Free Republic

Polls continue to dole out depressing numbers for Republicans, with several Senate races defying earlier predictions and Democrats radically outperforming how then-Vice President Kamala Harris fared against President Donald Trump in 2024. The polling numbers for Trump and the GOP have been brutal as his second term has progressed, with Americans’ views on his handling of the economy and immigration — topics on which he had previously outpolled Democrats — taking a dive. The president’s war in Iran has been another issue dragging down his polling, specifically because of its impact on gas prices. Several recent polls have had shocking...

President Donald Trump has said he is working on a “massive” deal to buy fertiliser from Belarus, pivoting away from main supplier Canada amid an escalating trade dispute, and moving instead toward an ally of Russia. “The United States is working on a massive deal with respect to the purchase of Potash from Belarus,” Trump said on his Truth Social network. “The pricing would be for substantially less than we are currently paying to Canada, very good news for our farmers and ranchers.” In recent weeks Trump has stepped up his trade war with Canada, a long-term US ally and...

A Nobel Prize-nominated journalist from Gaza who has hung out with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) multiple times has admitted to covering up footage of Israeli hostages being attacked on October 7, 2023. Photojournalist Motaz Azaiza admitted to hiding the dreadful images during a podcast interview, the New York Post reported on Monday. Azaiza said he covered it up to protect the people who were seen attacking the hostages once they were pulled into Gaza, because he feared the Israeli military would use the video to seek payback against the torturers. He also claimed Hamas controls all the...

Kamala Harris and Gavin Newsom are both drawing low levels of enthusiasm for potential 2028 presidential bids, with the California governor holding a lead over Harris among the state’s Democratic voters. The September survey, conducted by the UC Berkeley Citrin Center and POLITICO, found that 37% of registered California voters said they would be excited about a Newsom presidential run, compared with 28% who said the same about Harris. The figures mark a substantial decline from the February-March survey, when 48% of registered voters said they were excited about a Newsom bid and 41% were excited about Harris entering the...

Kash Patel is facing a major security breach at the FBI after hackers claimed to have stolen personal data on every employee and job applicant at the bureau. ShinyHunters, a notorious hacking gang, said it obtained FBI agents' names, home addresses, phone numbers and dates of birth, and even details on their spouses. The gang also defaced the FBI's jobs website on Tuesday, writing: 'This site has been seized by ShinyHunters.' The message mocked the seizure notices the bureau plasters on criminal sites it takes down. They then trolled Donald Trump, ending the message with the president's trademark Truth Social...

[Catholic Caucus] Cardinals praise ‘irreversible’ synodality and ‘healing’ nature of Church declineDescribing Pope Francis’ synodality as “irreversible” and the decline in Church figures as “healing”, two prominent cardinals have weighed in on the future of the Church in Europe. Synodality is impossible to forestall, Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich attested this past week. Luxembourg’s Cardinal Hollerich served as the relator general of the multi-year Synod on Synodality and thus – alongside Cardinal Mario Grech – has become one of the most vocal champions of Pope Francis’ synod and synodal style. Synodality, as begun by Pope Francis, is “irreversible” Hollerich claimed. Its goal...

Professor Anne Bayefsky, President of Human Rights Voices and Director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust, sharply criticized United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday following his address to the UN General Assembly in which he attacked Israel. In his speech, Guterres referred to the Hamas massacre of October 7, 2023, before accusing Israel of carrying out killing and destruction in Gaza on a scale unprecedented during his tenure as Secretary-General. Bayefsky accused Guterres of applying a consistent double standard to Israel and recalled his controversial comments shortly after the October 7 massacre, when he said...

President Donald Trump revealed a major decision he is considering regarding the conflict with Iran during his Sept. 22 address to the U.N. General Assembly. In his speech, Trump reiterated his administration’s position that Iran cannot be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon and outlined how the U.S. military has targeted Iran’s navy, missile capabilities, and nuclear development. “But now I have a big decision to make: Will a deal be made with Iran that lets them rebuild and create a far greater country than it ever was before, maybe one of the greatest in the Middle East or even...

This El Niño will have an epic tantrum. While still months away from reaching its peak, the super El Niño is already shattering temperature records. Data show that the sea surface temperature in the tropical Pacific has reached 3.07°C (around 5.5 F) — tying the record set by the 2015–16 El Niño — with scientists expecting it to get a lot hotter. “This month (September) is very likely to have the highest monthly anomalies on record,” Zeke Hausfather, co-author of comprehensive climate change reports for the United Nations, told Phys.org in an email. Based on an analysis of 14 different...

Tether Is Trading and Storing Silver in Las Vegas “Physical silver belonging to a Tether affiliate is being stored within Gold.com’s network” Below are two tether stories. The first is about their Gold loan business, which is booming. The second is from our own analysis of Gold.com’s most recent 10k revealing they control and are trading Silver as well. Tether’s $1.5 Billion Gold Loan Business Is No Joke Authored by GoldFix Tether has become a substantial source of financing in the physical gold market, extending approximately $1.5 billion in precious-metals financing to Gold.com, one of the largest bullion dealers in...

It’s hard to believe in this day and age that women are still falling for these Nigerian online romance scams. But they are. And they’re losing a lot of money. Most of us hear “romance scam” and picture some absurdly obvious message from a Nigerian prince in Africa, who’s promising eternal love after three hours and asking for a Western Union wire transfer. Who falls for that anymore? Apparently, a lot of people. Because six Nigerian nationals accused of belonging to an organized criminal network are now being extradited to the United States after reportedly targeting more than 100 American...

Microsoft Corporation has indeed announced new changes within its gaming division. Nearly three hundred employees will be affected by these layoffs. According to a statement by XBOX Content Director Matt Booty, the layoffs will take place at Halo Studios and several other studios — the full list has not been disclosed. They will also affect the management tier of XBOX and the central office. Layoffs are not the only changes Microsoft is implementing. Certain XBOX subsidiary studios are set for reorganization: Obsidian will now become part of Bethesda; the Microsoft Casual Game division, which works on games like Minesweeper and...

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez issued a thinly veiled warning to the Democratic establishment, making clear she wouldn’t step aside for any other potential presidential candidates in 2028 — including Kamala Harris. “I don’t think that my decisions would come down to deference,” Ocasio-Cortez told The New York Times when asked which factors would weigh on her decision about whether to launch a White House bid. The 36-year-old New York Democrat — the youngest woman ever elected to Congress — has yet to announce a presidential campaign, but her comments make clear she isn’t waiting for a nod from Democratic leaders or a...

Maybe he has a different definition of “obsessed”? It’s flimsy, but it seems like the best explanation, after Tucker Carlson rejected claims he’s “obsessed with the Jews” and Israel on the Monday episode of his podcast. But the episode seemed to instantly disprove Carlson, because the Jews and Israel came up a whole lot. How many times? 281 times, to be exact. That included 215 mentions of “Israel” and 66 mentions of “Jew” or “Jewish.” There was a lone reference to Judaism too, for good measure. The lion’s share of those mentions came from The Grayzone reporter Max Blumenthal, his...

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 22 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that Washington and Tehran were moving toward a settlement, while a senior Iranian official said Tehran could reopen the Strait of Hormuz within days if the US eased military pressure and lifted its blockade on Iranian ports.Trump's remarks came just hours after ‌he repeated a threat at the UN General Assembly to annihilate Iran if it failed to strike a deal.Speaking after a meeting with British Prime Minister Andy Burnham at the United Nations ‌in New York, Trump said: "They want to talk to us. They have been...

In the wake of the Lindsay Clancy Verdict and the Sydney Sweeney Pile-On and the Sophie Cunningham Point-ology it is time for a comprehensive and mandatory discussion of the issue of Women in the Public Square. WARNING to my liberal lady friends: You may not feel “safe” if you read this article. You will certainly experience it as “unwelcome.” Experts agree that the issue was raised by German sociologist Georg Simmel over a century ago. I first wrote about it 18 years ago. Simmel argued that it was not centuries of oppression that powered the feminist movement, but the new...

While I was in graduate school, I regularly participated in a research program that paid students to taste test food. Many social science disciplines conduct research this way. While these methodologies may be sound, relying heavily on convenience sampling creates limitations. Those dinosaur nuggets I rated highly in my late 20s may not test nearly as well with an older demographic. These sorts of limitations apply when we consider the research on political identification or bias in higher education—we are limited by our sample. Consider a recent analysis of political giving from faculty and staff at Florida’s five largest universities...

Israel is treating the new documentary “NAZA,” by the Israeli filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, less like bad publicity than a national security crisis. Eyal Zamir, chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces, pledged to use “every tool at our disposal” against the documentary, which features anonymous interviews with 24 intelligence officers and soldiers, most involved in remote strikes in Gaza. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called for legislation that would let the state strip Abraham and Szor of their citizenship. Israel’s culture minister has asked the Interior Ministry to investigate them for treason. Activists and staff members...

Saudi Arabia ‌has restarted operations at its East-West Pipeline and could resume exports from the Red Sea port of Yanbu later on Tuesday, three sources briefed on the matter said, as signs mounted of an increase in Middle Eastern oil flows. The resumption of supplies on Tuesday helped ​to drive selling on global oil markets. Global oil benchmark Brent crude fell by more than $2 a ​barrel towards $97, its lowest since September 8.

Today, President Donald J. Trump addressed the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly and delivered a powerful message: American strength and resolve is back. President Trump declared that under his leadership, America is stronger than ever — and we will use that strength to confront our enemies, protect our interests, forbid communism, reject global control, and always defend our sovereignty.“Two and a half centuries after the cause of liberty found its home on this continent, I can report to you with pride that America is back, and our country is stronger today than ever before.” (Watch)“As President of...