Free Republic

A leading progressive voice in the U.S. House of Representatives called on Thursday for intensifying the probe into President Donald Trump's behavior in office with the goal of determining whether to impeach him by year's end. Democratic Representative Ro Khanna, vice chair of the 98-member Congressional Progressive Caucus, told reporters he thought former Special Counsel Robert Mueller's multiple findings of obstruction by Trump formed the strongest basis for impeaching the Republican president. "I think it would be helpful if we were able to get through the process by the end of the year, before the political season really gets on...

MINNEAPOLIS — Rep. Ilhan Omar’s soap-opera love life threatened to become more of a political thriller Wednesday as watchdog groups questioned whether her alleged affair with a married member of her paid political-consulting team constituted an ethics violation. “It looks like on the surface that she used campaign finance funds to benefit her paramour,” said Tom Fitton, head of conservative oversight group Judicial Watch, which last month asked the House Office of Congressional Ethics to investigate unsubstantiated claims that Omar (D – Minn.) married her brother to get him a green card. “The new reporting is additional reason for an...

Lacy Johnson has been living in North Minneapolis for 40 years. He raised his two sons, Darien and Adrian, in North Minneapolis and knows there is so much potential yet to be unlocked for his hometown. Johnson is running against far-left Rep. Ilhan Omar, whom he believes espouses hate-speech. The Federalist sat down with Johnson to discuss his plans for MN-5 if elected. Chrissy Clark (CC): Can you explain your background and why you have decided to run against Ilhan Omar? *** I saw that black Americans were voting 80 to 85 percent Democrat. I also saw that Democrats wasn’t...

Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) announced on Monday that he is resigning from Congress after being elected to his fifth term in 2018. "After eight and a half years, the time has come for me to focus more on the reason we fight these battles — family," Duffy said in a Facebook post. Duffy — who was first elected to represent Wisconsin’s 7th Congressional District during the Tea Party wave in 2010 — said he will leave his seat on Sept. 23 after finding out his ninth child has a heart condition. “Recently, we’ve learned that our baby, due in late...

Matt covered the insanity brought on by climate change protesters at the Democratic National Committee's summer meeting this week. But, it isn't just the party crashers who are saying truly outlandish things, it's also the invited speakers. Progressive Pastor Rev. William Barber challenged Republicans on whether or not socialism is moral. He even invited the debate, saying Jesus would support the economic system. Luckily, we have Texas Republican Congressman Dan Crenshaw to explain to the preacher just how wrong he is. "When we embrace moral language, we must ask does our policy care for the least of these? Does it...

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - Early in-person voting is starting [TODAY] for two special congressional elections in North Carolina. *** Early in-person voting continues through Sept. 6, in advance of election day on Sept. 10. *** Candidates on the 3rd District ballot include *** Republican Greg Murphy. The 9th District candidates include *** Republican Dan Bishop.

In the decade prior to President Trump taking office, the decline of America’s patent system seemed inevitable and irreversible. Years of bad public policy championed in the halls of Congress, disastrous Supreme Court decisions, and misguided administrative rulings emanating from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) had accelerated the erosion of intellectual property rights and jeopardized America’s position as the global innovation leader.The United States was the undisputed beacon of innovation until its recent, marked and alarming slip. Now, less than three years into the Trump administration, the tide is turning. With key administration positions being filled with pro-patent...

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA) — There is a new effort to help ease the homeless crisis in Southern California. Congresswoman Maxine Waters hosted a hearing in Exposition Park Wednesday to take a closer look at homelessness in Los Angeles and try to find a solution. Democratic members of Congress heard testimony about the homeless crisis and explored the question, “What can the federal government do to help?” “The federal government has been missing in action,” said Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.

BEIT UR AL-FAUQA, West Bank, Aug 17 (Reuters) - Sitting under an olive tree in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Muftia Tlaib scoffs at the attention she has recently received from the president of the United States. "May God ruin him," she says. Tlaib is the grandmother of U.S. congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, at the center of an affair that has drawn Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu together against U.S. Democrats. On Thursday, bowing to pressure from Trump, Israel barred a visit by Rashida Tlaib and fellow Democrat Ilhan Omar that it had initially said it would allow.

The White House is seeking reauthorization of a law that lets the N.S.A. gain access to logs of Americans’ phone and text records — while acknowledging that the program has been indefinitely halted. Breaking a long silence about a high-profile National Security Agency program that sifts records of Americans’ telephone calls and text messages in search of terrorists, the Trump administration on Thursday acknowledged for the first time that the system has been indefinitely shut down — but asked Congress to extend its legal basis anyway. In a letter to Congress delivered on Thursday and obtained by The New York...

MANCHESTER, N.H. — Former Donald Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski leads the 2020 Republican U.S. Senate field in a new poll conducted this week by one of the president’s top pollsters and released by a friend and ally of Lewandowski. The poll of 400 likely Republican Senate primary voters was conducted by Trump campaign pollsters Tony Fabrizio, David Lee and Travis Tunis for David Bossie, the president of the Citizens United advocacy group who co-authored two books about Trump with Lewandowski. It showed prospective candidate Lewandowski as the choice of 30 percent of those surveyed, with retired Brig. Gen. Donald...

Texas Representative Joaquin Castro's stunt he pulled this week by shining a spotlight on San Antonio citizens and businesses who donated to President Donald J. Trump backfired spectacularly as he was harangued for the obvious danger and division his tweets promoted. But, unfortunately for Rep. Castro, the ire did not come just from conservatives and Trump supporters, but also his own donors. Apparently, the list of MAGA supporters also included folks who gave to Castro's campaign as well. On Sunday night, Rep. Castro tweeted, "Sad to see so many San Antonians as 2019 maximum donors to Donald Trump — the owner...

To paraphrase the earworm theme song from The Lego Movie, everything’s transactional — everything is cool when you’re part of a team. The good news from the latest Pew poll is that skepticism over executive power at the expense of Congress and the judiciary commands majorities overall and in all three political affiliations. The bad news? Republicans are now least likely to worry about it.I wonder why? Currently, 66% of the public says “it would be too risky to give U.S. presidents more power to deal directly with many of the country’s problems.” About three-in-ten adults (29%) offer the...

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) urged Americans to demand that their representatives ban assault weapons or kick their "a---" out of Congress. "Americans, please stop tolerating the pain, suffering, and prayers of families, friends, neighborhoods & all caring Americans. Demand the Members of Congress get rid of ALL assault weapons or kick our a--- out of Congress!" she tweeted Tuesday.

So far, seven months into 2019, eight Republican representatives have announced retirement, six of them during the months of July and August 2019. By comparison, in 2018, 39 congressional Republicans (three U.S. senators and 23 members of the House of Representatives), together with 18 Democrats, did not run for re-election. What is going on with all these Republican retirements? One narrative has it that Republicans were retiring because they were fed up with the toxic political environment or were afraid of losing elections, but these narratives were prematurely formed or they lacked correlation.  There actually are three possible hypotheses...

President Trump on Sunday forcefully denounced two mass shootings in Ohio and Texas, saying "hate has no place in our country." As the president spoke, top Democratic presidential candidates -- including Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and Cory Booker -- demanded Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell recall Congress from its recess, currently slated to last until the second week of September, to vote on initiatives to curb gun violence. Addressing reporters in Morristown, New Jersey, Trump promised "we're going to take care" of the problem. He said he's been speaking to the attorney general, FBI director and members of Congress and...

There are many issues Democrats and Republicans disagree on, but elevating women in peace negotiations should certainly not be one of them. Just a few weeks ago, the United States under the Trump administration became the first country in the world with a Women, Peace and Security (WPS) comprehensive law (2017) and strategy (2019) bringing women to the negotiating table in global peace efforts. This is something to be widely celebrated. I have proudly worked with women across the aisle to train, support and empower women around the world — because ending poverty and violence against women, and increasing their...

According to a June 12, 2019 article in the Washington Post, Transportation Security Administration security screeners are "short-staffed, poorly paid and suffering meager morale." What's also worrying, is that the situation for TSA screeners (or "Transportation Security Officers," as they're officially known) is likely to worsen by next year. And unfortunately, the chronic short-staffing issue is nothing new to the government security agency, as 2006 news reports, as well as government inspector general findings, reveal. Indeed, air travel has increased so much since TSA's creation that it's overwhelmed the agency's ability to increase staffing in response .... Solutions do exist,...

I’m just a simple unfrozen caveman, but isn’t this kabuki? Posturing by Dems, or at least many Dems, with no real intention of following through? The majority of the House Democratic caucus now supports an impeachment inquiry against President Trump, with Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) becoming the 118th Democrat in the chamber to support moving to such proceedings. “[President Trump] seems to think that Mueller’s performance wasn’t enough to trigger an impeachment inquiry,” the congressman wrote in an op-ed in the South Florida Sun Sentinel. Sorry, Mr. President, the question is no longer whether the House should vote to...

Representative Will Hurd announced Thursday that he will not seek re-election for his Congressional seat. He has represented the district stretching from San Antonio to El Paso since 2015. In the 2018 election, he won a close, expensive race against Gina Ortiz-Jones. He is currently the only Republican representing a district that borders Mexico. He has 17 months remaining in his term. On Twitter, he said he would pursue opportunities outside of Congress to solve problems involving technology and national security.