Free Republic

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit in Boston heard oral arguments today whether a provision of the July 4 “One Big, Beautiful Bill” that ended Medicaid reimbursements for one year for Planned Parenthood and other big abortion providers can remain in effect while legal challenges continue. In September, on an unanimous 3-0 vote, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit reversed the earlier preliminary injunctions by Judge Indira Talwani and allowed the Trump administration to resume blocking Medicaid funds to Planned Parenthood while the case proceeded. Background Planned Parenthood filed the...

Pennsylvania voters on Tuesday opted to retain three Democrat justices on the state Supreme Court, preserving a 5-2 liberal majority that pro-life advocates warn will expand abortion access to any reason throughout all nine months of pregnancy. With more than 54% of the vote tallied, 62.3% voted yes to retain Justice Christine Donohue, 62.5% for Justice Kevin Dougherty and 62.4% for Justice David Wecht. The outcome ensures Democrats maintain control of the court, which pro-life groups had urged voters to reject as a direct threat to unborn children. The Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation, in a pre-election alert, called on voters to...

Back aways, we reposted a story that told the grim truth about the fate of babies with Down syndrome in Denmark. In 2019 there were virtually none—just 18! When I read “The last children of Down Syndrome” by Sarah Zhan, I immediately thought of the 2017 story from CBS News about Iceland titled “What kind of society do you want to live in? Inside the country where Down syndrome is Disappearing.” Zhan’s is a brilliantly written piece that appears in the Atlantic magazine. The subhead puts the story in the larger context: “Prenatal screening is changing who gets born and...

As mayor, Mamdani has pledged to safeguard and expand access to comprehensive sexual and reproductive health care, including abortion and gender-affirming care. His platform calls for doubling funding for both New York City’s Abortion Access Hub and the New York Abortion Access Fund (NYAAF), ensuring that anyone can access abortion care regardless of income or immigration status. His plans also include an investment of $65 million in public clinics and sexual and reproductive health care providers to expand access to gender-affirming care and confronting private health care institutions that have refused to provide this critical care. Mamdani will also declare...

The internet is full of questionable content – if you spend any time on social media, you probably see things every day that make you shake your head. But every once in a while, a post lands so hard you can’t just scroll past. Take a Milwaukee abortion clinic’s recent Instagram post in which they offer supporters the opportunity (for a mere $10) to suggest a name for their new – wait for it – suction aspiration machine. You read that correctly. They are holding a naming contest for a machine whose sole purpose is to abort children. Let’s unpack...

Virginia gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger’s refusal to affirm life-saving care for babies born alive after failed abortions has drawn sharp condemnation from pro-life advocates, who accuse her of endorsing unlimited abortions throughout pregnancy and undermining parental rights in the process. During Thursday’s debate, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears pressed Spanberger on whether a baby born alive after an abortion should receive appropriate medical treatment. Spanberger remained silent, declining to answer the pointed question. The moment, captured on video, has fueled accusations that Spanberger backs a proposed constitutional amendment in Virginia that would enshrine unlimited abortions up to birth, block future protective...

On Tuesday evening, the Chicago-born Pope Leo XIV spoke out against anti-immigrant sentiment in the United States, as well as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s bellicose rhetoric. At an unusual gathering of military leaders earlier that day, Hegseth had told the top brass to be “prepared for war, not for defense,” while espousing the use of “overwhelming and punishing violence on the enemy” and promising to “untie the hands of our warfighters to intimidate, demoralize, hunt and kill the enemies of our country.” Speaking to reporters in Italian, Leo called Hegseth’s rhetoric “worrying,” per the Catholic News Agency, “because it shows...

[Catholic Caucus] The Brew: Pope Leo Smothers Pro-Lifers in the ‘Seamless Garment.’Well, the mystery man has taken off his disguise. Like traumatized children who hope that their mama’s new boyfriend won’t beat them as much as the last one, Catholics greeted the new man called “Il Papa” with hope. And indeed Leo XIV is a big improvement in some ways over Pope Francis. Leo doesn’t seem to be a sociopath, and is probably even a theist.But as we reported yesterday, Leo’s latest public statement has given away that he embraces one of the most detestable heresies in Church history since...

[Catholic Caucus] Michigan’s new ‘Catholic Caucus’ features two pro-abortion Democrat lawmakersGOP State Rep. Jim DeSana is pushing back against the Michigan Catholic Conference after the group announced two pro-abortion Democrats would co-chair its official legislative caucus.A traditional Catholic lawmaker in Michigan is pushing back against the state’s Catholic Conference (MCC) after the group announced that two pro-abortion Democrats would co-chair its official legislative caucus.GOP State Representative Jim DeSana granted reporter Stephen Kokx an exclusive interview on Wednesday to speak out against the decision.“I feel it is problematic and even scandalous for me as a Catholic state representative to participate in...

Democrat California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill on Friday allowing healthcare workers the option of anonymously mailing abortion drugs into red states to skirt pro-life laws. The law, AB 260, bolsters the state’s existing shield laws designed to protect abortionists from out-of-state prosecutions. Democrat Assembly Majority Leader Cecilia Aguiar-Curry said she introduced the legislation in direct response to a Texas man suing a California doctor for sending his girlfriend abortion pills, Politico reported. Newsom also signed a bill that would keep the abortion drug mifepristone available in the state, even if the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) decided to...

Money talks: Why Cupich may be honoring pro-abortion Sen. DurbinCupich has a long and friendly history with Durbin, who has pulled the federal purse strings for the Chicago archdiocese. Chicago’s Cardinal Blase Cupich is doubling down in the face of backlash to his decision to honor pro-abort Sen. Dick Durbin. Durbin is a Catholic who lives in Chicago, with a long track record of voting in favor of abortion.“Recently some have criticized the decision of the Archdiocese of Chicago to recognize Senator Dick Durbin at our annual fundraiser for our immigration ministry, Keep Hope Alive,” he wrote in a Sept....

Pregnant women are filming themselves taking Tylenol in defiance against Donald Trump's shaky claim the painkiller causes autism in children. The president announced that doctors in the US will begin advising expectant mothers against taking the drug because of an apparent link. Trump, 79, claimed that taking Tylenol 'is no good', adding that pregnant women should 'fight like hell' to avoid taking it, except for in cases of extreme fever. Several moms have gone viral on TikTok for posting videos of themselves taking Tylenol in protest. 'Here's me, a PREGNANT woman, taking TYLENOL because I believe in science and not...

US Army apologizes to pro-life groups for calling them ‘terrorists’ under Biden adminThe secretary of the Army formally apologized to Operation Rescue and the National Right to Life for a Biden-era military presentation labeling the pro-life organizations ‘terrorist groups.’The Trump administration’s work to rectify its predecessors’ misconduct continues, this time with a formal apology from the U.S. Army for a Biden-era military presentation that labeled mainstream pro-life organizations “terrorist groups.”As LifeSiteNews covered last year, a photograph leaked of a presentation shown during an anti-terrorism briefing at Fort Bragg (renamed Fort Liberty at the time), right after one about the Islamist...

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s liberal majority struck down the state’s 176-year-old abortion ban on Wednesday, ruling 4-3 that it was superseded by newer state laws regulating the procedure, including statutes that criminalize abortions only after a fetus can survive outside the womb.The ruling came as no surprise given that liberal justices control the high court. One of them went so far as promising to uphold abortion rights during her campaign two years ago, and they blasted the ban during oral arguments in November. The statute Wisconsin legislators adopted in 1849, widely interpreted as a near-total ban...

ealth and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has pushed discredited claims that the MMR vaccine contains "a lot of aborted fetus debris." He made the remarks during a town hall event on Newsnation on Wednesday, saying this "debris" was the reason many religious groups don't get vaccinated. Why It Matters The claim comes amid a serious measles outbreak in Texas that has already claimed the lives of two children in a Mennonite community with low vaccination rates. Kennedy Jr., who has long faced criticism over his comments about vaccines, has vowed to investigate the childhood vaccine schedule. Despite...

Colorado Governor Jared Polis has signed a bill forcing Colorado taxpayers to fund abortions. Polis signed SB25-183, a recently approved state measure that would allocate a minimum of $1.5 million per year of taxpayer funds to cover elective abortions. With Colorado having abortions up to birth, that means taxpayers will be on the hook for paying for killing viable babies who could easily live outside the womb. And with the $1.5 million figure a minimum, Colorado residents may be forced to pay even more to kill thousands of babies. “One thing pro-life and pro-choice people agree on nationwide is that...

The annual excitement over Girl Scout Cookie season took an unexpected turn this year when a viral report alleged that the beloved treats contain heavy metals and pesticides. The claim was initially met with skepticism, but has now escalated into legal action, leaving consumers questioning the safety of the iconic cookies. The controversy began when two consumer groups, Moms Across America and GMO Science, conducted a study analyzing 25 cookie samples from California, Iowa, and Louisiana. The report, which was published in December, claimed that 100% of the tested samples contained detectable levels of heavy metals, including aluminum, arsenic, lead,...

America’s public high schools are strange places to find displays of the alphabet. Perhaps with plummeting standardized test scores and a substantial increase in English-as-a-second-language students in sanctuary districts, high school educators feel the need to review kindergarten basics. In Fairfax County, Virginia’s West Springfield High School, located just 17 miles from the White House, school administrators and teachers have decorated the history hallway this month with a special, leftist rendition of the alphabet. The display, titled “The ABCs to ME,” is decorated with the school’s colors: a blue background lined with an orange border. Featured in the display is...

The DuPage County Board voted 10-5 at its Tuesday meeting to remove the Republican congressman’s name from the building and related offices in Wheaton. While Democrats and Republicans voted along party lines on the issue, Democrats Lynn LaPlante and Lucy Chang Evans abstained from the vote and expressed disappointment that the matter was raised. […] “Here in DuPage County, public buildings serve all people, regardless of race, gender, faith or … economic status,” board Chair Deb Conroy, a Democrat from Elmhurst, said ahead the vote. “This resolution reinforces the notion that the buildings on this campus support the rights of...

Ohio Democrats are looking to make a statement in favor of killing unborn babies by abortion by introducing the “Contraception Begins at Erection Act.” The bill, which will be introduced by Democrat state Reps. Anita Somani and Tristan Rader, would make it illegal for men to have sex without trying to create a child, Local12 reported. The bill is modeled after similar legislation introduced by Democrat Mississippi state Sen. Bradford Blackmon. “Fair is fair, right?” Somani said in video posted to Bluesky. “If this legislature is so dedicated to regulating women’s bodies and their access to contraceptives and abortion care...