Free Republic

The last week has been kind to its newly-innaugurated democratic-socialist New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. A massive blizzard left mountains of snow in the streets, more than a dozen homeless inhabitants froze to death, and rats are feasting on uncollected garbage piled up everywhere except right outside his Gracie Mansion residence. "I'm new to the job," the Mayor reminded everyone. "I know the burdens will get heavier, but right now I struggle to imagine how it could be better." Hmm, maybe haul away the garbage and snow plow the streets? Could that make things better?

EXCLUSIVE: A new inspector general's report released Thursday morning accuses the former Biden administration of bypassing federal rules when issuing a more than half-a-billion dollar "sole source contract" to a nonprofit led by a former Biden official to deal with the unaccompanied minor crisis in 2021. The Administration of Children and Families (ACF), which is under HHS and manages unaccompanied minors, awarded $529 million for a one-year contract in March 2021 to a nonprofit called Family Endeavors Inc. to help establish and manage a new emergency intake site in Texas (EIS) with 2,000 extra beds. However, according to the OIG's...

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has selected his teenage daughter as his heir, South Korea's spy agency told lawmakers on Thursday. Kim Ju Ae - who is believed to be 13 - has in recent months been pictured beside her father in high-profile events like a visit to Beijing in September, her first known trip abroad. The National Intelligence Service (NIS) said it took a "range of circumstances" into account including her increasingly prominent public presence at official events" in making this assessment. The NIS also said it would keep close tabs on whether she will attend the North's...

The Pentagon has reportedly ordered a second aircraft carrier strike group to prepare to deploy to the Middle East in support of potential military action against Iran. President Trump has not yet given the carrier group the greenlight to deploy, but an order could be issued “in a matter of hours,” the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday night, citing US officials. The deployment would likely come from the US East Coast, and one carrier is being prepped to head out to sea in two weeks, an official told the publication. The USS George H.W. Bush is currently conducting training exercises...

U.S. District Judge Roy K. Altman scheduled a two-week jury trial starting February 15, 2027, in Miami for Trump's suit filed December 15, 2025. The case accuses the BBC of defamation and unfair trade practices over its 2024 documentary 'Trump: A Second Chance?', which edited Trump's Ellipse speech to splice 'fight like hell' with a march to the Capitol, omitting his calls for peaceful protest. The BBC apologized for the error, leading to internal resignations, but rejected compensation demands; it plans a motion to dismiss over jurisdiction while vowing a strong defense.

Gene Simmons is again sticking his tongue out at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame for allowing hip-hop artists to snag a spot in rock’s most exclusive club. The 76-year-old KISS co-founder — who was inducted into the Cleveland shrine for rock with the band in 2014 — appeared on the “LegendsNLeaders” podcast last week, where he flipped the script on host Ben Weiss and asked which band shaped him most growing up. When the 25-year-old host revealed he gravitated toward more “hip-hop adjacent stuff” in his youth, Simmons blasted the genre and seethed that rap stars have scored...

In a move slammed by the Department of Homeland Security as a “lawless abomination,” a federal judge appointed by Barack Obama has ordered the immediate release of four criminal illegal aliens, three convicted murderers, and a pedophile, from ICE detention at Louisiana’s Angola Prison.

Families won’t see relief from rising electricity prices anytime soon, as demand from artificial intelligence data centers soars while power supply grows slowly, according to Goldman Sachs. Electricity prices jumped 6.9% in year over year 2025, more than double the headline inflation rate of 2.9%, Goldman analysts told clients in a research note published Wednesday. Prices will continue to rise through the end of the decade as data centers make up 40% of electricity demand growth, the analysts said. This will lower disposable income, drag down consumer spending and slightly slow economic growth in the coming years, they said. Households...

In 1997, IBM supercomputer Deep Blue defeated the reigning world chess champion Garry Kasparov. In 2023, ChatGPT passed the bar exam. And last year, Google DeepMind clinched gold at the International Math Olympiad.These milestones are only expected to accelerate, with some business leaders, including SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, predicting artificial general intelligence—AI that is able to meet or surpass human intelligence—could arrive as early as this year. While avid sci-fi fans and business leaders are thrilled by the technology’s potential, others caution about the economic downsides.Salman Khan, the CEO of Khan Academy and vision steward at TED—two organizations that provide...

A San Bernardino County man who was hired as a political adviser to a Southern California official was working as a secret agent on behalf of the People’s Republic of China, the Justice Department announced Monday. After pleading guilty to one count of acting as an illegal agent in October 2025, he was sentenced to four years in federal prison.

*** James Comer, tore into Rep. Ilhan Omar after [she] suggested that President Trump is a pedophile — and should be executed.Omar (D-Minn.), ***threw the demented tantrum after Trump appeared on Fox Business to discuss fraud in her home state of Minnesota, in which he claimed that the theft exceeds $19 billion. “The leader of the Pedophile Protection Party is trying to deflect attention from his name being all over the Epstein files,” she wrote on X, alongside a clip of the interview, in which Trump also criticized her. “At least in Somalia they execute pedophiles not elect them.”Comer (R-Ky.)...

It's NOT ENOUGH: Voters Say Trump WINS Aren't WORKING!

Super Bowl halftime has devolved into a stale Roman bacchanal—gaudy, raunchy, and empty—leaving millions bored, alienated, and wondering who the spectacle is even for anymore. In recent years, Americans have known what to expect from our Neronian Super Bowl halftime shows: mediocre music veneered over with gaudy, flashily lit, but ultimately empty and meaningless sets. As seen again this year, the usual array of supporting dancers twerk and simulate intercourse, in sync with the main singer, mindlessly grabbing his/her genitals—apparently to highlight the explicit sexual allusions of mostly nonsensical lyrics. For some strange reason, this Roman orgiastic ritual is supposedly...

Police arrested a couple in Florida after a game of pickleball allegedly descended into a massive brawl involving more than 20 people. Anthony Sapienza, 63, and his wife Julianne, 51, were detained following the fight at Spruce Creek, a country club not far from Daytona Beach. As reported by People, the Sapienzas were taking on another couple on the morning of Super Bowl Sunday when tensions came to the boil. Before long, both police officers and fire and rescue were called to the country club in response to 'a physical fight in progress on the pickleball court' involving 'over 20...

Daily Readings from the USCCBJesus went to the district of Tyre. He entered a house and wanted no one to know about it, but he could not escape notice. Soon a woman whose daughter had an unclean spirit heard about him. She came and fell at his feet. Mark 7:24–25The context of today’s Gospel is significant. Jesus traveled to Tyre, in modern-day Lebanon, a Gentile city on the west coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Tyre was an ancient and prosperous city, known for its maritime trade and wealth. As a center of commerce and culture, it played a prominent role...

Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) is calling for federal action against the NFL and NBC following Sunday’s explicit Super Bowl halftime show. In a post on X on Monday, Fine argued that the Spanish-language performance violated federal broadcast standards and should result in major penalties. “You can’t say the f-word on live TV,” Fine wrote.

In today’s Diary: - An invisible robo-navy - Meet the new 4-layer ocean tech stack - Introducing “Ghost sharks” - The only way to stop drug boats - Reversing America’s decline. Hey Rational Optimist, My friend and economist Tyler Cowen likes to frame the world in terms of what’s “overrated” and “underrated.” I love looking at innovation and technology through this lens. It helps you identify hidden edges you can take advantage of in markets, business and life. One criminally underrated frontier today is… the ocean. You’re reading this essay thanks to the ocean. The “cloud” is actually underwater. Over...

Border czar Tom Homan on Thursday said President Donald Trump has agreed with his proposal to conclude a federal immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota.

Guess what the main topic of debate at the European Parliament in Strasbourg this week is. It is what the Euro-elites consider the most concerning issue of the moment: “State violence in Minneapolis and the rule of law in the United States.”This is a typical example of seeing the speck in your brother’s eye while ignoring the beam in your own. The European Union is criticizing the rule of law in America, while there are indications that Ursula von der Leyen’s European Commission has in the past two years actively tried to interfere in eight parliamentary and presidential elections on...

‼️I just spoke with Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who has asked me to add him as a cosponsor of the SAVE America Act We’re now at 45 Baby steps to SAVE America ‼️