Free Republic

Human smugglers in Mexico routinely give young illegal immigrant girls birth control for their trip through Mexico. The odds are they will be raped.

Today at the Mexican Consulate just south of downtown Houston a protest against the illegal alien border surge was staged by concerned patriots. Apparently the word got out to the opposition forces. There were 25 to 30 illegals and associated supporters there as well. Our side numbered from 40 to 50 while I was on site. We were staged on opposite sides of the street. The illegals (they proclaimed themselves so, chanting "undocumented and unafraid") had a small public address system and had a designated wise-ass on the mike leading chants and taunts which actually were pretty comedic. The...

Bureau of Land Management Director Neil Kornze said that increased drilling and a shortage of staff are behind his agency’s request for a fee system to increase the agency’s inspection capacity. ... BLM is focused on a range of inspections, including drilling and production inspections. ... Irregular and declining budgets have hindered our ability to move out aggressively in this area. Through the President’s 2015 budget proposal, we are now seeking to fund inspections through a fee system that will allow us to be much more responsive to the needs of industry and, importantly, to meet the foundational safety and...

Texas State Senator and MSNBC heroine Wendy Davis is not doing that hot in the fundraising race as she pursues her shot for governor of the Lone Star state, the Daily Beast reported today. "As if things weren’t going badly enough for Wendy Davis, the Texas gubernatorial candidate got caught inflating her campaign’s finances this week by counting a Willie Nelson concert as a contribution," reporter Ben Jacobs noted in the lead paragraph of his July 17 story, "Wendy Davis's Fundraising Fiasco." You can read the full story here, but here's an excerpt to give you a taste (emphasis mine):

It seems all the Senate Republicans are willing to turn a blind eye to the scandal and corruption obviously at play in the Mississippi Senate race to protect their buddy Thad Cochran who, apparently, can no longer find his way to the clubby Senate lunches he’s been attending since Jimmy Carter was president. In what appears to be the ultimate modern demonstration of “drinking the Koolaid,” Republicans across the spectrum seem to have entered a pact in sticking together to defend, and even celebrate, campaign tactics predicated on gross voter fraud and manipulation of minority voters. In fact, we now...

HOUSTON -- The immigration crisis is touching nerves in every pocket of America. That includes the city of Houston. "Don't bring them here," said Bernadette Lancelin. "We don't have anything for them. They've taken too much already from my kids." Lancelin sounded off when she learned officials had been touring a vacant Houston school a possible site to house immigrant children. Mayor Annise Parker tackled questions on the situation Wednesday. "We have not been asked by the federal government to provide housing for immigrant children," said Parker. "Terrell Elementary School could be repurposed but at this point, it's not the...

The candidates for lieutenant governor have, not surprisingly, staked out opposing positions on a proposal that would speed the return of migrant children to their Central American countries. The legislation moving through Congress comes from U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, a Republican, and Rep. Henry Cuellar, a Democrat from Laredo. It calls for the thousands of Central American children detained at the border to be treated the same as Mexican children. Within seven days of being apprehended, a judge would hear their plea to stay in the United States. The judge would then decide on deportation within 72 hours. Dan Patrick,...

Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said he wants thousands of undocumented children from the border to be in Dallas by the end of July, adding that one of three proposed housing sites is a Parkland Hospital warehouse that needs to be fixed. However, according to at least one county commissioner, several steps must be taken before renovations can begin on taxpayer-funded county buildings. “There's been no declaration of an emergency at the federal level, state level, or the county level, so therefore if he's trying to operate within some type of Homeland Security emergency declaration, that hasn't occurred, so that...

Do you wish you were able to afford to go to a resort with pool, sauna, tennis courts, exercise room, sauna, steam room, racketball courts, and all the trimmings? Too bad you aren’t an illegal alien teenager, maybe a member of MS 13. Because your tax dollars (pay up, sucker!) are going to pay for a $50 million magnet resort for them. Kristinn Taylor writes at Gateway Pundit: The Obama administration has awarded a $50 million contract to a charitable group to buy a Texas resort hotel and transform it in to a 600 bed facility for juvenile illegal aliens. The beautiful Palm...

Two influential pastors in Dallas, Texas, are at odds on what they both believe the appropriate Christian response should be to the recently-publicized border crisis involving children entering the United States illegally and unaccompanied. The unprecedented influx of young children and teens trying to illegally enter the United State along the country's southwestern border has "triggered a political and humanitarian crisis," according to NBC News. According to Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Dallas, the most compassionate thing the U.S. government can do to address the border crisis, heightened by the influx of unaccompanied alien children, is to secure the...

Lawmakers and top military officials on Wednesday expressed fears that friction with Russia could someday leave the United States without the power to launch rockets into space. Reliance on a single Russian engine to launch many critical military satellites could come back to haunt the U.S., officials said, if tensions between the two nations continue to rise. “If you consider space a national security priority, then you absolutely have to consider assured access to space a national security priority,” Gen. William Shelton, commander of the Air Force’s space command, testified in a joint Senate committee hearing on Wednesday. “Given that...

When President Barack H. Obama visited Austin yesterday, he set off yet another social media tailspin. On a visit to Franklin Barbecue, the President of the United States of America encountered Daniel Rugg Webb – comedian, artist, musician (and friend of Gay Place), and part-time Franklin employee – and, of course, sparks flew.

Denton late Tuesday night became the latest jurisdiction to announce a referendum on a drilling technique, joining Colorado and New York in allowing voters to decide where hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas may take place. This a deeply worrying trend that mixes misinformation with a not-in-my-backyard attitude that too often ignores science, engineering and the nation's need for energy. In many ways, though, the drilling companies and state regulators have themselves to blame for public outrage by failing to quickly and transparently address the concerns of local residents. First, let me say I've spoken to a lot of people...

LUBBOCK, Texas—An illegal immigrant who was released by U.S. authorities with a Notice to Appear has been arrested for the alleged murder of a woman and kidnapping of children on U.S. soil. The alleged crimes occurred after the man was released. The man, Pedro Alberto Monterroso-Navas, entered the U.S. illegally with children and turned himself in to U.S. Border Patrol agents. He was processed and released, as are all illegal immigrants who come as unaccompanied minors or incomplete family units from Central America. The alien is from Honduras. The arrest was first reported by the Associated Press (AP), but Breitbart...

FALFURRIAS, Texas—The death march through Brooks County, Texas claimed the life of yet another illegal immigrant. A human skull and the decomposed skeletal remains are all that is left of a person who decided to come to this country illegally. A total of 42 bodies have been found this year in the desert-like ranch fields surrounding the town of Falfurrias.

House Republicans announced Tuesday they will recommend dispatching the National Guard to South Texas and speeding Central American youths back home as their response to the immigration crisis that’s engulfing the border and testing Washington’s ability to respond. The recommendations, to come from a working group established by House Speaker John Boehner, will set up a clash with leading Democrats who oppose changing U.S. law to eliminate automatic immigration hearings for Central American kids and return them more quickly to Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, where some areas are overrun by brutal gangs. With Democrats and the White House under...

A North Texas community that sits on a large natural gas reserve could become the first city in the state to partially ban hydraulic fracturing, with city leaders in Denton set to vote early Wednesday on a citizen-led petition to outlaw new permits for the drilling method. The process, also called fracking, has led to significant economic benefits but also to fears that the chemicals could spread to water supplies, worsen air quality and even cause small earthquakes. Scores of other cities and some states have considered similar bans, but the proposal in Denton is a litmus test on whether...

PYOTE A building that has stood vacant in the small, rural community of Pyote in West Texas could help house unaccompanied minors if given approval by the federal government. Odessa’s Una Voz Unida Founder and President Art Leal said his organization received an inquiry from the Federal Emergency Management Agency on places that could be used to house unaccompanied children as they wait for their court date. “We started thinking what we have around this area that would meet this criteria - I thought about the school in Pyote,” Leal said. The West Texas State School was a facility used...

LITTLEFIELD — The American flag that once flew over the Bill Clayton Detention Center in Littlefield is no longer there. Resident Gary Pringle took it down in protest of the town’s consideration of detaining illegal immigrants in the West Texas prison. “There will never be an American flag flying over that facility while it houses illegal aliens,” he said. But Pringle’s was just one voice heard by the Littlefield City Council at a town hall meeting Tuesday night. With a goal of alleviating concerns residents have expressed since the city went public with its negotiations with the U.S. Immigration and...

University of Texas May Use Race As A Factor In Admissions, Court Rules Federal appeals court rules in affirmative action case that barring race as a factor would harm diversity on campus 15 July 2014 A federal appeals court panel ruled Tuesday that the University of Texas can continue using race in its undergraduate admissions, a year after the US supreme court sent the case back to a lower court. A 5th US circuit court of appeals panel ruled 2-1 that barring the university from using race would hurt diversity on campus. The ruling came in a lawsuit filed in...