Free Republic

Cynthia and Robert Gifford are caught in a same-sex nightmare. They’ve been forced to defend themselves against claims that they’re lesbian-hating homophobes. “We respect and care for everyone!’’ Cynthia Gifford told me. “We had an openly gay man working for us this past season,’’ she said. “We’ve had a woman who’s transitioning to be a man. We don’t discriminate against anyone.’’ But the government of the state of New York sees things differently. The Giffords, who own the bucolic Liberty Ridge Farm in upstate New York, were ordered to pay a total of $13,000 — a $10,000 fine to the...

... Failure to solve this crisis effectively perpetuates the status quo, where an underclass of men and women work for unlawfully low wages, undermining businesses, and are less likely to report being victimized by crime for fear of being deported. It's why traditionally Republican-friendly organizations, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, have pushed for lawmakers to develop a comprehensive solution, and why immigrant-rights groups have grown so impatient with the Obama administration's promises of help. The president's administration deported more people in five years than his predecessor, George W. Bush, deported in eight years, according to the Pew Research Center....

The president and his advisers bet against Latinos in this last election — and they lost. Whatever the claims to the contrary, the administration delayed executive action on immigration to protect Democratic Senate candidates in red states. Latinos represent the fastest growing demographic in the electorate and the best opportunity Democrats have for building an overwhelming electoral coalition that could reliably defeat G.O.P. monetary and turnout advantages. But Democrats are not entitled to Latino votes. Like voters of all racial and ethnic groups, Latinos have the right to ask that candidates address their concerns directly.

President Obama said once again that he won't wait on Congress to start making changes to America's immigration system. In an appearance Sunday on CBS' Face The Nation, Obama stood by his recent statements that he'll use executive action to enact changes before the end of the year, but told host Bob Schieffer that he still wants Congress to act on the issue, too. Everyone agrees, Obama said, that the U.S. doesn't have the capacity to deport 11 million people.

FULL TITLE: 'I'm an American Without Documentation': The Trials and Tribulations of an Undocumented College Student Originally from a small town in Nayarit, Mexcio, Nestor Gomez always had a passion for a career in Engineering that is deeply rooted in his love for the environment. In most ways, Nestor is like any other college student. However, Nestor is a very ambitious individual. Nestor Gomez is an undocumented immigrant. The Pew Hispanic Center estimates that 1.5 million undocumented students currently reside in the United States. Of those students, approximately 765,000 arrived in the United States before turning sixteen. On June 15,...

Stolen lives, that is how families refer to the death of their loved ones at the hands of criminals who were present in the country illegally when these men and women’s lives were stopped short. German immigrant and single mother of her only child, Sabine Durden spoke at the Sunday event in tribute to her son Dominic. The 30-year old sheriff dispatcher and pilot was killed when a Guatemalan illegally present in the United States and driving without a license caused the accident that left him dead. Jamiel Shaw, Jr. was a high school football star with a very bright...

Absent the credible threat of impeachment, Obama will pardon millions of illegal aliens. There is high anxiety over President Obama’s impending unilateral amnesty order for millions of illegal aliens. How many millions? The estimates vary. On the low end, 3 to 8 million, assuming some correlation to the potential beneficiaries of the president’s already existing amnesty decrees (including DACA or Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals). On the high end, as many as 9 to 34 million, factoring in likely categorical expansions of amnesty and their ramifications over the next several years. The nation overwhelmingly objects to Obama’s immigration lawlessness, but...

OREGON CITY, Ore. — Twice illegally entering the United States, once deported, a man from El Salvador finds himself in a familiar spot of facing deportation. Aguirre pleaded guilty to driving under the influence in August and agreed to enter a diversion program. His blood-alcohol level was .12. He’s been living at the Augustana Lutheran Church in Northeast Portland since September after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents showed up at his house in Fairview to arrest him. Aguirre has a criminal past in Oregon dating back to 1999 when he was convicted of selling drugs to undercover police officers in...

One year after the surge began of illegal migrant children across the southern U.S. border, courts are buckling under the load of deportation cases, while immigration rights activists are sounding the alarm that many children can't get fair hearings because they are without legal representation. According to data obtained by Politico, courts convened over 800 hearings per week between July and October. More than half the 11,392 cases on the calendar during that time were given continuances because children had no legal counsel, adding to the backlog for courts in the coming months and increasing the burden on the limited...

Illegal aliens plan a showdown with President Barack Obama at the White House at high noon Nov. 7. Central American Solidarity Association of Maryland (CASA de Maryland) Executive Director Gustavo Torres is supposed to lead the revolt. This being a national security measure, the government is mum on which federal agency will take the lead on protecting the president. Either the secret service or Immigration Customs Enforcement is the likely leader. “Particularly in light of this critical juncture on the future of our country, the president must act decisively, broadly, and quickly,” Torres says in a press release Nov. 6....

Eighty percent of voters polled on Election Day say new jobs should go to Americans and legal immigrants, not to illegal immigrants, including the potential beneficiaries of President Barack Obama’s planned executive amnesty, says an election-day poll of 806 voters. “Voters overwhelmingly prefer an immigration system that protects American workers,” says a memo released with the poll by Kellyanne Conway, founder of the polling company. “Members of Congress should feel confident that voters will support actions using the power of the purse to protect American workers from Obama’s executive amnesty threat,” the memo said.

Maria Praeli stood crying at the podium as she held the hand of her mother, Chela Praeli. Maria Praeli, 21, has a special status bestowed by President Barack Obama on young adults brought here as children by their undocumented parents that allows her to go to school and work without fear of deportation. But Chela Praeli, a psychiatrist when she was living in Peru, but who now cleans houses for a living, lacks that protection. “The thought of her being taken away from me is unbearable. My mother deserves to be included in President (Barack) Obama’s administrative relief,” she told...

California Division of Motor Vehicles is preparing for roughly 1.4 million new driver’s license applicants after Jan. 1. That’s when Assembly Bill 60, or the Safe and Responsible Drivers Act, goes into effect. FOX40 spoke with a Maria Rodriguez, an undocumented immigrant living in West Sacramento who plans to apply for a license under the new law. “It’s the best thing that could have happened to us in California. We’ve been waiting for it for many, many years,” Rodriguez said. The DMV is encouraging all eligible applicants to start preparing for their drivers tests early. When Nevada adopted a similar...

Few were as excited about Election Day as Moises Herrera. He did not run for office. He cannot even vote. But reaching Tuesday’s election, he hopes, will set in motion actions that will allow him to stay in the country. “It’s the great hope,” Herrera, a 36-year-old father of four, said in an interview on Election Day, days after immigration officials released him. “There are many, many people in that jail, and they are waiting for that day.” In Massachusetts, Herrera was at constant risk of deportation. In 2011, after a traffic stop in Everett, he was jailed and deported,...

Condoleezza Rice said on Thursday that if President Barack Obama wants to tackle immigration in his last two years in office, he can’t do it through executive actions. “We can’t have a circumstance in which we are going after a problem as meddlesome and potentially divisive as immigration by executive action only, this has to go through the people’s representatives,” the former secretary of state said in an interview with Brian Kilmeade of “Fox and Friends.” “That’s our system, that’s the Congress.” Rice said that after Republicans dominated the midterm elections, the American people need to “watch what happens now”...

Ebola be Gone! At the urging of the Obama Administration, the Associated Press and other news outlets have agreed not to report on suspected cases of Ebola in the United States until a positive viral RNA test is completed. The administration and liberal activists were upset with coverage in the run-up to the midterm elections. [whining tweet from The New Yorker] Who said political hack Ron Klain was not a good pick for Ebola czar? In case you haven’t noticed… Media outlets are no longer reporting on suspected Ebola cases at the urging of the Obama administration. Downtrend reported: There...

House Speaker John Boehner and incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, outlining their legislative vision for the last two years of Barack Obama’s presidency, are vowing to try to repeal the Affordable Care Act. The Republican House speaker from Ohio and incoming Senate majority leader from Kentucky noted that a commitment to creating jobs “means renewing our commitment to repeal Obamacare, which is hurting the job market along with Americans’ health care.” The ACA remains a politically divisive issue, and further attempts at repeal would surely be met with significant Democratic opposition and a White House veto.

Voters demanded change from Washington on Tuesday, and Republicans say it’s now up to President Barack Obama to deliver it. But don’t count on that happening. The White House that emerges after the midterm elections won’t look, act or sound drastically different than the one battered for months by Republicans and abandoned by Democrats desperate to hang onto power. The president will seek some common ground with Republicans, but there are limits to how far Obama wants to go — and Senate Democrats will let him go. Despite losing the Senate, Obama doesn’t think too much should be read into...

November 4, 2014BREAKING: DOJ Turns Over 64,000 Fast and Furious Documents Held Under Obama's Executive PrivilegeKatie PavlichAfter years of legal battles between the House Oversight Committee and Attorney General Eric Holder, 64,280 redacted Operation Fast and Furious documents held under President Obama's assertion of executive privilege since 2012, have been turned over by the Department of Justice after an order from U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson. The Justice Department was originally ordered to turn over a list of documents, better known as a Vaughn Index, with explanations as to why documents fall under executive privilege claims by November...

"I kind of assume I’m on a list. I don’t think I’m the only one" Sharyl Attkisson is an investigative journalist who became the story when she quit CBS News after two decades amid allegations that the network refused to run some of her stories that were critical of President Barack Obama. Ahead of the Tuesday release of her book Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama’s Washington, she spoke to The Hollywood Reporter about her struggles with CBS executives and her assertion that her computers were hacked, possibly by Obama operatives.