Free Republic

Freepers, About a year ago I had some discussions with one of you about a grand jury in Utah that was examining evidence related to Harry Reid. Sorry, I don't have that email and forgot the essence of the case, but as I recall funding was denied the GJ that kept it from meeting for a while. If you had contacted me about this, please do so again. Thanks.

A $1.3 trillion spending bill passed this week by Congress has conservatives decrying a surrender of fiscal restraint and has prompted calls to eliminate the filibuster rule requiring 60 votes for most legislation in the Senate. Eliminating the filibuster would be a dramatic move that many Senate traditionalists are unwilling to make. But there is an alternative, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) said Friday on “The Laura Ingraham Show.” Lee (pictured above) said Republicans should actually make Democrats debate around the clock rather than “reward” them every time they merely announce a filibuster by recessing. “And then there’s no consequence for...

Thanks to the 17th Amendment, which slowly neutered the senate and eventually the entire congress, an administrative state performs legislative, executive and judicial functions. Congress goes far out of its way to avoid lawmaking and oversight of the agencies it created. The final straw should have been Obama’s Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) and Obamacare Death Panels. These agencies were set up to operate beyond the reach of the institution that created them. As such, they are even further displaced from the electorate than previous executive branch agencies. As an additional outrage, the fees and penalties the administrative state inflicts...

The Left's romance with the Islamic Republic ensues. The Senate debated on Tuesday a resolution introduced by Vermont Socialist Bernie Sanders that would require the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Yemen. The surprising support the resolution won from 44 U.S. Senators handed a big win to Iran, which is engaged in a hot war with Saudi Arabia on the Arabian Peninsula. And it was a huge slap in the face to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, who was meeting with President Trump in the White House as the Senate debated the motion on the floor. It also showed the...

President Donald Trump’s nominee for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is an open advocate for “sexual liberty” over religious freedom.. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) has called on Trump to withdraw her nomination, saying that her “radical views on marriage and the appropriate use of government power place her far Commissioner Chai Feldblum began serving on the EEOC under the Obama administration in 2010. Her second term will end this July. Last year, Trump nominated her to a third term; if she is confirmed by the Senate, Feldblum will serve until 2023.outside even the liberal mainstream.” Key quotes from Feldblum: “I’m...

Sub-headline: Florida’s Republican tries to blow up the Senate tax reform. The GOP is pushing forward on tax reform, though a receiving line of Republican holdouts are slow-rolling progress. One who deserves special mention is Marco Rubio, who contributed nothing to ObamaCare repeal and now aspires to dilute the tax bill.On Wednesday Mr. Rubio and his political sidecar, Mike Lee of Utah, announced that they’ll file an amendment to the tax bill to change the $2,000 child tax credit. They want to make the credit refundable up to a person’s payroll tax liability, among other expensive tweaks. To pay for...

President Donald Trump still has vocal Republican detractors. But they are laboring under two problems. The first, which has received a lot of attention, is that there aren’t a lot of them. In the latest Gallup poll, Trump has the approval of 82 percent of Republicans. The second, which has received less attention, is that this minority of Republicans is divided. It’s divided on policy issues. Bret Stephens, Max Boot and Charles Sykes are all right-of-center commentators who want Republicans to dump Trump. But they also want gun control, sometimes of a sweeping nature. Other frequent Trump critics on the...

Eight years ago, Sen. Orrin Hatch argued in a Senate Finance Committee then controlled by Democrats that Congress does not have the constitutional power to order people to buy things. The committee was discussing the incipient Obamacare bill. It's most outrageous element: The so-called "individual mandate," which would force Americans to purchase health insurance. Hatch did not believe the Constitution's Commerce Clause -- which gives Congress the power to "regulate Commerce with foreign nations, and among the states" -- could be stretched to give the federal government the power to compel individuals to do this. "Rather than regulate what people...

One of Alabama GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore's most prominent backers pulled his support Friday evening in the wake of sexual assault allegations against the former state Supreme Court chief justice. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, posted on Twitter that "having read the detailed description of the incidents, as well as the response from Judge Moore and his campaign, I can no longer endorse his candidacy for the U.S. Senate."

A GOP lawmaker is calling for the Senate to refuse to swear in Roy Moore (R) if the Alabama Senate candidate defeats Doug Jones (D) in a December special election.

He’s not saying Moore should go “if” the sexual assault allegations are true. He’s telling him to get out now. Mitt Romney called on Roy Moore to step aside from the Alabama Senate race Friday, becoming one of the only Republican politicians to say, unequivocally, that Moore should go in light of accusations that he sexually assaulted a 14-year-old girl. (TWEET-AT-LINK) On Thursday, The Washington Post reported that four women said Moore pursued them when he was in his 30s and they were between the ages of 14 and 18. The most serious case involves Leigh Corfman, who was 14...

@MittRomney Innocent until proven guilty is for criminal convictions, not elections. I believe Leigh Corfman. Her account is too serious to ignore. Moore is unfit for office and should step aside.

One of Mitt Romney's high school classmates says that the presumptive Republican presidential nominee was 'evil' in his younger years, and acted like he was a schoolboy gone mad 'like Lord Of The Flies'. The Romney camp was reeling after the revelations that he forcibly shaved the head of a high school classmate who was regularly taunted for being gay. The former governor of Massachusetts grabbed tearful John Lauber and hacked away with a pair of scissors because he thought his bleached blond hair was ‘wrong’. Mr Romney also supposedly mocked another student who was a closeted gay by shouting...

An ad from a pro-Obama super PAC suggests that Mitt Romney is responsible for a woman's death. The TV ad by Priorities USA Action has Joe Soptic, who has been used in Obama campaign ads, telling the story of what happened to his wife after Mitt Romney’s company, Bain Capital, closed the GST Steel plant where Soptic worked until 2001. On the screen are these words: "Mitt Romney and Bain Capital made millions for themselves and then closed this steel plant." Soptic says "I lost my health care. And my family lost their health care. And a short time after...

Two Republican senators have unendorsed Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore (R) following reported allegations of sexual misconduct against him. Both announced they would no longer endorse Moore for Senate on Friday night.

Sen. Mike Lee of Utah has asked Roy Moore's team to stop using his image on their campaign fundraising materials, per The Hill. After four women accused Moore of sexual assault and misconduct (when they were teenagers), his campaign blasted fundraising ads featuring images of some of the Republican senators who endorsed him — Lee, Ted Cruz, and Rand Paul specifically. Why it matters: Multiple Republican senators and lawmakers have said Moore should step down from the Alabama Senate race if the allegations are true, and now some of them (like Lee) are trying to completely remove themselves from his...

Republican Sens. John McCain and Mike Lee introduced legislation Thursday to permanently exempt Puerto Rico from the Jones Act shipping law. The senators say the Trump administration's decision Thursday to grant a 10-day waiver of the Jones Act for Puerto Rico does not go far enough to help rebuilding efforts after Hurricane Maria and encourage long-term economic growth on the bankrupt island. "While I welcome the Trump administration's Jones Act waiver for Puerto Rico, this short-term, 10-day exemption is insufficient to help the people of Puerto Rico recover and rebuild from Hurricane Maria," said McCain, R-Ariz. "Our legislation would permanently...

Utah Senator Mike Lee, one of Donald Trump's staunchest Republican skeptics during campaign season, is pleased with the president's first six months in office. During his remarks at Young America's Foundation's National Conservative Student Conference on Tuesday, the second-term Republican was asked to comment on any "pushback" he's received from the GOP as a result of his early criticisms of Trump. "I took a position at the time that was taking place because I had certain ideas about whether he could get elected," the senator said. "I didnt think he could. I turned out to be wrong." "He has since...

Tired of winning yet? National Border Patrol Council President Brandon Judd told C-SPAN Monday that the rapid downturn in illegal border crossings is “nothing short of miraculous.” He elaborated that total recorded border crossings in 2017 are just 53% of what they were in 2016, and that percentage continues to drop each week. As we have noted before, this has been achieved without building single foot of wall, without changes to existing statutes, without any new huge budget allocations to the Border Patrol, without the introduction of any new technology. The one and only reason for this fall is the...

This is an Excerpt. Republican Senator Susan Collins of ME said on Sunday she has extreme reservations about the U.S. Senate's healthcare overhaul and does not think it will be able to pass this week. The proposal released Thursday calls for a slower phase-out of the Medicaid expansion than a bill adopted earlier by the House.... Rand Paul, who has rejected the plan along with fellow Republican Senators Ted Cruz, Mike Lee and Ron Johnson, said fundamental problems remained that would leave taxpayers subsidizing health insurance companies. So it is possible that Mr. McConnell views the potential failure of a...