Free Republic

WASHINGTON (AP) — As transgender service members face a deadline to leave the U.S. military, hundreds are taking the financial bonus to depart voluntarily. But others say they will stay and fight.For many, it is a wrenching decision to end a career they love, and leave units they have led or worked with for years. And they are angry they are being forced out by the Trump administration’s renewed ban on transgender troops.Active duty service members had until Friday to identify themselves and begin to leave the military voluntarily, while the National Guard and Reserve have until July 7. Then...

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said Friday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” that he did not want to see taxes go up on anybody when asked about President Donald Trump’s comments on taxes. On Truth Social Trump posted, “The problem with even a “TINY” tax increase for the RICH, which I and all others would graciously accept in order to help the lower and middle income workers, is that the Radical Left Democrat Lunatics would go around screaming,“Read my lips,” the fabled Quote by George Bush the Elder that is said to have cost him the Election. NO, Ross Perot...

With President Donald Trump’s former reality TV show “The Apprentice,” streaming on Amazon Prime as of last month, politically astute viewers across the political spectrum have zeroed in on an episode from when Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-NY, now one of the president’s biggest political detractors, praised his fellow New Yorker as a business prodigy. During Season 5, Episode 8, of “The Apprentice” in 2006, contestants were given a challenge — as was typical during each episode — and the winners of said challenge got the chance to fly to the nation’s capital and have breakfast with Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-NY...

Maryland Democrat Senator Chris Van Hollen, who is championing the jailed illegal migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia, has some loud American advice for El Salvador’s government: “They should just let him go.” The advice was delivered at a safe press conference in the United States, far from the busy streets of the Latin American country that until recently was wracked by MS-13 gangsters. The gang violence was wiped off the streets when the voters elected President Nayib Bukele with a mandate to restore law and order in their small country.

The UK could be set to dodge US tariffs with work to begin on a new US-UK trade deal, it was revealed during Sir Keir Starmer’s visit to US President Donald Trump.Following discussions with Sir Keir, the President told a press conference on Thursday: “We’re going to have a great trade agreement, one way or another.“We’re going to end up with a very good trade agreement for both countries and we are working on that as we speak.”“We’ll see if we can do something pretty quickly. But we’re going to make some great trade agreements with the UK and with...

The IRS will lay off thousands of probationary workers in the middle of tax season, according to two sources familiar with the agency’s plans, and cuts could come as soon as next week This comes as the Trump administration intensified sweeping efforts to shrink the size of the federal workforce, by ordering agencies to lay off nearly all probationary employees who had not yet gained civil service protection. It's unclear how many IRS workers will be affected. Previously, the administration announced a plan to offer buyouts to almost all federal employees through a “deferred resignation program” to quickly reduce the...

Officials have begun a large-scale nuclear incident exercise in New York amid fears of WWIII. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said the exercise includes military aircraft, personnel who will carry out scenario threats to be ready 'to respond in the event of a nuclear incident in the United States or overseas.' The drills began Sunday, but the agency said the public may now see personnel practising out in the opening. The exercise ends on January 31. 'The training exercise will not pose risks to area residents. Please do not be alarmed by the activity,' the FBI shared in a...

Images of “deportation flights” swept social media on Friday after White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt posted striking pictures capturing illegal aliens waiting to leave the country. The images will please many Americans who want President Donald Trump to secure the southern border and prevent gang members, criminals, and migrants from entering the nation. “The Trump Administration arrested 538 illegal immigrant criminals including a suspected terrorist, four members of the Tren de Aragua gang, and several illegals convicted of sex crimes against minors,” Leavitt wrote on X. “The Trump Administration also deported hundreds of illegal immigrant criminals via military aircraft....

Boeing factory workers went on strike early Friday morning after overwhelmingly rejecting a new union contract with the company. Around 33,000 machinists went on strike shortly after midnight on the West Coast after the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) union announced 94.6 percent of workers had voted to reject the proposal and 96 percent approved the stoppage. The work stoppage puts financial strain on the storied airplane maker, which has been struggling to repair its reputation after the door plug of a Boeing 737 Max 9 blew out during an Alaska Airlines flight in January, prompting regulatory...

A combination of high interest rates, lower office utilization and the retreat of major institutional investors from San Francisco’s commercial real estate market have conspired to create a once-in-a-lifetime situation. While most eyes see a crisis, a particular set of bargain hunters instead see an opportunity they cannot pass up. In the last two years, office buyers have been snapping up recently renovated buildings that, in some cases, are going for a quarter of the price sellers paid pre-pandemic.

Novelist, Hollywood producer, and unabashed President Joe Biden supporter Stephen King took to social media Monday to tell the octogenarian it’s time to leave the 2024 presidential race. King’s message to his seven million-plus followers on X – formerly known as Twitter – was simple and straight to the point. The multimillionaire left-winger said: “Joe Biden has been a fine president, but it’s time for him—in the interests of the America he so clearly loves—to announce he will not run for re-election.”

We’ve seen politicians go to jail. We’ve seen a vice president of the United States — Spiro Agnew — resign to avoid any chance of going to jail. We have seen President Richard Nixon pardoned in order to keep him out of jail. What we have never seen is a former president of the United States in jail. But now that is a real possibility, because Donald Trump can’t shut up and abide by a simple gag order. Justice Juan Merchan has repeatedly tried to enforce his gag order with fines. Trump pays the fines and keeps violating the gag...

Rust, Go (Golang), and Java are three distinct programming languages, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. Let’s compare these languages across various dimensions to help you make an informed choice: Performance: Rust: Rust is known for its excellent performance, particularly in system-level programming and scenarios where low-level control over memory is essential. It can often outperform Go and Java in these domains. Go: Go offers good performance, especially for concurrent applications. While not as low-level as Rust, it is faster than many dynamically typed languages. Java: Java also offers good performance due to its Just-In-Time (JIT) compilation and optimization....

Senator John Fetterman (D-PA) said Tuesday on MSNBC’s “The ReidOut” that his colleague Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) was like the fictional mobster Tony Soprano when discussing the gold bars detailed in the lawmaker’s indictment on federal bribery charges. Fetterman said, “Honestly, I was actually surprised that I was the first one. I mean, it’s so black and white. I mean, it’s so clear. The last time there’s ever been a man with so much cash in their home in New Jersey was Tony Soprano. You know? I mean, it’s not a— it’s not a— it’s not a close call, and...

What used to be arguably America’s most famous candy became infamous over the course of the last few years as it descended into woke culture as many corporations did, and just like these other corporations, it paid the price."Get woke, Go broke," as the saying goes. M&M’s marketing team decided to take the beloved characters and begin changing up how they act and behave. While Red and Yellow were left alone, Green was defeminized so that she wasn’t so obviously a woman, which was offensive to the hard left for some reason. Moreover, they began adding other colors for the...

… From a political stagecraft standpoint, the scenery for Mr Biden on Thursday night couldn't have been more picturesque in person.The president's lectern was set in a tree-dotted park, with a fully lit Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed, as the backdrop. A Marine band playing patriotic tunes off to one side. On television, however, the mood came across a bit differently. The close focus of the camera meant the president was only framed in the dark red portions of the building. It made it look as though he were delivering his speech from the gates of...

Did anyone notice how dimly lit the audience was? That was the first late night show I have EVER seen where the audience was just about invisible. **Look at the difference of the lighting just two nights earlier.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) appeared in front of the U.S. Supreme Court building in Washington, DC, on Tuesday to stump about abortion to a crowd of hundreds of abortion advocates in the wake of Politico releasing a draft court opinion showing a decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. Blumenthal, like several of his colleagues from the far-left flank of the Democrat Party, reignited calls for nuking the filibuster so that Senate Democrats could vote in favor of pro-abortion legislation by way of a simple Senate majority.

Republicans are expected to do well in the November elections, but just how well remains to be seen. Democrats hold a narrow 12-seat majority over the GOP. Flipping just a handful of those seats will likely result in a Republican taking the speaker’s gavel from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). However, Rep. Jerry Carl (R-AL) said he believes the eventual likely Republican majority will be much larger.

Like so many others I am sickened by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the gigantic humanitarian crisis it continues to create. #StandWithUkraine️ At DuckDuckGo, we've been rolling out search updates that down-rank sites associated with Russian disinformation.