Free Republic

Attorneys including Sidney Powell and Lin Wood will have to pay more than $175,000 in attorneys fees to Michigan officials and the city of Detroit, a federal judge ruled Thursday, as part of sanctions the court had previously imposed against the attorneys for their lawsuit attempting to overturn the presidential election results. U.S. District Judge Linda Parker ordered the nine attorneys to pay $21,964.75 to the state of Michigan, on behalf of defendants Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, and $153,285.62 to the city of Detroit. Parker had previously sanctioned Powell, Wood and their co-counsel in...

One of the more bizarre January 6 cases delved further into the peculiar when an accused Capitol rioter who was arrested while touring in a Broadway production of "Jesus Christ Superstar" earlier this month attended his first court hearing on Monday. James Beeks, an actor who was playing Judas in the musical production, was arrested in Milwaukee last week on charges related to the Capitol riot after investigators attended two performances of the show to find him... ...The actor's antics irritated Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the U.S. District Court in Washington, DC, when he declined to represent himself, saying,...

Four Ways the Ghislaine Maxwell Trial Is Already Rigged Nobody likes a Debbie Downer, but I’m being realistic when I say I’m not expecting a ton of bombshell revelations to come from the Ghislaine Maxwell trial. We aren’t going to see Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, or anyone significant taken down as a result of the major revelations. I hope I’m wrong, but the cards seem to be stacked against the truth. Here are four reasons for my pessimism: No Coverage It should be the biggest story of the day (yes, bigger than Omicron) yet it’s barely a blip on mainstream...

Alison Julie Nathan has previously served as a special assistant to resident Barack Obama and also as his associate White House counsel.. As the trial of Ghislaine Maxwell begins on November 29, 2021, some questions may finally be answered about the sex scandal involving late Jeffery Epstein. Maxwell was arrested on July 2, 2020, and is one of the few remaining links investigators have to Epstein after he died suspiciously while he was in jail. The trial is likely to finally tell us how far, wide and deeply Epstein's sex trafficking ring had spread, especially in the elite circles he...

WILLIAMSPORT – More than seven years in prison and then likely deportation is the fate of a Nigerian citizen who with his wife admitted laundering nearly $1.9 million obtained by making false pleas for money on social media. Jabin Godspower Okpako, 36, of Sayre, was sentenced Tuesday by U.S. Middle District Judge Matthew W. Brann to 7 years, 3 months in prison followed by three years’ supervised release. Deportation proceedings likely will prevent him from serving his supervised release, court officials said. Earlier this year Okpako and his wife, Christin Bradley Okpako, 54, of Sayre, a U.S. citizen, pleaded guilty...

Judge Alison Nathan is likely to be nominated to the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The federal judge overseeing British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell’s sex trafficking case is set to be recommended for higher court – sparking concerns about possible ethical conflicts. New York Senator Chuck Schumer announced on Tuesday he is going to recommend to President Joe Biden that he nominate Alison J. Nathan, 49, to the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. appeals court on Friday tossed out greenhouse gas emissions rules for heavy-duty truck trailers, ruling two government agencies had exceeded their authority. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in 2016 set rules for the first time requiring trailer manufacturers to adopt fuel-saving technologies like side skirts and automatic tire pressure systems. An industry group challenged the rule, which was put on hold by the court pending the review. The administration of then-President Barack Obama said it was important to regulate the fuel efficiency of the trailer portion of commercial...

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has granted former President Trump's request for an "administrative" injunction, temporarily blocking the release of his White House records from the National Archives to the House Committee Investigating the January 6 Capitol attack. "The National Archives and Records Administration and the Archivist be enjoined from releasing the records requested by the House Select Committee over which appellant asserts executive privilege, pending further order of this court," the order reads.

A federal judge on Wednesday declined to delay a Friday deadline for the National Archives to begin handing over Trump administration documents to the House January 6 Select Committee. Lawyers for former President Trump had asked for a stay after U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan rejected his lawsuit seeking to block the documents from being released while he appeals. In a six-page decision on Wednesday, Chutkan, an Obama appointee, denied Trump's request for a temporary stay for essentially the same reasons that she ruled against blocking the documents from being handed over.

WASHINGTON, Nov 9 (Reuters) - A U.S. federal judge has ruled that a congressional committee investigating the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol can access some of former President Donald Trump's White House records. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan in the District of Columbia rejected an argument by Trump's lawyers that telephone records, visitor logs and other White House documents should be kept from the committee. Trump had argued that the materials requested by the House of Representatives committee were covered by a legal doctrine known as executive privilege that protects the confidentiality of some White House communications....

A judge playing a central role overseeing the criminal cases stemming from the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol building has forcefully rejected claims from many alleged rioters that they’re being treated more harshly than people who broke the law during the widespread protests that arose last year in response to the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. Speaking during a sentencing hearing for Capitol riot defendant Glenn Croy, Chief Judge Beryl Howell disputed the notion that participants charged in last year’s unrest were treated leniently. She also insisted that the motivations of those involved rendered the Jan. 6...

A federal judge endorsed the University of North Carolina’s (UNC) use of race as a factor in screening applicants after ruling that the university did not discriminate against white and Asian American applicants.No discrimination: Judge Loretta Biggs ruled on Monday that the UNC’s undergraduate admissions process had not been discriminatory toward specific race groups, reported CNN.The group Students for Fair Admissions alleged in its 2014 lawsuit that UNC deliberately discriminated against certain members by including race in its admissions process.According to the suit, UNC allegedly used “racial preferences in undergraduate admissions where there are available race-neutral alternatives capable of achieving...

A Colorado man who in August pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of “parading” inside the Capitol during the January 6 “insurrection” begged a federal judge for leniency, declaring himself “an idiot,” new court filings show, and repeatedly apologized to America for his participation in the day’s events.Colorado Springs resident Glen Wes Lee Croy, 46, wrote in the letter to the federal judge in his case, as reported by WUSA in Denver:I am guilty of being an idiot and walking into that building, and again apologize to America and everyone for my role in participating.Croy apologized in a number of...

WASHINGTON, Oct 4 (Reuters) - Facebook Inc (FB.O) asked a judge on Monday to dismiss the U.S. government's revised antitrust case that seeks to force the social media giant to sell Instagram and WhatsApp. Facebook said in a court filing that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) had failed to provide a "plausible factual basis for branding Facebook an unlawful monopolist." The company added it appears the FTC "had no basis for its naked allegation that Facebook has or had a monopoly." The social media giant asked that the lawsuit be dismissed with prejudice, which would make it harder for the...

A federal judge ruled that the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill can continue to use race-based admission practices, saying the school's policy did not discriminate against white and Asian American applicants. "Seventy years after the first Black students were admitted to U.N.C., the minority students at the university still report being confronted with racial epithets, as well as feeling isolated, ostracized, stereotyped and viewed as tokens," wrote U.S. District Judge Loretta Biggs in a 161-page ruling Monday. "As a whole, underrepresented minorities are admitted at lower rates than their white and Asian American counterparts." The lawsuit brought by...

The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday refused to issue an emergency injunction to stop Maine’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate.The three-judge panel of the Boston-based court issued a one-sentence statement saying the request was denied without an explanation, The Bangor Daily News reported.A final ruling will likely be issued next week, according to Liberty Counsel, an organization representing more than 2,000 health care workers across the state in the lawsuit.“We look forward to a decision from the Court of Appeals. If that decision is not favorable, we will request emergency relief from the Supreme Court,” Liberty Counsel Founder and...

Whether it’s their response to January 6 or to COVID, activist judges have abandoned the law and are engaging in tyrannical acts. Thirty years of litigation work in the San Francisco Bay Area, which some might consider Ground Zero for activist judges, left me with a deep and abiding disrespect for leftist judges who are more concerned with their prejudices and feelings, than with facts and law. Two recent stories perfectly exemplify this. The first story involves an Obama appointee who is reaming people arrested because they dared to do what leftists always do: Enter government property, including the Capitol,...

Andrew McCabe, the disgraced Russiagate FBI agent who lied four times to the DOJ and FBI, will receive his full pension more than three years after he was fired by the Justice Department, according to the New York Times. Under the terms of a settlement stemming from a lawsuit McCable filed in 2019 over his firing, he will also receive around $200,000 in missed pension payments. The DOJ has also agreed to expunge any mention of his firing from FBI personnel records, and that he would receive special cuff links given to senior executives, along with a plaque bearing his...

The nation’s most restrictive abortion law remains in place for now, after a federal appeals court on Thursday sided with the state of Texas. In a brief 2-1 order, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit refused the Justice Department’s request to reinstate an earlier court ruling that had blocked enforcement of the Texas law, which bars the procedure as early as six weeks into pregnancy and makes no exceptions for rape or incest. The brief order, which is expected to be appealed the Supreme Court, was backed by Judges James C. Ho, a nominee of Donald Trump,...