Free Republic

As political discord appears to grow every day on Capitol Hill, Republican Senator Ben Sasse told "CBS This Morning" that the country is headed toward a "deeper, darker tribal place." Sasse, author of the new book "Them: Why We Hate Each Other - and How to Heal" (St. Martin's Press) argues that politics is merely "filling a void" in Americans' lives amid a "hallowing out" of their sense of community. "I think politics are important but they're not the first thing, they're certainly not the only thing, and I think right now our politics are suffering because people are looking...

A poll conducted for Republican Rep. Don Bacon found he leads by 9 points in a House race Democrats have pegged as their best pick-up opportunity in Nebraska. Bacon led Democrat Kara Eastman 49 percent to 40 percent, with 9 percent undecided, according to a telephone survey of 400 registered voters conducted by Rob Autry and Kayla Dunlap. Republicans have held the 2nd District, which encompasses Omaha and contains some of Nebraska’s few pockets of Democratic strength for the better part of the last quarter century — barring two years Democrat Brad Ashford was in office from 2014 to 2016....

“I’m voting for confirmation because of the evidence and Judge Kavanaugh’s qualifications. After spending more than 150 hours doing my homework, I completed my reading of the FBI’s seventh background investigation this morning. This broken and politicized process has further undermined public trust. Washington embarrassed itself for the last month, but it is clear that most Americans are yearning for more than tribal blood feuds.”

GOP Sen. Ben Sasse (Neb.) said Wednesday night that he urged President Trump to nominate someone other than Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court earlier this year. "Although I've said many complimentary things about Judge Brett Kavanaugh and his distinguished record … I will say that I urged the president back in June and early July to make a different choice before he announced this nomination," Sasse said during an emotional speech from the Senate floor centering on sexual assault.

Ben Sasse can be an ass, but he is superb in this video.

A Republican who’s among President Donald Trump’s most vocal critics in the Senate says he “regularly” considers leaving his party and becoming an independent. That’s what Nebraska’s Ben Sasse writes on Twitter in response to a commenter who said she believed changing her Democratic affiliation to “no-party” would be “part of the solution.” She then asked the first-term senator whether he might follow suit. His response: “yep — regularly consider it (except the ‘from Dem’ part)” …

(Senator Ben Sasse Schools the Senate Judiciary Committee on the role of the Judiciary in the American constitutional republic..) Sasse describes the “elegant and fair process” the Founders created, a system in which Congress makes law, the executive humbly enforces the law, and the judiciary applies “written laws to facts and cases that are actually before it.” And in this process the key question is “not what did Brett Kavanaugh think eleven years ago on some policy matter. The question before us is whether or not he has the temperament and the character to take his policy views and political...

Five Republican senators had breakfast with Attorney General Jeff Sessions last week and encouraged him to not resign despite constant pressure from President Donald Trump. According to The Wall Street Journal, Sessions invited Sens. John Cornyn of Texas, Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Jerry Moran of Kansas, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, and John Kennedy of Louisiana to dine with him last Thursday morning at the Department of Justice. The meeting took place in Sessions' dining room and included a lengthy discussion about Trump's repeated attacks on him. The senators, according to the Journal, urged Sessions to keep doing what he's...

... “In 2016, a lot of us assumed we knew what would happen in Michigan and Wisconsin,” Salvanto told The Post. “It was a great lesson for us pollsters: Even if you think you know what will happen, poll it if you can.” Blame it on the Blue Wall. Since 1992, in six consecutive presidential elections, a solid block of 18 states had voted for the Democrat every single time. They would have given Clinton 239 electoral votes — 89 percent of the way to victory — if she had held on to them all.Few bothered to ask those states’...

Nebraska carried out its first-ever lethal injection Tuesday, executing double murderer Carey Dean Moore, said Scott Frakes, director of the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services. The execution, which involved a four-drug cocktail, began at 10:24 a.m. (11:24 a.m. ET), and Moore was declared dead at 10:47 a.m., Frakes said. "I am required to carry out the order of the court," Frakes said in a statement. "This agency has done so with professionalism, respect for the process and with dignity for all involved."

Federal authorities Thursday announced the arrest of 13 people they say were ringleaders in a massive scheme to exploit illegal immigrants as cheap labor on farms and Hispanic-oriented businesses in Minnesota and Nebraska. They also carried out search warrants on 11 of the businesses Wednesday and nabbed 133 illegal immigrant workers they found at the time. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said they suspect some of the migrants were coerced into working in rough conditions, either by force or threats of being reported to authorities for deportation...

GRAND ISLAND — During a multi-state operation led by special agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), a series of criminal arrest warrants were executed Wednesday for 17 individuals connected to an alleged criminal conspiracy to exploit illegal alien laborers for profit, fraud, wire fraud and money laundering in Nebraska and Minnesota. In addition to these arrest warrants, authorities also served search warrants for worksite hiring violations at agricultural firms in Nebraska and Minnesota, and federal document search warrants at locations throughout Nebraska, in Sleepy Eye, Minnesota; Appleton, Minnesota; and Las Vegas, Nevada. During this...

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers Wednesday issued criminal arrest warrants for 17 employers and other individuals charged with exploiting illegal immigrant employees in six Nebraska communities during a series of raids that swept up 133 workers. The operation, which also impacted two communities in Minnesota, was directed at employers and workers in O'Neill, Atkinson, Stromsburg, Ainsworth, Bartlett and Royal. Search warrants were also issued in Las Vegas. Businesses in Nebraska included a tomato greenhouse operation, restaurants, a grocery store, a grain company, a cattle company, farms and ranches.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents raided businesses in Montana and Nebraska on Wednesday, indicting 17 business owners and mangers for fraud and money laundering. The agents in the Homeland Security Investigations arm of ICE led the raids on businesses they allege knowingly hired and improperly treated undocumented immigrants, the Associated Press reported. Authorities took 14 of the people indicted into custody, and are still searching for three others. Special agent in charge Tracy Cormier told the AP that the raids were part of one of the largest operations in the 15 years of the Homeland Security Investigations branch. “The...

Our country rightly paused last week to honor the service of America’s Korean War veterans and to note our continuing interest in helping protect a democratic South Korea. Fighting in the Korean War came to a halt 65 years ago, when negotiations finally yielded an armistice that halted hostilities, created the Demilitarized Zone and separated the Korean Peninsula into a north-south division. The conflict, which included some of the American military’s most desperate battles and most inspiring demonstrations of heroism, took the lives of 36,000 Americans. Among the dead was Marine Pfc. Edward “Babe” Gomez of Omaha, a graduate of...

“This trade war is cutting the legs out from under farmers,” said Senator Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) on Tuesday, “and White House’s ‘plan’ is to spend $12 billion on gold crutches.” Referring to Donald Trump’s tariff brinksmanship with China, Senator Sasse was decrying Donald Trump’s request to Congress for compensatory farm subsidies. Sasse insisted that “America’s farmers don’t want to be paid to lose” — but regardless of what farmers want, we should want free trade. Tariffs are taxes, after all. Consumers ultimately pay for them all. Now, Trump’s requested “crutches” may amount to nothing more than just another fine...

Pssst! Don't call it socialism, especially in the Midwest. Pass it along. New York magazine writer Eric Levitz admits in his July 3 article that the socialism of Democratic-Socialist candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of the Bronx by way of Westchester County might be a tough sell to voters in the Midwest. His solution is to rebrand that leftist ideology in a way to make socialism somehow palatable to them. Levitz makes his palatability proposals in Ocasio-Cortez’s Socialism Can Work in the Midwest — With a Rebrand:

The Nebraska Democratic candidate for attorney general who was accused of attacking his father has stepped aside, citing health reasons. Van Argyrakis had faced calls to remove himself from the ballot because he was charged with felony strangulation following an altercation with his 82-year-old father on April 8. Party leaders can choose a replacement Democrat to appear on the ballot.

WASHINGTON — Nebraska volleyball coach John Cook has jumped into the controversy surrounding this week’s canceled White House visit by the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles. Cook posted a tweet Tuesday night: “Nebraska would love to go to the White House! Huskers would be honored and proud to visit our leaders in DC and represent Nebraska and the Natty! #gbr” The tweet appeared to be deleted Wednesday afternoon. Cook’s statement quickly drew a wave of responses from others on the social media platform, ranging from attaboys to how-dare-yous.

<p>The Nebraska State Patrol says the nearly 120 pounds of suspected cocaine and fentanyl that troopers seized last month turned out to be all fentanyl, a deadly opioid that federal officials blame for thousands of deaths nationwide.</p> <p>The patrol says the stash was a record fentanyl seizure in Nebraska and estimates the drugs may have been worth up to $20 million on the street. The Drug Enforcement Administration says just 2 milligrams of fentanyl can be lethal. The fentanyl seized was enough to kill 26 million people, according to DEA estimates.</p>