Free Republic

WASHINGTON — Former President Joe Biden has told some Democratic leaders he’ll raise funds, campaign and do anything else necessary for Democrats to recover lost ground as the Trump administration rolls back programs the party helped design, according to people close to him. Biden privately met last month with the new Democratic National Committee chairman, Ken Martin, and offered to help as the party struggles to regain its viability amid polling that shows its popularity has been sinking, the people said. So far, Biden's overture seems to have fallen flat. Democrats find themselves adrift, casting about for a compelling messenger....

Ben Gerrard had just sat down for Sunday lunch when he got a text from his friend Kurt that began to unravel a bizarre small-town crime spree. 'My pride flag got stolen last night, did yours?' Gerrard was out of town, so he checked his doorbell camera to see if the LGBTQ flag was still flying from the porch of his house in Chestertown, Maryland. His was gone too. Mystified, he wound his Ring doorbell footage back until 12.41am and caught the heist in action. The footage showed two teenagers run up the steps, unhook the flag, and sprint back...

ORLANDO, Fla. -- A woman drowned her dog in a Florida airport bathroom and then boarded her international flight after she was prevented from bringing the white miniature schnauzer with her because of a paperwork issue, authorities said. The woman was arrested in Lake County on Wednesday on a charge of aggravated animal abuse, a third-degree felony. She was released on $5,000 bail. “This act was intentional and resulted in a cruel and unnecessary death of the animal,” said an arrest affidavit from the Orlando Police Department. Online court records showed no attorney listed for the woman from Kenner, Louisiana....

Candida auris, also called C. auris, was first identified in the U.S. in 2016. Since then, the number of cases have increased every year, jumping substantially in 2023 (the last year of data available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). Recently, cases have proliferated in Georgia, the state’s health department told local news outlet WJCL. A study published this week, which focused on the Jackson Health System in Miami also found cases of the fungus have “rapidly increased.” ... People with a healthy immune system may be able to fight off infection on their own, but Candida auris...

[Catholic Caucus] "Lovest Thou Me More Than These?" | The Restoration of Peter and His Primacy in the Catholic Church“Simon, son of John, lovest thou me more than these?” The dialogue between Christ and Peter on the shores of Tiberias is thus far more than a moment of personal reconciliation. It is a solemn ecclesiastical commissioning that establishes Peter as the supreme shepherd of the Church.When the risen Christ appears to His disciples on the shores of the Sea of Tiberias, He offers a poignant moment of reconciliation and commissioning that holds profound theological significance for the Church. The exchange...

Interesting 59-minute interview regarding DOGE, the near future of AI, 10-20% chance of killer robots annihilating humanity in 5-10 years.

Following Friday night’s reported mass shooting in Las Cruces, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham lambasted lawmakers for what she described as a failure to take action on juvenile crime during the 60-day session ending at noon on Saturday. Police are continuing to investigate Friday night’s shooting at approximately 10 p.m. at Young Park in Las Cruces that killed three and injured 14 others. The deceased are two 19-year-old men and one 16-year-old boy. The injured range in age from 16 years to 36 years. Police have not as of publication, released the names of any of the victims, not...

It's easy enough to trace the decline of young white men in American letters—just browse The New York Times’s “Notable Fiction” list. In 2012 the Times included seven white American men under the age of 43 (the cut-off for a millennial today); in 2013 there were six, in 2014 there were six. And then the doors shut. By 2021, there was not one white male millennial on the “Notable Fiction” list. There were none again in 2022, and just one apiece in 2023 and 2024 (since 2021, just 2 of 72 millennials featured were white American men). There were no...

[Catholic Caucus] Pope appoints ‘critically loyal’ theologian to ecclesiastical universities’ oversight Pope Francis appointed on Friday a Belgian theologian who describes herself as "critically loyal" to the Church to serve on a Vatican body responsible for overseeing ecclesiastical universities. The appointment is likely to prove controversial, as theologian Bénedicte Lemmelijn is dean of the theology department at a university which called last year for women’s ordination and a “rethink” on the Church’s moral theology regarding sexuality.—The Vatican announced March 21 that Lemmelijn, dean of the faculty of theology and religious studies at KU Leuven had been appointed a member of...

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has faced calls to respond after the Trump administration cut funding to seven Australian universities. The administration's move came after US agencies asked Australian researchers to justify why they should continue receiving American research grants. The surveys they received asked several questions including whether the researchers had received funding from China, and if their university had recognised only two sexes - male and female.

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage put on a brave face this week, as he sought to put a blazing row with one of the party's now suspended MPs behind him. The party is still neck-and-neck with Labour in the polls, and on Monday, it showed off 29 councillors who had recently defected to Reform UK. While Farage acknowledged there had been "a little bit of turbulence", he stressed the upset was "very much at the edges". But does the disquiet within the party go deeper than he suggested? Divisions have become more acute in a party that now boasts more...

NEW YORK (AP) — An Orthodox Jewish passenger says a United Airlines pilot forcibly removed him from an airplane bathroom while he was experiencing constipation, exposing his genitalia to other flyers during a flight from Tulum, Mexico, to Houston. Yisroel Liebb, of New Jersey, described his trip through allegedly unfriendly skies in a federal lawsuit this week against the airline and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, whose officers he said boarded the plane upon landing and took him away in handcuffs.

President Donald Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is reopening an immigration detention center in Baldwin, Michigan, that President Joe Biden had shut down. The detention center will help ICE hold nearly 2,000 illegal aliens in custody. This week, GEO Group announced a contract with ICE to reopen the immigration detention center in Baldwin, which will have the capacity to hold about 1,800 illegal aliens so they are not released into American communities. “We expect that our company-owned North Lake Facility in Michigan will play an important role in helping meet the need for increased federal immigration processing center bed...

If you find yourself wondering, wait, what, why are we funding Australian universities? You are likely not alone.Apparently, the U.S. government has been sending $6oo million/yr to universities in Australia to subsidize various college research programs. The Trump administration has told Australia the funding will likely end.The Australian university system is in a state of panic, telling their government to declare a “state of emergency”.One particular quote from within the Sky News article below seemingly encapsulates the mindset of the situation in the land down under:AUSTRALIA […] Last week after it was revealed the universities had been asked to justify...

The Trump administration is revoking the legal status of more than 500,000 migrants who entered the United States through a Biden administration parole program. CBS News reported that 532,000 migrants from countries such as Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, who entered the country through a program called CHNV, will have their “work permits and deportation protections” terminated in April. Per CBS News: The move will affect immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela who flew to the U.S. under a Biden administration program, known as CHNV, that was designed to reduce illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border by giving would-be...

Kitty Dukakis, the wife of former Massachusetts governor and 1988 Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis, has died at the age of 88, Fox News Digital has confirmed. Her son, John Dukakis, said that the wife and mother of three died Friday night "surrounded by family." "She was born on December 26, 1936, and lived a full life fighting to make the world a better place and sharing her vulnerabilities to help others face theirs," he said in a statement. "She was loving, feisty and fun, and had a keen sensitivity to people from all walks of life. She and our...

(The Epoch Times)—The Department of Justice filed a motion on March 21 requesting District of Columbia District Judge Beryl Howell disqualify herself from Perkins Coie LLP’s case challenging President Donald Trump’s executive order against it due to her publicly declared disdain for the president and her connection with essential aspects of the case.This Court has not kept its disdain for President Trump secret,” Chad Mizelle, acting associate attorney general, wrote in his motion. “It has voiced its thoughts loudly—both inside and outside the courtroom.”Inside the courtroom, Mizelle noted that during now-former special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of Trump, she found...

Eagle Pass, Texas, police officers apprehended two men shortly after they illegally crossed the Rio Grande from Mexico into the U.S. The men were wearing wet suits and apparently used underwater propulsion devices to assist their undetected crossing. A vigilant Eagle Pass resident contacted the Eagle Pass Police Department after noticing two suspicious people in their south Eagle Pass neighborhood. Officers responded and found two men attempting to hide under a bridge, police officials posted on Facebook. The officers took the two men into custody after identifying them as Guatemalan migrants who illegally crossed the border from Mexico into Texas....

Australian universities are crying foul after the Trump administration asks questions that put $386 million in research grants in jeopardy. The bone of contention was a questionnaire sent to Australian grant recipients asking if the institution had "ties to communist or socialist parties, receive funding from China and it only recognises male and female sexes." The grants were frozen in January, shortly after President Trump was inaugurated, but were unfrozen at some time thereafter. This new round of questions is the second time the universities were queried, but this time, it has their attention. Seven days after the Trump administration...

Nike is still struggling. The iconic shoe company just reported a shocking sales collapse that has fans worried about the store's future. It's a bleak update in a saga that has seen arguably America's most legendary athletic fashion brand struggle to put popular products on its shelves. 'To me it seems that the only thing Nike has going for them is brand image to justify outrageous prices,' one customer recently complained on Reddit. '$200 for a sneaker? Yeah right.' Nike's sales dropped 9 percent, a staggering $1.16 billion fall in the value of shoes, tracksuits, and t-shirts. Executives said the...