Free Republic

A new study has found that Black girls in Florida often feel unsafe in their schools due to policing policies and cultures of criminalization in the Sunshine State. The report, published by the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) and Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), includes a group of Black girls and young women, ages 14 to 24, who shared their experiences within Miami-Dade County Public Schools (M-DCPS) through surveys and focus groups. In general, Black girls faced harsher treatment from school police and security including sexual harassment from security guards; humiliation and shame during in-class police and K-9 searches; and...

This was one action-packed scene. An irate moviegoer was caught on tape pummeling a fellow patron over a seat in a Florida theater earlier this month, authorities said. The unidentified suspect appeared to throw numerous punches at a 63-year-old man who stumbled to the ground during part of the unhinged attack on July 10, according to footage released by the Broward County Sheriff’s Office. The confrontation between the two men began when the victim and his wife saw the suspect and his female companion in the VIP seats they purchased in advance before showing up at the AMC Pompano theater,...

A new study claims red states like Florida and Texas are the worst in the nation to "live and work" despite these states leading the nation in net migration. CNBC's annual "Top States for Business" report broke down its rankings based on each state's commitment to "Life, Health and Inclusion." While Texas and Florida led the nation as best for business, the outlet slapped the red states for inadequate policies supporting abortion, child care, the LGBTQ community, and voting rights. Texas ranked as worst in the nation to "live and work", along with Oklahoma, South Carolina, Arkansas and Florida. The...

An 18-month-old Florida girl “baked to death” after police said her parents left her alone in a car all night in 105-degree heat after returning home from a Fourth of July party where they drank alcohol and smoked marijuana. Joel and Jazmine Rondon, both 33, from Lakeland, have been arrested on a charge of aggravated manslaughter of a child in what Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd described as their daughter’s “torturous” hot-car death, which he blamed on “negligence and drug use.” The couple went to a party on Tuesday with their three children, all under the age of 9, and...

The crazed ex-boyfriend of a popular Florida high school softball star repeatedly stabbed his former flame before cutting his own throat in a desperate suicide bid, cops said. The grisly, broad-daylight assault in posh Ponte Vedra Beach near Jacksonville was interrupted only after a courageous good Samaritan spotted the frenzied attack and intervened, according to police. Madison Schemitz, 17, a rising senior at Ponte Vedra High School, was eating at a restaurant Saturday with her mother, Jackie Roge, and friend Casey Estep when they spotted Spencer Pearson, a recent graduate of the school and a former football player. Estep told...

A book about Anne Frank has been removed from a Florida school library after a parent group complained that it was sexually explicit and minimized the Holocaust. The tome titled “Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation” was yanked from the shelves at Vero Beach High School in Indian River County after Moms for Liberty voiced concerns, WPTV reported. “We think true history absolutely needs to be taught, the Holocaust, the Anne Frank diary,” Jennifer Pippin, chairwoman of the group’s local chapter, told the outlet. But she argued that it was inappropriate that the book features illustrations of the girl strolling...

The family of a husband and wife who died when their Tesla crashed into a truck in a Florida rest stop has filed a wrongful-death suit against Elon Musk’s car company claiming that the electric vehicle ‘malfunctioned,’ causing the crash that ended the lives of their loved ones. Mercury News reports that a wrongful death claim has been made against Tesla by the family of a California couple who were killed in a Tesla crash in July 2022. The 2015 Model S collided with a tractor-trailer rig parked at a Florida rest area, killing Mary Lou Seelandt, 66, and Karl...

Jaw-dropping video captured a ginormous alligator sauntering through an upscale Florida community to the horror of residents. WINK meteorologist Matt Devitt posted footage on Facebook of the “big boy” waddling across the road at the Forest Glen Golf & Country Club in Naples late last week. “Dios mio!” a woman is heard saying in Spanish – meaning “My God!” “Is it really here? It’s gigantic!” another woman cries out about the 10-foot-long roving reptile that turned the neighborhood into a scene out of “Jurassic Park.” The scaly jaywalker, which apparently arrived from a nearby river, took all the attention in...

The White House on Friday called it “incomprehensible” for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) to block a new Advanced Placement (AP) course for high school students on African American studies. “It is incomprehensible to see … this ban or this block, to be more specific, that DeSantis has put forward,” press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters, noting the Biden administration does not play a role in dictating school curriculums.

Donald Trump has dropped his Florida lawsuit accusing New York Attorney General Letitia James of waging a “war of intimidation and harassment” against him, court papers show. The former president filed papers Friday voluntarily dismissing his West Palm Beach federal suit from November. The move comes on the same day he was due to respond to the AG’s bid to have his case tossed out by a judge. Trump had argued James abused her position while carrying out an allegedly politically motivated probe into the Trump Organization’s business dealings ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. James has been investigating Trump...

One person is dead and four wounded after a suspect opened fire on a basketball court near the Florida A&M University recreation center about 4:30 p.m. Sunday. Neither the deceased nor the injured were students at the university. The three wounded individuals are one male juvenile and three male adults, WCTV reports. The Tallahassee Democrat, citing a Tallahassee Police Department news release, points out, “A suspect walked toward the outdoor basketball courts and began shooting into a crowd. When the shooting occurred, there were more than a dozen people at the basketball courts both playing and watching the games.

Democratic strategist James Carville said the party would be “better off looking harder at Mississippi” than Florida following the overwhelming GOP success in the Sunshine State in this year’s midterm elections. Carville told MSNBC’s Joy Reid on Thursday that Democrats don’t lose “that bad” in Mississippi, saying a large Black population in the state means potential exists for Democratic success there.

Radical abortion advocate Val Demings spent $73 million to try to defeat pro-life Senator Marco Rubio but didn’t even come close as the Republican senator cruised to re-eletion. The Associated Press called the race shortly after 8 p.m., when polls closed in the Florida panhandle. Rubio criticized his Democrat opponent for supporting the killing of unborn babies in abortions “at any point” in pregnancy. Fox News reports Rubio, a Florida Republican with a strong pro-life record, said the abortion issue is a difficult one for many Americans, but he believes in “the right of an unborn, innocent human being to...

A video emerging from Rep. Charlie Crist’s (D-FL) journey on the campaign trail earlier this year shows the Democrat gubernatorial candidate, in his own words, affirming that he would be open to forced masking in Florida, over two years after the initial emergence of the Chinese coronavirus. Crist, who is challenging Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) in the Sunshine State’s gubernatorial race, spoke to a group in Wilton Manors, Florida, earlier this year and was asked if he would be “open to mandating or regulating masks” as the leader of the state. Video of that exchange has now surfaced across social...

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is leading Democrat Charlie Crist by 11 points in race for the governor’s mansion in the Sunshine State, according to a poll released on Wednesday. The Mason-Dixon Florida poll found that 52 percent of likely voters supported DeSantis, compared to the 41 percent that backed Crist, a former governor and U.S. representative. DeSantis also had stronger support from his own party, with 92 percent of Republicans saying they would back the incumbent governor. Fewer Democrats, 84 percent, said they would support Crist, who was a Republican when he last served as governor.

A 15-year-old died when a group allegedly stole a Maserati and crashed it early Sunday in Florida. According to Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, 15-year-old Keondrick Lang, 15-year-old Mario Bonilla, and 16-year-old Malachi Daniels had been looking for unlocked cars in the Saint Petersburg area, Insider reported Sunday. The group apparently located an unlocked Maserati with the keys still inside the vehicle.

Linemen have reportedly restored power for roughly two million customers in Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R) Florida in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian last week, the governor said on Sunday. The powerful storm rocked Florida’s west coast as a Category 4 storm, moving its way across central Florida and exiting off the east coast. It strengthened back to a hurricane after being downgraded to a tropical storm and smashed the South Carolina coast last week, making a second U.S. landfall. Prior to the storm, DeSantis assured that tens of thousands of linemen were ready to restore power when the inevitable occurred...

MSNBC contributor Claire McCaskill said Wednesday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that she hoped people in Florida who hate the federal government will remember that the federal government was there for them in a time of disaster. Discussing Hurricane Ian, McCaskill said, “Yeah, and when we are in devastating tornadoes in southwest Missouri, a very Republican area, you saw those party lines fall away. Now the one thing I do hope, Joe, to put a little politics in this. We all are praying for the people of Florida. We hope the devastation is not deadly. We are glad for the cooperation,...

President Biden called three Florida mayors Tuesday as Hurricane Ian nears Florida’s western coast — but didn’t call Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, with whom he has clashed on issues such as COVID-19 policies and migration. Presidents frequently speak directly with governors during emergency events — both to demonstrate political unity and to help coordinate federal and state relief efforts. As the devastating Category 3 storm approached, Biden instead spoke with Tampa Mayor Jane Castor, St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch and Clearwater Mayor Frank Hibbard. Castor and Welch are Democrats, while Hibbard is a Republican. DeSantis is a potential 2024 Republican...

A Florida man survived for three days in a swamp after an alligator ripped off his arm while he was attempting to swim in the lake - a move he admits was 'not the smartest decision a Florida boy can make.' 'I look over and there's a gator on my right-hand side,' he told 10 Tampa Bay. 'She got my forearm so I grabbed her like this, she was trying to roll by.' Merda said he was dragged underwater three times, but he fought back, and eventually, the alligator left - with his arm. 'Bones poking out, muscles, if I...