Free Republic

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows has decided Donald Trump is ineligible to appear on the state’s 2024 Republican primary ballot.

Police said Tuesday they are investigating incidents directed at Colorado Supreme Court justices and providing extra patrols around their homes in Denver following the court’s decision to remove former President Donald Trump from the state’s presidential primary ballot. The Denver Police Department declined in an email to provide details about its investigations, citing safety and privacy considerations and because they are ongoing. The department “is currently investigating incidents directed at Colorado Supreme Court justices and will continue working with our local, state and federal law enforcement partners to thoroughly investigate any reports of threats or harassment,” the email said. Officers...

Code is law, they say. ... Geofence warrants are warrants to obtain the location data that Google users let Google collect if they opt in to Google's location history service, which about a third of Google users do. Geofence warrants have been possible because, if you opt in, Google keeps a copy of the location history. And records are kept can be compelled, at least if the legal process is valid. All of which makes this Google announcement from yesterday of great interest. Google will no longer keep location history even for the users who opted in to have it...

WASHINGTON — Opening statements began Monday in a trial to determine how much Rudy Giuliani will have to pay two former Georgia election workers after he was found liable for defaming them with baseless claims that they committed fraud in the 2020 election. Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, sued Giuliani over the bogus claims, which they say upended their lives. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor and former federal prosecutor, was found to have defamed the two women, including by falsely claiming they were handing around what he alleged were USB drives "like they were vials...

House and Senate conservatives on Wednesday sounded the alarm on a potential move by congressional leadership to extend a deep state surveillance law in a defense bill. “Reauthorization of FISA can’t be hooked to anything. The federal GOV has spied on Americans [who] decided to go to Church or you went to a school board meeting. This needs to end. Reauthorization needs to stand on its own, and have significant reform,” House Freedom Caucus Chairman Scott Perry (R-PA) said during a press conference with the House Freedom Caucus and Senate conservatives. The conservatives held their press conference as congressional leaders...

Oklahoma state Rep. Justin Humphrey (R-Lane) sent a letter to the Oklahoma Attorney General, the Sheriff of Pushmataha County, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt and “All Oklahoma judicial authorities and other law enforcement entities,” requesting an investigation into ATF’s SWAT team raid at the home of his constituent, Russell Fincher. According to a press release, Humphrey said he was contacted by Fincher after a dozen ATF SWAT team members bearing “automatic weapons” raided Fincher’s home, handcuffed him on his porch in front of his 13-year-old son and coerced him into relinquishing his Federal Firearm License. “If this report is true, and...

7 min video - showing and explaining Jim Jordan’s letter to Garland. Letter requests data concerning use of geofencing Jan 6 and why the FBI refused to use geofencing in any other riot 2020 even though it had been requested in many cities. Geofencing is a fence that collects data from every phone in the area and sends it to google for processing. Jordan is requesting data on who did what concerning the use and denial of geofencing. Robert Gouveia is a lawyer with a podcast. He shows and explains the letter in this video.He covers many of the lawsuits/indictments...

The latest unsealed court filings shows that special counsel Jack Smith has all of President Donald Trump’s direct messages, including the deleted and unsent ones. We learned last week that the feds served Twitter with a warrant for Trump’s account. The company resisted. The court then fined the platform $350,000 and held it in contempt. The judge suspected Twitter wanted to delay the handover because CEO Elon Musk wanted “to cozy up” to Trump. I rolled my eyes. The government demanded everything. It seemed that no one in the room knew anything about the old fleets. Remember those? Twitter tried...

Sometime in the next three weeks, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to ask a grand jury to indict multiple people for trying to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election result. July 31 is the first of 10 days between now and August 18 that Willis has instructed most of her staff to work remotely, citing safety precautions.That window comes as U.S. Department of Justice Special Counsel Jack Smith is preparing to bring criminal charges stemming from his federal investigation into the Jan, 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Willis says the two investigations have not coordinated.“I don’t know...

ATLANTA (AP) — A list of criminal charges in Georgia against former President Donald Trump briefly appeared Monday on a Fulton County website, but prosecutors said Trump had not been indicted in a long-running investigation of the 2020 presidential election. A Fulton County grand jury began hearing from witnesses Monday. Shortly after 12 p.m., Reuters reported on a list of several criminal charges to be brought against Trump, including state racketeering counts, conspiracy to commit false statements, and solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer. Reuters, which later published a copy of the document, said the filing was...

grand jury is set to consider whether to indict 2024 GOP frontrunner Donald Trump in connection with alleged attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia. If indicted, this would be his fourth this year. Lawyers who have followed Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ investigation, including some who have worked with her in the past, expect her to invoke Georgia’s RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) Act, which is modeled after the federal act of the same name, according to the Wall Street Journal. “Signs are certainly pointing in that direction,” said law professor at Georgia...

This is not the presidential portrait he wanted. A sheriff in Georgia said former President Donald Trump will likely have his mug shot taken if he is hit with a fourth indictment in that state. Fulton County Sheriff Pat Labat anticipates authorities will adhere to “normal practices” if Trump receives an indictment for attempting to challenge the 2020 election results in the Peach State. “Unless somebody tells me differently, we are following our normal practices, and so it doesn’t matter your status,” Labat told reporters during a press conference Tuesday. “We’ll have a mug shot ready for you.”

"Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it." — Judge Learned Hand (1872-1961) Late last week, a judge on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court revealed that he had had enough of the FBI and Congress trashing the Constitution. The normally secretive court and the normally secretive judge explained in a rare public opinion the unlawful behavior of FBI agents spying on ordinary Americans in violation of the Fourth Amendment. The FISA Court judge...

A cop pulls you over for a minor traffic violation. After giving you a warning or a ticket, he says, "Drive safe!" and starts walking away. But he immediately turns around and walks toward your car again, saying, "Hey, can I ask you something?"That maneuver, known as the "Kansas Two-Step," is aimed at evading the Fourth Amendment's constraints on searches and seizures. Police are not supposed to continue detaining you after the ostensible purpose of the stop has been accomplished unless they reasonably suspect you are involved in criminal activity. The two-step is designed to extend the encounter by making...

Attorney General Rob Bonta announced this week that 3 new states would be added to California’s state travel ban list due to recent laws restricting transgender students from participating in school athletics that are not part of their original gender: Missouri, Nebraska, and Wyoming.

The Post & Email has received tonight a decclassified FBI report admitted in evidence in the case brought against W. Mark Felt and Edward S. Miller by President Jimmy Carter’s U.S. Attorney General, Mr. Griffin B. Bell. This document was obtained by an American citizen, who wished to remain anonymous, via a FOIA request. Mr. W. Mark  Felt is none other than the informant who spoke with reporters from the Washington Post, exposing the Watergate Scandal:  who went by the name “Deep Throat” a fact that points to his political neutrality in American politics.What is not know about Mr. Felt...

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Tuesday refused to reveal if he would support former President Donald Trump as the Republican nominee if the former president is convicted, asserting that he is “just simply not going to comment on the candidates.” CNN’s Manu Raju asked the Senate Minority Leader, “Given that the former president is facing a federal indictment and these serious allegations, could you still support him if he becomes the nominee, even if he’s convicte

Reuters has an interesting piece looking at how many experts are concerned that mass surveillance efforts by the federal government are making a mockery of the 4th Amendment. The focus of the article is on the scan of all Yahoo email that was revealed back in October, but it certainly touches on other programs as well. The concern is easily summarized by Orin Kerr: "A lot of it is unrecognizable from a Fourth Amendment perspective," said Orin Kerr, a former federal prosecutor and Georgetown University Law School expert on surveillance. "It's not where the traditional Fourth Amendment law is." But,...

Former President Donald Trump announced on Truth Social that he has been indicted and is scheduled to appear in a federal courthouse in Miami at 3 PM on Tuesday. According to The New York Times, Trump is facing indictment on seven separate charges. The reported charges break down into the following three categories: Withholding of national defense secrets: Former President Donald Trump has been indicted on this charge, which alleges that he intentionally failed to disclose crucial information related to national defense. This charge likely falls under the purview of the Espionage Act, which deals with the protection of classified...

Rep. George Santos (R-NY) is back in the spotlight again after becoming notorious for telling a series of lies when he was running for his seat in 2022. But now, it appears he might be in legal trouble for his questionable behavior.CNN reported:Federal prosecutors have filed criminal charges against New York Rep. George Santos, the Republican lawmaker whose astonishing pattern of lies and fabrications stunned even hardened politicos, according to three sources familiar with the matter.Santos is expected to appear as soon as Wednesday at federal court in New York’s eastern district, where the charges have been filed under seal.The...