Free Republic

Nations were poised to approve the first fee on pollution from ships. That’s when the Trump administration began the threats.More than 100 nations were poised last month to approve a historic deal to slash pollution from cargo ships. That’s when the United States launched a pressure campaign that officials around the world have called extraordinary, even by the standards of the Trump administration’s combativeness, according to nine diplomats on its receiving end. An ambassador from Asia was told that, if he voted in favor of the plan, his country’s sailors would no longer be allowed to disembark at American ports....

The Illinois governor, a potential presidential candidate, is fighting the presence of National Guard troops and the activities of ICE agents in Chicago.When President Trump ordered the National Guard to Chicago last week, Gov. JB Pritzker of Illinois became the latest Democrat to bear the brunt of managing an aggressive federal government. He has concluded it must be combated with a national campaign. Aside from instructing his attorney general to file a lawsuit to block troops from other states coming to Illinois, Mr. Pritzker has few formal options to resist what he described this week as an “unconstitutional invasion of...

President Trump has unleashed new weaponry in his war against Democrats, liberals and the left. Over the past four weeks, he has initiated what amounts to a unique form of partisan civil war designed to amass power in a nominal democracy and defang, decimate and defund the opposition. Trump’s assault on the left combines the use of the available tools of violent conflict — the military, the Department of Homeland Security and ICE in particular — with the prosecution of critics (and people he just doesn’t like), cuts of essential funds for liberal institutions, the use of regulation to threaten...

The New York Times editorial board was despondent over President-elect Donald Trump’s decisive victory, declaring his return to power was a “grave threat” to the republic. “American voters have made the choice to return Donald Trump to the White House, setting the nation on a precarious course that no one can fully foresee,” the board wrote on Wednesday, later adding, “Mr. Trump’s election poses a grave threat to [the] republic, but he will not determine the long-term fate of American democracy. That outcome remains in the hands of the American people.” Trump capped a stunning political comeback from his defeat...