Free Republic

All in-park overnight lodging will be closed for incoming arrivals beginning on Monday, December 7, 2020 and will remain closed until further notice. All overnight camping within Yosemite National Park will be prohibited beginning on Monday, December 7, 2020 until further notice. This includes all park campgrounds, wilderness camping, and overnight use along climbing routes. Overnight backpacking trips into Yosemite’s wilderness will also be prohibited. All visitors planning trips to Yosemite are asked to be our partner in recreating responsibly. Yosemite National Park conducts hundreds of search and rescue missions each year, many of which could be avoided with visitors...

"It sucks because we just put this up and it's like all new and everything," says Jasmine Kamali of 71 Saint Peter Restaurant on San Pedro Street in San Jose. Sadness among many workers who will now be out of a job. Those like Ann Truong at O Beauty Studio who is already five months behind on her rent. "If this closing keeps happening I can't afford to pay rent, I might have to close down my business and take the loss," says Truong.

Animal shelters are a practical response to a sad reality: Sometimes pets get lost or people are no longer interested or able to care for their furry friends, and dogs and cats need a safe place to stay. But the end goal is always to get those critters into safe, warm, caring forever homes. This has been a weird year, with shelters seeing an influx of pets that families could no longer care for alongside a renewed interest in fostering as people started working from home. Numbers have fluctuated as people returned to work, and the holidays are a double-edged...

Alex and Fara were toasting the holidays, with one last outdoor brunch. "We're trying to enjoy the last few minutes of eating outside before lockdown," said Alex Villafuerte. Server Raul Flores was setting up tables at Sotto Mare restaurant, he's being laid off until January. "It's my only job, I don't have another one. I have to stay home, no parties, no family times," Flores said. "It comes at the worst possible time, during the holidays. I think there would be less uncertainty because there's an end to the health order but I'm not certain January 4 is the day...

Amazing photo of @realDonaldTrump during his visitto Mount Rushmore on July 3, 2020 https://twitter.com/IvankaTrump/status/1335976353854844928

Audrey Strauss, the Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Ralph Sozio, the United States Marshal for the Southern District of New York, and Dermot Shea, the Commissioner of the New York City Police Department (“NYPD”), announced today the filing of a Complaint in Manhattan federal court charging GRANT GRANDISON with making false statements to federal agents and harboring or concealing a person from arrest. As alleged, GRANDISON allowed Andre K. Sterling, a fugitive wanted for the November 20, 2020, shooting of a state trooper in Massachusetts, to reside in his Bronx apartment. GRANDISON further allegedly...

Noxious Marxist theories that have festered in academia for decades finally burst out of ivy-covered walls in 2020, invading all aspects of American life. It wasn’t just the cities succumbing to nightly riots—everything from sporting events, to classrooms, to the workplace was hammered with the message that America was never the land of the free. Even “Jeopardy”—the beloved television quiz show that ratifies when a meme has become an integral part of American culture—had a question in December on the New York Times’ "1619 Project," which claims that “our founding ideals of liberty and equality were false when they were...

Venezuela’s illegitimate socialist regime attempted to celebrate the results of its rigged legislative elections Sunday as a “people’s victory” despite record-low turnout that the polling firm Meganálisis estimated to be less than 20 percent of eligible voters.Rubén Chirino Leañez, the CEO of Meganálisis, told Breitbart News in an interview Sunday that the turnout was especially embarrassing for Nicolás Maduro’s regime because the socialists used extortion and threats, including the threat of losing access to food, to get people to the polls.“The government was going to deploy its entire apparatus, everything: the infrastructure, the pressure, the military,” Chirino explained. “They pressured...

After the 2016 presidential election, I wrote an exceptionally unpopular op-ed for The Washington Post headlined, “We must weed out ignorant Americans from the electorate.” In it, I noted that “never have so many people with so little knowledge made so many consequential decisions for the rest of us.” My assumption has always been that the Post only accepted the piece because its editors believed I was aiming my criticism exclusively at the right-wing populists who had just voted for Donald Trump. If so, they were wrong. My skepticism extends to all sides. And to all elections. Indeed, today, the...

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) teamed up with Dr. Anthony Fauci for a press conference on Monday during which the governor compared himself and Fauci to actors Robert De Niro and Al Pacino. The governor also said that he will increase the frequency of his formerly daily press briefings, for which he recently won an International Emmy award.

n Ohio dad was not about to let his son’s high school basketball game begin without the National Anthem. Unfortunately, the audio system failed so Trenton Brown sang it on his own from the stands. This was his first time singing the National Anthem solo and he completely nailed it. The Star Spangled Banner is a very challenging song to sing even with practice. Brown decided to belt out the song with some encouragement from his wife to kick off the game.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer extended the three-week coronavirus “pause” on Monday by “12 days” and claimed “hope is on the horizon.” On November 15, Whitmer announced the state was regressing despite her relentless coronavirus orders and shuttered in-person dining as well as in-person learning for high schoolers.

If #SCOTUS grants cert in the PA election case, I have told the petitioners I will stand ready to present the oral argument. Full statement below...

The Arizona Supreme Court agreed Monday to hear an election challenge brought by the state’s Republican Party Chair Kelli Ward concerning mail-in ballots in Maricopa County. A lower court judge dismissed her case Friday, but she took the challenge to the state’s highest court and has said a small sample of ballots and envelopes she was able to inspect showed some irregularities. Arizona results show presumptive President-elect Joseph R. Biden topping President Trump by about 10,457 votes, or 0.3%.

Up until today, when using Microsoft Bing to search "Trump Twitter", the very first result was a direct link to the president's twitter feed. Now when you search the same words, his feed is nowhere to be found, and instead you get article after article of how the president is posting "election nonsense" to his feed nonstop. As an added bonus, there is also a news banner in the right frame from the "CyberSecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency" (cisa.gov/rumorcontrol) The CISA "responsible for monitoring and helping states with election security, addresses election misinformation and disinformation on this page." Can't image...

Rep. Cedric Richmond said the refusal of the vast majority of GOP members of Congress to recognize presumptive President-elect Joseph R. Biden as the winner of the 2020 race underscores how President Trump has “absolutely neutered” the Republican Party. During an appearance on CNN, Mr. Richmond, who Mr. Biden tapped as a senior adviser in the White House Office of Public Engagement, was asked to weigh in on a Washington Post report that found that 27 out of the 249 Republicans in the House and Senate acknowledged Mr. Biden won the election.

We are at another time for choosing. I refuse to give up and accept that the best days of the GOP – and of America – are a thing of the past. https://t.co/6KjQ1TCE02— Larry Hogan (@LarryHogan) December 7, 2020

Jamar Long Sentenced to More than Seventeen Years and Reddell Smith Sentenced to More than Seven Years in Prison for RICO ConvictionsSYRACUSE, NEW YORK – Jamar Long, 25, and Reddell Smith, 35, both of Syracuse, were sentenced today to serve 210 months (Long), and 78 months (Smith), respectively, in federal prison for violating the Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), announced Acting United States Attorney Antoinette T. Bacon, Thomas F. Relford, Special Agent in Charge of the Albany Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and Syracuse Police Chief Kenton Buckner. Senior United State District Judge Frederick J....

The 2017-2018 influenza epidemic is sending people to hospitals and urgent-care centers in every state, and medical centers are responding with extraordinary measures: asking staff to work overtime, setting up triage tents, restricting friends and family visits and canceling elective surgeries, to name a few. “We are pretty much at capacity, and the volume is certainly different from previous flu seasons,” says Dr. Alfred Tallia, professor and chair of family medicine at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical Center in New Brunswick, New Jersey. “I’ve been in practice for 30 years, and it’s been a good 15 or 20 years since...

2020 Election Timeline! 2020 Election Timeline!Here is what the US Constitution, Title 3 of the US Code and #WeThePeople demand occur over the next month. Read carefully and then #FightLikeAFlynn !@GenFlynn @SidneyPowell1 @LLinWood @RudyGiuliani @JennaEllisEsq @jbinnall @abigailcfrye pic.twitter.com/zAal8GgvgK— Ivan E. Raiklin (@Raiklin) December 7, 2020