Free Republic

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Judge Christina Mims has declared a mistrial in the trial of Christopher Schurr after the jury was unable to reach a verdict. For parts of four days, the jury deliberated over whether the former Grand Rapids police officer was guilty of second-degree murder or voluntary manslaughter in the death of Patrick Lyoya. On Tuesday, Judge Mims read an instruction — also known as the Allen charge — to the jurors, encouraging them to "talk things over in the spirit of fairness and frankness." Ultimately, the twelve could not reach unanimity in the case, causing a mistrial...

Activists in Grand Rapids, Michigan, are demanding that local officials declare the city a “sanctuary city” for illegal immigrants, MLive.com reported on Saturday. The news comes as President Donald Trump, who was sworn in on Monday, is taking steps against so-called “sanctuary” cities and some Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents have already arrested multiple criminal illegals. According to the MLive.com report, “A pro-immigration group is organizing a demonstration at the Tuesday, Jan. 28 Grand Rapids City Commission meeting to demand that commissioners put sanctuary protections in place and prohibit local police from cooperating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement...

Hamtramck Michigan Democrat mayor, Dr. Amer Ghalib, addressing the Grand Rapids crowd, states that besides his personal endorsement of Trump, a survey was taken in metro Detroit today of Arab Americans/Muslim Americans which shows 76% support for Trump, 03% for Harris

DETROIT — In a nod to Michigan’s importance among swing states, Donald Trump will hold his last campaign event in Grand Rapids late election eve Monday. That’ll make River City the former president’s final stop in all three of his campaigns. A nine-year journey that started with an escalator ride at Trump Tower will end at downtown’s Van Andel Arena in Michigan’s second-largest city. “Michiganders love a late-night rally, and President Trump loves Michigan,” Victoria LaCivita, the Trump campaign’s Michigan spokeswoman, told The Post. “From the beginning, Team Trump has known that the path to the White House runs directly...

The CRCNA (Christian Reformed Church in North America) is a historically conservative denomination in the process of being eaten alive by famished and bad-faith progressives, and they are barely fighting back. Like a wildebeest that quietly lets lions tear chunks out of its hindquarters with half-hearted resistance, so too has the CRCNA been being attacked and put upon by LGBTQ-loving liberals, slowly being drained of the lifeblood of Christ. We saw this defeatism most evidently in 2022, when their flagship school, Calvin University, made a devil’s deal with gay-affirming staff and professors. The school’s board of trustees voted to allow...

Mark Cuban has been one of the Harris campaign’s most visible outside surrogates in recent months. Now he’s making it official. The billionaire businessman will embark on a series of formal campaign appearances for Kamala Harris beginning with stops alongside the vice president later today, a campaign aide told Yahoo Finance exclusively. It’s a move that comes as the Harris campaign amps up its efforts to reach young men and further capitalize on the "Shark Tank" star's popularity in the worlds of both finance and sports. The first stop will be alongside the vice president today in Milwaukee and La...

Police say a man claimed to have a bomb outside a rally for former President Donald Trump in metro Grand Rapids and that he insisted it was the “real deal” — though it was not. As he appeared in a Grandville courtroom via video linkup from a jail cell Monday afternoon, Steven William Nauta, 65, of Sand Lake, acknowledged he could hear the judge and that he understood the charges against him and his rights. He held his head down for the majority of his arraignment. At one point, he made profane hand gestures, but apologized when the judge warned...

President Joe Biden’s decision to drop out of the race and endorse Kamala Harris makes Harris – the first black and female vice president – the heavy favorite to become the new Democrat nominee. While conventional wisdom suggests that Harris would be able to reverse Biden’s dramatic polling collapse with black voters over the past four years, polling data indicates that a Harris-led ticket might actually continue former President Donald Trump’s surging popularity with that demographic. Throughout Biden’s presidency, Harris has remained consistently less popular with blacks than Biden. A 2021 poll showed that just 38 percent of blacks believe...

Black voters who attended Donald Trump’s rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan, last weekend said that the former president “is for everybody” and that their beliefs are based on “morals,” not “skin color.” Speaking with Fox News reporters at Trump’s first campaign rally since the assassination attempt against him in Pennsylvania, Anthony from Kalamazoo said Democrats “take us for granted.” “When we speak, they don’t listen,” he added. While Biden won 87 percent of the black vote in 2020 compared to Trump’s 12 percent, the Democrats’ hold on minority voters has been slipping. A recent CBS News/YouGov poll revealed that Biden’s...

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was "crazy as a bedbug" and has accused her of turning on President Joe Biden "like a dog." More than an hour into his speech at a campaign event in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday—his first rally since last Saturday's attempt on his life—Trump dubbed Pelosi "Crazy Nancy" and said she is "selling out" Biden. **SNIP** "She's [Kamala Harris] not as crazy as Nancy Pelosi, Crazy Nancy. Did you see Nancy Pelosi is selling out Biden now? Did you see?" he said. "She turned on him like a dog....

Earlier this evening, Donald Trump held a rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan (indoors, this time) to a huge crowd. It was the first rally he held with his Vice Presidential running mate J.D. Vance (who got in a pretty good dunk on Kamala Harris during his speech), so the enthusiasm of the audience was extremely high to see them together after the recently concluded Republican National Convention. For the most part, Trump delivered his standard stump speech. Many have commented over the past week how Trump seemed changed, more reserved and presidential, after his literal brush with an assassin's bullet...

Trump, Vance to hold 1st campaign rally since shooting Trump's campaign announced that he and JD Vance will be holding a rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday. This will mark their first rally together and the first one after Trump's assassination attempt. The rally will take place in an indoor venue and the first since the assassination attempt on Saturday.

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Grand Rapids Police closed a 45-year-old cold case Monday. It was all thanks to one woman. Tommie Lee Hill was convicted of a string of sex crimes in Michigan and Indiana, and detectives spoke with other victims in Pennsylvania. Officials said his crimes include raping his young stepdaughters, assault with intent to murder, burglary, firearms and counterfeiting. He was on the run for 37 years. Joe Garrett, a Grand Rapids Police officer and U.S. Marshals Service fugitive task force member, first began investigating Hill's case in 2017. The FBI had handled it previously. In the 1960s,...

The illegal migrant suspected of killing a 25-year-old Michigan woman was deported during the Trump administration and subsequently re-entered the country again illegally. Brandon Ortiz-Vite, 25, is alleged to have shot and killed Ruby Garcia, 25, whose body was left at the side of highway U.S. 131 in downtown Grand Rapids on Friday night. Michigan State Police are still carrying out an investigation into her death but believe she may have been the victim of a car-jacking at around 11:38pm on Friday. Ortiz-Vite is awaiting arraignment on an open murder charge. He was booked on Sunday and is expected to...

It’s bad enough that the queer community has created a movement within their movement that they dare to label Christianity, a movement that not only seeks to normalize, but also to glorify sicj grotesque sex acts that would even have the assailants at Sodom and Gomorrah rolling over in their graves. From drag queen story time to trannies pushing abortion from the pulpits, those caught up in this movement would do well to remove the name of Christ from their lips altogether, as it will go better for them on the day of judgment. But to make matters worse, some...

A former U.S. congressman said several of his relatives were among the casualties when an Israeli airstrike hit a church in Gaza, which killed at least 18 people. Justin Amash, a Palestinian-American who formerly represented Michigan, revealed on social media that his relatives had been taking refuge in the Saint Porphyrius Orthodox Church compound in Gaza, partially destroyed by an Israeli airstrike on Thursday. "With great sadness, I have now confirmed that several of my relatives were killed at Saint Porphyrius Orthodox Church in Gaza, where they had been sheltering, when part of the complex was destroyed as the result...

Grand Rapids police are investigating recent swatting incidents in which 911 callers falsely report a serious crime at a specific place. The incidents happened at Holiday Inn Grand Rapids Downtown and a restaurant, police said. It is uncertain if the calls were related. “Swatting, or calling 911 to falsely report a serious crime occurring at a specific address, ties up police and other emergency responders, creates confusion and concern in and around the reported location, leads to rumors and misinformation being spread online and in the community, and generally causes chaos,” police said in a statement Tuesday, Oct. 10. Such...

Floyd Mayweather felt compelled to help after watching the Hamas terror attack, so the boxing legend arranged to send his private plane, chock-full of supplies, to the front lines in Israel. TMZ Sports is told Floyd, who teamed up with a relief organization in Israel, arranged to send "Air Mayweather" to the Middle Eastern country this weekend ... and deliver supplies. We're told they're planning to bring everything from food and water to bulletproof vests for the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) and civilians. Mayweather's pilots, AJ Ramey, Chris Javier, Sam Kniskern, and Freeman Blakney, will be flying the plane as...

PORTLAND - The drive west was everything Adrian Hammerle and Eleora Gouine had hoped it would be. The trip from Grand Rapids, Michigan to Portland, Oregon was a long one -- 2,300 miles -- but Adrian couldn't wait to introduce Eleora to Portland. After all, he'd lived here from 2017 to 2020. They'd heard about Portland's crime issues but understood it's something all big cities are going through. The day after arriving at their downtown Portland hotel, though, their excitement turned upside down when they headed to their car to find some coffee. “And when we got to the car,...