Free Republic

A federal agent assigned to Special Counsel Jack Smith's investigation of Donald Trump said prosecutors kept him in the dark that phone data he was gathering under grand jury subpoenas belonged to members of Congress and that he would have had reservations about doing so if he had been told, according to explosive testimony released Tuesday night by the House Judiciary Committee. Retired Justice Department Inspector General Special Agent Brian Burnett was quoted in the transcript as saying that during his decades working at the DOJ's watchdog, he never once was asked to collect congressional phone data and did not...

Why do we love the idea of a good king in fantasy but choose a constitutional republic in real life? Nick Freitas sits down with Jeremy Boreing to explore the appeal of monarchy, the limits of representative government, and whether a powerful ruler can create a free and virtuous society. From King Arthur and the stories we tell to America’s founding principles, they examine the tension between freedom, responsibility, and the desire for strong leadership. The conversation also turns to a larger question: Can a nation preserve its freedom through politics alone, or must its people and cultural institutions take...

It's harvest time in California wine country, but many growers are struggling to sell their grapes as changing drinking habits have caused demand to plunge. The decline is forcing some growers to tear out vineyards that their families have grown for generations. Wine sales have decreased by more than 20% over a five-year period, causing prices paid for grapes to drop and prompting California growers to take roughly a quarter of the state's vineyards out of production. Many growers are having to decide whether to harvest at a loss, leave grapes on the vine or replace vineyards with crops more...

The Trump administration is planning to welcome up to 17,500 additional White Afrikaners from South Africa as refugees over the next 12 months, according to a notice sent to Congress on Tuesday and obtained by CBS News. The State Department informed congressional officials that the Trump administration is planning to allocate 17,500 refugee spots for fiscal year 2027, and that they will "primarily" go to Afrikaners, who President Trump has claimed are being oppressed for being White. Fiscal year 2027 starts in October. While the second Trump administration has effectively shut down the U.S. refugee resettlement program for most people...

It's 2026 and I think I've found the most woke video to ever exist. This lady discovered that cotton fields still exist, and obviously the existence of this crop is racist towards black Americans. "Okay, when I didn't think they did cotton fields anymore. Y'all check this out. Y'all see that? There is literally a cotton field. Do y'all see that? Isn't that crazy?" How in the world do people like this exist?

President Donald Trump and Venezuela’s interim president, Delcy Rodríguez, met face to face for the first time Tuesda evening, publicly cementing a rapidly expanding relationship between Washington and Caracas that recent polling suggests is deeply unpopular among Venezuelans. Trump received Rodríguez at the Lotte New York Palace during a reception for foreign leaders attending the General Assembly. The meeting was held behind closed doors and without press access, but both governments released photographs showing Trump and Rodríguez together. Rodríguez later described the encounter as “historic” and said they discussed strengthening relations and cooperation in energy, mining and security. “We held...

Hayden Panettiere allegedly previously overdosed and secretly entered rehab weeks before her drug-related death at an Airbnb in Greenville, South Carolina, on Aug. 16. On Wednesday, Page Six obtained a more detailed report by the Greenville County Coroner’s Office, which stated that either Brian or Zach Hickerson (the name was redacted) claimed Panettiere had “a long history of drug, alcohol and nitrous oxide abuse” and that he “has had to administer Narcan to the decedent before.” Narcan is an emergency medication used to reverse opioid overdoses. One of the two brothers also claimed the actress “was in a drug rehab...

A woke activist who branded herself as a black Palestinian crusader has apologized after being exposed as a white Jewish woman. Hannah Gann, 34, a teacher with the Philadelphia School District, rose to prominence as an outspoken Palestinian-American activist who campaigned in the aftermath of the October 7 terrorist attacks on Israel. She allegedly used makeup to darken her skin, appeared to alter her accent, and donned keffiyeh scarves at protests as she railed against racism and Zionism in demonstrations across Philadelphia. But Gann has now been revealed to have lied about her identity for years, as she admitted she...

Based on its popular Ranger series, this beefy number parked outside the front door of Ford's Dagenham plant can carry a load of two tonnes, tow up to four tonnes and is also shouldering the hopes of the 2,000-strong workforce that still makes engines here. Inside the factory, the three-litre diesel engines that will power this camo-painted beast drift down a production line that has seen output cut from 90,000 engines a year to about half that over the last decade. Ford is hoping that a pivot towards military vehicles can help fill the void created by what the company's...

The Sacramento Municipal Utility District announced last year Sacramento electricity ratepayers would be under a new rate system that charges residential users higher rates between 5:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. — just in time for everyone to arrive home after work and begin evening family rituals: homework on computers, dinner, television, stereo, baths, laundry, and dishwasher after dinner.”

Hurricane Polo is an absolutely monstrous storm that everyone that lives in the entire state of California should be closely monitoring right now. On Monday, it was just a tropical storm that very few people had heard about. By Tuesday, it had become the most intense hurricane in the Western Hemisphere so far this year. It experienced one of the fastest rates of rapid intensification on record, and it is now a Category 5 storm. The National Hurricane Center is calling Polo “extremely dangerous”, and meteorologists are waiting to see what it does next. Is it possible that it will...

In a new survey, homebuilders around the country say ramped-up Immigration and Customs Enforcement crackdowns are creating huge headaches for their businesses. ... What they're saying: "ICE is becoming a very large issue and causing labor shortages," says a Houston builder in a survey conducted earlier this month by John Burns Research and Consulting, which regularly asks homebuilders about market conditions. A builder in Richmond, Virginia, says: "ICE has had significant impacts to vendors throughout Virginia/Maryland in the last 90 days. ... This has had a major impact on cycle times and the ability to start new houses." Jacksonville, Florida:...

‘The View’s Sunny Hostin boasts she was holdout juror who spared NYC’s Butcher of Tompkins Square Park cannibal killer “The View” co-cost Sunny Hostin revealed Tuesday that she was the lone holdout juror in the 1991 trial of a notorious New York City cannibal killer — resulting in the “Butcher of Tompkins Square Park” being found not guilty by reason of insanity. Hostin made the boast, which stunned her colleagues, in a discussion about Lindsay Clancy’s own insanity defense, and the attempts by Clancy’s lawyer to question the holdout juror in that case. The gruesome Butcher of Tompkins Square Park...

The new season of Fauda, released on September 8 on Netflix, is a hit around the world, as the series tends to be – but the big news is that, even as anti-Israel sentiment mounts around the world, it is the number one show in Lebanon, according to tracking sites such as FlixPatrol. Not only is it the top show in Lebanon, which has been in a state of war with Israel since 1948, but it is or has been in the top 10 in nine other Arab countries that have different relationships with Israel. At the time of writing,...

ICE watchers across the country who watched federal agents shoot people in the streets and fought to drive ICE from their cities are turning their new skills against the next authoritarian threat from the Trump administration: election interference. Volunteers who showed up a few months ago asking, “Where do I buy a whistle?” are now trained and committed members of an “ICE Watch” movement, said Zach Mueller, whose anti-authoritarian group States at the Core started hosting trainings earlier this year. “They’re not in the normal cast of characters that have been showing up to rallies over the last several decades,”...

More than 300 Utah voters were supposed to receive mail-in ballots for the June primary. Federal prosecutors say the postal worker trusted to deliver them did something else: He separated the ballots from the rest of his route, delivered none of them and dumped the mail in a church parking-lot dumpster. Now that former carrier, 34-year-old Damon Matai Seei of Payson, has been indicted on federal charges involving the unlawful destruction, delay and concealment of mail. The case is a blunt reminder that election integrity can hinge on something as ordinary—and as vulnerable—as one person doing his job. The Justice...

Gas Prices Are Out Of Control. Here’s What No One Is Telling You.We aren't simply wasting money on Ukraine. The return on investment has been overwhelmingly negative.Conventional wisdom is that “high gas prices” are the result of the war in Iran, that they’re going to result in heavy losses for the Republicans in the midterms, and that the cost of living is going to remain high for the foreseeable future. This consensus view, while not entirely wrong, is actually a simplistic and very optimistic version of events. The truth is actually worse than what conventional wisdom says. The truth is...

PENSACOLA BEACH, Fla. -- A Pensacola charter fishing group made an unusual catch on Saturday -- a large drone pulled from Gulf waters. It came from testing at Eglin Air Force Base and is now back in the military's possession. VIDEO AT LINK..................... "Hot Spots Charters" said the group was on a six-hour trip when it found the drone about 20 miles southeast of the Pensacola pass and gathered it in the aircraft. "It looked like a boat was upside down," Captain Daniel Arsenault said. "We thought it was an upside down skiff or something. So we changed our course...

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla., Sept. 23, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Real America's Voice (RAV) today announced that its White House and presidential pool coverage, captured by RAV's internal camera teams, will be made broadly and freely available to media organizations everywhere. "At a time when a handful of legacy outlets are casting the President's decision as the death of the free press, the reality is exactly the opposite," said Parker Sigg, Vice President of Real America's Voice at Performance One Media. "Real America's Voice is pleased to provide a feed of the pool camera to all the media, even the fake...

The unrelenting rise in healthcare costs has left state lawmakers facing a $1.6 billion deficit in the 2027-28 budget year ... The best-case scenario forecast that Colorado budget writers received in June turned out to be too good to be true. Three months later, the budget picture has crumbled again, economists told the Joint Budget Committee at the state’s quarterly revenue forecasts Friday. Analysts now expect the state to face a $1.6 billion deficit next fiscal year, setting the stage for another round of grueling spending cuts for the state legislature and Colorado’s next governor. The driving force behind the...