Free Republic

Robert Hanssen was one of the most damaging spies in the history of the FBI. The former US agent, who has died in prison, leaked top secrets to Moscow for nearly 20 years - betrayals that the agency says cost lives. It took 300 agents to finally bring him down. Two of them who played a central part tell us how they did it. In December 2000, FBI agent Richard Garcia had a curious visit from a colleague overseeing the Russia desk. "He asked, 'Do you know a guy named Robert Hanssen?'" Mr Garcia recalled. "I said, 'No'." The official...

Former Attorney General Bill Barr pushed back on former President Trump’s characterization of the special counsel’s documents probe as politically motivated and said he thinks the public eventually will come to realize the former president’s culpability. “Over time, people will see that this is not a case of the Department of Justice conducting a witch hunt,” Barr said in an interview on CBS Tuesday. “In fact, they approached this very delicately and with deference to the president, and this would have gone nowhere had the president just returned the documents. But he jerked them around for a year and a...

Leading pro-life organizations will hold a “National Celebrate Life Day” rally and gala in Washington, D.C., on June 24, the first anniversary of the reversal of Roe v. Wade. Students for Life of America (SFLA) announced the event in an April press release. The rally will be held on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall from 10:30 a.m. to noon and will be co-hosted by SFLA, 40 Days for Life, Live Action, and Pro-Life Partners Foundation. SFLA President Kristan Hawkins said in the release that the first anniversary of the Dobbs v. Jackson Supreme Court decision...

"Just left meeting for House Oversight. The FBI is afraid their informant will be killed if unmasked, based on the info he has brought forward about the Biden family," Luna wrote...... On Monday evening, Representative Anna Paulina Luna revealed that the FBI is reportedly "afraid" that their informant who brought forth information regarding a bribery scheme involving Biden during his days as Obama’s vice president would be "killed if unmasked." "Just left meeting for House Oversight. The FBI is afraid their informant will be killed if unmasked, based on the info he has brought forward about the Biden family," Luna...

[Catholic Caucus] In head-scratching cases, “It’s the transparency, stupid”The case of the Carmelite nuns in Fort Worth, Texas, has been a head-scratching one since the moment it made the papers about a week ago. It had all the elements of a sensational story – and a salacious one, to boot – even before the Vatican intervention, but very little is known for certain.The barest bones of the story are that the Bishop of Fort Worth, Michael Olson, opened an investigation in April into at least one unspecified allegation of sexual misconduct against the superior of the Carmelite monastic community in...

A sweeping review into the country's electoral system is recommending the voting age be lowered to 16, a 3.5 per cent party threshold, and a public referendum on a longer Parliamentary term. An independent panel of experts has been considering public submissions on nearly every aspect of electoral law, commissioned by former Justice Minister Kris Faafoi in May last year. After 58 public meetings and more than 1700 submissions it is now reporting a swathe of draft recommendations to make electoral laws 'fairer, clearer and more accessible'. "There have been piecemeal changes to electoral law over many years, including some...

Fox News contributor Kellyanne Conway said Tuesday on Fox News Channel’s “America’s Newsroom” that progressive activist Cornel West’s third-party presidential bid could decide the 2024 election. Conway said, “Even if you don’t become president, you as a third party candidate spoiler can decide who is the president. This happened in 1992 when we had Bush 41 as the incumbent and a guy named Bill Clinton the Arkansas governor got elected with 43 1/2% of the vote. Why? because Ross Perot got 19% of the popular vote even though he did not rack up any electoral votes.”

Boeing on Tuesday warned about a new defect on its 787 Dreamliner planes and that it will delay deliveries of the wide-body aircraft, the manufacturer’s latest production issue. “We are inspecting 787s in our inventory for a nonconforming condition related to a fitting on the horizontal stabilizer,” Boeing said in a statement. “Airplanes found to have a nonconforming condition will be reworked prior to ticket and delivery.” Boeing said the issue isn’t related to flight safety and that planes in service can continue operating. The problem is the latest in a spate of manufacturing issues on Boeing planes that have...

(LifeSiteNews) — Russell Moore, former head of the Southern Baptist convention in the U.S., criticized Uganda’s recent anti-sodomy law as “unchristian,” after conservative backlash over comments from Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz on Twitter that characterized the law as “grotesque” and “an abomination.” “One might be surprised to see Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) — not known for repudiating the far extremes of his base — labeled on various social media platforms as soft, weak, and compromising,” Moore said. “Some even suggested that Cruz was rejecting the Word of God itself. His radically ‘progressive’ idea? That Uganda shouldn’t criminalize homosexuality and...

For almost 20 years now, I have been guided by this principle when it comes to LGBTQ people and issues: reach out to the people with compassion; resist the agenda with courage. But how, exactly, is this done? And how does it play out in terms of the people we are called to reach and the agenda we are called to resist?

A federal judge sided Tuesday with families who sued over Florida’s ban on gender transition procedures for minors, declaring that “gender identity is real.”A group of families, backed by several LGBT activist groups, sued Florida in March shortly after the rule restricting minors from accessing surgical sex change procedures, puberty blockers and hormone therapy took effect. Northern District of Florida Judge Robert L. Hinkle, a Clinton appointee, granted a preliminary injunction against the law to prohibit it from being enforced against the plaintiffs, arguing that the “great weight of medical authority supports these treatments.”Hinkle repeatedly stressed the reality of “gender...

PHILADELPHIA – A highly unusual weather pattern is bringing critically dangerous wildfire conditions Tuesday to a swath of the Northeast and mid-Atlantic, including the Philadelphia and New Jersey area. Meanwhile, wildfire smoke from multiple blazes already burning across Canada has flooded the region’s skies with renewed haze and poor air quality. A deep and dry layer of air moved into the Great Lakes Monday night and is spreading into parts of the Northeast on Tuesday, dropping the humidity to as low as 25% and bringing a swath of breezy, gusty winds. Meanwhile, an upper-level trough of low pressure is expected...

Saying gender identity is real, a federal judge temporarily blocked portions of a new Florida law that bans transgender minors from receiving puberty blockers, ruling Tuesday that the state has no rational basis for denying patients treatment. Judge Robert Hinkle issued a preliminary injunction, saying three transgender children can continue receiving treatment. The lawsuit challenges the law Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed shortly before he announced a run for president. “The elephant in the room should be noted at the outset. Gender identity is real. The record makes this clear,” Hinkle said, adding that even a witness for the state...

For the entirety of his 2020 presidential campaign and the 28 months of his presidency, Joe Biden has been a sick man. During the campaign, he was so feeble that his political handlers kept him locked in the basement.

Dear Life in Plastic, You say that no man wants a woman who has let herself go, but there is a very big difference between aging naturally and taking care of yourself, and opting for plastic surgery. In fact, the vast majority of men infinitely prefer the natural look. Honestly, I’m trying to think of anyone I know who prefers a trout pout, unnaturally filled cheekbones and a brow that is sky-high, and I can’t think of one decent man who would choose that. I’m not anti-plastic surgery, but I am asking you to question your own sense of worth....

Recent polls indicate that House Speaker Dade Phelan’s popularity is plummeting in his district. House District 24, which prior to redistricting was the shape of a horseshoe encompassing Winnie, Port Arthur, Beaumont and Orange in southeast Texas, now includes a sliver of the region stretching north to include Jasper County. Two polls conducted by CWS Research, LLC, a veteran-owned general consulting and data analytics firm hired by Defend Texas Liberty PAC, show Phelan’s favorability has dropped by roughly half after the 88th general legislative session. Both polls surveyed likely 2024 Texas Republican primary voters in Texas House District 21. The...

A sonic boom was heard across the Washington, DC, area Sunday afternoon when military jets raced after an unresponsive private plane that crossed into restricted airspace and later crashed, killing all four people onboard. The deafening boom rang out when two F-16 fighter jets were scrambled from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland to investigate the aircraft that was not responding to radio transmissions shortly after 3 p.m., according to the Department of Defense. Residents around the capital and surrounding communities were left bewildered until more information came out. The F-16s were deployed after the private Cessna flew into restricted airspace...

ALBANY – Controversial “Clean Slate” legislation will no longer allow murder convictions and other serious felonies to get sealed after Albany Democrats tweaked bill language on Monday. The proposal would allow convicted people to apply to have their crimes nixed from their records after they serve their sentences, parole, and probation as well as a period of three years for misdemeanors and eight years for felonies. Narrowing the scope of the bill, which also exempts sex crimes, comes as Albany Democrats near a final deal on passing the bill before the scheduled end of the 2023 legislative session on Friday....

ESG scoring is a financial racket, and we're starting to learn how it works. The unfolding saga with huge American corporations like Anheuser-Busch (Bud Light) and Target are showing us a glimpse of what's going on behind the curtain with this cartel scam that's trapping our corporations. One tool of this cartel is the Human Rights Campaign's "Corporate Equality Index," which is concerned with "LGBTQ+" issues and is used as a scoring mechanism for the S, Social (Justice), part of ESG scoring. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay walks through how the ESG racket works,...