Free Republic

Dana Williamson, who served as California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s chief of staff from January 2023 to December 2024, faces a slew of federal charges for fraud, corruption, and obstruction, but none of those charges implicate her for wrongdoing in her capacity as Newsom’s aide. Instead, the charges allege that she stole and deceived outside of her official duties.That prospect is threatening to rope Newsom’s entire administration into the scandal.However, speculation is growing that Williamson also acted improperly in office — meaning that wrongdoing was taking place in the governor’s office under Newsom’s watch. That prospect is threatening to rope Newsom’s...

Dominion voting machines found to have phone chips in them mounted on the motherboards. Source: Attorney Peter Ticktin. These were in the tabulator(s) honest clerks in Michigan turned over to the good guys. So it is possible for someone to call into the tabulators using a phone or computer! This raises questions as Dominion voting machines, to the public appearance at least, use a USB stick style external modem. Similar to the one in the image below. The on-the-motherboard-chip used to be on most motherboards in the 1980's-1990's, until broadband came along. A true telephone chip on a motherboard is...

The case, Watson v. Republican National Committee, centers around a Mississippi law that allows mail-in ballots to be counted up to five days after an election as long as they are postmarked by Election Day. The U.S. Supreme Court has agree to take up a case that could have an effect on the 2026 midterm elections. The case, Watson v. Republican National Committee, centers around a Mississippi law that allows mail-in ballots to be counted up to five days after an election as long as they are postmarked by Election Day. The Mississippi law was enacted in 2020 due...

A mother and son face felony and misdemeanor charges stemming from an investigation into ballot tampering at a West Scranton polling place during the Nov. 4 municipal election. The Lackawanna County district attorney’s office charged Kathie Sico, 67, and Michael Sico, 46, both of Chestnut Street, Dunmore. The probe began after the county Bureau of Elections received a report from a voter who alleged they were handed a ballot with Kathie Sico’s name already written in for judge of election for Scranton Ward 6 Precinct 1. The election bureau referred the complaint about the incident, which occurred at the Jackson...

Leading pro-life organization Susan B. Anthony (SBA) Pro-Life America and Women Speak Out PAC (WSO) announced an $80 million investment on Wednesday into the 2026 midterm elections. The massive funding dump is aimed at retaining pro-life majorities in the U.S. House and Senate, with a focus on battleground states, like Iowa, Georgia, Michigan, and North Carolina, the organization announced in a press release. SBA and WSO plan to make 4.5 million visits to voters at their homes in those states. “All four states are Senate battlegrounds and contain key House battleground districts. Further, the effort includes deploying student teams into...

President Trump lost the tools necessary to examine the 2020 election process for fraud when he left office on January 20, 2021. He regained those tools on January 20, 2025. The questions were the same on both dates, although we know more now than we knew then -- or so we think.Too many examinations of the events in the country between Dec. 15 and Jan. 6 , 2021, are built on the premise of what we we think we know as a result of examinations that took place over many months and years AFTER the election of November 3, 2020....

The Georgia State Election Board will pay $50,000 to a nonprofit organization that sued the board over access to open records. American Oversight said Wednesday it settled a Fulton County Superior Court lawsuit filed in 2024 over claims that board member Janice Johnston had "significantly delayed responses to our public records requests." The lawsuit alleged that Johnston, vice chairwoman of the board, stopped election board attorneys from accessing her email to obtain public records held in her Gmail account. Johnston and other election board members used Gmail to correspond, according to the lawsuit. The settlement, provided by the organization, requires...

Those advocating to replace Oklahoma’s election process with a California-style “open primary” include campaign contributors to the Democratic presidential campaigns of Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, as well as a range of other left-wing candidates in Oklahoma, records show. Oklahoma’s current election system allows Republican voters to pick Republican nominees in party primaries while Democratic voters do the same in their party’s primaries, with the two parties’ candidates then facing off in the November general election along with any independent candidates who file for an office. But under the proposed State Question 836, all Oklahoma candidates—Democrats, Republicans, and independents—would be...

The Supreme Court is considering a Louisiana redistricting case that could have a greater impact on U.S House of Representatives seats than the Texas and California "gerrymandering" maneuvers combined. The New York Times wrote, "Democrats would be in danger of losing around a dozen majority-minority districts across the South if the court struck down part of the Voting Rights Act." White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller tweeted, "How many people just realized that Dems had as many as 20 extra seats based on years of unconstitutional race-based gerrymandering?" For the purpose of "racial justice" under the Voting Rights...

Setting the stage for a major ruling on election law, the Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide whether federal law requires ballots to be not only cast by voters but also received by election officials by Election Day. As part of the list of orders from the justices’ private conference on Friday, the court took up Watson v. Republican National Committee, a challenge by the Republican National Committee and others to a Mississippi law (as well as similar laws in 30 other states and the District of Columbia) that allow mail-in ballots to be counted as long as they...

The court agreed to hear the matter after the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the law in 2024. The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear a case addressing whether states may count ballots that arrive after Election Day. The Republican National Committee and Mississippi Libertarian Party challenged the state's law permitting the counting of ballots postmarked by Election Day should they arrive within five days, Politico reported. The court agreed to hear the matter after the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the law in 2024. President Donald Trump, for his part, has long been a...

Maricopa County election workers discovered Friday morning two sealed boxes of ballots that were mistakenly not returned on the night of Tuesday's election. Workers were inspecting equipment returned from voting locations in the Valley and found two sealed boxes containing 2,288 ballot envelopes, according to Deputy Elections Director for Communications Jennifer Liewer. Poll workers apparently placed the boxes by mistake in a blue drop box instead of returning them on Nov. 4. Liewer said a bipartisan team of election staff have taken custody of the boxes to ensure chain-of-custody protocols were followed. The ballot envelopes will now go through the...

Over one full term and less than a year of a second term, Trump has had confirmed: 3 justices of the Supreme Court (33%) 60 judges to the Circuit courts (34%) 187 judges to the district courts (28%) 29% of the judiciary overall Trump has filled all the existing vacancies on the Circuit courts this year. But there are five Circuit judges appointed by Reagan and four by HW Bush that should be retiring (they are all late 70's 80's and one who's 98). There are also several Clinton judges in their late 70's or 80's. There are currently twelve...

Did you know that, after Donald Trump won his surprise upset victory to become president in the 2016 general election, there was an almost identical reactionary result in elections held the following year? Both New Jersey and Virginia held state-wide elections in 2017, and Democrats swept those handily. In Virginia's 2017 gubernatorial race, Democrat Ralph Northam (then-Lt. Gov.) trounced former RNC chair Ed Gillespie 53.9% to 45% — a 9-point margin and the widest Democratic win in Virginia since 1985. (Recall also that the 1985 election was one year after President Ronald Reagan won re-election. In 1981, the year after...

The “Blue Tsunami”: What Haaretz Gets Wrong About America’s / Eli Gotthelf Israel’s left loves to preach that America is turning anti-Israel and that Democrats are drifting away, but the recent U.S. elections show nothing of the sort. Beneath the liberal drama lies a far duller truth: local races, local reasons — and no blue wave in sight. Eli Gotthelf. Nov 5, 2025 15:14 It may seem like a large sum to retire with, but there are many variables to consider. SmartAsset that America is changing, that young people are anti-Israel, that the Democrats are losing patience with us —...

Texas voters overwhelmingly approved an amendment on Tuesday that adds noncitizens to the list of individuals prohibited from voting in state elections, reinforcing that only US citizens are eligible to cast ballots. Proposition 16 passed with over 71 percent support as of Wednesday afternoon. The measure amends the Texas Constitution to explicitly include “persons who are not citizens of the United States” among those barred from voting. The list already includes convicted felons who have not met certain conditions for reinstatement and individuals deemed mentally incompetent by a court. By placing the citizenship requirement directly into the state constitution, the...

A House Democrat representing a district that President Donald Trump won in 2024 is not seeking re-election next year. Rep. Jared Golden, D-Maine, announced his plans in an op-ed for the Bangor Daily News on Wednesday, a day after Democrats' sweeping electoral victories in Virginia, New Jersey, California and New York City. "I have never loved politics. But I find purpose and meaning in service, and the Marine in me has been able to slog along through the many aspects of politics I dislike by focusing on the good work that Congress is capable of producing with patience and determination,"...

A good Wednesday morning to you on this day after the you-know-what. Thanks for stopping by. I admit to being a little over-tired today. I was up until late, backgrounding today's offering. Yesterday, I was busy enjoying the last few days of fall. Temps in the 50s and most of the leaves are gone now. As it happens, I live in one of the more beautiful areas of New York, near the entrance of Letchworth State Park, known as the Grand Canyon of the East. Here's a look at the Genesee River as it runs through the park. The bridge...

We apparently are not on a roll with some kind of conservative momentum. Leftist Democrats of the worst kind made inroads into political power yesterday. — NYC elects a radical Muslim. — Virginia threw out all reason and elected radical leftists to the Governorship and Attorney General, who had made violent threats. — Democrats flipped two red seats in MS breaking the Republican supermajority. — in my neck of the woods, Texas senate district 9 is going to a run-off after a DEM bested two Republicans for a plurality of votes. This was surprising as the polling place I revisited...

With the complete and overwhelming election results for the radical and progressive left, are we now actually seeing the “end times?” Candidates that espoused murdering their opponents, that cheated while in a military academy, a communist with absolutely no experience given control of the largest city in the United States with over 300,000 employees along with initiatives all over the country that allow them to move the entire country to the left. There may not be any coming back from this.