Free Republic

Drug Overdoses For January Break Record [Portland Maine] The Portland Police Department responded to 56 drug overdose calls (six fatal) in January of 2023, 11 more than a year ago and 34 more (22) than in 2021. Narcan, an overdose-reversal drug, was administered 38 of the 56 cases and was also issued in two of the six fatal cases. The Portland Police Department continues to work with its state and federal law enforcement partners in rooting out drug trafficking in our city. In 2022, the agencies removed approximately 28 ounces of methamphetamine, 22 ounces of cocaine products, 1.5 ounces of...

The son of a millionaire surgeon has been charged with domestic terrorism for the second time in a month over his role in violent Antifa protests in Atlanta on Saturday. Francis 'Frankie' Carroll, 22, from Kennebunkport, Maine, is one of six people charged after riots over the death of a protester who allegedly shot a police officer.

PORTLAND, Maine -- The U.S. would risk enabling the spread of extremism in Europe if it stopped providing support to Ukraine in its war with Russia, Maine's independent senator said Monday in the wake of meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Sens. Angus King of Maine and Jack Reed of Rhode Island, who sit on the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services, traveled to Kyiv last week to meet with Zelenskyy. King said he came back more certain that U.S. aid to Ukraine is vital. Ukraine is slated to receive $44.9 billion in U.S. aid as part of the recent...

Sen. Angus King (I-ME) says Congress ought to pass a legislative package that expands legal immigration levels to fill unfilled United States jobs with foreign workers rather than pulling jobless Americans off the labor market sidelines. In an interview with CBS News, King said such a package should include border-related reforms, an amnesty for millions of illegal aliens, and an expansion of the nation’s legal immigration levels. which already bring more than a million green card holders to the U.S. annually in addition to more than a million foreign visa workers to take American jobs.

New Englanders are contending with some of the highest electricity rates in the country this winter as they weather the transatlantic ripple effects of a global gas crunch. Residents of New England’s six states have thus far enjoyed a relatively mild winter without rolling blackouts. But skyrocketing rates — fueled by natural gas price surges and the war in Ukraine — are taking a toll on a region accustomed to cranking up the heat.

A young Maine man who recently became fixated with radical Islamic jihadism wounded two NYPD cops with a massive curved knife just outside the Times Square New Year’s Eve celebration, fracturing a rookie officer’s skull before being shot by police, law enforcement sources said Sunday. Cops and federal investigators are now taking a hard look at the internet history of the 19-year-old suspect, identified by sources as Trevor Bickford of Wells, Maine, to determine if terrorism motivated the bloody holiday attack, law enforcement sources said. .....

Forty-five million dollars to address erosion at Camp Ellis. Thirty-five million for Wolfe’s Neck Farm to promote climate-friendly farming practices nationwide. Twenty million to protect vital infrastructure from the effects of climate change. Five million to aid farmers affected by PFAS contamination. The money came from a variety of sources, for projects large and small, scattered across all 16 counties. More than $250 million for Maine projects (not all of it climate or environmental related) came in the form of earmarks in the $1.7 trillion federal spending bill passed in December. On the energy and environmental side, research and training...

Trevor Bickford — a Maine resident who arrived in the Big Apple just days before the attack — carried the handwritten note in his backpack, along with a collection of religious material and $200 while staying at the Bowery Mission in Manhattan, the sources said. Bickford, of Wells, Maine, is believed to have become a radicalized Muslim in recent years following the overdose death of his father, Tom, who died in 2018 at the age of 41. The teen’s father played a “very active” role in the lives of his three sons, and “could often be found coaching them at...

December 9, 2022 PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Four people in Maine have filed lawsuits with claims that they were sexually abused by Catholic priests as children. Three men sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland on Thursday in Cumberland County Superior Court. The men allege they were abused by priests as children decades ago. Another lawsuit is from a woman who sued the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate Eastern Province in U.S. District Court in Bangor. Her lawsuit alleges that she was sexually abused by priests in the 1950s at a Maine seminary and retreat house run by the order,...

Whole Foods angered elected officials by announcing its plans to cease buying Maine lobsters after climate change groups downgraded the North Atlantic fishing area’s sustainability rating. Democratic Maine Gov. Janet Mills and its Congressional delegation sent a note to Whole Foods expressing their “disappointment” in the grocery store giant’s decision to stop buying Maine lobsters, according to the official letter Nov. 22. Whole Foods made the decision after the organizations (Marine Stewardship Council and Seafood Watch) it uses to determine its sustainability ratings downgraded Maine lobster to “the worst rating,” reported The New York Times. “We are disappointed by Whole...

Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), a prominent centrist Republican, said Monday that former President Trump should not have had a meal or a meeting with Nick Fuentes, a white supremacist organizer and podcaster. “I condemn white supremacy and antisemitism. The president should never have had a meal or even a meeting with Nick Fuentes,” Collins told reporters when asked about a dinner Trump had with Fuentes and Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, at Mar-a-Lago before Thanksgiving. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) reported that Fuentes and his followers support closing U.S. borders to immigrants and oppose feminism and LGBTQ rights...

12 RINOs …

Maine needs to get more adults into the workforce and create affordable housing options for them if it wants to strengthen the state’s economy and quality of life, according to a report released Wednesday. The Measures of Growth 2022 examined 31 indicators, awarding Maine gold stars in areas such as entrepreneurship because the number of business starts exceeded closures by 9% in 2020. Wages are strong too, rising 0.5% in 2021. But the council, made up of business owners and lawmakers from both parties, issued red flags for housing affordability, labor force participation, mental and behavioral health and research and...

I've been keeping track of election results from Fox News updates. (Of those that "count," Fox is better than CNN, NBC, AP and others.) Election outcomes seem to be permanently stuck while a few states get their acts together, submit their results, and someone in the news "calls" the results as decided. Republican victories in the House have remain stagnant, while the Democrats continue to pick up seats. Here's where it still stands on Fox's map (as of 11/12/2022, 11:30 PST): House of Representatives: Republican: 211/218 needed Democrat: 201/218 needed Where are those yet uncalled 23-25 races*? California: 15 Arizona:...

Joe Biden and other Democrats promise to curtail U.S. domestic oil production, the northeastern United States could face a historic energy crisis as temperatures fall this winter, burdening an energy economy already beset by record-high prices and oil shortages. Signs of vulnerability in the Northeast have been apparent in recent months, Bloomberg reported, with retailers already rationing oil as stockpiles of diesel and heating oil are at a third of their normal levels. Those unfavorable conditions could bring about challenges to the Northeast's energy infrastructure that would be unprecedented in most Americans' lifetimes, according to Bloomberg: Add some cold to...

In this July 27, 2022, file photo, Gov. Janet Mills speaks during an abortion rights rally at Lincoln Park in Portland. Credit: David Marino Jr. / BDN The state’s largest abortion rights advocacy group has spent a likely record amount of money on candidate races this year in the wake of the Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England’s political action committee in Maine has spent $836,059 this year in independent expenditures, a category of campaign spending that allows groups to show support or opposition to candidates, according to Maine campaign finance records....

Heating oil, which is chemically similar to diesel, is primarily used in New York, Pennsylvania and New England, where most distribution is handled by small, family-owned businesses. This year, New England's inventories of stockpiled heating oil are about 70 percent lower than their average level since 1993, government data show. Supplies are lower this year due to the same factors impacting world oil markets, including the failure to rebuild production capacity following the pandemic, and disruptions from Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

As Maine retail heating oil prices surge to $5.43 per gallon and some market analysts predict rationing, Maine’s oil dealers say Gov. Janet Mills could ease pressure on Maine families this winter by issuing a waiver to allow them to import and sell non-low sulphur products, which have been banned in Maine since July 2018.

It’s only October, and in the mostly Democrat-run American Northeast, heating oil is already being rationed. Rationing. n America. We have natural resources so vast in this country, enough to power America for hundreds of years, and we’re not only rationing oil, we’re importing oil. And the only reason this is happening is that Democrats want it to happen. If the rationing is not bad enough, how about the average wholesale cost for a gallon of heating oil is now $4.09, compared to $2.46 a year ago? And that’s the wholesale price. So you are going to pay a lot...

PORTLAND, Maine — In November, Portland residents are being asked to approve sweeping changes to the city’s charter including controversial items that would result in a strengthened mayor, a financially independent school board and a citizen-led police oversight board. But, amid the ongoing fury, one charter change question among the eight-question list has been largely overshadowed. It would make Portland the only municipality that officially recognizes in its charter that it sits on unceded land, stolen from Indigenous peoples by European colonizers. The question, which would alter the governing document’s preamble, was written by charter commissioner Pat Washburn. It reads,...