Free Republic

A federal appeals court on Wednesday reversed an order requiring Texas to move a floating barrier on the Rio Grande that drew backlash from Mexico — the latest development in legal battles between the Biden administration and Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott over control of migration at the border. In December, a divided panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had sided with a federal district judge in Texas who said the buoys must be moved. On Wednesday, the court vacated the panel's 2-1 ruling after a majority of its 17 active judges voted to rehear the case....

President Trump on Wednesday was photographed while he was on his way to a Manhattan court to attend a trial where the jury will decide how much he has to pay E. Jean Carroll for his so-called ‘defamatory’ statements about her. The left-wing media freaked out over red marks on President Trump’s right hand. It could be red marker or blisters from playing golf, but miserable leftists like James Carville immediately claimed Trump has syphilis. “So this photo of lesions on Trump’s hand is real and from today,” far left ‘reporter’ Aaron Rupar said on X. So this photo of...

In a startling revelation, an insider at CVS has leaked internal documents shedding light on potential criminal violations of the Civil Rights Act. The leaked information suggests that CVS leadership is operating under directives to make hiring and promotion decisions based on race and gender, a practice that raises serious ethical and legal concerns.

It’s a tidy parable about GOP politics in the Trumpocene: A brash billionaire provocateur positions himself as the heroic guardian of the pieties of self-made success, and then collapses into a petulant litany of grievance, xenophobia, and conspiracy mongering. As of Tuesday, Vivek Ramaswamy, the sketchy biotech financier who ran his 2024 campaign for the presidency as Donald Trump’s Gen Z mini-me, has departed from the MAGA playbook for obtaining maximum national power: After a disappointing fourth-place showing in the Iowa caucuses, netting him just 8 percent of the vote in a race that allotted delegates by percentage results, Ramaswamy...

In a notable victory for Florida’s minority party, Democrat Tom Keen was elected to the Republican-dominated Florida House in a special election held Tuesday. Facing off against “conservative patriot” Erika Booth, Keen won 51.3% of the vote in District 35, which covers parts of eastern Orange and Osceola County. The District 35 seat has been vacant since former state Rep. Fred Hawkins, resigned from the seat last year to take a job as president of South Florida State College.

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas is once again refusing to appear before the House Homeland Security Committee, this time alongside Angel Moms, who have lost their children to illegal alien crime as well as fentanyl poisoning. On Wednesday, House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green (R-TN) revealed that Mayorkas had turned down the chance to appear before the committee at its January 18 hearing.

Kamala Harris went off-script during a media interview in South Carolina and admitted the Biden-Harris plan is to run ‘without an opponent.’ Did she actually mean to say this out loud?

~ The FReeper Canteen Presents ~ ~ Remembering Our Troops!! ~ Ooh Rah! Semper Fi! U.S. Marine Corps Private First Class Selena Serrano, a Marine with Golf Company, 2nd Recruit Training Battalion, poses for a photo with her eagle, globe and anchor on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California, Jan. 5, 2022. Serrano just completed the crucible – a 54-hour event that challenges all the skills a recruit has learned throughout recruit training. Serrano was recruited out of Los Angeles, C with Recruiting Station Montebello. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Sgt. Christopher A. Madero) Canteen Mission StatementShowing support and...

Pennsylvania House Democrats advanced an “assault weapons” ban and a ban on the purchase, possession, and sale of non-serialized gun parts on Wednesday. The Democrats also advanced legislation to “prohibit accelerated trigger activators, which increase the rate of gunfire,” and a bill to “subject 3D-printed firearms to the same regulations as standard firearms,” the Associated Press reported.

The bill is broad enough to target a Saturday Night Live skit lampooning Trump, a comedic impression of Taylor Swift, or a weird ChatGPT-generated image of Ayn Rand. Mixing new technology and new laws is always a fraught business, especially if the tech in question relates to communication. Lawmakers routinely propose bills that would sweep up all sorts of First Amendment-protected speech. We've seen a lot of this with social media, and we're starting to see it with artificial intelligence. Case in point: the No Artificial Intelligence Fake Replicas And Unauthorized Duplications (No AI FRAUD) Act. Under the auspices of...

In the tumultuous financial landscape, Hong Kong investors are on a dumping spree, while their Chinese counterparts seize the opportunity to buy the dip. Today’s colossal outflow of -13 billion yuan marks the largest since the ominous October 2022, signaling a potential trend reversal. Behind the scenes, a strategic game is unfolding. Hong Kong investors appear to be pushing for a drastic move – urging the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) to embrace full-scale quantitative easing (QE) and rate cuts. However, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is caught in a bind, fearing the repercussions of soaring wages and revealing the...

While the report has the mandated left-tard spin, the numbers themselves reek of corruption.11Alive investigation uncovers Fulton County payment logs showing that the law firms of two of the 3 persecutors assigned to the Trump persecution that is being overseen by Fulton County DA Fani Willis were paid far less. Pay for the same time period for the three persecutors John Floyd’s law firm: $72,907 Anna Cross’ law firm: $90,846Nathan Wade’s law firm: $653,880.60

A team has uncovered a universal biological marker for myasthenia gravis with the aim of developing a simple, fast and accessible diagnostic test for the rare autoimmune disease. Myasthenia gravis means "severe muscle weakness." Patients may experience drooping eyelids, double vision, difficulty speaking, chewing, breathing and controlling their limbs, and can be fatal. The team used advanced proteomics techniques and discovered blood levels of the protein fibrinogen in myasthenia gravis patients at 1,000 times the level found in both healthy controls and patients who have rheumatoid arthritis, another autoimmune disorder. Current blood tests for the disease assess one of three...

Hertz is offloading used Tesla Model 3s from its fleet at a deep discount. They may be former rentals, but they're cheap enough that you have to ask yourself—would you buy one for $14,000? Hertz initially ordered 100,000 cars from Tesla, but has since pushed back its EV adoption for a multitude of reasons. The company blamed high repair costs and recent price cuts on new Teslas for the decision in an earnings call reported by CNBC. It's possible that the arrival of the 2024 Model 3's "Highland" facelift may also have pushed Hertz to liquidate. In fact, Hertz is...

Researchers at Washington State University (WSU) say they have identified key neurons in the brain that are behind an appetite-inducing phenomenon familiar to cannabis users called the munchies. Previous research found a link between cannabis use and increased activity in the hypothalamus, which, among other things, regulates appetite. The new research study takes those studies even further by identifying typically dormant appetite-increasing neurons within the same brain region, which become activated after cannabis use. The researchers behind the finding believe their work can not only aid sufferers of anorexia and other eating disorders, but may also pave the way toward...

Former President Trump said he will miss the E. Jean Carroll trial on Thursday so that he can attend his mother-in-law’s funeral, blasting the judge presiding over the case as "nasty" for not delaying court proceedings for the day. ... "So, it happened very terribly as we asked to just delay the trial for one day so I could go to the funeral tomorrow and then we could start Friday or Monday or any time they want," Trump explained. "And he said, absolutely not, the trial will go on just as it is." Trump said the judge said, "You can...

President Trump appeared in court on Wednesday as E. Jean Carroll testified in a trial where the jury will decide how much Trump has to pay for his so-called ‘defamatory’ statements about her. Judge Lewis Kaplan, a Clinton appointee, previously ruled that Trump is liable for defamatory statements he made about E. Jean Carroll after she accused him of rape. In 2019, E. Jean Carroll alleged Donald Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the 1990s. Trump has denied the allegations and called E. Jean Carroll a “whack job” who’s “not my type.” Under cross-examination by Trump’s...

Many people don’t realize that electric cars have been around for more than 100 years. One might think that the fact they have never caught on is more than a coincidence.Yesterday, Robert Bryce provided testimony on electric vehicles to the Senate’s Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. His testimony is reproduced at his Substack site. It is all worth reading; here is an excerpt:The history of the EV is a century of failure tailgating failure. In 1901, in an article headlined “Edison’s New Storage Battery,” the Los Angeles Times declared, “The electric automobile will quickly and easily take precedence over...

Blackstone defaulted on the $308 million mortgage on a Manhattan office tower more than a year ago — and the debt is now up for sale at a discount of more than 50%. ... The skyscraper has been losing value since 2014, when the mortgage was originated and 1740 Broadway was appraised at $605 million, ... Blackstone ceased funding operating shortfalls at the building and stopped paying the mortgage as of March 2022,.. Midland, however, has yet to foreclose on the tower, though it’s unclear why. ... As of September 2023, the occupancy at 1740 Broadway was a mere 7.4%,...

[Catholic Caucus] Let’s Call Out Dirty Old Men AgainOne cannot speak against the acts that used to be called deviant and perverse because those very acts are being mainstreamed and normalized by all the powers that be.I don’t know about you, but I miss the days when we could freely identify and call out dirty old men. When, without reprisal, we could recognize and denounce sexual deviance and not have to pretend that sexual perversion was normal or good. Today? All discernment on the issue of sexual perversion has been dulled and even forbidden. One cannot speak against the acts...