Free Republic

Are we living in a banana republic? The vast majority of Americans believe so, and if they didn’t before the FBI raid on Donald Trump’s home, then they likely do now. The partisanship and lopsided control of our two-tiered justice system is rapidly deconstructing any trust there once was in the way our government operates. Fox News host Will Cain, sitting in for Tucker Carlson, gave one of the most important opening monologues I’ve ever heard. He cut to the core of what the raid on Trump’s home really tells us about our Justice Department. More importantly, he told us...

President Donald Trump has selected lawyer Eugene Scalia, the son of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, to be his new labor secretary. Trump tweeted news of the planned nomination on Thursday evening, less than a week after his previous secretary, Alexander Acosta, resigned amid renewed criticism of his handling of a 2008 secret plea deal with wealthy financier Jeffrey Epstein. The financier was indicted this month on charges of sexually abusing underage girls and pleaded not guilty. "Gene has led a life of great success in the legal and labor field and is highly respected not only as...

George Mason University School of Law has just been renamed the Antonin Scalia School of Law in honor of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Accompanying the name change was a receipt of a $30 million gift: $10 million from the Charles Koch Foundation and $20 million from an anonymous donor. The combination of the names of Scalia and Koch has led to a number of George Mason University faculty getting their panties in a bunch — and understandably so. Let's look at it. Justice Antonin Scalia had a reputation on the court and in his written opinions as...

Judicial Watch Submits Proposed Witness List, Discovery Plan to Federal Court in Clinton Email Matter National Security Agency Rebuffed Clinton Request for Blackberry Obama Plays Politics on Supreme Court Nomination National Security Agency Rebuffed Clinton Request for Blackberry Apparently, there is at least one government agency that understands Hillary Clinton is not above the law and must follow the rules like the rest of us. Your JW has just obtained State Department documents revealing that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton repeatedly sought to obtain “Blackberry-like communications,” but was rebuffed by the National Security Agency due to security and...

The White House will announce its choice for the Supreme Court on Wednesday, Reuters news agency reported. Citing “multiple sources,” Reuters said the choice to replace Justice Antonin Scalia will be either Sri Srinivasan or Merrick Garland.

There were no signs of a breakthrough as President Obama met Tuesday with Senate Republican leaders pledging to block anyone he nominates to the Supreme Court. Senate Majority Leader (R-Ky.) and Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) both sat down with the president in the Oval Office. “They were adamant. They said ‘no, we’re not going to do this at all,’ ” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said after the meeting. “All we want them to do is to fulfill their constitutional duty, and at this stage, they are deciding not to do that,” he added. “They’re going to...

PastPresident Obama has begun to consult with key senators from both parties on nominating a successor to the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, the White House said Friday. In the past 24 hours, Obama phoned Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), press secretary Josh Earnest said. Both senators have said replacing Scalia should be left to the next president. Earnest described the calls as "entirely professional" and said Obama made clear "he is going to nominate someone." "He is committed to talking to Congress," the spokesman added. "He reiterated his firm...

As the nation pays its respects to the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia on Friday, friends and admirers say they will remember his combination of gregarious charm and matchless intellect that conservatives revered and many liberals couldn't help but respect. Whether he was writing for the majority or authoring a biting dissent, Justice Scalia's fidelity to his conservative "originalist" view of the law and his analytical mind have placed him alongside legal giants such as Louis Brandeis and Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. Along the way, the intellectual force of his reasoning commanded appreciation. "I am sure he's going to...

The White House is defending President Obama's decision not to attend the funeral of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and pushed back on critics who called it a deliberate snub. White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Thursday it makes sense to send Vice President Biden to the funeral instead because his "security footprint is a little bit lighter" and he has a longtime relationship with Scalia's family. Earnest called it disrespectful for Obama's critics to use the funeral "as some kind of political cudgel." Republicans have slammed Obama for not attending the funeral of the longtime conservative...

The White House said Wednesday that President Obama "regrets" his filibuster against Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito in 2006, but insisted the situation was different than Republicans' current vow to block any nominee to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia. "These are two different things," said White House press secretary Josh Earnest. "The president's objections to then-President Bush's nominee were based in substance." In 2006, then-Sen. Obama and 23 other Democrats -- including Hillary Clinton -- tried to filibuster Justice Alito's nomination. He was confirmed for the high court anyway.

The son of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is rejecting conspiracy theories that his father died of anything other than natural causes. "Our family just has no doubt that he was taken from us by natural causes," Eugene Scalia said on the Laura Ingraham show on Wednesday. "We accept that. We’re praying for him. We ask others to accept that and pray for him." The younger Scalia's comments come after the justice's unexpected death on Saturday - and local authorities' decision not to conduct an autopsy - spurred conspiracy theories that something other than a heart attack may...

Supreme Court: Senate Democrats demanding that Republicans let President Obama pick a successor to Justice Antonin Scalia appear to be counting on the public's short attention span. But there's no statute of limitations on rank hypocrisy. "The Senate's constitutional duty to give a fair and timely hearing and a floor vote to the president's Supreme Court nominees has remained inviolable." That was Sen. Harry Reid in a Washington Post op-ed this week condemning any effort by the GOP to block President Obama from naming a successor to conservative stalwart Scalia. He went on to write that "the consequences of blocking...

Only power negates power. It's time to stop acting like impotent fools and start showing the Court how impotent it really is The death of the intrepid Justice Antonin Scalia has shaken the political world. If his successor’s appointment cannot be delayed until the next presidency, it’s assured that an unassailable hard-left majority will control the Supreme Court. This will mean, conservatives warn, the end of significant Second Amendment rights, curtailment of many religious freedoms and a consistent rubber-stamp for the “progressive” agenda. Unfortunately, the likelihood of replacing Scalia—the court’s pre-eminent legal mind—with even a pale imitation is slim. For...

Justice Antonin Scalia's passing extinguished a great light in American jurisprudence. As the tributes and fond remembrances all attest, America grieves this loss. Appointed by President Reagan in 1986, Justice Scalia served the nation from the Supreme Court's bench for three decades with a candor, wit and sagacity that few men in history can claim. No doubt that the good justice will be remembered for his pointed pen and rhetorical flair that made all his opinions -- whether you agreed with him or not -- well worth reading. Sometimes irascible, very often funny, but always genuine, Justice Scalia's opinions, dissents...

With the untimely death of Antonin Scalia Saturday, President Barack Obama has been handed the opportunity of a lifetime to tilt the Supreme Court to the left for decades to come. It's also given Democrats an issue to demagogue from now until election day and beyond. About an hour after Scalia's death was confirmed, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell "threw down the gauntlet," announcing that the Senate would not be confirming a replacement for him until after the 2016 election, a move Politico called, "an historic rebuke of President Obama's authority and an extraordinary challenge to the practice of...

Before Justice Scalia can even be given a Christian burial, they’re already looking for a way to replace him before the 2016 election In these darkest of days, the Obama regime is writing for society their very own ‘Bed Time stories’. None of their stories come with the proverbial ‘happy ending’. They disillusion, depress and seek for unsuspecting citizens to throw all caution to the wind. The latest chapter of Obama’s Bed Time Stories began to unravel the day before Valentine’s Day with the untimely death of the upstanding Justice Antonin Scalia. The White House paid lip service to the...

When Texas millionaire John Poindexter invited Justice Antonin Scalia to his remote ranch near the Mexican border, it was for a private party with about 35 other guests, a weekend of hunting and sightseeing on his painstakingly restored and cultivated 30,000-acre spread. But when Scalia, 79, failed to appear for a morning excursion at 8 a.m. Saturday, Poindexter became concerned and went to his room, which has its own outdoor fire pit and a wall of windows overlooking the 22-room adobe ranch hotel, a lake and surrounding peaks of the Chinati Mountains. "I had not seen him, and everyone else...

In such matters as the death of a great man, respect matters -- especially from our political leaders. Dignity and sober ceremony are called for. These are not trivial requirements, nor are they mere accessories to the event. They are part of the bedrock of enlightened civilization. Surely when America's president appeared before the TV cameras Saturday evening to deliver his scripted remarks about the death of a Supreme Court Justice, the great Antonin Scalia, Obama should have taken the trouble to dress at least as well as your average law student applying for a summer job. Instead, flanked...

NEWS ANALYSIS: Tom Goldstein, editor of the popular Scotusblog website that tracks the Supreme Court, called Justice Antonin Scalia a "historic figure, surely one of the most influential minds -- on and off the court -- of the last century." "His contributions to the law are incalculable," Mr. Goldstein wrote. "They substantially reframed discussions of constitutional, statutory and administrative law." With the high court balanced between a conservative bloc long led by Scalia and a group of four liberal judges, Mr. Goldstein said the question of a successor will prove a complicated one in the midst of a presidential election...

On Monday night’s radio program, Conservative Review Editor-in-Chief Mark Levin called out Donald Trump for mimicking the statists and the Republican establishment by attacking rival Ted Cruz and Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia over the weekend.Listen: Listen to the audio at the link.Levin cited three “reckless comments” made by Donald Trump.First, Mr. Trump joined in with a leftist on CNN to dump on Justice Scalia, who’s comments during oral argument have been unfairly accused of being racist. Conservatives know better. Second, Levin said that Mr. Trump’s insinuation that Ted Cruz is bought and paid for by Texas oil companies...