Free Republic

Long before he won NASCAR’s preseason Clash Wednesday night, Ryan Preece had plans to race at New Smyrna Speedway before next week’s Daytona 500 and its preliminaries. But in the afterglow of his longshot victory, he seized the opportunity to heap big praise on the “phenomenal” half-mile Samsula track, where Preece will be racing Late Models and Modifieds in the coming days during the annual World Series of Asphalt Racing. The post-race topic turned to the Clash’s potential future at Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, N.C., which has been host to the past two Clashes. NASCAR hasn’t talked about potential...

A surprise new candidate has entered Georgia's 2026 governor's race, and he's bringing serious money with him. Here's everything Georgians should know. Who is Rick Jackson? Rick Jackson, 71, a Republican health care executive and billionaire founder of Jackson Healthcare, formally announced his candidacy for governor on Tuesday, Feb. 3, immediately shaking up the GOP primary field. Jackson Healthcare, based in Alpharetta, has grown into one of Georgia’s largest health care staffing firms. Jackson’s business profile and financial success have helped make him a well‑known figure in both the state's business community and Republican donor circles. According to the AJC,...

The Budweiser Clydesdales are back for the Super Bowl in 2026 – and they’re teaming up with a couple of other American icons: a bald eagle and legendary Southern rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd. On Jan. 26, the day after the New England Patriots and Seattle Seahawks punched their tickets to Super Bowl LX by defeating the Denver Broncos and Los Angeles Rams, respectively, St. Louis-based Budweiser debuted its latest Super Bowl commercial on social media.

<p>Two Republican Kentucky congressmen will play a part in deciding the future of President Donald Trump's White House ballroom.</p><p>The lavish gold-accented ballroom, announced by Trump in July, is expected to cost around $300 million to create and sparked controversy in late October after bulldozers removed the entire East Wing of the White House, raising questions around transparency and legal authority.</p>

<p>A Milwaukee Brewers fan attending Game 2 of the National League Championship Series seen on video telling a Latino Dodgers fan that she was going to "Call ICE" on him, has lost her job.</p><p>The woman in the video is Shannon Kobylarczyk and her employer Manpower Group, a Milwaukee-based staffing company, confirmed Oct. 15 that she is "no longer with the organization." She also resigned from her role on the board of directors at Make-A-Wish Wisconsin, the organization confirmed Oct. 15.</p>

Gov. Ron DeSantis appointed Anne Marie Gennusa to the bench in 2023 and will appoint her replacement.An embattled 7th Circuit Putnam County judge facing possible discipline from the Florida Supreme Court for allegations she abused her authority has resigned her seat.On Oct. 3, Putnam County Judge Anne Marie Gennusa submitted her resignation, effective Oct. 31, to Gov. Ron DeSantis.Putnam County is part of the 7th Circuit which also includes Volusia, Flagler and St. Johns counties.The Florida Judicial Qualifications Commission found probable cause that Gennusa violated several judicial canons, including complying with the law; promoting confidence in the integrity and impartiality...

Some A-10 Warthogs could get a reprieve from total retirement as Congress moves to reverse some of the Pentagon’s most dramatic Air Force cuts in its proposed fiscal 2026 budget. The Pentagon’s budget, which the department released in June, calls for the Air Force to retire its remaining 162-plane fleet of A-10 attack aircraft in 2026, two years earlier than originally intended. It also calls for canceling the E-7 Wedgetail program in favor of E-2D Hawkeyes and space-based sensors, and cutting the planned purchase of F-35A Joint Strike Fighters down to 24, or nearly in half. The proposed E-7 and...

<p>The GOP mayor of Mesa, Ariz. — Phoenix’s largest suburb — endorsed Vice President Harris on Monday, saying only the vice president can “put country over party” in the November election.</p><p>Mesa Mayor John Giles wrote in an op-ed for The Arizona Republic that Republicans should reject former President Trump at the ballot box.</p>

<p>The most eye-popping part of the latest news about Sen. Justine Wadsack, alleged criminal speeder, is not the way she tried to use her status as a state senator to wiggle out of a traffic ticket.</p><p>It is not her sense of entitlement or her bizarre claim of “political persecution” after she was clocked going 71 mph in a 35 mph zone.</p>

<p>Donald Trump has a long history with the WWE. In fact, he's in the company's Hall of Fame.</p><p>So it's probably not surprising that the 2024 Republican National Convention in Milwaukee where Trump was officially named the GOP nominee for president again earlier in the week has turned into a WWE reunion.</p>

<p>A Columbus police officer is believed to have shot someone while working in Milwaukee as part of the security efforts surrounding the Republican National Convention.</p><p>Brian Steel, president of the Fraternal Order of Police Capitol City Lodge No. 9, said details are limited but he was contacted about a possible shooting in Milwaukee involving a Columbus police officer.</p>

<p>Massie said on X, formerly known as Twitter, that while he is still devastated over losing his wife, Rhonda Massie, he wanted to dismiss some falsehoods about her death without violating her privacy.</p><p>"She did not take the COVID shots (we were both seropositive by the time they became available), our house is very secure, family was in the house the night she passed, and an autopsy has been conducted (we do not yet have results)," Massie wrote in the post.</p>

INDIANAPOLIS — Before an audience of 400-plus Southern Baptists, former Vice President Mike Pence on Tuesday raised warnings about the shifting direction of the Republican Party but stopped short of denouncing a far-right religious movement rising amid former President Donald Trump’s candidacy for president in November. "There’s also a very healthy debate within my party about whether we’re going to stay on the course…traditional moral values, a right to life, an affirmation of religious liberty or whether we’re going to start to move in a different direction," Pence said during a luncheon organized by the Southern Baptist Convention's public policy...

Christian activists will show people this Saturday how to turn weapons of violence into instruments of peace using a hammer − and some faith − to forge guns into garden tools. The event, hosted by Delaware and Maryland churches belonging to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, is an effort to get people to think differently about guns and how to handle conflict without violence. The "Youtherans," young people who attend Lutheran churches in Delaware and Maryland, are also organizing this free event at St. Mark's Lutheran Church, north of Wilmington. "It's to say that there's a different way," said...

A Marine truck mechanic received a medal typically awarded to more senior service members for saving the Defense Department more than $140 million through work he began as a teenage lance corporal. Cpl. Gage Barbieri, now 21, received the Meritorious Service Medal on Friday from Col. Damon Burrows, commanding officer of 2nd Marine Division’s Headquarters Battalion. Barbieri is only the second Marine corporal to receive the Meritorious Service Medal since at least 2008, Burrows wrote on LinkedIn

<p>In August 2020, 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse shot and killed two protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and injured a third. He claimed self-defense. Then, in fall 2021, he was acquitted of criminal accusations in a controversial, heated trial, and became a hero of far-right politicians and Second Amendment advocates.</p>

<p>Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough is overruling plans to ban the famous Times Square kiss photo marking the end of World War II from all department health care facilities, a move criticized as political correctness run amok.</p><p>The ban was announced internally at VA medical facilities late last month in a memo from RimaAnn Nelson, the Veterans Health Administration’s top operations official. Employees were instructed to “promptly” remove any depictions of the famous photo and replace it with imagery deemed more appropriate.</p>

<p>When Attorney General Ken Paxton stopped in Bastrop to stump for a Republican candidate for the Texas House, the state's top lawyer took the opportunity to let voters know he has an election day wish list that has been simmering for years.</p>

<p>For more than an hour, sheriff's deputies, firefighters and other volunteers fought to pull Angela Chao out of a vehicle submerged in a pond on a Central Texas ranch, a picturesque location that complicated the rescue attempt, according to a report obtained Friday by the American-Statesman.</p>

<p>Wisconsin has a spring primary election Tuesday, held to narrow down candidates for local offices, like city councils and school boards.</p><p>You won't see presidential candidates on the ballot — the presidential preference election is April 2. The April election also will include the candidates who advance from Tuesday's primary.</p>