Free Republic

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) blasted conservative commentator Tucker Carlson on Tuesday for playing a leading role in demonizing the idea of sending military aid to Ukraine, saying the former Fox News host wound up “where he should have been all along” when he gave Russian President Vladimir Putin a megaphone during a fawning interview earlier this year. “I think the demonization of Ukraine began by Tucker Carlson, who in my opinion ended up where he should have been all along, which was interviewing Vladimir Putin,” McConnell said, referring to Carlson’s two-hour interview with Putin in February, which drew...

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul formed a noisy alliance with Rep. Thomas Massie this week that scrambled Congress’ plans to renew the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act without additional privacy protections for Americans and threatened the six-month tenure of the Republican speaker of the House. The libertarian duo scored a substantive victory in the House on Wednesday when the chamber passed legislation that would force federal agencies to obtain a court order to buy the online data of U.S. citizens from service providers. Massie, a Northern Kentucky Republican, was joined by Rep. James Comer in supporting the “Fourth Amendment is Not For...

Two juveniles were arrested for allegedly vandalizing a Catholic church in Kentucky on April 9. The juveniles are accused of causing damages to St. Theresa of Avila Catholic Church “well over” $10,000, WDRB reported. “Sheriff Phillip Wimpee said his deputies responded to St. Theresa of Avila Catholic Church [on April 9] about a vandalism complaint,” according to the report. “When officers arrived, they saw extensive damage inside and outside the church and the Parish Hall on Rhodelia Road in Payneville, Kentucky.”

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) is stepping up his pressure on Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to put the Senate-passed foreign aid bill up for a vote in the House, warning Wednesday that “starving” Ukraine of military support is “strategic and moral malpractice.” McConnell told a radio host in Louisville recently that despite plans to retire from Senate leadership, he intends to stay in the Senate through the end of his term in 2027 in order to fight back “against the isolationist movement in my own party.” On Wednesday, he did that by taking shots at President Biden for not...

Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), 82, intends to remain in the U.S. Senate to oppose conservatives who support a truce between Russia and Ukraine, he said Monday. McConnell announced in February he would step down as Senate minority leader at the end of the cycle following health issues and incidents of freezing up during press conferences. He is the longest-serving party leader in Senate history. In an interview on WHAS, Terry Meiner asked McConnell what his “mindset” is “when your feet hit the floor in the morning?" "I’m not leaving the Senate,” McConnell said. “I’m particularly involved in actually fighting back...

The Kentucky Senate sent a bill to Gov. Andy Beshear (D) Thursday that would strip him of his power to appoint people to the U.S. Senate. The bill seeks to hold special elections for Senate vacancies in Kentucky, according to The Associated Press. The legislation’s passage through the state Senate follows the late February announcement that Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), 82, would step down from his position as Senate Minority Leader at the end of the year. Republican state House Majority Floor Leader Steven Rudy, the bill’s main sponsor, has said the legislation doesn’t have to do with McConnell, but...

The Kentucky Senate sent a bill to Gov. Andy Beshear (D) Thursday that would strip him of his power to appoint people to the U.S. Senate. The bill seeks to hold special elections for Senate vacancies in Kentucky, according to The Associated Press. The legislation’s passage through the state Senate follows the late February announcement that Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), 82, would step down from his position as Senate Minority Leader at the end of the year.

(The Center Square) – Two dozen Republican U.S. senators are pushing back against the Biden administration's plan to increase taxes on the U.S. oil, natural gas and coal industries to the tune of over $110 billion. U.S. Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., led a coalition of 24 senators expressing “grave concern regarding the administration's continued hostility towards American energy production.” In a letter to U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, they wrote, “America's working families and small businesses are facing immense challenges including high energy prices. At the same time, our allies and partners across the globe are asking for reliable American...

WASHINGTON (NEXSTAR) – Four years after the death of Breonna Taylor, lawmakers are renewing their efforts to ban no-knock warrants. The push comes as Congress has struggled to enact policing reforms. Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul says it is time to ban no-knock warrants. “It’s just not a good idea to go in without announcing yourself,” Sen. Rand Paul, (R-Ky.) said. No-knock warrants are when law enforcement go into a home without announcing their authority or purpose. Paul named his bill after Breonna Taylor, who was killed in March 2020 when police entered her apartment through a no-knock raid and...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) says he will hold up a $1 trillion “minibus” spending package that needs to pass by the end of the day Friday to avoid triggering a partial government shutdown. “I will hold it up primarily because we’re bankrupt and it’s a terrible idea to keep spending money at this rate,” Paul told The Hill Wednesday.“The spending bills before us will lead to a $1.5 trillion deficit for the year. We’re borrowing about $1 trillion every three months. It’s an alarming pace of accumulation of debt,” he said. “My opposition to this will be based on how...

“Nobody” should go to jail for “smoking weed,” Vice President Kamala Harris said Friday, despite having prosecuted nearly 2,000 cases of marijuana possession, cultivation, or sale as California’s attorney general. Harris’s public flip-flop is likely due to the politics of a difficult reelection campaign in which the Biden-Harris ticket is losing to former President Donald Trump in 75 percent of 2024 swing states, polling shows. Harris condemned prosecuting those who smoke flowers while speaking at a roundtable event about cannabis reform with musician Fat Joe and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (D).

@elonmusk I would support Rand Paul and suspect that other candidates will not actually run polls out of concern for the results, but let’s see if they will

Republicans in the Kentucky House are proposing a resolution that would create “a sanctuary state” for fossil fuel-powered generators. The resolution, which was assigned to a committee Wednesday, appears to be modeled after the concept of “sanctuary cities,” which are local jurisdictions that have agreed not to comply with federal immigration regulations. The resolution aims to exempt Kentucky from EPA regulations regarding coal- and natural gas-fired power plants. Permitting for such facilities would be done by the state, and Kentucky agencies would be prohibited from collecting fines or penalties for violations of federal regulations related to fossil fuel-fired power plants.

Over the past decade, scientists working at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have earned an estimated $400 million in royalties from third-party companies for medical treatments and innovations they've helped produce. The NIH often provides grants to these same companies and produces research on their products. Despite that, the agency has resisted disclosing how much its scientists are getting paid and by whom. A bill moving its way through Congress would change that. On Wednesday, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee passed the Royalty Transparency Act of 2024 by a 12–0 vote. The legislation would require that...

More than a dozen senators — both Republican and Democratic — voted against a bill that would create partisan Kentucky Board of Education elections, but the measure ultimately passed the Senate Tuesday. In a vote of 24-14, the Republican-controlled Senate approved a bill that would transform the appointed board into an elected one. The legislation now goes to the House for consideration. The Senate’s seven Democrats were joined by Republican Sens. Jared Carpenter, David Givens, Jason Howell, Brandon Smith, Johnnie Turner, Whitney Westerfield and Phillip Wheeler in opposing Senate Bill 8. The bill’s sponsor, Senate Republican Whip Mike Wilson, of...

Is it a coincidence that McConnell is stepping down as Senate minority leader? On Feb. 12, 50-year-old Angela Chao was found dead in her Tesla that was submerged in a pond on private property in Blanco County, Texas, according to the incident report from fire department EMS personnel. Ms. Chao was the sixth and youngest daughter of Chinese-American shipping magnate James Si-Cheng Chao, who founded the New York-headquartered Foremost Group in 1964. She had been CEO of the company since 2018 and was a founding member of The Asian American Foundation. On Feb. 28, 82-year-old Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell...

The death of Sen. Mitch McConnell’s billionaire sister-in-law is being investigated as a crime weeks after her body was pulled from her submerged car in Texas. Angela Chao, 50, was found dead in her sinking vehicle in a pond on a ranch in Johnson City, near Austin, on Feb. 11. “Although the preliminary investigation indicated this was an unfortunate accident, the Sheriff’s Office is still investigating this accident as a criminal matter until they have sufficient evidence to rule out criminal activity,” the Blanco County Sheriff’s Office wrote in a Thursday letter to state Attorney General Ken Paxton, according to...

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced his support for Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) as the next Senate Republican leader. “Mitch McConnell, who has served in the Senate for almost 40 years, announced he’ll step down this November. Part of public service is about knowing when to usher in a new generation,” Kennedy said Wednesday in a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, highlighted by Mediaite. “It’s time to promote leaders in Washington, DC who won’t kowtow to the military contractors or push us deeper into foreign conflicts,” Kennedy continued. “We need representation who will prioritize...

<p>The veteran Republican Senate leader has become the last serious bulwark within the party against Trump populists’ animosity toward US international commitments, even as the increasingly frail McConnell’s influence has waned sharply in the last year.</p><p>McConnell has steered clear of Trump for years and on Sunday wouldn’t address the Republican presidential front-runner’s comments at a Saturday campaign rally that he’d encourage Russia to invade NATO members who hadn’t met defense-spending commitments.</p>

Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said Wednesday that he will step down as Republican leader in the Senate in November. McConnell, 82, revealed his plans in an address to the Senate, where he currently serves as minority leader. McConnell, who is the longest-serving Senate caucus leader in history, plans to keep his seat in the chamber, which he took in 1985. His current term ends in January 2027.