Free Republic

[Catholic Caucus] Bishop Eleganti: Meetings with leftist celebrities are degrading the papacy Pope Leo XIV's 40-minute audience with the 'Godmother of Punk' reflects a troubling pattern of popes courting cultural elites while doctrinal clarity fades, Bishop Marian Eleganti warns.On July 31, 2026, Pope Leo XIV met with American rock musician, poet, and artist Patti Smith, known as the “Godmother of Punk,” during a 40-minute private audience at the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican. Both are from Chicago. The meeting was attended by Father Antonio Spadaro. There are several official photos and a video of the encounter.This harmless encounter – I...

BREAKING: Man yelling “Allahu Akbar attacked 2 female and 1 male police officers in Toulouse, France today. 2 officers were stabbed. The male police officer managed to tackle the attacker before he managed to kill anyone. 0:10 VIDEO AT LINK............... Motive unknown..................

President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice threw in the towel in its attempt to prosecute David Hearn for allegedly vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, but the White House is now asking them to try again, according to a new report by The Wall Street Journal. White House officials are now asking the DOJ to “consider a new prosecution” of Hearn, citing sources “familiar with the discussions,” the Journal reported. Any attempt to bring new charges “would be highly unusual,” the article noted, because the U.S. Attorney Office for the District of Columbia, headed by Jeanine Pirro, already admitted it...

Former Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall said Monday that he was suing the Trump administration, after the Department of Defense revoked his access to classified information for allegedly leaking classified information regarding the Qatar-gifted Air Force One. Kendall told CNN that he had learned of the revocation through a tweet by the Department of Defense, saying he intended to sue and had hired national security attorney Mark Zaid to represent him against the government. “More to come,” said Zaid in a post on X confirming his hiring. In a Friday post on his official X social media account,...

The Fifth Circuit has set aside Biden-era energy efficiency standards for stoves and cooktops, ruling that the Energy Department illegally refused to withdraw the rule after states raised objections requiring ordinary notice-and-comment rulemaking. Judge Oldham accused the Biden administration of trying to “dodge” controversy, said DOE’s interpretation made a “mindless hash” of Congress’s scheme, and called its concession that CA, MA, and NY do not fairly represent the states “the understatement of the day.” The ruling could significantly limit DOE’s use of direct final rules. The Fifth Circuit held they are for consensus regulations, must be withdrawn when objections provide...

All Talk and No Substance Apparently, nothing is quite so devastating to the Democratic Socialists of America as simply and directly asking them, specifically, what policies they want to see enacted if their candidates win office.The New Yorker’s David Remnick interviewed DSA co-chair Megan Romer Friday. It did not go well for Romer. You can watch the video here; notice Remnick did not ask her about algebra or obscure regulation details or historical dates. He simply asked her to go beyond the slogans and to articulate specific policies. And on issue after issue, she simply couldn’t:Romer: But we do believe...

The Democrat Senate nominee said the experience was part of the religious tradition that eventually led him into politics. Democrat U.S. Senate nominee James Talarico says the church he grew up in once housed illegal aliens who were facing deportation by federal immigration authorities. The comments, first reported by Fox News, came during a 2023 appearance by Talarico on Texas Impact’s Weekly Witness podcast. Asked how his faith influenced his political career, Talarico pointed to a history of progressive activism at his church. “Our church was really active in LGBTQ rights in the ’90s. We caught some attention by letting...

(The Center Square) – A southern state that banned medical gender transition for children is funding a network of doctors and therapists who promote some of those same controversial treatments, an investigation by The Center Square found. A nonprofit called Charlotte Transgender Healthcare Group openly touts puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones as treatment options for minors. And through 2027, it's receiving $1.28 million from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, records and interviews show. North Carolina state law strictly forbids body-altering gender treatments on children younger than 18, including puberty blockers, hormones, and surgeries. Health and Human...

What recent reports, investigations and scandals reveal about a problem Britain refuses to confront. Charity Commission building.Here’s a story unfolding in Britain that deserves a lot more attention. Over the weekend, The Daily Telegraph broke the news that the FBI in America believe that one of the largest Muslim charities in Britain, the Al-Khair foundation, has been used to bankroll the banned Islamist terrorist group Hamas. The FBI claims the Foundation, which is a partner of the UN refugee agency, has been used as a front to send money to Hamas under the guise of ‘humanitarian aid’. Last week, its...

SpaceX is closing in on 130,000 acres of Louisiana coastline. A second mega Starbase, so large that today's Starbase would fit into it more than nine hundred times. And that's only half of the expansion story, because in a letter to the federal government on Friday, SpaceX asked to open up the ocean itself. Yes. The Starship oil rigs are back. Meanwhile, at the pad that just launched Flight 13, our flyover caught something nobody expected: scaffolding deep inside the flame trench. We dug into what's happening down there, and the answer comes with a clock attached, because the paperwork...

Tuesday’s CNN This Morning played a clip of the radical DSA candidate, the favorite to win Wisconsin’s Democratic gubernatorial primary, supposedly walking back her insanely radical positions. In the clip, she offers this defense of her past calls to defund the police, abolish the U.S. Senate, and cancel Thanksgiving: “I learned then you have some hot takes, sometimes bad takes, on Twitter, and I let my feelings out into the world.” Francesca, Francesca! You let your feelings out? Do you realize you just admitted the crazy stuff is actually how you feel? Host Audie Cornish did her best to cushion...

U.S. — The Democratic Party announced on Tuesday that U.S. citizens were not allowed to remember all those things the party said and did just a few years ago. Eyeing a return to national power, several potential Democratic presidential nominees called on the nation to forget all those things they said about, for example, refusing medical care to the unvaccinated in hopes that they die a slow and painful death. "You are only allowed to believe what we tell you now, not what we told you then," explained presidential hopeful Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. "All that stuff about how people gathering to...

Arc of Justice—the California-based charity established by Code Pink cofounder Medea Benjamin to dole out millions to Code Pink and other far left activist groups—was recently ordered by the state's attorney general to cease all operations after failing to file taxes for three consecutive years and account for more than $51 million in assets that still remain a mystery, according to documents reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon. Since California first revoked the foundation's charitable registration 18 months ago and ordered it to provide a full accounting of $51,445,599 in outstanding assets it held as of 2023, "no public document...

A phenomenon known as Black Fatigue is growing among many Americans who are tired of the rude and anti-social behavior in parts of black culture, and the unspoken privilege it creates. Among all the viral memes and online trends one sees while scrolling through social media, one term has been coming up more regularly: “black fatigue.” The term has been around since 2015, and appears to have originated from a board on a site that has become the Twilight Zone of the internet (a site that is “both shadow and substance, of things and ideas”), 4Chan. As with many post-modern...

Oh say can you see…no fireworks or football? Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s (D) past views on iconic aspects of American life might make some voters take note. The progressive candidate, who narrowly won his Aug. 4 primary over Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) to face Republican Mike Rogers in November, was caught hating on ultra-American things like fireworks, the Second Amendment and even — gasp! — football in old YouTube videos. The clips, some of which have since been deleted, were reported by CNN’s K-File. In one now-deleted July 2024 video, El-Sayed, 41, says, “Fireworks suck!” and pleads with viewers...

A federal appeals court cleared the way for the Trump administration to deport thousands of illegal aliens. A three-judge panel for the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit on Tuesday lifted a lower court order striking down the administration's deportation directives, which instruct officers to consider expedited removal for certain migrants who came to the US under the Biden-error.

Shi Zhengli is recruiting researchers for “pathogen discovery/coronavirus” and “cross-species infection risk” work. NIH-backed scientists continued collaborating with her after COVID, including on research using materials she supplied from her new Chinese laboratory. Shi Zhengli, the Chinese virologist whose years of bat coronavirus research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology made her one of the most scrutinized scientists in the world after COVID-19, did not disappear. She moved on to another powerful Chinese state laboratory, where she is now helping train a new generation of coronavirus researchers. Chinese-language records reviewed for this report show Shi is currently affiliated with Guangzhou...

The upper chamber adjourned until Sept. 14 without passing the Safeguard America Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act, a cryptocurrency bill or a third reconciliation package. A group of Republicans supported cancelling recess to pass the SAVE America Act, though they did not force a formal vote on canceling the adjournment.

The Naked Communist by W. Cleon SkousenI have spent the last several months working intensively on completing the dictation of an audiobook that is available as a free down on the reputable site Librivox.org, which is partnered with Gutenberg.org, a global repository for books that are not covered under international copyright laws (whether those books were printed before copyright law as we know it existed, or if a sufficient time has passed, and the copyright has expired.) This important and relevant work may be downloaded at this link: LINK TO: “The Naked Communist” It was first published in 1958 by...

A Syrian court has sentenced ousted president Bashar al-Assad to death in absentia after convicting him of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the country's civil war. BBC reports that Assad fled Syria for Moscow with his family in December 2024 after his regime was overthrown, bringing an end to his family's more than five-decade rule over the country. He has remained in Russia since then, and it is unclear whether Syria's new authorities will be able to secure his extradition. The death sentence marks the latest legal action against Assad by Syria's new leadership. An arrest warrant...