Free Republic

Last month, activists packed the Chicago Teachers Union Center for the annual conference of the National Alliance Against Racist & Political Repression (NAARPR). Attendees gathered to discuss fighting ICE and confronting the Trump administration. Despite NAARPR’s relative obscurity—it was founded in 1973 to agitate for the release of Angela Davis and has since become a catch-all activist organization—the group’s conference featured several high-profile speakers, including Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson, who claimed to have inherited a “white supremacist system.” The event was hosted by the Chicago Teachers Union, one of Johnson’s most aggressive backers. Johnson’s appearance, along with that of several...

Maintenance problems affecting the Strategic Petroleum Reserve are in the spotlight after oil releases under former President Joe Biden. President Donald Trump pledged to replenish the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve after the Biden administration sold nearly 200 million barrels of its stock — but that won’t be as simple as buying more oil. Energy Secretary Chris Wright told the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy this week that SPR drawdowns under former President Joe Biden resulted in structural damage to facilities. More than $100 million of repairs are needed to bring the storage facilities back to full capacity, Wright...

A potential veto of Chicago’s 2026 budget by Mayor Brandon Johnson could trigger the Windy City's first-ever municipal shutdown. Johnson reportedly rebuked the budget passed by council over the weekend, which lacks the mayor’s favored per-employee "head tax" on corporations, as "morally bankrupt." If Johnson were to veto the budget, it would place the onus back on city council to rehash a plan that could get signed before Dec. 30 – or plunge the city into shutdown. City Council lacks any Republican representation – with a Democratic majority of 48 plus two independents, so the situation represents a clash within...

The White House/Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain. Not only did the Obama and Biden Administrations go to great lengths to protect Hillary Clinton, they went to unconstitutional lengths to get Trump. The Obama-Biden Administration prevented agents investigating Hillary Clinton from reviewing some eight thumb drives of intel based on purported concerns over executive and congressional privilege, newly released documents reveal. This reality renders last month’s revelation that the Biden Administration approved Special Counsel Jack Smith’s subpoenaing of congressional Republicans’ toll records even more appalling — and the Democrats’ weaponization of the criminal justice system even more obvious and outrageous. Last week, Sen....

Five years after the fact, Georgia election officials have admitted that 315,000 votes in the 2020 presidential election lacked the necessary signature from poll workers and should not have been counted. President Donald Trump was unjustly indicted for alleging just such a violation of election security. A bombshell report out last week in The Federalist from journalist Brianna Lyman provides all the details on what should be considered one of the biggest election-related scandals in American history. As she relays, election officials in Fulton County, Georgia, the most populous in the state, admitted to failing “to sign off on the...

ELECTION INTEGRITY: Fulton County told the Georgia State Election Board it does not dispute 315,000 early votes in 2020 were illegally counted giving Biden the win. Fulton County produced no signed tabulator tapes for roughly 315,000 early votes in 2020, according to evidence presented to the Georgia State Election Board. At a Dec 9 hearing, county lawyer Ann Brumbaugh said the county does not dispute the tapes were not signed and called it a rule violation. Georgia’s Secretary of State investigation summary substantiated that 36 of 37 advanced voting precincts failed to sign the tapes required by statute.

For those who understand the basics of attrition warfare, the outcome of the fight in Ukraine was obvious a long time ago. Russia's superior logistical position along with its grinding offensive tactics have worn down Ukraine's defenses and left the country with a desperate manpower shortage. The recent capture of the vital hub of Pokrovsk has now opened the door to an accelerating Russian advance. The Russian offensive is gaining significant ground from Pokrovsk to the north, all the way to Kupiansk. The strategic city of Siversk is now largely under control of Russia according to geo-location mapping. Myrnohrad, also...

The Biden Presidential Library has recently suffered a series of setbacks caused by a lack of funding. The initial presidential library was envisioned to eclipse the Obama Presidential Library (aka Obama Death Star) however those plans have been scaled back significantly by the lack of donor largesse. Donations from persons pardoned in the last moments of his presidency have been severely curtailed when President Trump declared those autopen pardons null and void. Even with these setbacks, Slow Joe declared he will march forward with the project even though he will have to scale it back somewhat. The Biden Presidential Library...

An angry Joe Biden emerges from hiding to trash Trump as he accepts a lifetime achievement award for inspired leadership from the Edward M. Kennedy Institute in Boston. Credit: Fox News screenshot ====================================================================== Joe Biden emerged from hiding on Sunday night to deliver a Trump-bashing speech that once again illustrates just how tone-deaf he and his handlers are with reality. As ABC News reported, 82-year-old Biden was speaking publicly for the first time since completing a round of radiation therapy for an aggressive form of prostate cancer. The former White House occupier was present to receive a lifetime achievement award...

Finally managed to get my relocation to Tennessee approved by the big multi-national bank I work for. Used a medical exception, a large medical file and several doctors letters saying Chicago area winters are brutal on my Ankylosing Spondylitis, Rheumatoid Arthritis and peripheral neuropathy in my feet and lets.More in Comments

Baltimore residents in Federal Hill say Mayor Brandon Scott owes them answers after revelations that his new city-issued SUV cost taxpayers $163,495 – including nearly $65,000 in upgrades including police lights, sirens and a security microphone. “Not the taxpayers’ money! If he wants it for himself, yeah. But not with our money,” said Christian Heath as she was celebrating her birthday with friends in Federal Hill Park. She didn’t know about the mayor’s luxury Jeep Grand Wagoneer until speaking with Spotlight on Maryland. “Our money should be for the city, the schools, the kids. Just to ride around? We don’t...

There is growing evidence that city officials knew, or should have known, about dangerous living conditions inside a South Shore apartment building long before federal immigration agents raided it last week. Wells Fargo, has been pressuring its owner to “re-assert control over the building.” In a recent court filing, the bank claimed “the building is unsecured, which allows non-tenants to access the interior. There has also been increased criminal activity and shootings at the property, which is located across the street from an elementary school.” While recent coverage framed the raid as the breaking point, Head’s videos show the building...

This evening, President Trump is ordering 400 members of the Texas National Guard for deployments to Illinois, Oregon, and other locations within the United States. No officials from the federal government called me directly to discuss or coordinate. We must now start calling this what it is: Trump’s Invasion. It started with federal agents, it will soon include deploying federalized members of the Illinois National Guard against our wishes, and it will now involve sending in another state’s military troops

I simply don't trust the MSM to tell us what Putin actually said (shades of Russia!Russia!Russia!). Below is the link to the video and the YOUTUBE auto-generated TRANSCRIPT. The video and TRANSCRIPT are long; if you want to skip to the comments, I recomment you return to the forum and click on the comments link there.[H/T Delta7]WATCH: Putin Full Speech at Valdai Forum in Sochi | Gaza, Ukraine & EU Relations | AC15DWS News88.6K subscribersOct 2, 2025 ransomnote: The transcript is an computerized interpretation of the spoken word. The translator in the video speaks with an accent so there are...

Oct 3 (Reuters) - Former U.S. President Joe Biden exceeded his authority by withdrawing large areas along U.S. coastlines from future offshore oil and gas development, a federal judge in Louisiana ruled on Thursday.U.S. District Judge James Cain in Lake Charles, Louisiana, sided with Republican states and oil and gas industry groups that sued to block Biden's move to protect all federal waters off the East and West coasts, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and portions of the northern Bering Sea in Alaska.Biden, on one of his final days in office, used his authority under the 70-year-old Outer Continental Shelf...

The Trump administration has threatened to inflict maximum pain on Democrats during the shutdown. OMB chief Russ Vought told House Republicans on a private call Wednesday that the administration will start mass reduction in force moves, or firings, of federal workers “in a day or two,” according to four people granted anonymity to describe the call. Vought and President Donald Trump have both threatened to inflict maximum pain on Democrats during the shutdown as Senate Republicans hope to peel off additional Democrats in the coming days to vote for the GOP-led stopgap to end the standoff. A bipartisan group of...

Co-host (of CNN’s The Situation Room) Wolf Blitzer said, “I want to play something President Trump said last hour as he addressed senior U.S. military officers at the Marine base at Quantico, Virginia. Listen to this, then I’ll get your reaction.” […] Johnson said, “This is absolutely appalling. This president is an unstable human being, and it’s right for this moment to check him. We’re calling on Congress to do its job. There’s no way that anyone in this country should be OK with armed militarized troops being sent to cities. These individuals, these brave women and men who sign...

Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7 President John Catanzara released a spicy YouTube video of his own on Friday, a video he recorded while standing in front of the mayor’s home, which is protected 24/7 by multiple CPD units. “Three squad cars blocking it, patrolling it, protecting it for him and his family,” Catanzara said. “Yet, he calls law enforcement a sickness. What a hypocrite. Piece of garbage.” Catanzara told viewers that Johnson’s words were no mistake. “He has always hated us. He still hates us. He just can’t say what he wants to publicly. But two days ago, the...

Federal agents deployed tear gas and pepper balls Friday to disperse an unruly mob of anti-ICE protesters — including a Democratic mayor — attempting to blockade an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility outside Chicago. More than 100 protesters surrounded the ICE Broadview Processing Center as they “assaulted law enforcement, threw tear gas cans, slashed tires of cars, blocked the entrance of the building, and trespassed on private property,” the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement. (snip) Daniel Biss, the Democratic mayor of Evanston, Ill., was among those taking part in the demonstration. “We. Will. Not. Be. Intimidated,”...

In a bid to stave off an infusion of law-enforcement assets into his city by President Trump, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson declared that "the idea that law enforcement is the solution to reducing crime is a sickness. Folks commit crimes because they are desperate. Sending armed cops after them just accelerates that desperation leading to more death and destruction." Johnson went on to praise Gov. JB Pritzker's (D) "Peacekeepers" initiative, saying "rather than give up on folks with criminal records we are going to give them a chance to refocus their efforts in ways that will help the community become...