Free Republic

UPDATE: Federal court grants Biden DOJ request to move $30 million Ashli Babbitt wrongful death lawsuit from Ashli's home in San Diego to Washington DC. The case was just assigned to Judge Jia Cobb, who was appointed to the bench by President Biden in 2021.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The SS United States, a historic ship that still holds the transatlantic speed record it set more than 70 years ago, must leave its berth on the Delaware River in Philadelphia by Sept. 12, a federal judge says. The decision issued Friday by U.S. District Judge Anita Brody culminated a years-old rent dispute between the conservancy that oversees the 1,000-foot ocean liner and its landlord, Penn Warehousing. It stemmed from an August 2021 decision by Penn Warehousing to double the ship's daily dockage to $1,700, an increase the conservancy refused to accept. When the conservancy continued to...

The Biden campaign on Monday launched a battleground state ad that lambasts former President Trump as a “convicted criminal,” highlighting his numerous legal problems and his recent felony conviction in New York. The ad, titled “Character Matters,” will run on general market television across battleground states and on national cable. It is part of a broader $50 million paid media campaign for the month of June and comes less than two weeks before the first debate between President Biden and Trump. “In the courtroom, we see Donald Trump for who he is. He’s been convicted of 34 felonies, found liable...

More than 30 people are now without jobs after the sudden closure of all three remaining OCF Coffee House locations throughout Philadelphia. Workers said they announced a plan to form a union a week earlier.

While most ebikes on the road today will come with a battery pack, some are riding down the hydrogen fuel-cell cycle path. HydroRide not only has fuel-cell ebikes available, but also a compact refill station to top up H2 canisters. The global ebike market is estimated to grow in value to almost US$120 billion by 2030, and it's not surprising. Whether commuting or leisure riding, pedal-assist bikes take some of the strain out of the journey while also opening up routes for older riders. The vast majority of ebikes on the street roll with Li-ion batteries, but they can spend...

...A pizza topping or tasty treat isn’t what comes to mind for most when it comes to cicadas, but for one group of University of Illinois educators, that is exactly what they thought of. ...

... Strategists said Rubio’s background, experience as a legislator and skills as a political candidate would make him a strong candidate to widen the ticket’s appeal. “I happen to think that he’s the candidate the Biden campaign probably fears the most,” said Florida-based Republican strategist Justin Sayfie. “Of all the people that President Trump can pick to be his running mate, I think that the Biden campaign probably would not like to see Marco Rubio on the ticket.” Rubio, 53, is among the youngest candidates on Trump’s short list. He was first elected to the Senate in 2010 with support...

It's not clear who knew about an embarrassing double-date for Canada's HMCS Margaret BrookeCanadian navy patrol boat HMCS Margaret Brooke passes by Russian nuclear-powered cruise missile submarine Kazan and frigate Admiral Gorshkov as it enters Havana's bay in Cuba on June 14, 2024. (Alexandre Meneghini/Reuters)The Royal Canadian Navy now finds itself in the unusual position of both shadowing Russian warships as a threat in the Caribbean and sharing an anchorage with them as a guest in the port of Havana — because Canada accepted an invitation to send a patrol ship to Cuba while the Russian navy is in town....

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who is running to head up a potential GOP majority in 2025, knocked Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) Friday, saying former President Trump is going to need new leadership to help support his agenda for a possible second term. “We have Republicans in the Senate that are caving to Democrats for all sorts of horrible bills. Now, remember this so-called infrastructure bill? … That required Republican votes. Guess who gave it to ‘em? Mitch McConnell,” Scott told a crowd at The People’s Convention in Detroit, organized by the conservative activist group Turning Point Action. He...

California's Democratic leadership, backed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, wants to keep the tough-on-crime measure off the November ballot. They worry the ballot measure's proposal would disproportionately criminalize low-income people and those with substance use issues rather than target ringleaders who hire large groups of people to steal goods for them to resell online. If voters approve the tough-on-crime ballot initiative, Democratic leaders plan to void most measures in their own legislative package, citing potential conflicts. Lawmakers were short on details about how the two paths conflict earlier this week. Later, they said they fear if both efforts succeed, law enforcement...

Several subpoenas issued to connect Patel to attacks according to the legal records HOUSTON – In Fort Bend County, investigators say online impersonation in a key political race resulted in handcuffs for a politician who was viewed by many within Democratic circles as a candidate on the rise. Now there are questions of “What’s next?” after Democrat Taral Patel was arrested on Wednesday on third-degree felony charge of online impersonation and a Class-A misdemeanor charge of misrepresentation of identity. The arrest comes weeks after Patel secured the Democratic nomination in the race for County Commissioner of Precinct 3. “That does...

Justice Samuel Alito on Friday asserted that Congress could amend the law to successfully ban bump stocks in an opinion concurring with the Supreme Court’s decision Friday to invalidate a Trump-era ban on the devices. The ban on bump stocks, which allow semi-automatic weapons to fire hundreds of rounds per minute, was implemented by the Trump administration in the wake of the 2017 Las Vegas mass shooting, where a shooter used a bump stock to kill a total of 60 people and wound hundreds of others — the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. The Biden administration later defended the...

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday ruled in favor of a challenge to a federal ban on "bump stock" devices that enable semiautomatic weapons to fire rapidly like machine guns, dealing a setback to yet another firearms restriction — one enacted under Republican former President Donald Trump. The justices, in a 6-3 ruling, upheld a lower court's decision siding with Michael Cargill, a gun shop owner and gun rights advocate from Austin, Texas, who challenged the ban by claiming that a U.S. agency improperly interpreted a federal law banning machine guns as extending to bump stocks. The conservative justices were...

Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Vice President Harris will be a “safeguard” if President Biden wins the 2024 presidential election and Republicans challenge the results. “Remember that we will have the vice president that day,” Pelosi said in an interview with The Washington Post. “That’s a safeguard.” Pelosi also threw cold water on the idea that congressional Republicans would challenge the result, as they did when Biden defeated then-President Trump in 2020. Vice President Mike Pence eventually came under pressure from Trump and other Republicans to not certify the results of the election. “I don’t think that the Republicans,...

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said former President Trump criticized the $61 billion for Ukraine passed under Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) leadership and signaled his disinterest in sending the war-torn country more support during his Thursday meeting with House Republicans. “TRUMP ON UKRAINE: ‘They’re never going to be there for us,’” Gaetz wrote in a post on the social platform X, sharing comments from Trump at the morning meeting. According to Gaetz, Trump also asserted the U.S. should “pay OUR TROOPS” instead of sending billions of dollars to Ukraine. “Trump trashing the Ukraine Aid to @SpeakerJohnson’s face is so epic,” Gaetz...

A Pentagon-funded company is seeking proposals to feed America’s soldiers lab-grown meat in a bid to "reduce the CO2 footprint" at Defense Department outposts. BioMADE, a public-private company that has received more than $500 million in funding from the Defense Department, announced earlier this month that it is seeking proposals to develop "innovations in food production that reduce the CO2 footprint of food production at ... DoD operational environments," according to an online announcement. These include "novel cell culture methods suitable for the production of cultivated meat/protein," or lab-grown meat, a product that is still in its experimental phases. This...

MOSCOW (AP) — U.S. journalist Evan Gershkovich, who has been jailed for over a year in Russia on espionage charges, will stand trial in the Ural Mountains city of Yekaterinburg, where he was detained, authorities said Thursday. An indictment of The Wall Street Journal reporter has been finalized and his case was filed to the Sverdlovsky Regional Court in the city about 1,400 kilometers (870 miles) east of Moscow, according to Russia’s Prosecutor General’s office. There was no word on when the trial would begin. Gershkovich, 32, is accused of “gathering secret information” on orders from the CIA about Uralvagonzavod,...

Nigel Farage’s Reform party has overtaken the Conservatives in a poll for the first time in a symbolic moment that deals another blow to Rishi Sunak’s electoral hopes. The YouGov survey for The Times found that support for Reform had increased by two points to 19 per cent while the Tories were unchanged on 18 per cent. It is the first time any poll has shown Reform ahead of the Tories, a so-called crossover moment.

President Biden has blamed politics for his son Hunter’s conviction Tuesday on federal gun charges — ignoring that his offspring’s defense attorneys helped scuttle a sweetheart plea bargain last summer that would have staved off the criminal case. “If I weren’t running for re-election, he would have gotten the plea deal,” the elder Biden, 81, told one of his confidants earlier this month, according to Politico. The reported remark recalls former President Donald Trump’s claim that prosecutors have engaged in “election interference” by pursuing criminal cases against him. Biden, in response, has called such claims by his great rival “reckless,”...

Boeing Leaks After years of delays and technical problems, Boeing's Starliner finally made it to the International Space Station with NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams on board last week. But when exactly it'll be able to undock and deliver its crew of two back to the surface remains to be seen.