Free Republic

Biden and Cardinal Wilton Gregory share a mandate for healing divisionsWhen Pope Francis needed someone to help heal Catholics in the nation’s capital recovering from the latest round of clergy sex abuse that had engulfed now former cardinal Theodore McCarrick, he tapped Archbishop Wilton Gregory as its new leader in April 2019.This January, when Joe Biden becomes only the second Catholic president in U.S. history, the politician who pledged to heal America amid a global pandemic, economic dislocation and a racial reckoning will have Gregory as his local pastor.Both men have been put in their positions with a mandate for...

WASHINGTON – Cognosante, LLC has agreed to pay the United States $18,987,789 to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by using unqualified labor and overcharging the United States for services provided to government agencies under two General Services Administration (GSA)) contracts, the Justice Department announced today. Cognosante, which is headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, provides health care and IT services and solutions to federal agencies. GSA’s Multiple Award Schedule (MAS) contracts allow the federal government to leverage its buying power to achieve favorable pricing. Under MAS contracts, contractors negotiate with GSA to set maximum prices for...

WASHINGTON – Dawn Monique Garris, a 45-year-old District of Columbia resident, pled guilty in federal court in the District of Columbia to contempt in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 402, for disclosing the name of a Superior Court grand jury witness to a D.C. Department of Corrections inmate. Garris pled guilty to Count One of a criminal Indictment charging her with contempt. According to court papers, Garris was the sergeant-at-arms and a grand juror for a D.C. Superior Court grand jury in September 2019. She heard testimony from a grand jury witness as part of a violent crime investigation,...

Dr. Anthony Fauci on Sunday said bars should be closed in order to prioritize getting children back in school in New York City and other regions that have experienced rising COVID-19 cases. “Close the bars and keep the schools open,” Fauci told ABC anchor Martha Raddatz on “This Week.” “The default position should be to try as best as possible within reason to keep the children in school or to get them back to school.” The Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases added that schools haven’t played a significant role in driving community spread of the...

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — As families across New York City grapple with ensuring their children are getting an education amid the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, new data shows that enrollment at public schools is dropping across the five boroughs. According to preliminary data obtained by Chalkbeat, school rosters lost about 31,000 students compared to this time last year — or 3.4%. Current enrollment at New York City public schools is just over 901,000, not including charter schools or early childhood programs. The analysis found bigger drops in enrollment at elementary and middle schools, while high schools remain stagnant. Losses in enrollment...

Dominion Voting Systems confirms it is a Clinton Foundation donor, and that it hired a Pelosi staffer as its lobbyist. Dominion Voting Systems is rebutting assorted claims of partisan bias and voting manipulation in the 2020 election, including rumors of a secret U.S. military raid on purported servers in Germany and ownership interests and other influence in the firm by prominent Democratic families. Election tech company Dominion Voting Systems is rebutting assorted claims of partisan bias and voting manipulation in the 2020 election, including rumors of a secret U.S. military raid on purported servers in Germany and ownership interests and...

WASHINGTON – Michael Johnson, 43-years old, a former background investigator who did work under contract for the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA), pled guilty today to a charge stemming from his falsification of work on background investigations of federal employees and contractors, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Michael R. Sherwin. Johnson, of Columbia, Missouri, pled guilty in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to making a false statement. The Honorable Trevor N. McFadden scheduled sentencing for February 9, 2021. The charge carries a statutory penalty of up to five years in prison and a fine of...

WASHINGTON – Since May 2020, the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia has charged more than 156 individuals for protest-related violence, marking the highest number of people charged in any federal district in the United States. These cases include Brennan Sermon, who was charged with assaulting a police officer who was responding to assist officers protecting Senator Rand Paul on August 28, 2020; six people who were charged for their role in inciting violence and destroying federal monuments in Lafayette Square on June 22, 2020; and 20 people who have been charged with assaults on civilians...

BREAKING UPDATE— Judge Timothy C. Batten, Sr. issued an order on Sunday to freeze ALL Dominion voting machines in the state of Georgia. Via Attorney Linn Wood: “Defendants are ordered to maintain the statue quo & are temporarily enjoined from wiping or resetting any voting machines in the State of Georgia until further order of the Court.”

A suicide bomber blew himself up in an ice-cream parlour in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, killing seven people, a police official said. Ten others were wounded in the attack on Friday, said senior police officer Mohamed Dahir. The death toll could rise as the critically injured were rushed to nearby hospitals, he added. The Gelato Divino restaurant is located near K4 Junction in the heart of Mogadishu, near the international airport. This latest attack comes days after five people were killed in Mogadishu on November 17, after a suicide bomber blew himself up in a restaurant near a police academy....

In yet another move that seems to indicate that COVID-19 is unlike any virus that has ever existed, Dr. Anthony Fauci told McClatchy DC that people previously infected with and recovered from COVID-19 should get the vaccine anyway:“I believe they should” take the vaccine, Fauci said, addressing concerns among individuals who have already recovered from infection. “The final decision is going to be awaiting both FDA input, because we know that there were a certain percentage of the people who were in the original vaccine trial that had evidence they had been previously infected. So we need to see what...

“Defendants are ordered to maintain the statue quo & are temporarily enjoined from wiping or resetting any voting machines in the State of Georgia until further order of the Court.”

At least five police officers were killed and several others wounded when a bomb blast targeted their vehicle outside the capital Mogadishu on Wednesday, police said. The attack took place in the vicinity of Eelasha Biyaha located 16 kilometers (9 miles) south west of Mogadishu. Ibrahim Mohamed Yare, a police officer in the area, told Anadolu Agency by phone the attack was a roadside bomb blast targeting police officers traveling from Mogadishu to Eelasha Biyaha, lower Shabelle region. The wounded personnel were admitted to Mogadishu hospital, he said, blaming al-Shabaab terrorist group for the attack. Roads between Mogadishu and Afgoye...

The ball is now in the court of the Supreme Court of the United States, with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court throwing out a big victory for the Trump legal team. The top court of the Keystone State has a terrible track record, allowing changes in election law that the state legislature did not authorize, so this story from the AP is no surprise:Pennsylvania’s highest court on Saturday night threw out a lower court’s order preventing the state from certifying dozens of contests on its Nov. 3 election ballot in the latest lawsuit filed by Republicans who are attempting to block...

At least 30 people were killed and over 24 others wounded after a suicide car bomb hit a military camp in Ghazni city, capital of Afghanistan's eastern Ghazni province, on Sunday, Baz Mohammad Hemat, director of Ghazni hospital, confirmed. One suicide bomber was killed after detonating an explosive-laden vehicle roughly at 7:37 a.m. local time on Sunday along a road connecting Ghazni city and neighboring Dih Yak district. The targeted camp belonged to the Public Protection Police Forces, according to a local official. All of the victims are security personnel. Another bombing on Sunday, in Afghanistan's southern Zabul province, targeting...

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A mysterious silver monolith that was placed in the Utah desert has disappeared less than 10 days after it was spotted by wildlife biologists performing a helicopter survey of bighorn sheep, federal officials and witnesses said.

A few days ago, I wrote on the 5-4 decision by the Supreme Court to strike down Andrew Cuomo’s clearly unconstitutional COVID regulations. They were clearly unconstitutional because they specifically and unfairly targeted religious institutions. Cuomo didn’t even really attempt to make a salient case, as one simply doesn’t exist. His rules have been arbitrary and discriminatory, worrying more about Jewish kids going to school than mass protests in the street. Neil Gorsuch eviscerated Cuomo in response (see Neil Gorsuch Murders Andrew Cuomo, Twitter Murders John Roberts) Justice Gorsuch finally puts words to the thoughts of many. #SCOTUS pic.twitter.com/sXdvtkDm7x —...

Let's Celebrate Sheila's Life with Pictures and Memories.

Wilton Gregory, Biden’s Kind of BishopHe will treat Joe softly no matter what he does.Wilton Gregory, the archbishop of Washington, D.C., is basking in the praise of the mainstream media. Reports of his elevation to cardinal have generated such gushing headlines as: “Archbishop Gregory stood up to Trump. Now he’s about to be the first Black cardinal in U.S.”In June, Gregory blasted Trump for trying to “silence” the mob during the riots outside the White House. Gregory’s criticism conformed perfectly to the media’s line. He accused Trump of clearing the mob for a mere “photo op.” After Trump visited the...

Well, you really can’t be surprised with the bumper car of numbers that we have seen with COVID-19 given by the government that they would admit once again that they estimated how many people have caught this. This time though the number is pretty darn high. According to the Center for Disease Control, many more millions of Americans so far have caught the COVID-19 and they now say it could be as high as 1/3 of the country. From the New York Post… The record surge in coronavirus cases across the US is likely far worse, with an estimated eight...