Free Republic

PBS fired two diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) executives and scrapped the department after Bari Weiss’ online publication Free Press was tipped off that the broadcaster was ignoring President Trump’s executive order eliminating the controversial initiative. On Monday, PBS CEO Paula Kerger informed staff that it was parting ways with Cecilia Loving, senior vice president of DEI, and Gina Leow, director of DEI. In the email, Kerger explained that the departures were necessary in order to adhere to Trump’s executive order from Jan. 20, which mandates the elimination of DEI-focused positions and funding in federally supported organizations. “I know you...

The FP is in our nation’s capital for the inauguration—and we’re talking to everyone with skin in the game. Today, hear Bari Weiss in conversation with Speaker Mike Johnson on the future of America under Donald Trump's second administration. Stay tuned for more conversations from "The Free Press in D.C." Presented by Uber and X.

As we prepared yesterday afternoon for this conversation, the war that Iran has outsourced to its proxies for the last year finally became a war being waged by Iran itself, as it launched over 100 ballistic missiles towards Israel. Israel’s 9 million citizens huddled into bomb shelters, while missiles rained down on their homes, with a handful making direct impact. As of this recording, two people were injured, and one person was killed—that person was a Palestinian man in Jericho. Just before that onslaught, at least two terrorists opened fire at a train station in Jaffa, Israel, killing at least...

‘We expected Hamas to kill Jews. We didn’t expect Americans to celebrate it.’Someone asked me the other day how I planned to commemorate October 7. I found myself speechless, befuddled by the question. How do you offer an elegy when the war is not yet over—and 101 hostages, those still alive and the bodies of the murdered, are not yet home? How do you remember a catastrophe when it is still unfolding? How do you mark a past event that feels as though it was a prelude to a much deeper darkness, whose dimensions we are still discovering? How do...

Who really owns the paper? I’ve seen this before, but never at such a high-profile level. Journalists, including Bari Weiss, were squeezed out at the New York Times and targeted by campaigns coordinated by their colleagues with outside radical leftist outlets like Huffington Post, Vox, and The New Republic, but this time it went bigger than ever before. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos decided that his pet paper, The Washington Post, needed a change of management and brought in vets from the UK’s Telegraph. The Post’s wokes and some around the media decided that wouldn’t fly and began running hit pieces...

Lucy Aharish is one of the most prominent television broadcasters in Israel—and the very first Arab Muslim news presenter on mainstream Hebrew-language Israeli television. Born and raised in a small Jewish town in Israel’s Negev desert, as one of the only Arab Muslim families, she has a unique lens through which to view the divisions in Israeli society, the complexity of the country’s national identity, and the Middle East more generally. Lucy has long been a vocal critic of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and is equally critical of her fellow Arab Israelis, particularly of Arab violence and the Arab leadership...

Months ago, I was asked to give a lecture at the Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention. It was a surprising invitation for a number of reasons. First, I am not a lawyer. Second: I am not a member of the Federalist Society—the libertarian and conservative legal organization. (If the name rings a bell it’s probably because you’ve heard of it in the context of the hearings of any of the conservative justices who currently sit on the court.) Third: if you look at the people who previously gave this particular lecture—Supreme Court Justices, attorneys general, people like Bill Barr, Don...

On Nov. 10, The Federalist Society invited journalist and founder of The Free Press Bari Weiss to deliver the Barbara K. Olsen Memorial Address at their national convention. Weiss, by her own admission, was taken aback by the invitation as she is not a lawyer and she considers herself a liberal. But Barbara Olsen was a political commentator whom Weiss respected. She was also a passenger aboard American Airlines Flight 77, which was flown into the Pentagon by terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001.

Call it a realignment, call it a political awakening, call it a vibe shift. Something has changed since the attacks on Israel. Here’s an example of what we mean: a friend, appalled at the equivocation and apologia in the West after the brutal Hamas killings, told one of us that he used to consider himself a “conscientious objector” in the culture wars. “Not anymore,” he said. October 7 changed that. Liberal friends were suddenly talking about buying guns. Progressive friends were texting about topics like border security and immigration. In a whisper, one even admitted to watching Fox News. For...

Matt Taibbi, who authored the first release of the infamous “Twitter Files,” is back for round two. Or at least he’s back to provide a supplement to round one while round two is still being worked on. According to Taibbi, James Baker, who was general counsel for Twitter and a former top-level FBI official, inserted himself into the disclosure in an attempt to “vet” the files that were ultimately released. Elon Musk was not notified of Baker playing middle-man. As RedState reported, Baker was fired on Tuesday, and with Taibbi’s latest thread, we now know why. I normally try to...

At dinner time on December 2 , I received a text from Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, founder of SpaceX, founder of the Boring Company, founder of Neuralink, on most days the richest man in the world (possibly history), and, as of October, the owner of Twitter. Was I interested in looking at Twitter’s archives, he asked. And how soon could I get to Twitter HQ? snip In the days that followed, we—the journalist Matt Taibbi; investigative reporters connected to The Free Press, including Abigail Shrier, Michael Shellenberger and Leighton Woodhouse; plus Free Press reporters Suzy Weiss, Peter Savodnik, Olivia...

Missouri’s Attorney General Eric Schmitt who, together with Louisiana’s Attorney General Jeff Landry, filed a lawsuit alleging collusion between the federal government and social media companies to censor certain speech, sent a letter to Twitter asking for the preservation of evidence related to communications between the company and federal government officials on content moderation and misinformation. Schmitt, who was elected to the Senate in November, referenced the internal documents, dubbed “Twitter Files,” that are being released by CEO Elon Musk via journalists Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, and Michael Shellenberger. The files showed that then-deputy legal counsel Jim Baker, who was...

1. A new #TwitterFiles investigation reveals that teams of Twitter employees build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics—all in secret, without informing users.

Journalist Bari Weiss asked former Attorney General Bill Barr if convicted child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein may not have taken his own life. Epstein was discovered dead of an apparent suicide in his cell at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Center in 2019, according to The New York Times, but some have speculated that he did not kill himself or may have been murdered. In an interview released Thursday, journalist Bari Weiss asked Barr, “Is it possible that Jeffrey Epstein didn’t die by suicide?” “No,” he responded.

Former Attorney General Bill Barr criticized some on the right for “pandering to outrage” after the unprecedented raid by the FBI on former President Donald Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago.On an episode of journalist Bari Weiss’ “Honestly” podcast released Thursday, Barr defended the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) handling of the raid. He admitted, however, that the politically motivated investigation into Russian collusion with the Trump 2016 campaign damaged trust in federal law enforcement and “created the condition” for the public to think “the worst.”“So what do you say to conservatives who say, ‘Why should we possibly trust these institutions to prosecute...

We need strong leaders like Lisa Murkowski – someone who has worked tirelessly for the people of Alaska her entire career. Alaska, please join me in supporting @LisaForSenate !

Sen. Tim Scott Thursday defended his endorsement of Sen. Lisa Murkowski for re-election, amid blowback from some Republicans who support her Trump-endorsed opponent, Kelly Tshibaka. "The road to socialism runs right through a divided Republican Party," Scott, R-S.C., said. "I like winning and frankly the best shot at us keeping that seat is without doubt Lisa Murkowski." Scott said that among the reasons he thinks Murkowski, R-Alaska, gives Republicans the best chance to hold on to her seat in a key election year is that "the power of incumbency is undeniable." He added that "she works really hard." The senator's...

Journalist Bari Weiss spilled the details of an internal battle at The New York Times over an op-ed piece submitted by Senator Tim Scott during his appearance on her podcast this week. On the Wednesday episode of her show, Honestly with Bari Weiss, she hosted Scott to talk about his time in the Senate and his life story. At one point during the conversation, Weiss recalled a story from her time as a writer for Times, a position she departed from in 2020 citing bullying from colleagues and an “illiberal environment.” The story centered around a behind the scenes debacle...

A former New York Times opinion page editor alleges that her bosses refused to run an op-ed submitted by Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) without first getting approval from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY). Bari Weiss, who resigned from the Gray Lady two years ago citing “bullying” as well as an “illiberal environment” for those with right-leaning views, made the allegation during an interview with Scott on her popular podcast “Honestly with Bari Weiss.” Weiss’ comments were reported by the news site Mediaite. The Post has reached out to the Times seeking comment. During the interview, Weiss recalled a discussion...

Rep. Peter Meijer (R-MI), a moderate GOP congressman, blasted Democrats for bankrolling his Trumpian opponent, John Gibbs, ahead of Tuesday’s primaries in Michigan. Democrats have been financially backing MAGA GOP candidates this primary cycle in order to have a better shot at beating them ahead of an expected Republican wave in November. In Bari Weiss’ Substack outlet, Common Sense, Meijer wrote that he voted to certify Joe Biden’s electoral victory as president, while noting that Gibbs “denies the results” of that election. “The DCCC’s ad buy was more than Gibbs raised over the entire duration of his campaign. It was...