Free Republic

Veteran political correspondent Howard Fineman, who spent three decades covering the corridors of power in Washington for Newsweek before becoming an analyst for MSNBC and other outlets, died from pancreatic cancer, his wife announced Tuesday. Fineman, who was 75, died Monday at his home in Washington.

Puerto Rico’s elections commission has announced that is will be reviewing its contract prior to the November 2024 election with Dominion Voting Systems after finding hundreds of discrepancies while using over 6,000 Dominion Voting machines during their heated primary elections. ... machine-reported vote counts were lower than the paper ones in some cases, and some machines reversed certain totals or reported zero votes for some candidates. ... This isn’t the first time states or counties have discussed canceling their contracts with Dominion Voting Systems. In an interview with Georgia’s SOS Brad Raffensberger, who many believe is an untrustworthy election official,...

A federal judge on Tuesday struck down a 2023 Florida law that blocked gender-affirming care for transgender minors and severely restricted such treatment for adults, calling the statute unconstitutional. Senior Judge Robert Hinkle said the state went too far when it barred transgender minors from being prescribed puberty blockers and hormonal treatments with their parents’ permission. He also stopped the state from requiring that transgender adults receive treatment only from doctors, and not from registered nurses or other qualified medical practitioners. And he barred the state’s ban on online treatment for transgender adults.Hinkle said transgender people are constitutionally entitled to...

Four Russian warships including a nuclear submarine have reached Cuba, just 200 miles off the coast of Florida, ahead of a planned military exercise in the Atlantic. The fleet — made up of a frigate, a nuclear-powered submarine, an oil tanker and a rescue tug — arrived in Havana Bay on Wednesday, welcomed by a 21-cannon salute from Cuba.

In Oakland, California, a startling incident unfolded as a 77-year-old homeowner found himself at the center of a controversial arrest after fatally shooting a robbery suspect. The homeowner, whose identity remains undisclosed, was taken into custody under suspicion of murder following the tragic event that transpired at 98th Avenue and Burr Street in East Oakland on Monday evening. Reports indicate that the homeowner encountered a harrowing situation when two men and a woman arrived at his property in a stolen Infiniti Q40. Eyewitnesses recall observing the trio trespass onto the premises, with one of the men wielding a crowbar. The...

Jerry West, who was selected to the Basketball Hall of Fame three times in a storied career as a player and executive and whose silhouette is considered to be the basis of the NBA logo, died Wednesday morning, the Los Angeles Clippers announced. He was 86. West, nicknamed “Mr. Clutch” for his late-game exploits as a player, went into the Hall of Fame as a player in 1980 and again as a member of the 1960 U.S. Olympic Team in 2010. He will be enshrined for a third time later this year as a contributor. President Donald Trump gives the...

The odds that former President Donald Trump will win back the White House have increased to a record high of 58%, according to political oddsmaker SportsHandle. Its latest election odds tracker of overseas betting on the race shows President Joe Biden trailing badly. His odds of winning reelection are just 39%.The site said that at 58.6%, Trump’s winning odds are the highest he has seen. What’s more, the site showed that Trump has maintained a lead since last October.In an analysis provided to Secrets, SportsHandle said, “Even in the aftermath of Donald Trump’s historic criminal trial, his chances of winning...

First, let’s dispel the myth that Hunter Biden’s conviction on gun charges proves that Joe Biden’s Department of Justice dispenses justice fairly.Democrats contend that Hunter is only facing gun charges because he’s the president’s son. While it’s true lying on a background check is rarely prosecuted, it’s mostly because people tend to avoid confessing in their published memoirs.Indeed, Hunter is exceptionally lucky he’s only facing tax and gun charges. Though, perhaps, lucky is the wrong word.It wasn’t luck, after all, that AG Merrick Garland did basically everything within his power to keep Hunter out of a courtroom. After the Trump...

Across the U.S., thieves have been targeting electric-vehicle charging stations, intent on stealing the cables, which contain copper wiring DETROIT -- Just before 2 a.m. on a chilly April night in Seattle, a Chevrolet Silverado pickup stopped at an electric vehicle charging station on the edge of a shopping center parking lot. Two men, one with a light strapped to his head, got out. A security camera recorded them pulling out bolt cutters. One man snipped several charging cables; the other loaded them into the truck. In under 2½ minutes, they were gone. The scene that night has become part...

Opill, the first birth control pill approved to be sold without a prescription, has landed on shelves at some Walgreens stores. The pill is also available to order online from Amazon, CVS, Walgreens and the Opill website. It’s the first time that U.S. residents are able to buy birth control pills over the counter — the same way they would purchase Tylenol or Advil — though many states allow pharmacists to dispense birth control pills to patients without a prescription. Sriha Srinivasan, 21, said she plans to start taking Opill as soon as she can find it at a store...

Dominion Voting Systems’ electronic voting machines contract with the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico is under threat after contentious primaries produced upset results. According to election officials, some machines reported zero votes for certain candidates or reversed count totals. Counts reported by machines were also sometimes lower than paper counts. “The concern is that we obviously have elections in November, and we must provide the [island] not only with the assurance that the machine produces a correct result but also that the result it produces is the same one that is reported,” said Jessika Padilla, interim president of Puerto Rico’s...

Then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) arrives with her daughter Alexandra at the Americans for the Arts National Arts Awards in New York City in 2009. (Lucas Jackson/Reuters) HBO empowers the entitled in worshipful documentaries made by the daughter of the former speaker. Alexandra Pelosi is the second-to-last person you’d trust to do a documentary about the January 6 demonstration and its chilling, weaponized aftereffects — including political prisoners and the misuse of the word “insurrection.” As the daughter of Nancy Pelosi, who was Speaker of the House of Representatives during the J6 turmoil, Alexandra has an obvious conflict of...

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95 years ago today, on June 12th, 1929, Democrats across the country expressed outrage that President Herbert Hoover’s wife, Lou, invited an African-American woman to a White House reception. First Lady Lou Hoover, a Republican, held a luncheon for the wives of Republican congressmen. Mrs. Hoover refused the Democrats’ demands that she rescind her invitation to Jessie De Priest, wife of Oscar De Priest, an African-American congressman from Chicago. The Luncheon went on as planned.

People recorded Nancy Pelosi and Samuel Alito. The circumstances behind the recordings of the two most prominent Italian-Americans in U.S. public life diverge from that point. “We have responsibility, Terri,” then-Speaker Pelosi told her chief of staff on Jan. 6, 2021. “We did not have any accountability for what was going on there, and we should have. This is ridiculous. You’re gonna ask me in the middle of the thing, when they’ve already breached the inaugural stuff that, ‘Should we call the Capitol Police?’ I mean, ‘the National Guard.’ Why weren’t the National Guard there to begin with?”She privately admits...

While the Biden administration continues prosecuting pro-life Americans, Mark Houck is fighting back in court. Pro-life group 40 Days for Life filed a lawsuit recently against the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) for “[m]alicious/retaliatory prosecution, abuse of process, false arrest and related claims” committed against pro-life advocate and Catholic father of seven Mark Houck. In 2022, Houck was indicted by the DOJ for two alleged violations of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. Houck was eventually exonerated on the bogus charges Biden officials brought. The lawsuit claims that these charges “were a result of a faulty and...

A homeowner who fatally shot a burglary suspect in Oakland on Monday has been arrested.

Radical abortion activist Chuck Schumer the head of Senate Democrat in Congress, has made June a month to celebrate and promote abortion. Abortion advocates like Schumer like to pretend that they’re pro-choice – but the only choice they ever promote is abortion. Here is a response from SBA Pro-Life president Marjorie Dannenfelser to Schumer declaring June “Abortion Month.” It’s crystal clear: abortion extremists like Chuck Schumer will stop at nothing to push their abortion-first agenda in 2024. Schumer recently declared June “Abortion Month,” rallying his allies to advance their extreme agenda before the 2024 election. They have pushed deceitful bills...

Ben & Candy Carson @RealBenCarsonI’m looking forward to being in my hometown this weekend with my friend and our next President, @realDonaldTrump . It’s hard to believe this photo was taken outside my childhood home nearly 8 years ago. The battle to save our country continues, and we will prevail. @TeamTrump

DETROIT (AP) — An appeals court is raising major questions about the trial of two key figures in a plot to kidnap Michigan’s governor — and putting federal prosecutors on the defensive as the government tries to preserve the extraordinary guilty verdicts.After hearing arguments in May, the court took the uncommon step of asking for more written briefs on the impact of a trial judge’s decision to bar evidence that might have supported claims of entrapment made by Adam Fox and Barry Croft Jr.Fox and Croft are in prison for leading a conspiracy to try to snatch Gov. Gretchen Whitmer...