Free Republic

When it was recently reported that protesters disrupted Columbia University’s graduation ceremony, one might ask: which one?In addition to its main commencement, Columbia hosts no fewer than 10 separate graduation ceremonies, often referred to as affinity graduations. These include distinct events for black, Latino, Asian, LGBTQIA+, Jewish, native, international, disabled, and first-generation/low-income students.While Columbia claims that it has a “long history” of offering race-based and other segregated graduation ceremonies, this practice only dates back to 2005.To put this in perspective, Columbia was founded in 1754. For more than 250 years, the university held a single, unified commencement ceremony for all...

President Donald Trump on Monday said he had ordered the firings of the boards of visitors for all of the U.S. military’s service academies, the outside advisory panels that help oversee academic programs and student life, saying that the government’s training grounds for military officers had been invaded by so-called “woke” ideology. “Our Service Academies have been infiltrated by Woke Leftist Ideologues over the last four years,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “I have ordered the immediate dismissal of the Board of Visitors for the Army, Air Force, Navy, and Coast Guard.” The president did not immediately announce the appointment...

Lady Liberty will be depicted as a black women on a coin -- the first time in the nation’s history Lady Liberty has not been a white woman -- the U.S. Treasury Department announced on Thursday. The coin, worth about $100 face value, is part of a commemorative series to honor the 225th anniversary of the U.S. Mint. “The 2017 American Liberty 225th Anniversary Gold Coin is the first in a series of 24-karat gold coins that will feature designs which depict an allegorical Liberty in a variety of contemporary forms-including designs representing Asian-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and Indian-Americans among others-to reflect...

Israel used its humanitarian aid mission to Nepal as a cover for trafficking 25 Nepalese babies, two Spanish-language networks reported. Iranian HispanTV and Venezuela's Telesur networks broadcast the reports. Telesur is the national public television channel in Venezuela, which is rebroadcast throughout Latin America on other public television networks. HispanTV broadcast the original report, which quotes an unnamed NGO as stating that "Israel uses humanitarian help as a cover for trafficking of 25 babies in Nepal." Telesur picked up the report last week. The report stated, correctly, that of the 25 babies that were taken to Israel, "15 of them...

Eh, this could get messy. Apparently, Steve Bannon was talking to media in Italy and said some rather confrontational things about Elon Musk. (CP) “I will have Elon Musk run out of here by Inauguration Day,” Bannon told the Italian daily Corriere della Sera this week. “He will not have a blue pass to the White House, he will not have full access to the White House, he will be like any other person.” “He is a truly evil guy, a very bad guy. I made it my personal thing to take this guy down,” Bannon added. “Before, because he...

You can smell it in the air. A deep sense of betrayal among Democratic voters. An underlying realization that the Democratic party’s politburo — Obama, Pelosi, Schumer, Jeffries, and their courtiers of elected official and consultant sycophants — sold voters a bill of goods: the gaslighting of the public on President Biden’s decrepitude; the false idol of the Kamala Harris “campaign of joy” as a smart last-minute stand-in; and the repeated cowering to the far left whose wokeness and moral condescension turns off most voters. In a just world, one might expect a formal no-confidence vote on this leadership failure....

There are many people who only became aware of Elon Musk after he dropped Ron DeSantis and took up a position in support of President Trump. Most of those people do not have a reference for Musk complying with the platform control demands of Brazil, France and Turkey [Durov (Telegram), and Pavlovski (Rumble) did not]. Most of those Pro-Elon people also do not have a reference for Musk claiming he and his legal team did not know former FBI Chief Legal Counsel James Baker was the legal counsel for Twitter at the time of the purchase, until after independent journalist...

A Yale-affiliated psychiatrist encouraged LGBTQ+ people whose family members voted for Donald Trump to cut ties and shun their relatives over the upcoming holidays — as fallout from the election reached hysteria on left-leaning MSNBC. Yale University child psychiatry fellow Dr. Amanda Calhoun dug into the issue of the post-election crises in the LGBTQ+ community with MSNBC’s Joy Reid on Friday night. “There is a societal push that, if somebody is your family, they are entitled to your time. And I think the answer is absolutely not,” Calhoun said in a clip shared online. “So, if you are going through...

This gentleman is amazing. I transcribed a little bit of his soliloquy below. It is worth watching and listening in its entirety. To the Democratic Party. I'm voting for Trump, but I have to say. You guys got me on this one. You are correct. I can definitely see, Trump is causing division. You guys have said over and over, you said, how can you as a Christian support somebody like Trump when all he's here to do is cause division and separation. And you're right! So let me read something to you. This is Luke 12:51-56. And this is...

North Carolina school reassigns DEI staff amid statewide crackdown The University of North Carolina Wilmington is the most recent college to close its “diversity and inclusion” office. The school announced the decision to shut down its Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion last week, ... “Based on policy requirements and consistent with System Office guidance, UNCW will close the Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion (OIDI), eliminate the Chief Diversity Officer position and shift the cultural and identity centers from OIDI to Student Affairs,” Chancellor Aswani K. Volety wrote in a message to the school. “Careful and deliberate thought was...

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology made headlines in May when its leaders told faculty to discontinue the practice of requiring mandatory diversity, equity and inclusion statements in faculty hiring. It blazed a trail for elite colleges, as Harvard did the same a few weeks later, and Cornell also appears to have followed suit. But a prominent MIT alumni group argues the move is not enough to protect free speech, academic freedom and intellectual diversity, and is calling on campus leaders to go further. The MIT Free Speech Alliance in mid-June released a set of recommendations urging the university to establish...

University hired 6 new DEI deans in 1 year The Massachusetts Institute of Technology added more than 1,200 new administrative/support staff positions in less than a decade – including six “diversity, equity, and inclusion” assistant deans in one year, a College Fix analysis found. Meanwhile, between 2013 and 2022, undergraduate student enrollment remained basically flat. The administrative hiring increase coincides with concerted efforts by the research university to “advanc[e] diversity, equity, and inclusion” throughout its programs. During the 2022-23 school year, the most recent data available, the university employed 6,693 full-time administrators and support staff, according to information the school...

Senior Vice President at The Walt Disney Company details discriminatory hiring practices: "Nobody else is going to tell you this, but they're not considering any white males for the job," says Michael Giordano, a Vice President of Business affairs, "there’s no way we’re hiring a white male.” Giordano reveals Disney uses "code words and buzzwords" to avoid legal action and even mentions a candidate being rejected for not looking black enough. Giordano also admits Disney gives bonuses to executives for practicing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), agreeing that "diversity helps with financial incentives." Giordano further claims he’s been denied promotions...

Dean says goal is to promote ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion’ An Alabama college is offering $75,000 in scholarships for trade programs – but only to female students. The goal “is to promote diversity, equity and inclusion in Gadsden State’s career technical programs,” according to a news release from the community college. The list of “qualified programs,” include welding, construction technology, and civil engineering. “This scholarship program is an initiative to get more women into manufacturing, construction, and transportation careers in order to help develop the workforce in our area,” Dean Alan Smith stated in the news release. Smith did not...

On April 28, 2023, the Santa Monica Daily Press ran this headline on page one: "Metro Rider Violently Beaten by Eight Teenagers at Santa Monica Station." The article, written by Magnolia Lafleur, reported the incident (which occurred on April 19) as a case of simple assault. But buried on page eight was this: "the teens jumped on him screaming insults and racial slurs". Now, when violent thugs shout "racial slurs" during an attack, is that not a hate crime? Yet LaFleur's long article -- 30 paragraphs -- never mentions "hate." Nor are we told the races of the "teenagers" or...

United Methodism’s largest overseas jurisdiction has voted to quit the denomination in response to the church’s divorcing sex from marriage at its governing General Conference earlier this month. The United Methodist Church in the Ivory Coast voted on May 28 to exit the denomination. In 2022, this conference reportedly had over 1.2 million members. So, its departure means over one tenth of United Methodism has in one day left the denomination. Oddly, United Methodist News Service reported the vote very briefly in an emailed news digest but as of today has no article on its website. Perhaps it will post...

A controversial bill being pushed by lefty legislators in Albany is trying to make the Empire State less “white,” critics say. The legislation, sponsored by Assemblywoman Jessica González-Rojas (D-Queens) and Sen. Michael Gianaris (D-Queens), would mandate state agencies and other entities use separate categories for Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) New Yorkers when collecting demographics data – rather than relying on the US Census, which classifies them under one “white” umbrella. The state Senate on Thursday voted unanimously to pass it, but González-Rojas’ version of the bill is still facing pushback in the Assembly. Both pols argue “MENA” individuals...

Ford’s electric vehicle (EV) division lost $1.3 billion in the first quarter of 2024, which adds up to a $132,000 loss for each of the 10,000 EVs sold. Sales of Ford EVs also plunged by 20 percent compared to last year, and “its revenue plunged 84% to about $100 million, which Ford attributed mostly to price cuts for EVs across the industry.” Ford expects losses on its Model e to hit $5 billion by the end of the year. More: The losses go far beyond the cost of building and selling those 10,000 cars, according to Ford. Instead the losses...

Rico Tice, a well-known Evangelical leader and former Church of England clergyman, has left the denomination in reaction to what he perceives as its growing departure from biblical values, especially concerning same-sex marriage and repentance. Tice, best known for co-writing the evangelism course Christianity Explored and co-founder of Christianity Explored Ministries, cited the denomination's recent decision to allow priests to bless same-sex couples and its lack of substantive response to concerns laid out by him and five other leaders of CofE-connected parachurch organizations last October.In an interview with Evangelicals Now, Tice, the former senior minister at All Souls, Langham Place...

Southwest Airlines issued a press statement Thursday declaring their intention to fire around 2,000 employees and cancel service to four airports following financial difficulties. “[W]e are implementing cost control initiatives, including limiting hiring and offering voluntary time off programs. We now expect to end 2024 with approximately 2,000 fewer Employees as compared with the end of 2023,” Bob Jordan, the president and CEO of Southwest Airlines ... Jordan also announced that the company was shutting down its service to three airports in the United States and one in Mexico. “[W]e have made the difficult decision to close our operations at...