Free Republic

In the lead-up to the 2026 FIFA World Cup, hosted primarily in the United States along with Mexico and Canada, there was widespread criticism from many European fans. Concern that the Trump administration's immigration policies would somehow impact fans' ability to enter the country. Complaints that the host stadiums, places like Los Angeles Stadium, Boston Stadium or Seattle Stadium would somehow prove unworthy of hosting World Cup matches. Those concerns and complaints have proven to be wildly unfounded. The atmosphere in Los Angeles for the U.S. Men's National Team opening match win over Paraguay was widely praised. To the point...

A nationwide welfare fraud crackdown reached Massachusetts this week, as federal authorities announced the arrests of 15 people — 11 of them illegal immigrants — accused of stealing more than $1.4 million in American taxpayer-funded benefits. The defendants are accused of fraudulently obtaining benefits through programs including Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food assistance, MassHealth, Social Security disability payments, housing assistance and unemployment benefits, according to the Department of Justice. "Alarmingly, 11 of the 15 charged defendants are suspected illegal aliens, some of whom assumed stolen identities to steal these taxpayer-funded benefits and avoid detection," Acting Assistant Attorney General Colin...

A federal judge in Massachusetts has ordered the Trump administration to restore all signs that were changed or removed at national parks across the country as part of President Donald Trump’s controversial directive last year. In a scathing 63-page ruling on Friday, Judge Angel Kelley wrote, “Under the guise of promoting American dignity, this Administration seeks to share a limited history by ordering the removal of all signs, displays, and interpretive exhibits at National Parks that do not align with its preferred narrative, thereby telling half-truths.” Kelley, an appointee of President Joe Biden, ordered that the restoration be complete by...

“The pitchfork was erected into the air, anchored into his head,” police said.A Fall River man is facing murder charges in connection with the deaths of two men Wednesday night, after victims were fatally beaten with cobblestones and one was found with a pitchfork impaled in the back of his head, authorities said. Vitor Francisco Gomes, 28, is charged with two counts of murder for the double homicide, Bristol County District Attorney Thomas Quinn announced in a press release. Shortly before 9 p.m. Wednesday, police responded to 90 Aetna St. in Fall River after receiving reports of three shots fired....

The newly elected vice president of Massachusetts's top teachers' union is a longtime left-wing activist who has denounced the United States as a "fascist oligarchy," objected to national borders as a "construct of colonizers," and pushed resolutions condemning Israel as "genocidal." The Massachusetts Teachers Association (MTA)—an affiliate of the National Education Association (NEA), the largest labor union in the United States—earlier this month elected Deb Gesualdo as its vice president. The new leadership team will take over from outgoing MTA president Max Page in July. Gesualdo, along with the MTA’s newly elected president, Matt Bach, is a member of Educators...

Reports of an explosion from people across New England on Saturday afternoon sent police agencies and others scrambling to understand what caused a double boom that shook buildings in Massachusetts and Rhode Island. The American Meteor Society said that the booms people heard were actually caused by a meteor about 3 feet (nearly 1 meter) wide entering the atmosphere around the New Hampshire border with Massachusetts, north of Boston. NASA officials confirmed that the meteor was natural material, not a satellite or space debris, and that it entered the atmosphere at 2:06 p.m. American Meteor Society program monitor Robert Lunsford...

A Democratic National Committee staff member is believed to be behind a profane X post targeting White House adviser Stephen Miller that was published from the DNC’s official account. Paulina Mangubat, 30, a DNC senior digital strategist who previously worked as digital content and creative director for the Democrats, serves on the team responsible for managing the party’s @TheDemocrats X account, which has 2.4 million followers. Her LinkedIn profile says she graduated from Barnard College in 2017 and previously worked as digital and creative director for woke Boston Mayor Michelle Wu.

Barney Frank, the former Massachusetts congressman who served for more than three decades and was known for his combative style and historic achievements, died Tuesday night at the age of 86.

Massachusetts prosecutors scolded a judge over the sweetheart deal she handed to serial criminal Tyler Brown — who is accused of opening fire on random drivers on Monday — after he was convicted of trying to kill a cop years earlier. Brown, 46, pleaded guilty to armed assault with intent to murder in 2021, one year after he fired 13 rounds at Boston officers, including firing a .40 Glock semi-automatic at close range at one officer’s chest. Prosecutors recommended a 12-year prison sentence followed by five years of probation; however, Judge Janet Sanders handed out a five- to six-year sentence...

A gunman who opened fire at cars on Memorial Drive in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Monday afternoon was shot by a responding State Police trooper and a civilian. Two men in separate cars were shot and have life-threatening injuries. The suspect, 46-year-old Tyler Brown, is in custody and is being treated for gunshot wounds at a hospital. It happened around 1:30 p.m. near the intersection of River Street. Videos from witnesses show the gunman walking down the middle of the street firing and waving a rifle. According to I-Team sources, a photo of Brown was included in an officer safety bulletin that...

Democrats, including President Joe Biden and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), are blaming Donald Trump for the sudden collapse of two banks, Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank. But Barney Frank, a leading sponsor of the Dodd-Frank Act, sharply disagrees. The law, signed by then-President Barack Obama in 2010, made significant changes to Wall Street regulations and federal financial regulatory agencies in the aftermath of the financial meltdown in 2008. The bill, though controversial, was theoretically designed to protect Americans. Democrats say Trump is responsible because he signed a law rolling back some of the regulations enacted by the Dodd-Frank Act....

Former Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), author of the 2010 Dodd-Frank bill, sat on the board for Signature Bank which collapsed in the wake of the Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) implosion. The U.S. Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) announced in a joint statement on Sunday the plan to manage the fallout of SVB’s collapse as well as the demise of Signature Bank. “Today we are taking decisive actions to protect the U.S. economy by strengthening public confidence in our banking system,” the joint statement read. “This step will ensure that the U.S. banking system...

President Donald Trump has promised sweeping reforms to "horrendous" US banking regulations that were introduced after the financial crisis. "We're going to do a very major haircut on Dodd-Frank," he said, referring to the Wall Street and consumer protection rules Barack Obama enacted in 2010. Dodd-Frank aimed to prevent banks taking on too much risk and to separate their investment and commercial arms.

Posted 2008 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. Romans 8:35,37 KJV All the outrage over Bernie Madeoff is pretty surprising. Sure he bilked people out of everything they had, putting them in financial disaster and bankruptcy? So he lied to people over decades taking everything they saved in a fraudulent investment Ponzi scheme bankrupting Pension/Charity and College funds. So he was lying to investigators about those cooked books...

What’s Barney Frank’s take on President Donald Trump’s first action to scale back the landmark financial overhaul law that bears his name? Don’t bank on it succeeding, he says. […] Any scaling back of Dodd-Frank would have a difficult time getting through Congress, because many Republican lawmakers’ constituents favor policing Wall Street, Frank told The Associated Press in an interview. He spoke Friday after Trump signed an executive order directing the Treasury secretary to review the Dodd-Frank law. Trump has called the law a “disaster,” pledging to dismantle it. …

Former Rep. Barney Frank spent decades as one of the Democratic Party’s most recognizable left-wing figures. Now, in what may be one of his final public warnings, he is telling Democrats that their loudest activists have pushed the party into territory the public simply is not buying. Frank’s warning, delivered as he enters hospice, is blunt. He is not attacking the left from the right. He is saying the left has made a strategic mess of things by turning its most controversial causes into purity tests and then acting surprised when voters balk. “I think we’re in a situation where...

Liberal icon, former Rep. Barney Frank, who is dying of congestive heart failure, spoke out from hospice to deliver a stark warning to Democrats for swinging too far to the left on social issues — and said it will cost them with voters.

Washington, D.C. – Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced legislation today to repeal Donald Trump’s global tariffs, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sens. Tim Kaine, D-Va., Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., Peter Welch, D-Vt., and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. The binding measure will be treated as a privileged resolution that must receive a vote on the Senate floor. The measure would terminate the emergency that Trump declared in order to slap tariffs of up to 40% on products Americans buy from other countries. In the wake of Trump’s tariff declaration, costs have...

Spirit Airlines is preparing to shutter operations after a $500 million bailout deal with the Trump administration fell apart, according to a report Friday. The embattled budget airline has been unable to secure enough funding from the government and certain bondholders to keep it in business, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing sources familiar with the matter. Spirit had been in talks with the Trump administration about a deal that would hand the government a stake of up to 90% in exchange for a major cash boost — potentially allowing the White House to use part of the bankrupt carrier’s...

Spirit Airlines is preparing to cease operations after a last-ditch rescue effort reportedly collapsed, leaving the struggling budget carrier on the brink of collapse. The ailing airline had been hoping to secure a $500 million lifeline from the government to keep it afloat, but talks have failed to produce a deal. People familiar with the matter told the Wall Street Journal that Spirit has been unable to win sufficient backing from key bondholders and government officials, raising serious doubts over its ability to continue operating. Discussions had taken place with the Trump administration over a potential bailout package that would...