Free Republic

The phone banks have been humming for three weeks straight in the headquarters of the teachers' union for Minnesota's largest school district, as Anoka-Hennepin teachers and their allies plead with voters to renew an operating levy worth $48 million a year. "If this levy were to fail, I don't know what our district would look like," said Julie Blaha, president of the local chapter of Education Minnesota.

WASHINGTON—The Salvadoran convicted of killing Washington intern Chandra Levy nearly a decade ago was sentenced Friday to 60 years in prison. In November, a jury convicted Ingmar Guandique of first-degree murder in Ms. Levy's 2001 disappearance and death, despite a lack of witnesses and no DNA evidence linking him to the crime.

"Salvadoran Immigrant Ingmar Guandique Found Guilty of Murdering D.C. Intern Chandra Levy [12:45 p.m. ET]" That was the breaking news headline that was blasted to my inbox from ABCNews.com regarding today's murder conviction of the suspect in the 2001 murder of the former congressional intern for then-Rep. Gary Condit (D). In the Associated Press story by Matthew Barakat at the ABCNews.com website, there is no mention of the fact that Guandique is an illegal immigrant nor of the fact that he is involved in the ruthless gang Mara Salvatrucha, more commonly known as MS-13. This despite the fact that numerous...

Former California Rep. Gary Condit told jurors Monday that he didn't murder Chandra Levy and insisted he cooperated fully with police when they investigated the Washington intern's disappearance nearly a decade ago. But he continued to evade direct questions on cross-examination about whether he had an intimate relationship with Levy, saying "we're all entitled to some level of privacy." A Salvadoran immigrant, Ingmar Guandique, is on trial for murdering and attempting to assault Levy back in 2001. Prosecutors say Guandique had a history of assaulting female joggers in Rock Creek Park, where Levy's remains were found. But it is Levy's...

Gary Condit repeatedly refused to say whether he had sex with intern Chandra Levy Monday in testimony in her accused killer's trial. The former Democratic congressman from California told Washington prosecutor Amanda Haines he has never revealed whether he and Levy were intimate in the nine years since her disappearance, CNN reported. Asked whether he would answer the question, Condit said: "We've lost our feeling for common decency. I didn't commit any crime. I didn't do anything wrong." When defense attorney Maria Hawilo asked if he was invoking his right against self-incrimination, Condit said he would not respond because it...

WASHINGTON—After a week of jury selection, a panel of 12 women and four men has been chosen to serve on the Chandra Levy murder trial. The panel includes four alternates. Ingmar Guandique, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, is charged with the attempted sexual assault and murder of Levy back in 2001. The Washington intern's disappearance made headlines when she was romantically linked to then-Rep. Gary Condit, D-Calif. Condit was once a suspect but police no longer believe he had anything to do with Levy's death. While the defense had worried pretrial publicity would contaminate the jury pool, it turned...

If one person is associated with the mysterious slaying of Washington intern Chandra Levy, it isn't the man who will soon be tried on charges he murdered her. It's former California congressman Gary Condit, whose political career imploded after he was romantically linked to the woman and became the No. 1 suspect. Ingmar Guandique, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, goes on trial Monday for Levy's 2001 killing.

WASHINGTON — The mother of murdered intern Chandra Levy is asking a judge's permission to attend the trial of the accused killer. In a new legal filing, Modesto resident Susan Levy states she wants the opportunity to be in the courtroom "for the entire trial," set to start Oct. 4. She requires permission to watch because she could also be called to testify. "I'm a mother," Susan Levy explained in a telephone interview Friday. "As hard as it's going to be, it's something a mother has to do."

Chandra Ann Levy (April 14, 1977–ca. May 1, 2001) was an intern at the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Washington, D.C., who disappeared in May 2001 and is presumed murdered after her skeletal remains were found in Rock Creek Park in May 2002. The investigation led to media allegations of an extramarital affair with then-U.S. Representative Gary Condit,[1] a Democrat representing California's 18th congressional district and a senior member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Condit was never named a suspect by police and was ultimately cleared of involvement, however the cloud of suspicion raised by the...

You would think that in the midst of the liberal media's fight to rip Arizona's Immigration Law, that the phrase ‘illegal immigrant' would be fairly easy to use in an appropriate manner. Yet that is seemingly only the case when the phrase is used to cast common-sense immigration enforcement as discriminatory. But when it comes to a story that could shed light on why enforcement is a necessity for the safety and security of a nation and its people, then the phrase - no matter how accurate - is quickly forgotten.

Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is very popular in New York. Governor David Paterson and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand are not... and they're both up for re-election. Conventional wisdom has had it that Cuomo will run for one of their jobs: Paterson's. Amidst unsourced press reports that Cuomo would begin his campaign for governor sometime in March, Paterson even announced he would not be seeking re-election. But now March has come and just about gone, and there's no announcement. Cuomo, in fact, keeps insisting he's running for attorney general. But it's hard to believe the heretofore ruthless politician, suddenly lacks any ambition...

A new Siena poll (810 RVs, 3/15-18, MoE +/- 3.4%) is the first in New York to test the potential Republican primary for governor between former Rep. Rick Lazio (R) and Steve Levy, the Suffolk County Executive and soon-to-be-former Democrat. Lazio leads Levy 45-16 in an initial test, with 40 percent undecided. When Republican voters are informed of Levy's political affiliation, Lazio's lead expands to 60-19, with 22 percent undecided. Democratic Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, meanwhile, continues to be the early heavy favorite to ultimately win the seat in November.

Andrew Cuomo, gearing up for a late April announcement, breathed a loud sigh of relief over the weekend after hard-charging Democratic-turned-Republican Steve Levy failed to win Conservative Party backing for his new gubernatorial campaign. While Attorney General Cuomo enjoys a wide lead over all comers in the race for governor, he and his advisers believe the high-energy "and a little crazy" Suffolk County executive is a far more dangerous GOP opponent than former Rep. Rick Lazio, the undistinguished current Conservative favorite, or little-known Buffalo businessman Carl Paladino, Democratic insiders say. "There is a lot of anger out there in New...

ALBANY — The campaign for the Republican nomination for governor was blown wide open on Thursday as the party’s presumptive frontrunner, Rick A. Lazio, lost key support after a last-minute entry into the race by a conservative Long Island Democrat. The Democrat, Steve Levy, was quickly amassing Republican endorsements, just hours after he said he would switch parties and seek the Republican nomination. Mr. Lazio, seeking to contain the damage and play down the growing number of defections from his campaign, hit back on Thursday, calling Mr. Levy, the Suffolk County executive, a “rank opportunist.” “The people of New York...

The New York Republican Party, no stranger to controversy in the past year, has a new internal battle brewing over its gubernatorial nominee that could lead to a New York-23 like split for the GOP. Rick Lazio, the former Long Island Congressman who unsuccessfully challenged Hillary Clinton in the 2000 U.S. Senate race, appeared well on his way to securing the nomination. Endorsements included former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former Gov. George Pataki, as well as a slew of county chairmen and local officials. But others in the party, said to be concerned over what is described as...

On Friday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Fernando Campoamor told a judge in D.C Superior Court that accused murderer and gang member Ingmar Guandique, 28, along with members of the MS-13 gang threatened to kill a witness and his family, if he testifies at Guandique’s January trial.A Salvadoran national in this country illegally, Guandique was arrested last April for the murder of missing intern Chandra Levy, who disappeared in 2001. Her skeletal remains were discovered a year later in D.C.’s Rock Creek Park.At the time of his arrest for the Levy murder, he was already in prison for the assault of two...

More than a year after Bay Area air pollution regulators became the first in the nation to charge businesses for pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, the program has raked in close to $1.7 million. And as early as this week, the state may follow suit by imposing similar fees on large California polluters as part of an ongoing effort to cut greenhouse gases 20 percent by 2020. The proposed program from the California Air Resources Board and the fledgling regional effort are designed to use the fees to pay for measuring, monitoring and studying the emissions blamed for global...

From July 16 through July 22, 1994, pieces of an object designated as Comet P/Shoemaker-Levy 9 collided with Jupiter. This is the first collision of two solar system bodies ever to be observed, and the effects of the comet impacts on Jupiter's atmosphere have been simply spectacular and beyond expectations. Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 consisted of at least 21 discernable fragments with diameters estimated at up to 2 kilometers.

An attorney who served in the Clinton administration was found dead Thursday in an apparent suicide at his Washington law office. Kilpatrick Stockton, an Atlanta firm, confirmed in a statement that attorney Mark Levy had died. "Mark Levy was well known and highly respected for his successful appearances before the Supreme Court of the United States," said Bill Dorris, the firm's co-managing partner. Levy was a deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice between 1993 and 1995 and served five years in the Solicitor General's office. D.C. Police spokeswoman Helen Andrews said officers were called to an office...

The dreaded "i-word" is not part of the mainstream media lexicon these days. Most coverage does not use "illegal immigrant" or "illegal alien" to describe the suspect in the Levy case.