Free Republic

Chinese gangs have set up thousands of illicit weed farms across the US as they begin to challenge Mexican cartels for supremacy as America's cannabis kingpins. Authorities in Oklahoma, Oregon, California, New Mexico and Maine have all been battling a surge in Chinese weed farms, with some thought to be linked to criminal gangs known as 'triads'. The spread is seemingly uncontainable, with police in Penobscot County, Maine, last week arresting three Chinese nationals at a weed farm and seizing 40 pounds of the drug alongside $4,700 in cash. It is thought to be one of around 270 illegal weed...

The family that had wanted to build the world’s tallest flagpole in rural eastern Maine has agreed to pay a $250,000 penalty under a consent agreement following construction of more than 50 cabins without obtaining environmental permits from the state. The Board of Environmental Protection signed off Wednesday on the consent agreement signed late last month by Morrill Worcester, patriarch of the family whose company owns the land. The Flagpole View Cabins were built from 2019 to 2022 in sparsely populated Columbia Falls near the site where the family wanted to build a flagpole taller than the Empire State Building....

Residents of Maine are expressing their outrage over the state’s plans to spend $13 million on constructing apartment complexes for illegal border crossers where some could be afforded up to two years of free rent. The apartment complex plan — derisively labeled the “Taj Mahal” for illegals — took a lot of heat from residents of Brunswick during a February 20 city council meeting. The locals were upset over the fact that the same apartments that cost citizens between $1,800 and $2,300 a month were going to be handed out to illegals for free.

Alade McKen plagiarized pages of material from Wikipedia.. The chief diversity, equity, and inclusion officer of Columbia University's medical school, Alade McKen, plagiarized extensively in his doctoral dissertation, lifting entire pages of material, without attribution, from sources that include Wikipedia, according to a complaint submitted to the university on Wednesday. The allegations implicate approximately a fifth of McKen's 163-page dissertation, "'UBUNTU' I am because we are: A case study examining the experiences of an African-centered Rites of Passage program within a community-based organization," submitted to Iowa State University's School of Education in 2021. More than two of those pages are...

The Maine Republican Party says it won’t recognize ranked choice voting in the March 5 presidential primary, adding another layer of complexity to an already confusing election. snip BALLOTS SET FOR RANKED VOTING Despite the party’s opposition, Maine’s official Republican primary ballots are set up for ranked choice voting consistent with state law. The ballots offer voters the options of picking second and third choices. The state’s Republican party reiterated its position in an email to voters Tuesday, the day after early absentee voting started for the March 5 primary. “Mainers will vote on RCV ballots, but the first round...

In the race for President, Donald Trump (R) is leading Joe Biden (D) by six points statewide.

NEW ENGLAND GRID NEEDS: New England’s grid operator warned that the region will need to invest nearly $1 billion in its electric transmission infrastructure per year through 2050 to avoid capacity shortfalls and handle the rising power demand—especially as wind and solar make up a rising share of its energy mix. Takeaways: The report modeled for several different demand scenarios through 2050. The low end of 51 GW could be achieved only if the region kept online some stored fuels like natural gas and oil—which is almost a certain impossibility, given the emissions reduction targets passed by several of the...

Maine’s Department of Education is reportedly urging school districts to stop using taxpayer-subsidized electric school buses that were purchased within the last year. The districts reported problems with the new buses, which were supplied by Canada-based Lion Electric Co., last fall ... The windshields on the buses would leak whenever it rained, as the glass didn’t appear to be securely in place. concerns about mixing electricity and water from the leaking windshields led them to stop driving some of the buses. The buses, which cost about $345,000 each, were also sold with misaligned or incorrect lettering on the sides, and...

Forty-five Maine lawmakers are pressuring Cabela’s to stop selling AR-15s and other firearms Democrats describe as “assault rifles,” noting the October 25, 2023, Lewiston attacker bought a handgun from the retail giant. Lawmakers did not explain what buying a handgun has to do with buying an AR-15, but they are pushing for Cabela’s to drop the sales of AR-15s anyway. WGME noted that the push is being led by State Rep. Lori Gramlich (D), and that she the other 44 lawmakers sent a letter to Cabela’s which said, in part:

Unsettling Post footage and interviews with US residents along the Canadian border offer a rare glimpse into the thriving migrant smuggling operation that has taken hold up north in addition to the debacle to the south. ... smugglers have become so rampant that some locals are packing pistols to protect themselves and turning into amateur sleuths to help thwart them. “Now I’ve got the Border Patrol guys on speed dial,” local Chris Feeley, 52, recently grimly acknowledged. ... According to Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data, the number of migrants illegally entering the US at the northern border last year...

Caribou High School has changed course and decided against implementing a biometric identification system to track student attendance. Parents and guardians of students who attend the high school were notified Wednesday that Regional School Unit 39 has abandoned its plan to use a finger scanning system at the high school, which enrolls about 460 students in grades 9-12. The RSU39 district serves students from Caribou and Stockholm. “Following careful consideration and feedback from our community, it was determined that the implementation of this system will not proceed,” Superintendent Jane McCall said in a statement released Wednesday. Only 2% of parents...

(The Center Square) — Maine is required to release its voter lists to a conservative group that's conducting audits of recent elections to probe for fraud following a new federal court ruling. A U.S. Court of Appeals ruling in Boston sided with lawyers for the Virginia-based Public Interest Legal Foundation, which filed the lawsuit, who argued that federal law allows data to be available for public inspection. The three-judge panel cited a provision of the National Voter Registration Act requiring public disclosure of "all records concerning the implementation of programs and activities conducted for the purpose of ensuring the accuracy...

A Democrat-sponsored bill in Hawaii that could ban former President Trump from the ballot for allegedly inciting the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol advanced in the state legislature Monday. Hawaii state Sen. Karl Rhoads, a Democrat representing Honolulu who frequently criticizes Trump and Republicans over the Jan. 6 riot online, first introduced SB 2392 last week, which aims to "specify that election ballots issued by the chief election officer or county clerk shall exclude any candidate who is disqualified under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States; article XVI, section 3 of...

Maine is on the docket to becoming a "sanctuary state" for children seeking to undergo life-alternating transgender treatments. In an effort to create a "safe space" for teens, Maine's state legislature is eyeing a bill that would give authorities the right to take custody of kids away from parents and guardians who oppose allowing medical providers to impose "gender-affirming care" onto their children. The "Act to Safeguard Gender Affirming Health Care" would allow a "court to take temporary jurisdiction because a child has been unable to obtain gender-affirming health care or gender-affirming mental health care." LD1735, brought forth by Rep....

A bill being debated in Maine’s state legislature would give authorities the power to take children away from parents who oppose allowing medical providers to impose “gender-affirming care” onto their children. The bill, LD1735, is explicit about this startling new power In its summary, for instance, directly states, “The bill authorizes a court to take temporary jurisdiction because a child has been unable to obtain gender-affirming health care or gender-affirming mental health care.” There seems to be no provision made for religious objection. Parents would have no parental rights on the issue; either they allow their children to be exposed...

The Maine Superior Court on Wednesday ordered Trump back on the ballot pending a decision from the US Supreme Court. President Trump appealed Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows’ 2024 ballot ban to the state superior court on Tuesday. “Former President Donald Trump’s legal team on Tuesday appealed Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows’ ruling that deemed him ineligible from appearing on the state’s GOP primary ballot to Maine’s Superior Court, the state’s top trial court,” ABC News reported. Maine’s psychotic Democrat Secretary of State Shenna Bellows unilaterally barred Trump from the 2024 ballot because she decided the former president...

“The error is significant”: South Portland Faces $4 Million Budget Shortfall After Mistakenly Failing to Increase Property Taxes Enough Edward Tomic The City of South Portland is working to close a $4 million shortfall in their current fiscal year budget they identified earlier this month — a gap the city attributes to mistakenly not taxing residents enough to support the City Council-approved budget. According to the city, South Portland’s current mill rate is $14.14, meaning property owners must pay $14.14 out of every $1,000 of their property’s assessed value. But it should have been raised to $14.69 this past summer...

Maine House Speaker’s Plan to Give Illegal Aliens Driver’s Licenses is Dead – For Now Edward Tomic A bill proposed by Maine House Speaker Rachel Talbot Ross (D-Portland) that would have allowed illegal aliens to obtain driver’s licenses was shot down by the Legislature’s Transportation Committee during a Tuesday afternoon public hearing. The bill, LD 1138, would have removed the requirement to prove legal presence in the U.S. in order to obtain a Maine driver’s license or state identification card. When opening the public hearing on the bill, Transportation Committee Chair Rep. Lydia Crafts (D-Newcastle) said that Talbot Ross had...

The Maine Wire Maine Court Orders Secretary of State Bellows to Revisit Trump’s Ballot Eligibility After SCOTUS Decides Colorado Case Libby Palanza The Maine Superior Court on Wednesday ordered Secretary of State Shenna Bellows to revisit her decision blocking former President Donald Trump from Maine’s primary ballot pending the Supreme Court’s issuance of an opinion in a similar case out of Colorado. Secretary Bellows will need to release her updated ruling within thirty days of the Supreme Court publishing its ruling in Trump v. Anderson, a case concerning former President Trump’s eligibility to appear on Colorado’s presidential primary ballot later...

Maine officials are coming under fire after handing a $132,000 contract to a racial justice group, only for it to conclude with a 30-minute webinar on 'problematic' place names. Taxpayers footed the bill for the lecture as part of the state's employment of non-profit Atlantic Black Box (ABB), which claims to 'engage the public in the collective rewriting of our regional history.' In footage of the webinar this week, ABB founder Meadow Dibble urged attendees to acknowledge suffering caused by 'white settler people' as she rattled off place names Maine residents should feel offended by.