Free Republic

As the Trump administration continues its effort to root out federal funding for diversity initiatives, the National Institutes of Health has modified its grant review process to identify research that contains words associated with race or gender, which has held up some grant disbursements and forced scientists to rewrite proposals. “I feel that this kind of censorship is making the path forward to support narrower and narrower research only to include, for example, white, straight, cisgender men,” said a program director at one of NIH’s institutes. “Any other population is being scrutinized, which is highly, highly, highly problematic for a...

As former Vice President Kamala Harris considers another run for president, she is also signaling that she has no problem with a public airing of what went wrong last time — telling donors she believes the Democratic National Committee should release its buried autopsy of her failed 2024 campaign, according to a person who has heard the conversations. While she indicated to donors that she had no issue with releasing it, Harris has not discussed the postmortem with DNC Chairman Ken Martin and did not know about his decision to keep it under wraps until it happened, this person said.

Auckland company exec Doug Sinclair has generated a fair bit of buzz for his Instagram skills and his eye for talent. Sources have told our reporters that every time Instagram suggests a good-looking female influencer, Doug’s name seems to appear in the “followed by” section. “It’s beyond uncanny,” says one colleague of Doug’s. “He spends his days managing a modest team of 15 in central Auckland, but the second a model, dancer, cheerleader or fitness influencer posts anything, Doug’s there first, liking the post and almost always dropping a fire emoji in the comments.” The irony is Doug hasn’t had...

The advisor to the Supreme Leader of Iran on military affairs, Mohsen Rezaei, accuses the United States of being the only pirate force in the world that owns aircraft carriers. Rezaei added that Iran's ability to confront pirates is no less than our ability to sink warships. Rezaei addressed the Americans and said: "Prepare to face a graveyard for your aircraft carriers and troops, just as the wreckage of your planes remained..."

..... Bangor City Councilor Wayne Mallar, 81, discussed a proposed budget increase for multilingual services in schools at a Board of Ethics meeting on March 31. 'The school department's asking for a 10 percent increase. As far as I'm concerned, they get no increase,' he said - seemingly unaware his comments were being picked up by a microphone. A Maine city councilor will face an ethics board review after he was heard complaining about 'illegals' in his community. Bangor City Councilor Wayne Mallar, 81, discussed a proposed budget increase for multilingual services in schools at a Board of Ethics meeting...

Iranian Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has promised that the US will not remain in the Strait of Hormuz. In a written message, Khamenei wrote, "Today, two months after the beginning of the campaign of aggression by global bullies in the region and America’s disgraceful failure, a new chapter is beginning in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz." "Iran, through its management of Hormuz, will ensure the security of the Gulf region and eliminate the possibility of exploitation by enemies. The new laws and management of the Strait will bring stability and prosperity to all the peoples of the...

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer welcomed King Charles III to Capitol Hill Tuesday with a large bandage covering about half his forehead. The New York Democrat was first seen with the bandage – and a small abrasion just below it – Monday on the Senate floor. The senator said he suffered the wound after a late-night encounter with an open door.

In January, the Franklin County Board of Elections in Ohio received a surprising call. The man on the line said he was an agent at the Department of Homeland Security – and he needed immediate access to voter records. Franklin County has a large population of Democrats and has long been a focal point of Republican skepticism about urban voting centers in Ohio. In the weeks that followed, the requests multiplied. According to emails reviewed by Reuters, the agent asked for voter registration forms and voting histories for dozens of voters – records that include driver's license numbers and other...

Sir Keir Stamer has insisted the "vast majority" of Labour MPs supported him and wanted him to continue doing his job as prime minister. He was speaking to the Sunday Times at the end of a week in which speculation about a potential leadership challenge has risen. Sir Keir told the paper "in politics, you get this sort of thing all of the time, there is always talk". Shadow home secretary Chris Philp said the prime minister should resign over his decision to appoint Lord Mandelson as the UK's ambassador to the US, adding that Labour MPs should "develop a...

Former Vice President Al Gore is still making climate doom predictions, 20 years after his warnings from An Inconvenient Truth proved false — this time invoking the science fiction film The Day After Tomorrow for a rapt Hollywood audience. Gore joined the first-ever Sustainability in Entertainment Honors event Thursday, organized by The Hollywood Reporter and the Sustainable Entertainment Alliance, for a keynote conversation with The West Wing star Bradley Whitford. The pair reminisced about the Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth, conspicuously omitting its failed prophecy that Earth’s ecosystems would reach a “tipping point” of no return, thanks to human industrial...

A useful rule of thumb is that when a problem persists for decades despite serious effort, the failure is usually not one of effort or intelligence, but of framing. Climate change sits squarely in this category. We have poured talent, capital, policy, and good intentions into solving it, and yet the core dynamics continue to worsen. This suggests that something foundational is off in how we are thinking about the problem. One of the clearest illustrations of that deeper issue sits far from financial centers and climate summits, in the Arctic. About 50 years ago, Denmark made a decision that...

Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee are demanding that FBI Director Kash Patel fill out a screening test used to assess “harmful patterns of alcohol consumption and routinely used by individuals to help identify hazardous drinking behaviors,” following allegations published in an Atlantic article. In a letter to Patel on Tuesday, ranking member Jamie Raskin, D-Md., and more than a dozen other Democrats suggested the alleged behavior could harm U.S. national security. Some of the screening questions, attached to the letter, ask “How many drinks containing alcohol do you have on a typical day when you are drinking,” “How often...

ATHENS – Fraudulent messages promising safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for cryptocurrency have been sent to some shipping firms with vessels stranded west of the waterway, said Greek maritime risk management firm Marisks. The US has maintained its blockade of Iranian ports, while Iran has lifted and then reimposed its blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, through which about one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas passed before war broke out in the Middle East. Amid ceasefire talks, Tehran, which controls the choke point, has proposed tolls on vessels to safely transit. Marisks on...

The head of the Southern Poverty Law Center said Tuesday that the civil rights organization was being "targeted" by the Trump administration with a criminal investigation that appeared to focus on the group's use of confidential informants that gathered evidence on "extremely violent groups." Bryan Fair, the interim chief executive of the group, said in a video posted Tuesday that the 55-year-old organization was facing a "serious" threat: "a criminal investigation and possible charges against the SPLC or some of our employees." Fair said SPLC's confidential sources had “risked their lives to infiltrate and inform on the activities of our...

Pope Leo XIV don end in official visit to Cameroon as e comot from di West African kontri on Saturday afternoon. Di Pope wey spend three days for Cameroon enta plane dey go Angola to continue di third part of im apostolic visit. According to di Vatican News, na around 12:45 local time di flight wey di Pope dey inside takeoff from Yaoundé-Nsimalen International Airport.

Greta Thunberg’s freedom flotilla, which set sail from Barcelona Sunday for another anti-Israel voyage to Gaza, has been rocked by scandal after one of its woke leaders was accused of “sexual misconduct” with at least three volunteers. “A senior leader within the flotilla — a member of the steering committee, the highest governing body of the organization — engaged in sexual relations with multiple activists while on the boat heading to Gaza. Not one person. Not two. Three different individuals,” claimed Palestinian group Heart of Falastin in a social media post earlier this week. “To do it on the boat,...

Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem delivered a defiant speech on Monday evening, making it clear that the terrorist organization has no intention of retreating from its positions despite heavy military and political pressure. Qassem directly attacked Lebanon’s top leadership, including President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, claiming that US support for the Lebanese army is intended to drag the country into a civil war in order to destroy Hezbollah. Ahead of a new round of ambassador-level talks scheduled to begin on Tuesday in the United States, Qassem stated unequivocally that Hezbollah opposes any negotiations with Israel. “We have decided...

The New York Post reports that New York City’s First Lady, Rama Duwaji, has publicly addressed for the first time a growing controversy over past social media activity that has drawn accusations of anti-Israel rhetoric and sympathy for extremist causes. In an interview with Hyperallergic, Duwaji, 28, expressed “deep shame" over comments she made as a teenager, saying that being young does not excuse the harm caused by her words. However, her response stopped short of addressing a number of more recent and more serious allegations, leading critics to view the apology as partial and evasive. Recent reports in American...

Iranian Parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf on Wednesday insisted once again that no ceasefire in Iran would be possible without the inclusion of Lebanon. “The completion and consolidation of a comprehensive ceasefire in Lebanon will be the result of the resistance and steadfast struggle of the great Hezbollah and the unity of the Axis of Resistance," Ghalibaf wrote in a post on social media. He added, “The United States must comply with the agreement. Resistance and Iran are one soul, both in war and in ceasefire. America should withdraw from ‘Israel First’ mistake." .....

President Donald Trump has slipped underwater with one of the most important blocs in his political coalition, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS, which found his net approval among white working-class voters turned negative for the first time in his second term. The survey, conducted March 26 to March 30 among 1,201 adults, showed Trump at 49% approval and 50% disapproval with white non-college voters, a narrow but politically notable reversal for a group that helped drive his return to the White House. The shift matters because white working-class voters have long been central to Trump's electoral...