Free Republic

California's blustery San Francisco Bay is home to the Golden Gate Bridge, commercial ports, public marinas and ferry boats. But more recently, a new sight is attracting locals' attention: Eastern North Pacific gray whales.The whales have brought wonder, as residents and researchers now get to closely observe how they feed, breed and socially engage. They've also brought growing unease: why are so many of them undernourished and dying?In 2025, a record number of 21 dead gray whales were found in the broader San Francisco Bay. So far this year, seven have died due to a combination of dwindling prey availability,...

Two men were found dead this week after a minivan carrying nearly 500 pounds of liquid meth — which authorities said had a street value of up to $3 million — crashed in a Texas neighborhood, prompting a federal drug probe and a hazmat response. Cops and firefighters responded to the crash on Delga Street in Fort Wayne around 11:30 am Thursday and found the vehicle had slammed into a parked car before rolling into a nearby fence, CBS News reported. The vehicle allegedly contained 10 buckets of the addictive drug, authorities said. The man in the passenger seat was...

Abortion medication access barriers prevent me from providing evidence-based careGrowing up, I always knew I wanted to be a doctor. But when the FDA needlessly placed an age restriction on over-the-counter levonorgestrel (Plan B) for emergency contraception, I decided I needed to become a lawyer too. I reasoned that political interference in healthcare meant my future patients might not receive the care they needed, and that as a physician-attorney, I could help advance evidence-based policy. In the 20 years since, levonorgestrel-based emergency contraception and daily oral contraceptives have become available over the counter with no age restrictions. Recent conversations, however,...

75-year-old with terminal disease used illegal 'magic mushrooms' after Health Canada denied him legal accessPete Pearson had three reasons for trying psilocybin, or "magic mushrooms," for the first time at age 75. "I hope it will keep me from losing my mind," he told CBC's White Coat, Black Art. "I hope it will keep me from being a complete jerk to everybody, and being so hard on Susie" — his wife. Pete had been diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), a progressive lung disease that makes it difficult to breathe. The average survival prognosis is three to five years and...

LOS ANGELES — A federal judge on Wednesday handed down a sentence of 15 years in prison to a woman who pleaded guilty to selling actor Matthew Perry the ketamine that killed him in 2023. "You're going to have to show some epic resilience," Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett said to Jasveen Sangha, echoing the defendant's words earlier in the hearing about her self-improvement. Citing the unique role Sangha admitted to playing in Perry’s death and her broader drug-dealing business, the judge gave the 42-year-old a sentence that will almost certainly be more than all four of her co-defendants combined. The...

A social media account affiliated with Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency published a pointed critique Friday of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, accusing him of being unfit to govern due to alleged substance abuse and detachment from public needs. “How can a leader lead when they sleep half the day and spend the other half high on substances?” read the post in Farsi from the @MossadSpokesman account on X, formerly Twitter. It ended with a charged refrain: “Water, electricity, life!” The post, which was automatically translated from its original Farsi, did not name Khamenei directly but was widely interpreted as...

BRANFORD, Conn. (WTNH) — What’s known to some as “gas station heroin” will officially be illegal in Connecticut to manufacture or sell.Kratom has been described by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as more potent than morphine and, at times, addictive like opioids. Starting Wednesday, Kratom will be classified as a Schedule 1 controlled substance, meaning it’s going to be banned from gas stations, convenience stores, vape shops, and other businesses in Connecticut.

The Trump administration is preparing to impose new tariffs on branded drugs from pharmaceutical companies that have not struck landmark deals with the president to lower their U.S. drug prices, CNBC has learned. Patented medications and their active ingredients would be hit with a 100% tariff, according to a draft of the document obtained by CNBC. But there are pathways for drugmakers to reduce or avoid the levies if they move their manufacturing to the U.S. or are negotiating deals with the administration. The proposal is not final, and it is unclear when the Trump administration may announce it, though...

Officials in Philadelphia have dismantled a massive drug ring operating out of a sham coffee shop, run largely by longtime, senior figures in the criminal world, Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday announced Sunday. The sweeping takedown, dubbed "Operation Cocaine and Coffee," was launched and primarily targeted a storefront known as Cumberland Coffee and Snacks, where authorities say the second floor was used to cook and package crack cocaine for street-level distribution. At least 17 suspected members of the operation were arrested, many described by officials as well past middle age and deeply entrenched in the drug trade. Authorities said the...

Lehigh County Commissioner Zachary Cole Borghi was arrested on charges that he allegedly bought and sold cocaine from his home and his job inside Bethlehem City Hall, the district attorney's office announced Wednesday. Lehigh County District Attorney Gavin Holihan said more than 100 new charges filed against Borghi were born out of a 2025 drug investigation involving the county's 12th Investigating Grand Jury. Court documents show Borghi became the subject of a drug trafficking investigation in May of 2024. According to Holihan, Borghi played a minor role in that initial grand jury investigation, which involved more than 40 other defendants....

The U.S. military said it carried out a strike Wednesday on a boat accused of smuggling drugs in the Caribbean Sea, killing four people, as the Trump administration pushes forward with a monthslong campaign against alleged traffickers in Latin America while waging a war against Iran. The latest attack brings the number of people who have been killed in boat strikes by the U.S. military to at least 163 since the Trump administration began targeting those it calls “narcoterrorists” in early September. As with most of the military’s statements on the dozens of strikes in the eastern Pacific Ocean and...

A California-born American citizen is reportedly rising to lead Mexico’s most powerful drug cartel, and his U.S. citizenship could shield him from the intelligence tools that helped take down his predecessor. Juan Carlos Valencia González, 41, began consolidating control of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel shortly after Mexican special forces killed his stepfather, Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera, in early March, according to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ). Two senior commanders reportedly stood aside rather than contest his takeover, keeping the organization intact, WSJ reported. Valencia González was born in Santa Ana, California. His biological father, Armando Valencia Cornelio, founded the...

ransomnote: According to Fox News, Campo was indicted, arrested, plead not guilty and is in custody.RealRobert@Real_RobNHere it is:The Kenyan administration’s ties to the Mexican cartel.Paul Campo, an Obama-era DEA official, laundered approximately $12,000,000 and participated in narcotics trafficking, aiding and abetting one of the most notorious Mexican cartels, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (also known as Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación, or CJNG), responsible for countless deaths through violence and drug trafficking in the United States and Mexico.Campo served during the Kenyan administration as Obama’s Deputy Chief of the DEA’s Office of Financial Operations.

Homeless individuals were allegedly bribed with cash, cigarettes, and marijuana in exchange for signing voter registration forms and ballot petitions — often using fake addresses Independent investigative journalist James O’Keefe and his team at O’Keefe Media Group (OMG) have released explosive undercover footage documenting what appears to be widespread voter registration and petition fraud on Los Angeles’ Skid Row, where homeless individuals were allegedly bribed with cash, cigarettes, and marijuana in exchange for signing voter registration forms and ballot petitions — often using fake addresses. The investigation, titled “CALIFORNIA ELECTIONS FRAUD CASH FOR BALLOTS PART I,” captured at least 28...

Five Mexican nationals were indicted on federal drug trafficking and weapons charges this week after authorities discovered a clandestine methamphetamine lab in Northern California, leading to the seizure of nearly 3,000 pounds of the drug, officials said. The Department of Justice said a federal grand jury returned a 10-count indictment Thursday against Luis Reyna Carrillo, 33, Mariana Vanessa Mendoza Camacho, 33, Juan Jesus Manriquez Diaz, 31, Alvaro Rosales, 44, and Manuel Juan Madrid Perez, 38, charging them with conspiracy to manufacture and distribute methamphetamine and multiple drug trafficking and gun offenses. "These illegal aliens allegedly operated a secret lab on...

In 2017, I took Cipro for just five days to treat a simple UTI. Since then, my quality of life has been steadily deteriorating. Over the past seven years, my condition has worsened to the point where I can barely walk, and I will soon need a wheelchair.

Kuwaiti authorities arrested 14 Kuwaiti citizens and two Lebanese nationals belonging to a Hezbollah cell, seizing weapons, narcotics, and terror paraphernalia.

Seventeen alleged drug traffickers are facing charges after authorities say they ran a sprawling methamphetamine pipeline that pumped hundreds of pounds of the drug every month across Northern California. Prosecutors in Placer County announced Thursday that the suspects were charged with crimes including conspiracy and transporting large quantities of methamphetamine for sale after an eight-month undercover probe dubbed “Operation Meltdown.” The investigation began in July 2025 when an undercover detective bought several pounds of meth from a suspected dealer in North Auburn, according to the Placer County Sheriff’s Office. What started as a single case quickly snowballed into what investigators...

Takeshi Ebisawa of Japan, Leader Within the Yakuza Transnational Organized Crime Syndicate, Allegedly Trafficked Nuclear Materials, Including Uranium and Weapons-Grade PlutoniumDamian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York; Matthew G. Olsen, the Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s National Security Division; and Anne Milgram, the Administrator of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (“DEA”), announced the issuance today of a Superseding Indictment charging TAKESHI EBISAWA with conspiring with a network of associates to traffic nuclear materials from Burma to other countries. In the course of this conspiracy, EBISAWA and his confederates showed samples of nuclear...

The global order is no fan of Iran. Atlantic writer and former National Endowment for Democracy board member Anne Applebaum has consistently named Iran, alongside Russia and China, as one of the three greatest autocracies threatening the world. Senator Chris Murphy, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a speaker at the Council on Foreign Relations, drew an explicit parallel during the 2022 Mahsa Amini massacres, declaring, “Just as we stood together with the people of Ukraine during their revolution of dignity, the United States must continue standing with the people of Iran.” One might think that these...