Free Republic

It shows a remarkable level of confidence from Donald Trump that he’s chosen for his running-mate the man who once called him “America’s Hitler.” J.D. Vance, the thirty-one-year-old junior senator from Ohio, made the private comment in 2016, as he rose to fame off the back of his autobiography Hillbilly Elegy. The book recounts what it was like to grow up in a deprived rust-belt town, where his family and neighbors had “no college degree” and “poverty’s the family tradition.” Vance escaped by joining the US Marine Corps, which included a tour in Iraq. Once home, his degrees from Ohio...

Neither Donald Trump nor Joe Biden is the other guy. This, we are frequently reminded, is their principal advantage in the eyes of many. It may be the only advantage Biden has left after decomposing in real time on the debate stage. Ironically, though, not being each other is one of the few important things these two men have in common. In 2024, a sizable portion of the electorate — maybe the majority — will vote not for a presidential candidate but against his opponent. It’s enough to make you wonder whether the whole affair is an apotropaic exercise, a...

Is Joe Biden close to dropping out? Those chances shot up to 50 percent after the proverbial dam appeared to have broken yesterday. Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) called on Biden to exit the race, with Sen. Chuck Schumer and Reps. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) echoed those sentiments. They showed him polls highlighting the president’s inability to win and Biden becoming a weight on the entire party. NEW — "According to my sources, President Biden agreed to step down as the Democratic nominee. It will happen as early as this weekend..."- Mark Halperin on Newsmax just now pic.twitter.com/89vkN7VV0Q—...

Former President Barack Obama is pressuring President Biden to reconsider his 2024 run for re-election, according to a new report. Obama and Biden have only spoken once since the president’s debate debacle on June 27 — but stressed during that conversation that his old running mate’s chances of beating Donald Trump were “greatly diminished,” the Washington Post reported. Reps for Obama did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Sources also spilled to the Washington Post that Biden’s former boss in the White House has been fielding calls with Democrats panicking on Capitol Hill — including House Speaker emerita...

OK. I just watched Vice President Vance speak, at the convention. He gets it. 100 percent. Nice wife and family too. Sorry we only get CNN here, but he gets it. Just like Trump gets it. Good choice. Genuinely nice guy.

So how goes the Joe Biden Victory Tour these days?I originally had the new Associated Press/NORC poll results in the Headlines, but this deserves more commentary as we head into Night Three of the Republican National Convention. The poll results appear to be driving a new media narrative that has coalesced with a Democrat establishment mutiny, all intended for the same objective -- for Biden to surrender his nomination.First, the poll results show Biden's attempts to instill confidence in his competence failing miserably. In fact, majorities of all respondents want both Biden and Trump to withdraw, not terribly surprising given...

Republican candidates owe it to voters — and the unborn — to be artful, clear, and convincing in defense of the pro-life cause.Make no mistake. Donald Trump is right that Republicans should be worried about abortion attacks in the 2024 election. His efforts to frame himself as moderate on abortion in the presidential debate, along with the significant reduction of pro-life language in the Republican platform, have made his perspective clear. And Trump’s instincts on how to handle the question in a debate are not terrible. But it can be done better.And it must.The uncomfortable fact about the next four...

There is only one Democrat who thinks he’s winning or in a good position to win: Joe Biden. Every other member of his party, excluding his Rasputin-like inner circle, knows he’s in trouble. Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) reportedly told donors that House Democrats face annihilation if the president remains in the race. The polling reflects that the map has only improved for Donald Trump ever since Biden’s abysmal June 27 debate. CNN’s John King’s projection of the 2024 race isn’t just brutal for Joe Biden; it’s also something of an epitaph. We’re sixteen weeks away from Election Day, and with...

Advocacy groups on both sides of the aisle have weighed in on former President Donald Trump's selection of Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, as his running mate in the 2024 presidential election, with pro-life activists mixed in their enthusiasm. Vance, a 39-year-old who became a U.S. senator in 2023 after winning the election to fill the seat vacated by Republican Sen. Rob Portman, is best known as the author of the 2016 bestselling book Hillbilly Elegy, which focused on the decline of white working-class Americans in the post-war era and was later adapted into a movie. In a statement published Monday,...

On July 15, former President Donald Trump announced that Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) was his vice presidential pick, ending months of speculation.“After lengthy deliberation and thought, and considering the tremendous talents of many others, I have decided that the person best suited to assume the position of Vice President of the United States is Senator J.D. Vance,” former President Trump said in a Truth Social post.Based on Mr. Vance’s published works and interviews, here are 39 things to know about the Ohio Republican who is set to share a ticket with the former president.1. He’s 39 Years OldMr. Vance was...

Those of us who desire the MAGA movement to endure after Trump can breathe easy with his choice of J.D. Vance for vice president. Most presidential campaigns try to keep VP pick under wraps until the convention, though it was increasingly clear in the last couple of weeks that Trump was going to choose Vance. The fact that Secret Service agents secured Vance's residency after the assassination attempt on Trump sorta gave the secret away — though I wouldn't have put it past them to have gone to the wrong senator's house. And did they secure the shed in his...

Who is J.D. Vance and why would he be qualified to run the country if something unthinkable were to happen to Donald Trump? The answer in a word: 'He's not.' Oh, but that was two words. But that doesn't matter because he actually is qualified, for the very reason that he's not qualified. Simply put, he's not a career politician. He's a real person who represents real Americans. J.D. Vance, the freshman senator and best-selling author from Ohio, is Trump’s running mate for the upcoming election. He is the first Millennial on a major party ticket and brings a refreshing...

Teamsters President Sean O'Brien is set to speak at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee on Monday night, but he is not yet scheduled to speak at the Democrat convention in August.For years, O'Brien has aligned with the Democrat Party, as labor unions tend to support Democrat candidates and policies. But it sounds like the Teamsters president O'Brien is a fan of former President Trump's vice presidential pick, J.D. Vance. O'Brien told Fox News anchor Neil Cavuto:J.D. Vance, in the short time that we have worked together, has been great on Teamster issues. He co-sponsored an airline manufacturing bill that...

At his massive rally in Butler, PA, President Donald Trump survived assassination by millimeters, saved by the grace of God and a turn of his head. Sadly, an attendee was killed, and two others were seriously wounded by a 20-year-old assassin. As the investigation continues into the killer and the major security lapses at the event, it is important to reflect upon the intended victim, Donald Trump. He is a man of enormous courage, who used the assassination attempt to show amazing strength to his supporters by yelling “Fight, Fight, Fight” and pumping his fist in the air. It was...

AMERICA was attacked today. Our country must come together… we must get it together. The seriousness of it all demands we unify to fend off cowardly political attacks of persons and of the collective, as we just witnessed, now more than ever. It’s literally a matter of life and death. And let’s acknowledge it’s by the grace of God #Trump continues to stand so strong🙏

The scandal-plagued Biden campaign has pulled all its ads against former President Donald Trump after he was nearly killed by a shooter on Saturday. Joe Biden is “pausing all outbound communications and working to pull down our television ads as quickly as possible,” a campaign official told The Wall Street Journal on Sunday morning. The ads would have likely labeled Trump as an existential threat ahead of the 2024 election. Biden’s anti-Trump claims have rightfully led critics to question whether this heavily partisan rhetoric has incited violence against Trump.This rhetoric often conflates Trump with dictators, including Adolf Hitler, and suggests...

Stick a fork in Joe Biden. He's done. After the recent turmoil his party went through after the debate, which significantly damaged his candidacy and prompted calls for him to drop out, Democratic strategists who spoke with NBC News on Sunday say that now the failed assassination attempt on Donald Trump most certainly was the true end of his hopes of getting reelected. "We're so beyond f---ed," lamented a longtime Democratic insider, emphasizing that the image of Trump thrusting his fist in the air, blood dramatically smeared across his face, will be an unforgettable image between now and Election Day....

President Joe Biden's post-debate remarks about "put[ting] Trump in a bullseye" aren't aging well.Five days before former President Donald Trump narrowly survived an apparent assassination attempt at a Pennsylvania campaign rally, Biden reportedly told Democrats: "It's time to put Trump in a bullseye."“It’s time to put Trump in the bullseye.”—Joe Biden pic.twitter.com/MlSXXybN1U— Dinesh D'Souza (@DineshDSouza) July 13, 2024A defiant Biden delivered the message Monday in a private phone call with his National Finance Committee as well as hundreds of top Democratic donors, Biden backers, and bundlers, according to Politico and CNN, who had obtained a recording of the donors-only conversation...

How do I know that the reports over Democrat despair are credible? This one comes from Politico, but the New York Times has covered it wall-to-wall for the past two weeks as well. This isn't just conservative schadenfreude, but a real phenomenon unfolding on and being reported by the Left.Before we get to Politico's more explicit report, we can certainly extrapolate establishment Democrat despair from this NYT report about Joe Biden's appearance in Michigan. He drew a crowd, but not any other high-ranking Democrat officeholder:Conspicuously absent, however, were many of Michigan’s highest-profile Democrats, including Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, whose popularity in...

Speculation is swirling around President Biden’s political fate — and over who might replace him on the Democratic ticket this fall should he decide to drop out of the race. Biden has insisted he’s in it to win it, and Vice President Harris would have the inside track on becoming the party’s standard-bearer, but Democratic concerns are growing that his candidacy could cost them the White House and House majority this fall. Though a highly anticipated Thursday evening press conference after the NATO summit in Washington, D.C., was seen as a better performance for Biden than in recent weeks, the...