Free Republic

Elon Musk's much heralded chainsaw couldn't make the cut. Despite the Trump administration's efforts to slash government spending through the Department of Government Efficiency, federal expenditures actually increased in fiscal year 2025. A new investigative report from the New York Times released this week showcased that many of the contracts cut by the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, led by tech billionaire Musk for the start of Trump's term, were already winding down, or were not on track to reach their maximum spending allotment. The findings were stark: Of the top 13 contract cancellations in DOGE's database all 13...

'Tis the season for Senator Rand Paul to air his Festivus grievances about government waste! It's out, and it's spectacular! We're proud that--for the 7th year straight--the report features wasteful animal tests exposed by WCW, including: 🐶 $5.2M to inject beagles with cocaine and meth (NIH) 🐕 $13.8M for Dr. Fauci’s ongoing maximum pain tick bite experiments on beagles (NIH) 🦆☣️ $1M for a dangerous USDA-CCP bird flu gain-of-function collaboration (USDA) 🦭🐬 $77M for the Navy’s outdated Marine Mammal Program (DOD) 🐁🤰$2.8M to implant bone, liver, and thymus tissue from aborted human fetuses into lab animals to create “BLT mice”...

The group of men challenging their deportations include migrants who were deported to a prison in El Salvador under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act in March, over allegations that they were members of Tren de Aragua. ================================================================= Federal District Court Judge James Boasberg ruled Monday that the Trump administration must allow Venezuelan men who were deported earlier this year to return to the United States to fight allegations they were part of violent gangs. The group of men challenging their deportations include migrants who were deported to a prison in El Salvador under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act in March,...

Donald Trump has doubled down on his attacks on Rob Reiner after the Hollywood star and his wife were apparently murdered. The President appeared to blame Reiner and Michele's killings on the liberal director's 'Trump Derangement Syndrome' in a Monday post on Truth Social. Hollywood celebrities and Republicans pushed back on his statement, with some calling it 'disgusting and vile.' But the President seemed undeterred in his criticism of the late director. When pressed by a reporter in the Oval Office about his previous statement, he said: 'Well, I wasn't a fan of his at all. He was a deranged...

California Governor Gavin Newsom has once again resorted to using artificial intelligence to try to mock President Donald Trump and his administration. On Wednesday, Newsom shared an AI-generated video on X depicting President Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller in handcuffs, crying in the back of a police car, and being led into a courthouse amid flashing cameras. The video, set to R&B singer SZA’s song “Big Boys,” overlays text reading “It’s cuffing season,” a clear parody of a recent White House post celebrating Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrests of criminal...

Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA) took a page out of the authoritarian, theocratic Iranian regime’s playbook over the weekend, deeming the country he serves “The Great Satan” during a rant on The Dean Obeidallah Show. Johnson offered his evaluation of his country after host Dean Obeidallah submitted that President Donald Trump’s strikes on alleged drug runners in the Western Hemisphere were “defining us as some kind of-, like a Putin-esque type of nation.” “Yeah, we are the world’s No. 1 bully, and we’re using our immense, unrivaled power to rule over those who have less power. And we’re doing it with...

“And I think some of the things being done by the Secretary—through some permission with the White House, but most of it’s coming out of the Under Secretary for Policy—a lot of decisions are coming from there. But it’s going to cause damage to our country for years to come, way after they leave. It’s undermining our trust with our allies and a very important alliance. And that troubles me more than anything.”

Sir Keir Starmer has enlisted the help of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron in his battle against Nigel Farage's Reform UK. The Prime Minister revealed the trio of 'centrist' politicians recently discussed how to take on 'populists' such as Mr Farage. The leaders of the UK, Germany and France met for dinner in Berlin last month to discuss European security, Ukraine and the Middle East. But Sir Keir has now said their talks also focused on their shared domestic challenges and battles with both far-Right parties and hard-Left parties. Mr Merz is continuing to face a...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) blasted Secretary of War Pete Hegseth on Tuesday for his role in the controversy surrounding the strike on a suspected Venezuelan narcoterrorist cartel boat on Sept. 2. “Secretary Hegseth said he had no knowledge of this, and it did not happen. It was fake news. It didn’t happen. And then the next day, from the podium at the White House are saying it did happen,” Paul said while speaking to reporters at the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday. “So, either he was lying to us … or he’s incompetent and didn’t know it had happened.” Paul also...

@RepThomasMassie Republicans campaigned on reducing spending, but after the election almost all Congressmen voted to spend hundreds of billions more in 2025 and 2026 than in 2024.

Donald Trump's latest power play may be derailed by a member of his own political party in a vote planned to take place over 500 miles away from Washington, DC. Indiana State Senator Michael Bohacek, a Republican from the Hoosier State, has pledged to vote against a draft congressional map that would see two Democratic seats eliminated because of the president's inflammatory rhetoric. The proposed map comes as part of a redistricting effort aimed at keeping a GOP majority in Washington, DC, after the 2026 midterm elections. As midterm elections typically result in the president's political party losing seats, Trump...

Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) claimed the Trump administration’s first military strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean was a “war crime.” Host Dana Bash said, “I want to turn to new questions around the first U.S. military strike in September on a ship that the administration says was carrying drugs. Now, sources tell CNN, after the missile struck the boat, there were survivors and that a second strike was launched to kill anyone who was left. Secretary Pete Hegseth is defending the move, saying it is lawful under both U.S. and...

Friday on CNN’s “News Central,” Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) said that President Donald Trump’s deployment of “military troops in the nation‘s capital or in any city” should be reconsidered because it caused two members of the National Guard to be shot in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday. Wasserman Schultz said, “This is a deeply concerning situation, but, you know, it’s one that I think we have to — it begs the question, would an individual have flown across the country to target law enforcement officers in Washington, D.C.? And, I mean, the answer is likely no. So why wasn‘t the...

As the US Navy remains primed for action in the Southern Caribbean, Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro prepares for what could be an American attempt to remove him. And as President Trump alternates between calling Maduro on the phone and authorizing air strikes, a bevy of misinformation is being peddled by public figures with an agenda. There are so many claims and counter-claims on the air waves right now that it’s difficult to separate fact from fiction. A sizable chunk of this disinformation is of course being sold by Maduro himself, a man who has learned from his predecessor and mentor,...

Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said Sunday he would advise against Ukraine signing the peace proposal that President Donald Trump has offered to end its war with Russia unless more "ironclad" security guarantees are written into the agreement."Without that, I would not advise Ukraine to sign this. They can't sign an agreement like Budapest and then allow Russia to invade again," McCaul told ABC News' "This Week" co-anchor Martha Raddatz.Peace talks continue as American officials are meeting on Sunday with a Ukrainian delegation in Geneva.

MARGARET BRENNAN: ... Is the President holding himself to the same standard that he is asking of others when it comes to dialing back dangerous rhetoric? PAUL: You know, everybody knows that the President is famous for his unfiltered social media. But if you take at face value the idea that calling your opponents traitors and then specifically saying that it warrants the death penalty is reckless, inappropriate, irresponsible, there are a number of other ways to describe it, but it’s not something that is helping the country heal wounds. I think it stirs things up and- and really, I...

A federal judge on Friday blocked the IRS from giving ICE the home addresses of taxpayers who might be undocumented immigrants — dealing a blow to the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts. The ruling is a significant victory for immigrant-rights group and liberal activists who are trying to resist the mass deportations that President Donald Trump has made a top priority for the first year of his second term. The Trump administration can appeal the decision, and it has a decent track record this year of overturning lower-court losses. A separate federal judge in a related case previously declined to...

President Donald Trump’s call for House Republicans to support releasing Jeffrey Epstein-related documents was a stunning capitulation after a months-long campaign to block the vote. It was also a specific defeat for Trump at the hands of a despised GOP opponent: Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky. “He got tired of me winning,” Massie said of Trump’s U-turn in an interview Monday morning. Insisting “I DON’T CARE!” in a late-night Truth Social post, Trump was bowing to the inevitable — a broad House Republican mutiny on a vote that was only scheduled because Massie forced it. It was the result of...

A former top aide to New York Governor Kathy Hochul enjoyed a life of luxury because she was an undeclared agent for China, federal prosecutors have claimed. Linda Sun, 41, is accused of acting as an unregistered operative for the Chinese Communist Party and using her position to influence Hochul and ex-Governor Andrew Cuomo into actions favorable to Beijing. Sun earned a government salary of $145,000, but was also receiving millions of dollars from side deals arranged by Chinese officials, prosecutors told her trial Monday. She and her husband Chris Hu used cash to purchase a $3.6 million mansion in...