Free Republic

BALTIMORE (WBFF) — A nonprofit tied to Mayor Brandon Scott’s wife stopped operations after receiving roughly $100,000 in taxpayer money, leaving unanswered questions about whether those funds will be returned. ...

The wife of a homeless charity boss who allegedly cheated California taxpayers out of $23 million dollars was spotted dashing out of her $7 million dollar mansion Sunday — as neighbor’s dished on the couple’s lavish lifestyle. Alexander Soofer and Ashley Afraimian allegedly blew $40,000 just on landscaping at their Westwood estate, which the feds claim was bought with fraudulently obtained funds meant to help Los Angeles’ homeless community. “The neighborhood is buzzing,” one local resident said. “Taking money marked for the homeless. Its horrible, horrible” said another outraged neighbor. Afraimian, dressed in a grey sweater adorned with blue stars,...

Key points covered: Arrest of Alexander Soofer (former executive director of Abundant Blessings charity in California), charged with wire fraud for allegedly misusing ~$23 million in government funds meant for homeless housing and food to finance a lavish lifestyle (mansion, luxury vehicles, vacations, private school tuition). The arrest was announced by First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli for the Central District of California. Broader commentary links this to other alleged Democrat-connected frauds, including the Minnesota "Feeding Our Future" scandal (involving $250 million in child nutrition funds), where a convicted fraudster reportedly claims leaders like Gov. Tim Walz and AG Keith...

Federal prosecutors announced Friday that the head of a South Los Angeles charity was arrested on wire-fraud charges, accused of stealing more than $23 million meant to help people experiencing homelessness — and spending some of it on luxury travel, including stays at a Maui resort featured in HBO’s “The White Lotus.” Authorities say Alexander Soofer, 42, ran Abundant Blessings, a Hyde Park-based nonprofit that received more than $23 million in homelessness funding between 2018 and 2025. Prosecutors allege he pocketed at least $10 million for a $7 million Westwood home, private jet trips, designer shopping and a vacation property...

Republican senators have asked the Justice Department to investigate a Minneapolis-based charity, which nearly landed $1 million in taxpayer money courtesy of Rep. Ilhan Omar, saying it shows signs of being a fraudulent operation. The nonprofit group Generation Hope MN bills itself as a “Somali-led” organization offering drug addiction recovery services. It says it helps “East African youth” get “culturally specific treatment.” Republican Sens. Joni Ernst of Iowa and Mike Lee of Utah said something about the operation is fishy, such as its locations. One is a shared space with a Somali restaurant, and the other is a home in...

Officials in Maine have suspended state Medicaid payments to a Somali-run charity after more than a million dollars in possible fraud was discovered in several audits of the charity’s services. The Maine Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has cancelled MaineCare payments to Gateway Community Services after the audits found that the charity over billed the state for $1,068,598 from March 2021 through December 2022. The cash was supposedly to cover the costs of “interpreting services” to Somali migrants, the Bangor Daily News reported. This same organization has been under investigation before. Gateway reportedly overbilled for more than $600,000...

A Christmas Prayer By Rian B. Anderson It was Christmas Eve 1881. I was fifteen years old and feeling like the world had caved in on me because there just hadn't been enough money to buy me the rifle that I'd wanted so bad that year for Christmas. We did the chores early that night for some reason. I just figured Daddy wanted a little extra time so we could read in the Bible. After supper was over I took my boots off and stretched out in front of the fireplace and waited for Daddy to get down the old...

Donnie Allen allegedly shot and killed 27-year-old Benjamin McComas at a Cleveland light rail station around 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 14, according to Fox 8. Allen was charged with aggravated murder and arraigned on a $1 million bond. Court records reviewed by Fox News Digital show Allen was charged with drug possession, breaking and entering, vandalism, obstructing official business and possessing criminal tools in relation to a separate incident at a Cleveland light rail station on Dec. 4. His bond was initially set at $15,000, which was later lowered by Judge Joy Kennedy to $5,000 on Dec. 8. In that...

SNIP The truth is that our foreign aid had become a joke — a way to line pockets and spread wacko leftist ideology more than anything. Rubio told ABC's George Stephanopoulos — who tried to do that whole "Trump is killing people by cutting aid" thing — back in September that "We're gonna do more than anyone in the world, again, this year, but we're gonna do it the right way. We're gonna do it holistically. We're gonna do it as part of an integrated foreign policy." During that interview, Rubio pointed out that the reason why people die is...

There’s a particular kind of innocence in believing that generosity will be recognized for what it is. A nation opens its doors, offers a warm meal, provides a safe bed, and assumes the visitor understands the privilege. For decades, America set out the banquet, refilled the bowls, and quietly told itself that this time, surely, the guests would take only what they needed. But people who are constantly fed start to forget who stocked the pantry. They come back with friends. Then relatives. Then demands. And the hosts, too polite to object, keep ladling stew while pretending not to notice...

A Dallas Muslim community leader will be deported after an immigration judge ruled he provided “material support” to the Holy Land Foundation, the Richardson-based charity whose leaders were convicted in a major terrorism financing case. Marwan Marouf, 54, a Jordanian national who has lived in the United States for roughly 30 years, has served as the public relations and fundraising director for the Muslim-American Society’s DFW chapter. He has been held in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody since September. The Dallas Express previously reported that ICE arrested Marouf in September and charged him with lacking a valid entry...

It’s not so much the idea that rich Christians are bad people. It’s more the idea that we live in a land that is quite literally the richest nation that has ever been and yet, we are surrounded by a large population of people who lack basic necessities. It raises the question – Why? …It doesn’t matter if we are hearing prophets like Jeremiah and Isaiah, or Jesus’ own words. The message is the same – God cares how the poor are treated and does not look kindly on those who exploit the poor for their own benefit because when...

Wisconsin is seeking to deny a tax exemption not only to the CCB, but to all such religious and nonreligious organizations across the state. Amid leftists’ ongoing judicial coup against the Trump administration, America’s propaganda media have fomented baseless fears that President Trump is going to “defy” or “ignore” a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court if it rules on a case in a way he doesn’t like. But if these so-called “defenders of democracy” are concerned about government officials “ignoring” court rulings as they claim, where is their outrage about Democrat-led Wisconsin’s apparent bid to sidestep SCOTUS in a...

It may be appropriate to mention that something like rugged individualism is said to have been at the root of the brutal anarchy, characterized by rape, murder, civil war, genocide, and the nearly total disintegration of what had been the emerging nation of Israel that obtained during the latter part of the Period of the Judges: “In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes.”[3] Several biblical texts emphasize the importance of caring for widows and other vulnerable persons in the community. Laws intended to assist such persons can be...

The president and CEO of the 9/11 Memorial & Museum offered a tone-deaf defense of the nonprofit’s extravagant executive salaries this week, as The Post’s Page 1 expose stirred outrage that officials are exploiting the city’s greatest disaster. “Our executive compensation lags well behind that of peer institutions,” Elizabeth Hillman said in an email sent to the foundation’s trustees on Monday, adding that “recent compensation studies have supported adjustments across the organization.” But in the email, obtained by The Post, Hillman did not name any other institutions or cite specific compensation studies. Neither she nor the September 11 National Memorial...

EXCLUSIVE: Despite the US saying we are not accepting Palestinian “refugees” into the United States under the Trump administration, I have obtained video footage of Palestinians who claim to be refugees from Gaza coming into the United States via San Francisco and Houston, Texas this month. The Palestinians traveled from Gaza to the US with the help of a group called “Heal Palestine”.

California Governor Gavin Newsom’s wife makes “gender justice” movies and sells them to the state public education system through her non-profit, The Representation Project. By 2023, she had charged the state $1.5 million for her “gender justice” movies. That’s a screaming example of a conflict of interest. If that’s not enough, the governor requested nonprofits and private corporations to contribute to his wife’s charity before taking their side on state issues.

An American arrested over the assassination of Haiti's president worked with Sean Penn after the star set up a charity to help rebuild the island after its devastating 2020 earthquake, it emerged Saturday. James Solages, 35, worked as a driver and bodyguard for the relief organization set up to respond to the aftermath of the magnitude 7.0 quake that killed 300,000 Haitians and left tens of thousands homeless. It is not known if they ever worked directly together. In an online profile Solages also lists as past employers the Canadian Embassy in Haiti, while his Facebook page - which was...

The fire aid concert raised over a $100 Million, but where did all the money go? Jimmy Dore went to the the Annenberg Foundation who are in charge of the funds, to find out more. After repeated emails, phone calls, etc with no replies, they eventually heard from Barbara Chen of Annenberg. Turns out most of the money went into the pockets of NGO’s, etc with just 30% going to the actual victims of the fire. Anyone surprised? Nope. This is LA after all.

The liberal media had been trying to make a lot of hay out of accusations that the Trump family had tried to sell access to themselves and their president-elect father. So far such concerns seem to have little merit since all of the instances pointed to by accusers have not actually happened. But that didn’t stop it from being a topic of conversation on CNN’s OutFront on Wednesday. “This has been a stumbling block for the Trumps,” argued fill in host Poppy Harlow, after a long winded report about the accusations was aired, “Why even open yourself up to this...