Free Republic

There were two sightings of Western yellow-billed cuckoos this year, both in Delta County, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said. The secretive birds are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is considering designating parts of western Colorado as critical habitat for the migratory bird, including lands along the Colorado River through Mesa County. Sightings — which frequently involve people hearing the cuckoo’s distinctive “klak-klak” sound — have been recorded in Mesa and Delta counties in previous years. ... “We have changed the initial map due to comments from the proposed...

Grand Junction will no longer be home to a district Bureau of Land Management office after the agency’s Grand Junction Field Office gets transferred from the northwest Colorado district to the southwest district under a reorganization. ... Mesa County Commissioner John Justman is uncomfortable with the Grand Junction Field Office no longer being part of the Northwest District, despite Mesa County’s close economic ties to the oil and gas development that takes place in northwest Colorado. Many area oil and gas jobs are based in Mesa County. “Financially the county is much more attached to the Northwest District than the...

(KUTV) Researchers at the University of Utah say there's a strong case to impeach Donald Trump, should he be elected as president. Law professor Christopher Peterson said he found ample evidence to charge the Republican candidate with fraud and racketeering, both of which are considered felonies within state and federal law.

Utah Sen. Mike Lee on Friday rejected Donald Trump's Supreme Court nomination proposal, saying he already has the job he wants, Politico reported. "Sen. Lee already has the job he wants which is why he is campaigning to represent the great people of Utah again this year," Lee's spokesman Conn Carroll told Politico in a statement.

LIVE on #Periscope: Bomb threat - potential active shooter at Utah grade school

SALT LAKE CITY – Well-known Hispanic activist Tony Yapias was charged with rape after he allegedly assaulted a woman who ended their four-year relationship a few months ago. Yapias, 50, known as Adolfo Tony Yapias-Delgado, was formerly charged in the 3rd District Monday with rape, a first-degree felony and evidence tampering, a class A misdemeanor.

Sea Bears is a successful restaurant serving sea food in Ogden, Utah.  They have made national news by their policy of open carry for restaurant employees and guests.  The policy brought them attention, and they have been successful enough to expand to larger quarters.  The family owned restaurant signed a lease for a new space at Union Station.  Union Station is home to four museums, including the John M. Browning Firearms Museum and the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum.  This appeared to be a good fit for an open carry themed restaurant.The management of Union Station decided to...

A reader alerted me to this incredible story of patriotism at a high school in Heber City, Utah: Student Ben Schofield is known around Wasatch High School for his American spirit. He flies an American flag from the back of his red pickup truck. "I think it's really important," Ben told Fox 13 in Salt Lake City. "It's not just the material part of the flag, it's the meaning behind it." The other day someone set fire to Ben's flag in the school parking lot. Part of his truck was scorched by the blaze. Some of his classmates saw what...

A US student who supposedly died in China in 2004 has reportedly turned up alive in North Korea after being kidnapped to serve as Kim Jong Un's personal tutor. David Sneddon of Brigham Young University disappeared in Yunnan Province aged 24, in what Chinese police said was probably a hiking accident. But the reality, according to Choi Sung-yong, head of South Korea's Abductees' Family Union, is that he was kidnapped to be an English tutor to the then-heir to North Korea Yahoo News Japan reported Wednesday.

Fresh after Congress and the White House scored the largest transportation spending package in a decade, both presidential candidates this year are proposing billions in funding to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure. While both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump—and the parties they represent—agree the nation’s roads, bridges, airports, rail system, and ports are in need of repair, the new proposals invite familiar questions over how the spending would be paid for, and whether the federal government is the best provider to pay for it. Those questions, and the lack of a must-pass infrastructure initiative requiring Congress’ attention in 2017, mean that...

The Environmental Protection is admitting to a spill from a treatment plant it set up after it dumped 3 million gallons of toxic wastewater into a Colorado river last year. The EPA said Thursday night that the spill happened on Tuesday, and officials are still attempting to determine how much and what metals were contained in the sludgy discharge, ... The Navajo Nation sued the agency over the spill last week after the EPA inspector general and the Justice Department opened a criminal investigation into the incident a few days before the Aug. 5 anniversary of the 2015 spill. The...

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials improperly withheld information from The Daily Caller News Foundation confirming its reporting that the contractor responsible for the August 2015 Gold King Mine spill was awarded nearly $2.7 million not long after the disaster. The EPA internally acknowledged the award and crafted a response to TheDCNF’s finding, according to emails obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, but the response was never sent to the news organization. (RELATED: Feds Obstruct Media Probe By Blocking Interviews With Key Officials) “It just slipped through the cracks,” EPA spokeswoman Melissa Harrison told TheDCNF 32 minutes after deadline. “It...

PPP.com reported: Clinton's unpopularity makes Utah probably a step too far for Democrats even in a year where Trump's weakness as a candidate is putting unusual states on the map. Trump leads the state with 39% to 24% for Clinton, with Gary Johnson at 12%, Evan McMullin at 9%, Darrell Castle at 2%, and Jill Stein at 1%. If voters had to choose just between the two major candidates, Trump's lead would grow to 20 points at 53/33.

If my theory about his candidacy is correct then this was the only state ballot that really mattered to him and his team. Mission accomplished. McMullin, running as an alternative to Donald Trump, filed the required 1,000 signatures on Monday to be on the ballot, Utah Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox’s office confirmed. “Petition filed. He will be on the ballot,” Mark Thomas, Cox’s director of Elections told POLITICO moments after members of McMullin’s campaign walked into his office to file. The deadline to file the signatures was Monday by 5 p.m. Mountain Time, 7 p.m. Easter

The Republican chairmen of the House Oversight and House Judiciary Committees laid out the case for perjury charges against Hillary Clinton in a letter sent to the U.S. Attorney in Washington, D.C. on Monday. Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz and Virginia Rep. Bob Goodlatte, the chairs of Oversight and Judiciary, respectively, say that Clinton may have violated 18 U.S.C. § 1621 and § 1001, federal laws which govern perjury and false statements, respectively, during her Oct. 22, 2015 testimony in front of the House Select Committee on Benghazi. In a letter to U.S. Attorney Channing Phillips, the lawmakers point to four...

The BLM released its draft environmental impact statement Thursday. It is proposing amending up to 11 resource management plans in the two states. In 2014, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service determined the Gunnison sage-grouse requires listing as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. ... about 5,000 breeding Gunnison sage-grouse live in the two states. Some 4,000 live in the Gunnison Basin, and the others in six satellite populations in Colorado and a seventh in Utah. ... Fish and Wildlife pointed to the low numbers of birds in the other populations and their range of habitat threats as...

I’m running for president to make sure our country continues to live up to our founding principles. Those timeless ideas teach us that we’re stronger together when we work in unison to solve our problems, no matter what we look like, where we come from or how we pray. That last one is important. As Americans, we hold fast to the belief that everyone has the right to worship however he or she sees fit. I’ve been fighting to defend religious freedom for years. As secretary of state, I made it a cornerstone of our foreign policy to protect the...

House Speaker Paul Ryan wins primary, defeats longshot GOP challenger praised by Donald Trump. Ryan was being challenged by Paul Nehlen. Nehlen had been courting Trump supporters and won praise from the Republican presidential nominee last week. But Trump endorsed Ryan days later. Ryan had largely ignored Nehlen in what had been a sleepy primary before Trump thanked Nehlen on Twitter for his comments defending Trump. Nehlen won the backing of some prominent conservative figures, including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, but it wasn't enough to overcome Ryan's popularity in his southeastern Wisconsin district. Ryan was first elected in 1998...

Donald J. Trump has vowed to turn blue states red in November, but as he continues to rattle Republicans with his combative style and provocative proposals, voters in some of the country’s most conservative strongholds are considering a radical idea: supporting Hillary Clinton. The dilemma posed by this year’s choice of candidates is perhaps most apparent here in Utah, the mountain state that has not backed a Democrat for president since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964. More than 50 years later, a large Mormon population with a strong distaste for Mr. Trump has left the state up for grabs, and...

A coalition of national LGBT advocacy groups is urging the Big 12 not to admit BYU as a new member, FOX Sports has learned. On Monday, Athlete Ally, a non-profit that conducts LGBT awareness campaigns for sports leagues, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights, sent a letter to Big 12 administrators detailing what they believe are discriminatory policies by BYU, a religious institution owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. In the letter addressed to commissioner Bob Bowlsby, the authors write in part: “BYU … actively and openly discriminates against its LGBT students and staff. It...