Free Republic

A federal lawmaker introduced legislation Thursday aimed at cracking down on alleged fraud within a federal program that paid for dead people’s phone and internet service. Iowa Republican Sen. Joni Ernst is targeting the federal Lifeline program, which subsidizes the services for low-income Americans, after California was accused of taking in $3.8 million between 2020 and 2025 to cover the costs for 94,000 dead people. “While Californians are taxed to the grave and back, its governor especially can’t pass the buck when the state is allowing providers to enroll dead people in a federal program,” Ernst told The Post. A...

WASHINGTON — President Trump took a victory lap Thursday after a federal judge allowed his administration to carry on with construction of his prized $400 million White House ballroom. US District Judge Richard Leon, a George W. Bush appointee, found that construction on the epic project was not a violation of a federal law, as alleged by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. “Great news for America, and our wonderful White House! The Judge on the case of what will be the most beautiful Ballroom anywhere in the World, has just thrown out, and completely erased, the effort to stop...

A federal judge appointed by former President Joe Biden on Thursday again ruled against the Trump administration’s third-country deportation policy, months after the Supreme Court blocked his earlier decision and rebuked him in a rare follow-up order. The Supreme Court not only stayed Boston-based Judge Brian Murphy's injunction over the same deportation policy in a 6-3 order last June, but the high court followed up with a second 7-2 order a week later admonishing the judge for flouting its decision. Murphy's latest ruling is also likely to land before the justices, setting up a fresh test of the judge's decisions...

Virginia’s Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger was widely panned by conservatives on social media over her rebuttal to President Donald Trump’s State of the Union, with many calling out the governor for labeling herself as a "moderate" during the campaign but changing her tune. Spanberger’s speech contained several examples of supporting far-left causes that drew criticism online, including school walkouts over ICE, touting "affordability" despite pushing to raise taxes and slamming Trump. Her overall speech quickly drew heat from conservatives online over her policies and her tone. "This Spanberger speech can basically be summed up as ‘I AM A DEMOCRAT WHO...

As President Donald Trump vowed to wage a "war on fraud" during his State of the Union address Tuesday, a panel of voters across the political spectrum had mixed reactions. The panel, assembled by polling group Maslansky + Partners and comprising 29 Democrats, 30 independents and 41 Republicans, gave real-time reactions as Trump spoke. The reactions were displayed on a line graph where high values represented positive reactions and low values indicated negative reactions. Trump said corruption was "plundering America" and said the most "stunning example" was in Minnesota, where welfare fraud has been a focal point and a child...

Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders and Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin were involved in a heated back and forth during a Senate hearing Tuesday that sparked immediate reactions across social media. "Everybody we bring up here, you guys chastised for trying to make changes," Mullin said during a Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions hearing Wednesday. The committee was discussing issues with Obamacare during a hearing on the nomination of Casey Means as U.S. surgeon general. "God forbid we change and try to fix our broken system," Mullin continued. "Anyway, I ranted too long." As Mullin was attempting to return...

President Trump touted his economic agenda, honored our heroes, defended his actions abroad, promised that Iran would never get nuclear weapons, and yes, found time to make Democrats look like morons. He rightly kept chastising them for not applauding or standing for issues that are universally popular, like increased public safety. He was able to get a couple, like a new law banning insider trading on the Hill. **SNIP** Sen. Liz Warren (D-MA) provided a standing ovation for that one. Trump later asked if Nancy Pelosi would’ve stood. He bodied her, but after the speech, Pelosi was blindsided by CNN,...

President Donald Trump unleashed on Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), after they heckled him in his State of the Union address, saying they should be institutionalized or deported. Omar and Tlaib were two of the most outspoken members of the audience during the State of the Union, throwing curses and insults at the president throughout. Trump responded directly in a colorful post on Truth Social, deriding their performance and calling for harsh action against them. “When you watch Low IQ Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, as they screamed uncontrollably last night at the very elegant State of...

The American Forces Network is ending its eight-channel satellite television service for U.S. military personnel living off base across Europe and Asia. The long-running service known as “direct-to-home” is screening its final programming before going dark March 22, said Kimberly Antos, director of AFN’s Broadcast Center. The network is replacing the satellite broadcast with its AFN Now application, which has drawn 57,000 registered users since it launched in 2022, she told Stars and Stripes in a Jan. 30 email. “This transition is absolutely a cost-saving measure,” Antos said, adding she doesn’t have information about how much money the broadcaster will...

Retired Navy Capt. E. Royce Williams has been keeping a secret for more than 50 years. To his friends, family, and others he served with, Williams was known as a decorated fighter pilot, who led a successful career in the Navy, where he served for more than 30 years and flew more than 220 missions in Korea and Vietnam. However, even his wife wasn’t aware of what he’d done on Nov. 18, 1952. That morning, Williams was continuing what had become a daily routine for him as a young Navy pilot stationed onboard the USS Oriskany off the coast of...

CBS News fact checked President Trump's 2026 State of the Union address Tuesday night, in which he highlighted his record on the economy, immigration and tariffs, and also assessed a claim made by Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger during her Democratic response. Here are some of the claims and CBS News' ratings and context for those statements: True: Trump claims murder rate saw its largest decline in recorded history last year "Last year, the murder rate saw its single largest decline in recorded history. This is the biggest decline, think of it, in recorded history — the lowest number in over...

(The Center Square) – Federal agents continue to pursue visa fraud and forced labor crimes across the U.S. perpetrated by Americans and noncitizens who exploited a border crisis and loopholes in a weak visa system, prosecutors argue. The prosecutions come as Mexican smuggling operations at the northern border continue to be thwarted, The Center Square reported. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Washington announced this week 61 indictments against six people in the Tri-Cities and Yakima areas for extensive visa fraud, victim tampering, aggravated identity theft, mail and wire fraud, visa fraud and other charges. Two people...

As former President Barack Obama’s namesake foundation prepares to roll out the welcome mat to huge crowds of tourists flocking to the South Side when the Obama Presidential Center opens its doors in a few months, it is promoting Airbnb, a company with close ties to the Obama family that has faced international protests for its impact on local rents and housing supply. “(We’re) committed to making sure that South Side residents and entrepreneurs are ready to take full advantage of this influx of new visitors,” Valerie Jarrett, CEO of the Obama Foundation, said in a December release announcing a...

Does anyone know WHO the four lawmakers who stood on the Democrat side of the aisle when Trump asked the following question at the SOTU address last night:Please stand if you think the priority of government should be to protect American citizens over illegal aliens?

Donald Trump faced-off in-person with Supreme Court justices who ruled against his tariffs last week. The four justices who attended his State of the Union address were forced to remain stoned-faced as the president berated them in front of a joint session of Congress, administration officials – and the world. The president tore into the decision right after sharing cordial handshakes with the four justices seated in the front row of his State of the Union address on Capitol Hill on Tuesday. 'Just four days ago, an unfortunate ruling from the United States Supreme Court. Oh, very unfortunate ruling,' Trump...

I think the idea of Trump accounts, to allow tax free savings for specific self-funded social benefits that aren't taxed, is the way to go. It always has been. Keep them reasonable, so the billionaire class can't sock away billions of dollars of untaxable income but allow it high enough so that it can provide for the average person so that he self-supports himself and isn't supported by the taxpayer. As long as the account is used for the specific purpose intended, any drawings from it remain tax free. However, if it is drawn for other purposes, it becomes taxed...

The lefty student government at a local California university rejected a proposal that would grant its student body free subscriptions to The New York Times, citing issues with how The Times covered major world-happenings. “The New York Times has historically been a little bit problematic and controversial in their reporting and in their journalism,” student official Alya Hassan, who voted against the proposal, told the Fresno Bee. Hassan referenced its coverage of Israel and Gaza as one example, adding the organization lacked journalistic integrity for avoiding words like genocide, ethnic cleansing and occupied territory in its reporting. The paper has...

A Maryland squatter posed online as a financial adviser, but was actually living off food stamps and sending her 16-year-old daughter out to work instead of school, while hiding out in a $2.3 million mansion, according to a report. Tameika Goode, 40, who recently returned to the ritzy, 7,500-square-foot home in the suburbs of Washington, DC, presented herself as a bankruptcy expert, flogging $800 courses online and sharing social media posts of her Porsche. In reality, however, she was a squatter, living on a total monthly income of $946, which included $538 in child support and $408 in food stamps,...

Your iPhone calendar used to remind you about dentist appointments and dinner reservations. Now? It might be screaming that you’ve “won a prize” — or worse, that your device is infected and your bank account is toast. Welcome to the latest digital headache: a calendar con that’s turning Apple users’ schedules into spam central, per Newsweek. Cybercrooks have figured out a sneaky way to blast iPhones and iPads with bogus alerts — no shady app download required. Instead of slipping malware onto your device, scammers trick users into unknowingly subscribing to rogue calendars. Once you’re in, they’ve got a direct...

Zohran Mamdani’s socialist pals wrap their proposals in the most innocuous language possible. So when activists rally in Albany on Wednesday to pressure lawmakers to raise taxes, the Democratic Socialists of America claim the bill it backs would “create new brackets starting at $1 million” so that “they pay a slightly higher share in taxes.” Sounds fair. It’s also a lie. Sponsored by Assemblyman Demond Meeks and State Sen. Robert Jackson, the tax increases actually start at half that. For individual incomes over $450,000, and joint incomes over $500,000, the state tax rate would be raised by a point to...