Free Republic

<p>Gusts of wind howled through the Ithaca Commons on Wednesday, flapping banners and dragging a rattling tambourine along the ground. But Ithaca’s women were louder.</p> <p>Nearly 200 women and men stomped along a one-mile loop from City Hall to the Commons in a march that served to both celebrate International Women’s Day and protest proposals from President Donald Trump and other Republicans on issues including health care and immigration.</p>

Police arrested the young woman who allegedly attacked a 71-year-old woman with her own cane in the new Second Avenue subway station at 86th Street earlier this week, authorities say. Breonna Turk, 24, was arrested Wednesday on assault charges. Police say Turk had her daughter with her as the two waited for the elevator alongside the 71-year-old victim shortly after 2 p.m. Monday. The child apparently pushed a bit to get onto the lift when it came, and once they were inside the elevator, the victim told Turk she should teach the girl to wait for people to get off...

U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer today urged the Acting Secretary of Army Civil Works to approve an agreement with the Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) to release critical funds to dredge the Ogdensburg Harbor.

Left-wing actress and feminist activist Lena Dunham penned a letter on her LinkedIn account Wednesday honoring International Women’s Day and praising her “undocumented” friend’s courage to protest for other immigrants. Dunham described her undocumented friend as a “personal hero,” who’s participation in a “march for immigrants’ rights” left the Girls star “embarrassed” because her “own social anxiety had left me wondering for weeks whether I’d attend the women’s march before I quelled my piddling fears and just showed up.” Video The Failed Promises of Obamacare Dunham says her friend’s decision to march and risk being deported “was a keen reminder:...

O say can you see, the Statue of Liberty? A portion of Lady Liberty mysteriously went dark save for the iconic colossal's torch and crown on Tuesday night. The statue was cast in darkness for at least an hour around 11 p.m. and even the National Park Service seemed perplexed by the New York harbor’s black void. “Some lights on the Statue were temporarily off tonight,” a spokesman for the Statue of Liberty National Monument tweeted. The “unplanned outage” may have been due to emergency generator project as part of its “last remaining Hurricane Sandy recovery,” but park official Jerry...

Households in New England paid electricity prices last month that were 47 percent higher than the national average.. Consumer energy information released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for its Boston region showed the area's households paid an average of 19.5 cents per kilowatt hour for electricity, compared to the national average of 13.3 cents. The region includes Hampden and Worcester counties as well as Greater Boston and parts of New Hampshire, Connecticut and Maine. The figures came out one day after energy utility Eversource proposed a 10 percent increase in its electricity distribution rates beginning early next year. The...

GILLIBRAND, SCHUMER UNVEIL NEW PLAN TO ENSURE SAFER DRINKING WATER ACROSS NY; HARMFUL CONTAMINANTS FOUND IN NEW YORK DRINKING WATER—FROM HOOSICK FALLS TO NEWBURGH TO LONG ISLANDWashington, DC – U.S. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Charles Schumer, today announced legislation that would require the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop a maximum contaminant level for perfluorinated compounds (including PFOA and PFOS), 1,4 dioxane, and perchlorate in public water systems. Currently, these chemicals are unregulated under the Safe Water Drinking Act and this legislation would require the EPA to create safety guidelines and determine legally enforceable standards that apply to public water...

Beauty and the Beast star Emma Watson is an outspoken feminist and defender of gender equality. But, to her, that doesn’t include championing the rights of unborn baby girls (or boys). Vanity Fair recently filmed Watson giving advice remotely through an iPad at New York's Grand Central Station. For just two dollars, the magazine’s “man on the street” Derek Blasberg promised commuters that the 26-year-old actress would answer any question. And that she did. Watson offered advice on everything from relationships to New York City sightseeing. One young man praised Watson’s “HeForShe” gender equality campaign as “very inspiring” in her...

Monday morning on CNN’s New Day, hosts Chris Cuomo and Alisyn Camerota spoke with media correspondent Brian Stelter and analyst Bill Carter about Trump’s claims that he was wire-tapped by President Obama. The CNN panel took the opportunity to not just bash Trump but also blast the “illegitimate” and “partisan” right-wing sources where Trump gets his news. CNN painted with a broad brush, lumping in talk radio and several right-wing websites as illegitimate propaganda, simply because they weren’t “CNN or the New York Times.” The roundtable began with Cuomo asking Stelter about where Trump gets his information. “That’s the real...

Though it's been three months since Donald Trump won the presidential election, it's not unusual to see handmade "I'm still with her" signs displayed in windows of multimillion-dollar brownstones in Park Slope, "H" arrow buttons (the Clinton campaign logo) on lapels around major cities and Hillary Clinton's campaign avatar used in social-media profile pictures. Please, just let it go.

The NYPD won’t cooperate with federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents seeking to repatriate illegal immigrants, Mayor Bill de Blasio told RTVi, or Russian Television International. “The NYPD will not participate as immigration enforcement agents because we have, for decades, built a close working relationship with immigrant communities,” de Blasio said. “Our police force is not going to be out there knocking on people’s door and it is not going to share information about people’s documentation status with the federal authorities.”

A parolee has been arrested for a brazen attack on a woman at a liquor store on South Avenue Thursday evening. Police say 59-year-old Kevin Quander has been charged with first degree murder and first degree robbery. They add that Quander is currently on parole for first degree robbery, and was just released from prison on January 12, 2017. Police tell us that officers responded to South Avenue just before 5:00 p.m. Thursday evening when they found 46-year-old Charlotte Lahr of Greece seriously injured. They tell us Lahr was pronounced dead following first aid attempts by the Rochester Police Department...

A snowshoe racer from India whose entry into the U.S. to compete was made possible by Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer was being held Friday in a New York jail on a sex charge. The U.S. embassy in New Delhi last month rejected Tanveer Hussain’s application for a visa so he could compete in the World Snowshoe Championship in upstate. Local officials then intervened on Hussain’s behalf, appealing for help to the offices of Schumer and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y. Their offices reached out to the New Delhi embassy, which allowed Hussain to reapply for a visa and granted that...

SARANAC LAKE — Village police Wednesday arrested a snowshoe racer from India, whom the community wholeheartedly welcomed for this past weekend’s World Snowshoe Championships, after a local girl accused him of sexually abusing her. Tanveer Hussain, 24, of Kashmir, India, stands charged with first-degree sexual abuse, a felony, and endangering the welfare of a child, a misdemeanor. First-degree sexual abuse, according to New York law, means the perpetrator “subjects another person to sexual contact” without consent, in this case because the alleged victim is under age 13 and legally too young to give consent.

The right to speak on Cornell’s campus is a “paramount value,” one upon which the University has an “essential dependence,” according to the Campus Code of Conduct... But some groups that have hosted conservative speakers on campus are not buying the administration’s rhetoric, citing the thousands of dollars they have been asked to pay the University for security at their events. And they say it is a cost that hosts of conservative speakers disproportionately have to bear. “The University, through its current policy — intentional or not — imposes additional financial and administrative costs on groups wishing to host conservative...

The hysteria over Trump administration officials talking — or not talking — with Russia needs to end.

A man was repeatedly punched in the face and told to “go back to your country” on a Brooklyn subway platform Wednesday evening, an NYPD official said. The 27-year-old victim was on the southbound J-train platform at the Crescent Street station at about 5:20 p.m. when a man came up to him and punched him in the nose twice, an NYPD spokesman said. The victim’s nose was broken in the attack. The perpetrator called the victim a “****ing Mexican” and said “Go back to your country.” …

West Point Elementary School Was Originally Constructed In 1963 & Fails to Meet Federal Education Regulations – Replacing School Would Ensure Students Receive Great Education In State-Of-The-Art FacilitySchumer & Maloney: West Point Elementary School Needs & Deserve to Be UpdatedToday, U.S. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer and Representative Sean Patrick Maloney announced that the Army has awarded a $48 million contract to fully renovate and expand the West Point Elementary School. The current school was constructed in 1963 and remains in violation of numerous federal education regulations.  Dobco, Incorporated will execute this contract, which will fully replace the elementary...

Ten Suspects Were In The Country Illegally, Officials Say A broader 41-count indictment against 13 members of MS-13 includes charges connected to seven murders, attempted murders, assaults, racketeering, obstruction of justice, arson, conspiracy to distribute marijuana, and related firearms and conspiracy charges, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. “Ten of those defendants are illegal aliens, two are U.S. citizens and one is a green card holder,” U.S. District Attorney Robert L. Capers said. ... On Sept. 13, the day before her 16th birthday, Nisa Mickens’ brutally beaten body was found on a tree-lined street. The next day, the beaten...

Some people have a hard time letting go. With Hillary Clinton‘s most ardent supporters still stewing over her stunning defeat in the 2016 Presidential election, some are taking calls for her to jump into the New York City mayor’s race very seriously. At least one anonymous Clintonite has been posting “Hillary for Mayor” signs at various spots in the Big Apple.