Free Republic

So much for the Spring Showdown. Two weeks ago, the Supreme Court appeared ready to jump into the middle of a 2020 election debate over ObamaCare, telling both sides of an appear to submit briefs over the possibility of an expedited review of a case where the law was ruled unconstitutional. There was just enough time to add this to the calendar for this session — if the court wanted to stick their fingers into a political and electoral maelstrom.To quote Emily Litella … never mind: The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected Democrats’ plea to consider a high-stakes legal...

Yesterday a caravan of roughly 2,500 migrants stopped trying to cross Mexico’s southern border by bridge and instead waded across the river and attempted to get past a line of Mexican National Guardsmen waiting on the other side. That led to some rock-throwing by both sides but hundreds of migrants wound up being taken into custody by the Mexican authorities. Today, those migrants are already being deported by bus and by plane: …1,000 had tried to enter illegally Monday…and hundreds of them were apparently detained by Mexican National Guardsmen and immigration agents. Immigration officials estimated Monday night that 500...

Several Senate Democrats are privately discussing the possibility of calling Republicans’ bluff on witnesses, weighing an unusual trade in President Trump’s impeachment trial: the testimony of Hunter Biden for the testimony of a key administration official. Publicly, most Democrats have scoffed at the growing GOP clamor to hear former vice president Joe Biden’s son testify, dismissing him as irrelevant to the charges against Trump and accusing Republicans of trying to distract from the allegations against the president. But behind closed doors, a small group of Democratic senators and aides has begun to question that logic, sounding out colleagues on whether...

"Not even (House Intelligence Chairman Adam) Schiff’s Republican colleagues were allowed into the SCIF" during the House impeachment investigation. — Pat Cipollone on Tuesday, January 21st, 2020 in remarks in the Senate impeachment trial On the first full day of President Donald Trump’s Senate impeachment trial, White House Counsel Pat Cipollone claimed that House Democrats had run roughshod over the president’s procedural rights by denying Republicans access to key parts of the investigation. Cipollone had several complaints, but one stood out to us as clearly wrong. "Not even (House Intelligence Chairman Adam) Schiff’s Republican colleagues were allowed into the SCIF"...

Hillary Clinton who’s hovered about long after her 2016 humiliating presidential election defeat is still out there—still licking her lips Senate Impeachment Trial proceedings are set to begin at 1 p.m. today—taking us back to the October 19, 2016 presidential debate—where it really all began. October 19, 2016 is the night when Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, convinced she had nothing to lose, was licking her lips in anticipation.

The senate must thoroughly expunge the impeachment from the Congressional Record Democrat prosecutors claim their “right to a fair trial.” An hour before the trial begins, Adam Schiff, the impeachment manager, demanded that the president and House Democrats be given a fair hearing. The problem is, the House Democrats are not being tried—Donald Trump is.

Fox News Host Tucker Carlson dedicated a segment of his show Tuesday night to torching the Wall Street billionaire Paul Singer. Carlson’s show featured an investigation into how hedge funds, like the the one Singer manages, have destroyed American towns and economies for the sake of lining their pockets. Carlson described how Singer and his hedge fund Elliott Management has made billions of dollars from their style of “vulture capitalism,” exploiting financially distressed countries and American companies. “Elliott Management has made billions by buying large stakes in American companies, then firing workings, driving up short-term share prices, and in some...

Senate Republicans defeated a series of amendments from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to subpoena the Trump administration for Ukraine documents on the opening day of the bitterly fought impeachment trial of President Donald Trump. Schumer offered several measures seeking a trove of documents from the White House, the State Department and the Office of Management and Budget that the Trump administration refused to turn over during the House's impeachment inquiry, but the amendments were thwarted one by one on 53-47, party-line votes. At around 7:30 p.m. ET, Schumer introduced his fourth amendment subpoenaing testimony from acting White House chief...

Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska has revealed that she recently phoned President Trump to clarify that she doesn’t hate him. Mrs. Murkowski, a moderate Republican whose votes will be watched closely in the president’s impeachment trial, told the Anchorage Daily News that she learned before the holidays Mr. Trump reportedly told a group of people that he believed she hated him. “He was just kind of off the cuff and he said, ‘I don’t know, I think Lisa Murkowski hates me. I kind of like her,’ ” she said of the president’s comments. She told her home-state newspaper, “And I...

Socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) repeatedly demonized successful business owners in an interview during a Martin Luther King Jr. Day event on Monday, literally arguing that business owners were lazy slave owners who profit off the backs of minorities who are “dying” because the business owners are successful. Ocasio-Cortez made the extreme remarks when she was asked why successful business owners were “the enemy of health care.” “Well, you didn’t make those widgets, did you?” Ocasio-Cortez began. “Because you employed thousands of people and paid them less than a living wage to make those widgets for you. You didn’t make...

In a bid to fill thousands of new positions this year, Germany’s federal police (Bundespolizei) has lowered requirements for recruits, according to a media report published Monday. The newspapers of the Funke Media Group reported on the changes, noting that physical fitness requirements as well as the language level in exams have been changed. […] For recruits looking to join the “middle-level” of police service, authorities have also “slightly raised” the number of mistakes they are allowed to make in the test in order to still secure a passing grade. Police recruits in this level could go on to provide...

... Democrats figure Republicans will vote down witnesses, and they can run from here to November claiming the trial was “rigged” and hid the truth. We think Republicans are justified in voting to convict or acquit based on the current evidence without witnesses. But if they want to rebut the coverup claims, then call the Democrats’ bluff. Give them witnesses, but insist on calling those the President’s team would also like to call such as Hunter and Joe Biden. Democrats say this is irrelevant to Mr. Trump’s behavior, but it is directly relevant to their charge that Mr. Trump acted...

White House legal team members mocked the case against President Trump on Tuesday in their first appearance at the Senate impeachment trial, calling out Democrats claiming to have “overwhelming evidence” of wrongdoing but demanding more witnesses and documents. White House counsel Pat Cipollone said House Democrats are afraid to make their case. He said he would be laughed out of court if he requested more evidence to a judge at the start of a trial. “Judge, my case is overwhelming — but I’m not ready to go forward. I need more evidence,” he said, mimicking a court appearance. “I would...

Organised child abuse is happening up and down the country and requires billions of pounds to fix, writes children's commissioner Anne Longfield OBE.

A firm employing James Biden, the younger brother of former Vice President Joe Biden, received more than $1.5 billion in government-backed contracts during the Obama administration. The dovetailing of James Biden’s professional life with his brother’s political influence are extensively detailed in Breitbart News senior contributor Peter Schweizer’s new book—Profiles in Corruption: Abuse of Power by America’s Progressive Elite. Schweizer is also the president of the Government Accountability Institute (GAI). In 2010, shortly after a disastrous attempt at running a hedge fund with his nephew Hunter, James Biden entered the construction and international development industry. Even though he lacked background...

An Idaho state legislator plans to introduce a bill that would require biologically male athletes to compete on boys sports teams, regardless of whether they identify as a transgender girl or not. Idaho state Rep. Barbara Ehardt is the latest Republican lawmaker across the country to introduce legislation ensuring girls aren’t forced to compete against biologically male athletes. The wave of proposed legislation comes as biological males have piled up victories in female athletics. “Boys and men will not be able to take the place of girls and women in sports because it’s not fair. We cannot physically compete against...

China says the number of cases of a new virus has risen to 440 and the death toll has risen to 9. Deputy Director of the National Health Commission Li Bin told reporters on Wednesday that the figures were current as of midnight Tuesday and all the deaths had been in Hubei province, where the first illnesses from the new coronavirus were reported in December.

by Lauren Hass President Trump won a huge Senate vote on the procedures to follow for the rest of the trial. This was a test vote on other issues and the president won on what seems to be a party line vote. And after winning it, he won again, and again...a total of three times, devastating Democrat Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, who was shot down proposing the rule changes. Schumer (D-NY) wanted to subpoena the White House for documents regarding Ukraine. Something the incompetent House Democrats failed to do by refusing to vote subpoena power to their own Judiciary Committee....

WASHINGTON, D.C., January 17, 2020 (C-Fam) — The leader of one of the world’s top human rights organizations told the U.S. Commission on Unalienable Rights last week that abortion is a “fundamental right” for “anyone who wants or needs it” and that arguments about the humanity of the unborn are merely “philosophical,” with no place in policy. Human Rights Watch head Kenneth Roth criticized Secretary of State Michael Pompeo’s basis for founding the commission. Pompeo initiated the expert body to guide the department in response to a proliferation of new rights claims that often compete against one another. Roth said...

Digitizing patients’ medical histories, laboratory results and diagnoses has created a booming market in which tech giants are looking to store and crunch data, with potential for groundbreaking discoveries and lucrative products. But recent revelations that Alphabet Inc.’s Google is able to tap personally identifiable medical data about patients, reported by The Wall Street Journal, has raised concerns among lawmakers, patients and doctors about privacy. Hospitals have granted Microsoft Corp., International Business Machines and Amazon the ability to access identifiable patient information under deals to crunch millions of health records, the latest examples of hospitals’ growing influence in the data...