Free Republic

President Trump announced Wednesday that he will pardon Texas Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar, who had faced federal bribery charges. Cuellar, an outspoken critic of former President Joe Biden’s border policies, was indicted last year for allegedly accepting $600,000 from Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil company and a Mexican bank in exchange for official acts.“For years, the Biden Administration weaponized the Justice System against their Political Opponents, and anyone who disagreed with them,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. One of the clearest examples of this was when Crooked Joe used the FBI and DOJ to ‘take out’ a member of his own Party...

On Friday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” White House National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby responded to concerns that the unfreezing of assets as part of a reported prisoner deal with Iran will incentivize Iran to take more Americans hostage by stating that “it’s not like the regime in Iran needed another excuse to see value in detaining Americans,” but acknowledged that there has been a “deeply concerning” rise in state-sponsored hostage-taking by countries like Iran.