Free Republic

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials last year released 68,000 illegal immigrants with criminal convictions, undercutting Democratic claims that President Obama has strictly enforced immigration laws. An internal Department of Homeland Security document compiling statistics on arrests and deportations in 2013 showed that ICE agents encountered 193,357 illegal immigrants with criminal convictions but issued charging documents for only 125,478. More than 67,800 were released. The data came from an end-of-year “Weekly Departures and Detention Report.” The Center for Immigration Studies, a research group that favors stricter enforcement of immigration laws, estimates ICE agents released more than a third of illegal...

President Obama’s Department of Homeland Security caught then released 68,000 aliens who had previously been convicted of a crime, a new report from the Center for Immigration Studies shows.The report, provided to Breitbart News ahead of its late Sunday evening release, reviews internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) metrics to conclude that the Obama administration released 35 percent—or 68,000—convicted criminal aliens back into the U.S. general population when they could have been deported. “The criminal alien releases typically occur without formal notice to local law enforcement agencies and victims,” CIS’s Jessica Vaughan, the report’s author, added.By “criminal,” ICE means people...

**SNIP** Tens of thousands of diving ducks and other waterfowl spend their winters in the southwest part of Lake Michigan each year, said Douglas Stotz, conservation ecologist and ornithologist at the Field Museum. Most years, they fly from places like Canada and Alaska and spend their time here diving for mollusks and fish without major problems. But then came Chicago’s frigid winter, which as recently as last weekend had blanketed about 93 percent of Lake Michigan in ice. Hundreds of waterfowl likely have died as a result, experts say, many more are near starvation and a winter storm — the...

Competitive high school ice fishing. Who woulda thought? In Wisconsin, it's a growing sport, complete with rankings, trophies, a state tournament, cheers and, yep, team uniforms. Not officially sanctioned as a varsity sport, the activity is growing in popularity in western Wisconsin four years after starting up as a way for teams to square off against schools in eastern Wisconsin during the statewide championship planned for Saturday on Lake Winnebago. The championship will be the eighth and final event of the season for the state circuit, which remains loosely affiliated under the unofficial direction of activities directors and coaches, some...

The acting head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, whose appointment to the post raised eyebrows because of his scant law enforcement experience, told agency employees he will resign Friday, FoxNews.com has learned. John Sandweg, a former defense attorney who knew former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano from their days as political allies in Arizona and came to Washington with her, gave his notice just six months after taking the reins in August. In a letter Friday to coworkers, Sandweg said he will return to work in the private sector but gave no explanation for his departure. “Over...

The relentless snow and ice storms this winter have led to the highest number of flight cancellations in more than 25 years... U.S. airlines have canceled more than 75,000 domestic flights since Dec. 1, including more than 14,000 this week. That's 5.5 percent of the 1.37 million flights scheduled during that period.

Caving into the demands of a leftist civil rights group, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has terminated an enforcement program that apprehends illegal immigrants in California’s central valley. The unbelievable story comes out of Kern County in Bakersfield, which is considered the heart of the nation’s most populous state. The increasingly powerful American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) didn’t like that the DHS agency responsible for deporting illegal aliens, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), was doing its job. So the ACLU, which has repeatedly shown to wield tremendous power in the Obama administration, fired off a letter demanding that the...

From the bridge of the Coast Guard cutter Mackinaw, northern Lake Huron looks like a vast, snow-covered field dotted with ice slabs as big as boulders - a battleground for the icebreaker's 58-member crew during one of the roughest winters in memory... As of Thursday, ice cover extended across 88 percent,... At Apostle Islands National Lakeshore in Wisconsin, the rock-solid cover has allowed around 35,000 visitors to trudge miles over Lake Superior to explore caves featuring dazzling ice formations. It's the first time in five years the lake surface has been firm enough to allow passage.... Coast Guard icebreaker teams,...

"My first shot at a hog with an AMAX out of the 300 SAUM was spectacular. Hit in the neck at 258 yards and there was only a little piece of fur holding the body together at that point. Good terminal performance.” - Mark Swab’s appraisal of the Hornady .308 AMAX sniper ammunition round Despite rising unemployment, record number of people on public assistance, the US Government via the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) has placed a solicitation for more sniper ammo, in this order – they are requesting 141,160 rounds of ammunition (7,058 boxes) of...

Interstates remained gridlocked around the Raleigh-Durham area Wednesday night, creating eerily similarities to the traffic nightmare in Atlanta just two weeks ago. The trouble started around lunch as businesses and schools released early, just as the heaviest snow started falling. NCDOT online maps showed no one was moving on I-40, I-85 and other major roads. According to ABC 11 in Raleigh, police weren't even responding to minor accidents, instead telling drivers to exchange license and insurance information. Officers want to clear the roads as quickly as possible. One driver in Durham told The Weather Channel he'd only gone one mile...

by John Urban | Top Right NewsIt was a remarkable -- and disturbing -- catch. Not fruit-pickers. Not landscapers. Not roofers or housekeepers. Not "hard-working immigrants" performing "an entrepreneurial act" by crossing the border, as elitist tool George Will described illegal aliens to Laura Ingraham this past Sunday. Not quite. In just three days last month, Border Patrol agents in the Tucson sector recently re-arrested more than a dozen convicted felons, including two MS-13 gang members, most of whom were not supposed to be in the United States, officials said. A majority of the felons were sex offenders convicted of...

For the second day in a row, chunks of ice fell from the Freedom Tower — but this time streets remained open and Port Authority officials didn’t close the nearby PATH station. Instead, pedestrians had to fend for themselves, scurrying for cover about 11 a.m. Saturday in the shadow of the nation’s tallest building. “We just saw ice falling down the building,” said startled Austrian tourist Katharina Amann, 24, who is visiting the city with her family. “It was scary. Then I heard it shatter.” Ice also fell from 7 World Trade Center, which is 52 stories tall, some chunks...

The Olympic Team Ice Skating event features 8 skating performances by each team and a totally messed up scoring system. It started with 4 short program skates with 10 teams and you scored 1 point for showing up and 1 extra point for every competitor your were better than. After the 4 short programs (mens', ladies', pairs', heterosexual dancing') came the 4 long programs with only the top 5 teams advancing. Now here is where the stupid part comes. The 4 long program skates with 5 teams and you scored 6 points for showing up and 1 extra point for...

DULUTH, Minn. -- A frigid winter is pushing Lake Superior toward a complete ice-over for the first time since 1996, though there's still a ways to go before you can skate from Duluth to the Soo Locks. Lake Superior had at least some ice across an estimated 91 percent of its surface as of Thursday, according to the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory. That compares with the 40-year average annual Lake Superior ice coverage for February of just 30 percent. George Leshkevich has been tracking Great Lakes ice for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory...

Measurements from ESA’s CryoSat satellite show that the volume of Arctic sea ice has significantly increased this past autumn. The volume of ice measured this autumn is about 50% higher compared to last year. In October 2013, CryoSat measured about 9000 cubic km of sea ice – a notable increase compared to 6000 cubic km in October 2012. Over the last few decades, satellites have shown a downward trend in the area of Arctic Ocean covered by ice. However, the actual volume of sea ice has proven difficult to determine because it moves around and so its thickness can change....

Thousands of Atlanta students stranded all night long in their schools were reunited with their parents Wednesday, while rescuers rushed to deliver blankets, food, gas and a ride home to countless shivering motorists stopped cold by a storm that paralyzed the business capital of the South with less than 3 inches of snow. The result was gridlock on freeways that are jammed even on normal days. Countless vehicles were stranded and many of them abandoned. Officials said 239 children spent Tuesday night aboard school buses; thousands of others stayed overnight in their schools. One woman's 12-mile commute home took 16...

by John Urban | TopRight News A potentially disastrous security breach by the Pentagon was discovered by sheriff's deputies during a routine traffic stop in Southern Arizona. Pinal County deputies stopped a 2006 Ford Expedition for a traffic violation. The Mexican national initially presented an Arizona Identification Card, in the name of Armando Villalobos of Phoenix. A records check revealed that not only did the illegal alien have no driver's license, but there were outstanding felony warrants for his arrest in Texas.The suspect eventually told the deputy that his real name was in fact Mario Bustamante, 37, and that he was in...

A Russian research ship and a Chinese icebreaker that were stranded in Antarctica have broken free from heavy ice and no longer need to be rescued by the United States, Australian officials said Wednesday. More than 50 scientists, researchers and tourists had to be airlifted from the Russian-owned vessel Akademik Shokalskiy after it became trapped on Dec. 24, 100 nautical miles east of French Antarctic station Dumont d'Urville and about 1,500 nautical miles (2,250 miles) south of Tasmania, Australia. The protracted international rescue effort was itself delayed by the conditions, with blinding snow, strong winds and thick sea ice preventing...

All right stop, collaborate and listen: the universe has chosen in recent weeks to teach everyone a little lesson about the pranks that fate likes to play on we humans. A group of scientists sallied forth into the hinterlands to research climate change, more commonly referred to as global warming, by recreating a 1912 expedition and then comparing findings. The better to show how the ice is melting. But a funny thing happened on the way to the forum: the "missing ice" investigators found ice. Or more accurately, found themselves in ice. Or more humorously, they were hoisted by...

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A U.S. Coast Guard heavy icebreaker left Australia for Antarctica on Sunday to rescue more than 120 crew members aboard two icebreakers trapped in pack ice near the frozen continent's eastern edge, officials said. The 122-meter (399-foot) cutter, the Polar Star, is responding to a Jan. 3 request from Australia, Russia and China to assist the Russian and Chinese ships because "there is sufficient concern that the vessels may not be able to free themselves from the ice," the Coast Guard said in a statement. The Russian research ship Akademik Shokalskiy has been trapped in ice-clogged...