Free Republic

A House Democrat representing a district that President Donald Trump won in 2024 is not seeking re-election next year. Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, announced his plans in an op-ed for the Bangor Daily News on Wednesday, a day after Democrats' sweeping electoral victories in Virginia, New Jersey, California and New York City. "I have never loved politics. But I find purpose and meaning in service, and the Marine in me has been able to slog along through the many aspects of politics I dislike by focusing on the good work that Congress is capable of producing with patience and determination,"...

One Senate Democratic aide granted anonymity to discuss caucus deliberations said there is “enormous” pressure on the group to hold the line after Tuesday: “It’s hard for anyone to argue the message from voters is ‘Please cave ASAP to Trump.’” The Democrats involved in the talks received no cover from senior leaders of their party Wednesday. Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries demanded a new meeting Wednesday with Trump to discuss ending the shutdown and addressing health care, which has emerged as the centerpiece of the weeks-long spending brawl. Schumer made no secret Wednesday that he believes his party...

Travel chaos has hit across the US on Wednesday evening as staffing shortages from the ongoing government shutdown have triggered major flight delays. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said at least 17 airports, from San Francisco to Chicago and New York City, could experience delays of up to seven hours lasting into early Thursday. The average wait time is expected to be around 2 hours and 20 minutes.The affected include Newark (EWR), JFK, LaGuardia (LGA), Los Angeles (LAX), Atlanta (ATL), Chicago O’Hare (ORD), Miami (MIA), Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW), Houston (IAH, HOU) and Washington DC area (DCA, IAD, BWI).San Francisco (SFO),...

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That is the loaded questionI’m watching JAM and the Buttered Biscuits (formerly the Jeffrey A. Meyer Band) at The Shanty Shack in Santa Cruz. Their original songs have such great funk grooves I see a man eat chicken with his jaw chewing in time to the beat. The audience is reserved, they quietly watch, nobody dances. Then the band breaks into a funk version of the Beatles song “Eight Days a Week.” A young woman with black hair to her waist twirls onto the dance floor, her shoulders and hips roll like they’re wired to the bass line. She throws...

All mothers have sleepless nights. We lie awake worrying needlessly that our offspring may be in danger, but Nicky’s fears for her girls are not just fears. She believes she has very good reason to fret that her three daughters, and millions of other people’s children, are not safe. “To be honest with you, I think it’s inevitable that one day I will turn on the TV news and there will be some man I have granted asylum to and he will have raped or murdered a young girl, just like my girls.” Nicky, whose name I have changed to...

FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford told reporters that the reduction will begin on Friday and is intended to alleviate pressure on air traffic controllers. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Wednesday announced that it would reduce flight capacity at the United States' top 40 high-traffic markets by 10% later this week amid the record-long federal government shutdown.The move comes because of a staffing shortage at airports nationwide because of the government shutdown, which began on Oct. 1. The Transportation Department has seen a high number of air traffic controllers call in sick amid the shutdown because they are required to...

---SNIP--- The documents — which were released by the alleged hacker on LeakForum and reviewed by The Daily Pennsylvanian — include internal University talking points, memos about donors and their families, receipts of bank transactions, and personal identifying information. In a message accompanying the data, the group claimed that it gained “full access” to a University employee’s PennKey account and export data on “1.2 million University of Pennsylvania students, alumni, and donors” from University databases

Citing frustrations with persistent crime, a trio of North Carolina lawmakers is urging Democratic Gov. Josh Stein to deploy the National Guard in Charlotte, saying the state of the city has become "increasingly dire." "Recently, the city faced eight homicides in seven days. The murder rate in uptown Charlotte is now 200% higher than it was a year ago," the letter states. "According to the Fraternal Order of Police, aggravated assaults involving knives or guns have risen from 86 in 2024 to 111 in 2025, and personal strong-arm robberies have increased from 26 to 31 in the same period." Rep....

Rapper 50 Cent declared that 'New York is over' after Zohran Mamdani was elected mayor and urged locals to flee to the Louisiana city he poured millions into reviving. After Tuesday's election, in which Mamdani assumed his victory over Independent candidate Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa, Jackson reiterated his discontent with the far-left politician. He shared an image of a tombstone that read, 'RIP NYC,' with the city's death date as 2025. The pro-Trump artist, 50, has been flooding his social media with posts denouncing the Democratic-socialist mayoral elect while prompting like-minded New Yorkers to leave the Big Apple...

[Catholic Caucus] Quis ut Virgo? - Who is like unto Mary? -- Reflections on the Document of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, by Roberto de MatteiOn October 16, 1793, what was perhaps the most disgusting crime of the French Revolution took place: the execution of the Queen of France, Marie Antoinette, after a sham trial before the Revolutionary Tribunal. Plinio Correa de Oliveira wrote of Marie Antoinette: "There are certain souls who are only great when the winds of misfortune blow upon them. Marie Antoinette, who was futile as a princess and unforgivably frivolous in her life...

Mamdani didn't win a policy debate. He won a personality contest.Two mayoral elections in major cities with two candidates.Both Omar Fateh and Zohran Mamdani followed the familiar AOC playbook of seizing their party’s nomination in low turnout primaries or in Fateh’s case, DFL conventions, against an established candidate.Both were Islamists running on ‘free stuff’ and socialism.Mamdani beat Cuomo in New York City while in Minneapolis, Jacob Frey appears to have defeated Fateh (with not enough of a margin, leading to the election-rigging plague that is ‘ranked choice voting’ which Mamdani also benefited from.)The difference didn’t come down to policies, it...

Congressional Republicans need to do something worthy of voter support, and the party has to sharpen its early-voting ground game. The third time wasn’t the charm for Republican businessman and former New Jersey lawmaker Jack Ciattarelli in Tuesday’s race for the Garden State’s next governor. And Virginia didn’t elect its first black female governor. New Jersey and Virginia remain squarely in the blue state column.But Tuesday’s election, contrary to the left and their corporate media partners, wasn’t an early verdict on Republican President Donald Trump or a bellwether of next year’s midterms. The Democratic National Committee proclaimed far-left Abigail Spanberger’s...

Republicans wasted no time using democratic socialist Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani of New York City as a political cudgel to bash Democrats. As the 34-year-old state lawmaker from New York City was on his way to a roughly 9-point victory in Tuesday's election in the nation's most populous city, the GOP instantly took aim. "Democrats have officially handed New York City over to a self-proclaimed Communist, and hardworking families will be the ones paying the price," Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Joe Gruters claimed in a statement. "His election is proof that the Democrat Party has abandoned common sense and tied...

Earlier today, President Donald Trump delivered a speech at the America Business Forum in Miami, Florida. On the anniversary of President Trump’s historic 2024 election day win, President Trump celebrated with the assembled audience and business leaders. WATCH: President Trump Delivers Remarks to Republican Senators During Breakfast at White House. WATCH:

Nova Scotia MP Chris d'Entremont resigned from the Conservative caucus Tuesday — and he's joining the Liberals. In a statement disseminated by the Liberal Party, d'Entremont said he decided to leave the Conservatives after "serious consideration and thoughtful conversations with constituents." "I came to a clear conclusion: there is a better path forward for our country — and a better path forward for Acadie-Annapolis," he said. D'Entremont won that rural Nova Scotia riding by about one percentage point over his Liberal opponent in the spring federal election.

Russia said on Wednesday that its forces were advancing north inside Pokrovsk in a drive to take full control of the Ukrainian city, but the Ukrainian army said its units were battling hard to try to stop the Russians from gaining new ground. Ukraine has acknowledged that its troops face a difficult position in the strategic eastern city, once an important transport and logistics hub for the Ukrainian army... Russia sees the city as the gateway to its capture of the remaining 10%, or 5,000 square km (1,930 square miles) of Ukraine's eastern industrial Donbas region... The Russian defence ministry...

With Bill Gates retreating from his high-profile climate crusade, the stage has opened for more unconventional actors to step into the planetary arena. Enter Elon Musk, the chief executive of SpaceX and self-styled architect of humanity’s future in space.This week, Musk floated an audacious vision: a vast swarm of orbiting satellites, not merely to beam internet or data, but to harvest solar energy and regulate how much sunlight reaches Earth. On Monday, he wrote on his platform X:A large solar-powered AI satellite constellation would be able to prevent global warming by making tiny adjustments in how much solar energy reached...

Pennsylvania voters on Tuesday opted to retain three Democrat justices on the state Supreme Court, preserving a 5-2 liberal majority that pro-life advocates warn will expand abortion access to any reason throughout all nine months of pregnancy. With more than 54% of the vote tallied, 62.3% voted yes to retain Justice Christine Donohue, 62.5% for Justice Kevin Dougherty and 62.4% for Justice David Wecht. The outcome ensures Democrats maintain control of the court, which pro-life groups had urged voters to reject as a direct threat to unborn children. The Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation, in a pre-election alert, called on voters to...

Zohran Mamdani’s incoming administration began taking shape on Wednesday as the New York City mayor-elect announced a transition team to help enact what he called the city’s most ambitious policy platform in a generation, vowing to get right to work when he takes office on 1 January. Speaking at a morning press conference in Queens, the 34-year-old democratic socialist revealed an all-female transition team led by Elana Leopold as executive director. It also includes co-chairs Maria Torres-Springer, the former first deputy mayor; Lina Khan, the former federal trade commission chair; the United Way’s president and CEO, Grace Bonilla; and the...