Free Republic

Rep. Eric Swalwell’s campaign spent thousands of dollars after the election on childcare expenses for the California Democrat, raising potential ethics concerns for a lawmaker who has been accused in the past of using his campaign war chest as a "personal piggybank." According to campaign finance records, the Swalwell campaign spent at least $20,000 on "childcare" from Nov. 8, three days after the election, to March 31. The payments went to two of the Swalwell family’s longtime babysitters as well as a Washington, D.C.-area Spanish language immersion preschool where tuition is around $3,000 per month. The payments raise potential ethics...

State Dept. to close woke programs. The Department of State revealed on Tuesday the Trump administration’s plans to slash the agency’s bloat. Internal documents obtained by the Free Press revealed that the State Department will close 132 agency offices — a 17% reduction. The office terminations also reportedly involve eliminating 700 positions, including civil service and foreign service employees. The news outlet reported that the offices earmarked for closure include those dedicated to advancing human rights, democracy overseas, and thwarting extremism and war crimes. The State Departmen's new shake-up will consolidate 137 offices by transferring them to other parts of...

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is continuing his push against President Donald Trump's tariffs, with legislation he is co-sponsoring against them to come before the Senate next week. Paul says lawmakers should be in control of tariffs, rather than Trump, through the use of a national-emergency law. The discussion will come less than a month after Paul was one of the only two chamber Republicans to vote against his party's budget, which is seen as a key part of the president's tax cuts, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday. "I don't have any bad feelings towards the president, but this is...

Accelerates permitting procedures to develop American Energy Dominance... In response to President Donald J. Trump’s declaration of a National Energy Emergency, the U.S. Department of the Interior will implement emergency permitting procedures to accelerate the development of domestic energy resources and critical minerals. These measures are designed to expedite the review and approval, if appropriate, of projects related to the identification, leasing, siting, production, transportation, refining, or generation of energy within the United States. The new permitting procedures will take a multi-year process down to just 28 days at most...

President Trump just made one of the biggest moves yet to destroy the left’s most powerful weapon—and hardly anyone is talking about it. It didn’t even make a blip on the media’s radar. With one blistering executive order, Trump took a sledgehammer to the very foundation of the DEI movement. That’s right—47 just gutted the so-called “legal theory” that’s been used for decades to punish businesses, control hiring, and force unfair racial quotas under the phony guise of “civil rights.” This was the left’s top-secret weapon—and it was called “disparate impact”—and until now, it’s been holding America back from greatness....

On Wednesday, Judge Beryl Howell excoriated DOJ lawyers and signaled that she may permanently block President Trump from taking action against Perkins Coie. Last month, President Trump stripped security clearances of the employees at DNC law firm Perkins Coie. Recall that Hillary Clinton and the DNC paid law firm Perkins Coie more than $1 million to hire oppo research firm Fusion GPS to peddle the bogus ‘Trump-Russia’ dossier during the 2016 election. Former British spy Christopher Steele compiled over a dozen memos alleging the Russians had blackmail on Trump and that his associates were conspiring with the Kremlin to win...

To: 🔥 🚨 Everyone in DOD that coerced another into an experimental jab Subject: Lawyer up for Nuremberg 2.0! Texas Tom✓ @TomTX_RSVM I approve of @PeteHegseth using the military to round up all the crooked politicians, DAs, heads of NGOs, and Judges that have destroyed our country. Try them all for treason! Why the hell is no one being tried for Treason anymore???

The O’Keefe Media Group on Wednesday released undercover video of a Defense Department Branch Chief attacking President Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Nicolas Turza, a Department of Defense Branch Chief, called President Trump “illegitimate” and vowed to “resist him, everything he does.” Turza also attacked Hegseth and said the 44-year-old is “insanely young” and unfit to lead. “The same guy who tried to overthrow an election is just, like, truly setting us down a path of dictatorship. He’s illegitimate. He’s terribly immoral, breaking every norm. We’re going to resist him. Everything he does,” Turza said about Trump.

More than a dozen senior lawyers — many with decades of experience working under presidents of both parties — have been reassigned, the current and former officials say. Some have resigned in frustration after they were moved to less desirable roles unrelated to their expertise, according to the sources. “It’s been a complete bloodbath,” said a senior Justice Department lawyer in the division who is not authorized to speak publicly... The managerial jobs vacated in recent weeks have not been filled, so the traditional work of the division has all but stopped.

MS-13 Member Sentenced to Over 12 Years for Kidnapping, Witness Retaliation, and a Firearms Offense https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/ms-13-member-sentenced-over-12-years-kidnapping-witness-retaliation-and-firearms-offense An MS-13 member and Honduran national, illegally in the United States, was sentenced today to 147 months in prison for kidnapping, retaliating against a federal witness, and unlawful possession of a firearm. According to court documents and statements made in court, on Nov. 5, 2023, Bayron Wuifredo Santos-Recarte, 27, of Honduras, together with other associates of La Mara Salvatrucha 13, better known as MS-13, kidnapped a former federal witness at gunpoint in the parking lot of a laundromat in Nashville, Tennessee. The witness was...

For socialists, they’re sure a couple of high flyers! Far-left New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was spotted exiting a private jet with her comrade in arms, Sen. Bernie Sanders, after shuttling between stops for a campaign dedicated to denouncing the wealthy. Video from Fox News shows AOC and Sanders exiting a Bombardier Challenger 604 — despite both railing against flying private planes and the people who own them — a luxury aircraft with a lofty $5 million to $7 million price tag and costing an eye-watering $15,000 per hour to charter. The duo hopped the swanky ride to attend a...

The Trump DOJ responded to a federal judge’s order demanding more details on its decision to deport MS-13 gang member Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador’s CECOT prison. On Tuesday evening Judge Paula Xinis, an Obama appointee, erupted on the Trump Administration after a conference to address the government’s dispute over discovery in the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case.

It could take up to five years to develop a domestic supply chain to supplant China’s global monopoly in processing rare earths into materials needed to produce everything from iPhones to F-35 fighter jets. While the United States has most of the 17 rare earth elements and 50 critical minerals underground, it has no industrial capacity to refine them into processed metals and magnets, according to Melissa “Mel” Sanderson, American Rare Earths board member and Critical Minerals Institute co-chair. “Currently in the United States, we have zero magnet manufacturers,” Sanderson told The Epoch Times. She said that’s why China imposed...

Democratic U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin will not seek a sixth term next year, confirming to WBEZ in an Illinois exclusive that he will leave office in 2027 in a long-awaited move certain to set off a massive, intraparty succession fight. “I’ve decided not to run for re-election. So a year and a half from now, I’ll be wrapping up. I plan on working full-time until that moment, but I’m not going to be waging a campaign for re-election,” Durbin said during an interview in downtown Chicago. A major reason for his decision boiled down to one thing: his age. By...

Four years of classes, thousands of dollars in tuition and one freshly minted diploma — all to be outdone by a chatbot. As artificial intelligence floods the workplace, nearly half of Gen Z job seekers say their degrees have already been made obsolete by the rise of generative AI tools like ChatGPT — and they’re wondering why they even bothered hitting the books in the first place. It’s a waste of time and money, according to respondents to a new Indeed report, which found 49% of Gen Z job hunters think their college education has lost value in hoen defective...

“60 Minutes” executive producer Bill Owens abruptly quit on Tuesday, citing a loss of journalistic independence as CBS’ parent company, Paramount Global, looks to settle a lawsuit from President Trump. “Over the past months, it has become clear that I would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it, to make independent decisions based on what was right for ‘60 Minutes,’ right for the audience,” Owens wrote in a memo to staff that was obtained by The Post. He added: “So, having defended this show — and what we stand for — from every angle,...

The U.S. Supreme Court is weighing the extent to which parents can opt their children out of public school instruction in which LGBT-themed books are read as part of the curriculum. The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Tuesday morning in the case of Mahmoud, Tamer, et al. v. Taylor, Thomas W., et al. The case centers on whether public school parents in Montgomery County, Maryland — the state's largest school district — have a constitutional right under the First Amendment to exempt their children from lessons that feature LGBT ideology. Eric Baxter of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty...

Judge Paula Xinis, an Obama appointee, erupted on the Trump Administration after a conference to address the government’s dispute over discovery in the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case. The judge accused the Trump Administration of defying her court order and ordered the government to provide more details by Wednesday about its decision to send Abrego Garcia to CECOT. Kilmar Abrego Garcia is an El Salvadorian national who was illegally residing in Maryland. In 2019, an immigration judge ordered Abrego Garcia, an alleged member of the dangerous MS-13 gang, removed from the US. ...... Snip....... On Tuesday, Judge Xinis accused the Trump...

The architect of global elitism is finally facing the scrutiny he long deserved. Klaus Schwab—the godfather of the World Economic Forum’s dystopian “Great Reset” agenda—has abruptly resigned from his throne of influence after a whistleblower letter accused him of financial misconduct, personal enrichment off globalist funds, and abuse of young staffers, according to the Wall Street Jounal. According to the whistleblower complaint — reportedly penned by current and former employees of the WEF — Schwab used the Forum as his personal piggy bank. Among the accusations: Withdrew thousands in cash using junior staffers as gofers. Charged private hotel massages to...

The Trump administration has received official trade offers from 18 countries, and its trade negotiation team has meetings scheduled with 34 countries this week, the White House announced Tuesday.White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt provided an update on trade negotiations during a briefing on Tuesday.“There is a lot of progress being made. We now have 18 proposals on paper that have been brought to the trade team,” she detailed. “Again, these are proposals on paper that countries have proposed to the Trump administration and to our government.”Over 100 countries have expressed interest in making a deal, per the press secretary.“You...