummer2p18DITTOS!

For the first time in 25 years, the International Republican Institute will have a new leader. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who is battling brain cancer, has decided to step down from his role as chairman of the board of the organization, which for decades he has helped to fight for democracy, freedom, civil society, the rule of law and human rights around the world. McCain’s handoff to IRI’s next chairman, Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), is not a signal that McCain’s health is declining. In fact, several McCain associates say his condition hasn’t changed in recent months and he remains actively...

After Twitter was caught last month “shadow-banning” Republicans, while giving Democrats unrestricted voice, the social-media giant insisted it has no political agenda. But records of its political contributions show board members, top executives and major shareholders have all given overwhelmingly to Democrats, including Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, while snubbing Republicans and Donald Trump. Federal records reveal 80 percent of Twitter’s corporate PAC contributions in the 2018 election cycle have gone to Democratic candidates, none of whom are moderates. Liberal Democrats also got top dollar in the 2016 race. The lobbying records I reviewed, moreover, show Twitter has sought to...

School officials “did not follow through” when Nikolas Cruz asked for special assistance months before the massacre, a new report finds. While more than half of the report was redacted, the blacked-out sections of the document could still easily be read by copying and pasting into a separate document, a trick used by The Sun-Sentinel to release the unredacted report on Friday. In Cruz’s junior year, after he had already begun exhibiting behavior so disturbing it led to guidance counselors wanting to have him committed,