Free Republic

On his last day as president on Jan. 20, 2021, Donald Trump stood in a snapping wind and waved goodbye to relatives and supporters before he took his final flight on Air Force One back to Mar-a-Lago. No elected Republican of any stature showed up at Joint Base Andrews for the bleak farewell. Trump, at that moment, was a pariah among Republican elites. The party’s leaders in the House and Senate, Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell, blamed him for the Capitol siege. Party fundraisers assured donors they were done with him. On conference calls, House Republican leaders contemplated a “post-Trump”...

For 74 years, the NATO has been America’s most important military alliance. Presidents of both parties have seen NATO as a force multiplier enhancing the influence of the United States by uniting countries on both sides of the Atlantic in a vow to defend one another.Donald Trump has made it clear that he sees NATO as a drain on U.S. resources by freeloaders. He has held that view for at least a quarter-century.In his 2000 book, “The America We Deserve,” Trump wrote that “pulling back from Europe would save this country millions of dollars annually.” As president, he repeatedly threatened...

For Donald J. Trump, a new set of New York Times/Siena College polls captures a stunning, seemingly contradictory picture. His 91 felony charges in four different jurisdictions have not significantly hurt him among voters in battleground states. Yet he remains weaker than at least one of his Republican rivals, and if he’s convicted and sentenced in any of his cases, some voters appear ready to turn on him — to the point where he could lose the 2024 election. Snip---------------- If the former president is convicted and sentenced — as many of his allies expect him to be in the...

Former President Donald Trump recently told aides to hire Laura Loomer, a far-right, anti-Muslim activist with a history of expressing bigoted views, for a campaign role, according to four people familiar with the plans. Trump met with Loomer recently and directed advisers to give her a role in support of his candidacy, two of the people familiar with the move said. On Tuesday, after Trump’s arraignment in New York, Loomer attended the former president’s speech at Mar-a-Lago, his resort and residence in Palm Beach, Florida. Some of Trump’s aides were said to have concerns that such a hire would cause...

WASHINGTON — As Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, prepared to bring criminal charges against former President Donald Trump, House Republicans rallied to Trump’s side, vowing to use their power in Congress to haul in Bragg and force him to turn over documents and answer questions. The reality, they have privately acknowledged, is much more complicated. For weeks, top House Republicans and their lawyers have been grappling with how to move forward in their investigation of Bragg amid legal and institutional concerns about overreach and how to enforce a subpoena in court. The situation is a reminder for the new...

The Florida governor, who joined Donald Trump in declaring that defending Ukraine from Russia was not a vital interest, drew swift condemnations from establishment Republicans.Declaring this week that defending Ukraine against Russia’s invasion was not a vital interest for the United States, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida cemented a Republican shift away from hawkish foreign policy that has played out over the past decade and accelerated with Donald J. Trump’s political rise.Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis — whose combined support makes up more than 75 percent of Republican primary voters in the nascent 2024 presidential contest — are now largely...

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has sharply broken with Republicans who are determined to defend Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, saying in a statement made public on Monday night that protecting the European nation’s borders is not a vital U.S. interest and that policymakers should instead focus attention at home.###“While the U.S. has many vital national interests — securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness with our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural and military power of the Chinese Communist Party — becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not...

Breitbart, once called the platform of the “alt-right” by Steve Bannon, shredded former President Donald Trump on Friday for dining with far-right white nationalist and Neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes. News broke on Wednesday night that Trump dined with Fuentes and rapper Kanye West, both avowed anti-Semites, ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday – a dinner Trump has since both acknowledged and tried to distance himself from. Axios’s Jonathan Swan reported that during the dinner Trump and Fuentes “fawned” over each other. Swan wrote that at one point during the conversation Trump asked Fuentes, “‘You like it better when I just speak off...

The Biden administration has canned several immigration judges, all appointed by Trump, and replaced them with “progressive” magistrates. Republicans have an idea as to why this happened (spoiler alert: politics as usual) but sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland demanding answers anyway. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) want the answers by 5 p.m. on August 3. The letter begins:Dear Attorney General Garland:We write about your decision to terminate the employment of multiple immigration judges who were hired during the Trump Administration. If true, your termination of these immigration judges because of their political ideology...

Donald Trump has plans to purge the so-called 'deep state' beyond what any president has done before if he runs for and wins the presidency in 2024 and as many as 50,000 government workers could find themselves on the chopping block.

Former President Donald Trump’s potential return to the Oval Office will include an effort to purge the unaccountable administrative state that creates and directs vast amounts of far-left policy in the federal government, a report Friday by Axios detailed.If reelected in 2024, Trump is planning to cut about 50,000 administrative state employees to rein in unelected technocrats in federal government agencies that have great influence over policies impacting American workers, according to the outlet.“The impact could go well beyond typical conservative targets such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Internal Revenue Service,” the report explained. “Trump allies are working...

Former President Trump’s top allies are preparing to radically reshape the federal government if he is re-elected, purging potentially thousands of civil servants and filling career posts with loyalists to him and his "America First” ideology, people involved in the discussions tell Axios. The impact could go well beyond typical conservative targets such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Internal Revenue Service. Trump allies are working on plans that would potentially strip layers at the Justice Department — including the FBI, and reaching into national security, intelligence, the State Department and the Pentagon, sources close to the former president...

Intended as a hit piece, it reads like an important section of Trump’s 2024 campaign manifesto to his supporters. Just yesterday, Axios carried a piece provocatively entitled “A radical plan for Trump’s second term.” The following are key excerpts from the article: The heart of the plan is derived from an executive order known as “Schedule F,” developed and refined in secret over most of the second half of Trump’s term and launched 13 days before the 2020 election. (snip) Trump signed an executive order, “Creating Schedule F in the Excepted Service,” in October 2020, which established a new employment...

Former President Trump’s top allies are preparing to radically reshape the federal government if he is re-elected, purging potentially thousands of civil servants and filling career posts with loyalists to him and his "America First” ideology, people involved in the discussions tell Axios. The impact could go well beyond typical conservative targets such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Internal Revenue Service. Trump allies are working on plans that would potentially strip layers at the Justice Department — including the FBI, and reaching into national security, intelligence, the State Department and the Pentagon, sources close to the former president...

Former President Trump’s top allies are preparing to radically reshape the federal government if he is re-elected, purging potentially thousands of civil servants and filling career posts with loyalists to him and his "America First” ideology, people involved in the discussions tell Axios. The impact could go well beyond typical conservative targets such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Internal Revenue Service. Trump allies are working on plans that would potentially strip layers at the Justice Department — including the FBI, and reaching into national security, intelligence, the State Department and the Pentagon, sources close to the former president...

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a once-loyal member of Donald Trump's court, is refusing to bend a knee to the former president and says backing him in the 2024 election 'is too much to ask' after Trump publicly attacked his character, according to a report. Trump reportedly said the popular governor has 'no personal charisma' and a 'dull personality' as rumors swirl the ex-president is angry DeSantis hasn't declined to challenge him for the GOP presidential nomination. DeSantis, however, has told his inner circle that Trump's 'expectation that he bend the knee is asking too much,' the New York Times reported....

This feud just reached the tipping point as the media reports and stories are coming in like an avalanche on a daily basis. AND, people are arguing about it, yep, it's causing division and animosity and arguments even among people at FreeRepublic. Here's some of the evidence cited: 1) Sources say DeSantis may not back Trump 2) Reports have it that Trump poked fun at DeSantis 3) People are saying the riff is growing wider 4) Articles are on the increase citing unnamed sources and reports involving BOTH, DeSantis and Trump, yes, both

Former President Donald Trump has reportedly been bashing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) in private as a potential 2024 primary opponent, calling him a “dull personality” with no chance of winning. As polls continue to put Ron DeSantis in the top spot for the 2024 nomination without Donald Trump on the ballot, sources confirmed to Axios that the former president has been privately trashing the popular Florida governor.

President Biden and the Democratic-controlled Senate have installed more federal judges during the first six months of his presidency than any administration since Richard Nixon's. Why it matters: While Democrats may spend more time talking publicly about vaccines and infrastructure, the rapid pace of both nominations and confirmations shows judges are one of the party's most urgent priorities. President Trump pushed through his own slate of judges to boost conservatives for decades. By the numbers: Biden has had eight federal judges confirmed since taking office on Jan. 20. * Six months into their presidencies, Trump and George H.W. Bush had...

Tucker Carlson was talking to U.S.-based Kremlin intermediaries about setting up an interview with Vladimir Putin shortly before the Fox News host accused the National Security Agency of spying on him, sources familiar with the conversations tell Axios. Why it matters: Those sources said U.S. government officials learned about Carlson's efforts to secure the Putin interview. Carlson learned that the government was aware of his outreach — and that's the basis of his extraordinary accusation, followed by a rare public denial by the NSA that he had been targeted. Axios has not confirmed whether any communications from Carlson have been...