Free Republic

Israel says it first bombed Iran to stop it from being able to produce nuclear weapons and the “existential threat” they would represent. But the conflict may in the long run serve the opposite purpose: illustrating to Tehran and other nuclear-aspirant nations that nuclear weapons are essential in shielding them against attack. Countries such as North Korea already pointed to Libya, whose leader Moammar Gadhafi gave up his nascent weapons program but was toppled anyway in 2011 after a NATO intervention. That’s one of the reasons Pyongyang has developed its own arsenal — which is believed to have San Francisco...

The gunman accused of shooting two Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota has been taken into custody. Vance Boelter, 57, was arrested late Sunday night for the murders of Democratic State Representative Melissa Hortman and her husband, and the attempted murder of Democratic State Senator John Hoffman and his wife. He is facing both state and federal charges, with authorities announcing on Sunday that there is both a 'nationwide warrant' for Boelter's arrest for the murders and attempted murder at the state level as well as a federal warrant for 'unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.' Boelter, a Trump supporter, was tracked into...

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem's LA riots press conference descended into chaos Thursday as a Democrat Senator interrupted the event. California Senator Alex Padilla began shouting over Noem before he was removed from the room. 'I'm Senator Alex Padilla, and I have questions for the secretary,' Padilla said as he was escorted out. Fox News reported Chad Pergram posted on X that a colleague told him Padilla was forced to the ground and handcuffed by the FBI. This is a developing story...

When immigration agents pulled up outside a Los Angeles car wash on a quiet Sunday afternoon, it sparked instant chaos. Some customers at the Westchester Hand Wash, which sits in the centre of a busy shopping area just blocks from the city's airport, froze as the officers in olive-green uniforms approached, CCTV footage obtained by the BBC shows. Two employees who spotted them ducked behind a luxury SUV they were wiping down with a rag. Another worker halfway through cleaning the back window of a car looked up. Then all at once they scattered and ran, some jumping over a...

Donald Trump has frequently poured scorn on those who served in the US military. Even though he avoided serving after obtaining a note from a friendly doctor who said he had bone spurs, he famously mocked late Republican John McCain, the 2008 presidential candidate and a prisoner-of-war, saying he preferred people who did not get captured. He would later stun his chief of staff, former Marine General John Kelly, during a visit to France for the centennial anniversary of the end of the First World War, when he allegedly claimed those who gave their lives were “suckers” and “losers”. Now,...

Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) has gained access to sensitive data of Russia's strategic aircraft manufacturer Tupolev, a source in HUR told the Kyiv Independent on June 4... ...According to the source, HUR's cyber corps accessed over 4.4 gigabytes (GB) of internal data, including official correspondence, personnel files, home addresses, resumes, purchase records, and closed meeting minutes. "The significance of the data obtained cannot be overestimated," the source said. "Now, in fact, there is nothing secret left in Tupolev's activities for Ukrainian intelligence.

President Donald Trump is lashing out on social media. Jerome Powell is on the receiving end of today's ire. Powell, the Federal Reserve chair who is slowly cutting back interest rates to minimize the risk of continued inflation, is caught in the President's crosshairs after a paltry jobs report. US private payrolls increased far less than expected in May, the ADP National Employment Report showed on Wednesday. Private payrolls increased by only 37,000 jobs last month, a far cry from analyst projections and the worst private job hiring slump since March 2023. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast private employment...

A senior official who dismantled the US government’s Russian disinformation unit is married to a Russian woman with links to the Kremlin, The Telegraph can reveal. Darren Beattie has provoked alarm within the State Department since being appointed in February for his ardent pro-Russian views. He has been noted for his focus on destroying the agency tasked with tackling Kremlin propaganda. Mr Beattie, the acting under-secretary for public diplomacy and public affairs, is married to a woman whose uncle has taken several roles in Russian politics and once received a personal “thank you” message from Vladimir Putin.

When President Vladimir Putin traveled to the Kursk region this month for the first time since Russia expelled Ukrainian forces, his helicopter reportedly came under fire from Ukrainian drones. And that’s exactly how the Kremlin designed it. As ordinary Russians continue to bear the domestic brunt of Putin’s war, the Kremlin and the security services staged this PR stunt to convince the public that Putin, too, is making sacrifices for the country, four current and former Russian officials told The Moscow Times. All of these sources spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details related to Putin’s security. With...

Vladimir Putin is demanding urgent potato imports from Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, while he delays supplying the ally with promised notorious Oreshnik horror missiles. Putin has made the shameful admission that he has run out of spuds - one of his country’s leading food staples - amid economic meltdown during his war with Ukraine. It now appears Belarus will not get the lethal missiles until after Lukashenko supplies Putin with new exports of potatoes which have spiralled in prices in Russia. The Minsk tyrant has even cancelled sanctions against imports from the EU to stock up to supply Russia. -snip-...

Americans across the country are remembering George Floyd five years after he was killed by police, with special gatherings in the city where he grew up and the one where he died. The murder of Floyd, a black man, in Minneapolis by police officer Derek Chauvin led to nationwide protests against racism and police brutality. On Sunday, Floyd's family gathered in their hometown of Houston near Floyd's gravesite for an event led by the Rev. Al Sharpton, while Minneapolis held several commemorations. What many hailed as a national "reckoning" with racism after Floyd's death, though, seems to be fading as...

She's been called 'ICE Barbie' for treating her Cabinet position like a TV production, but now Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is pushing for an actual reality show pitting immigrants against each other 'for the honor of fast-tracking their way to U.S. citizenship'. It may sound like a joke, but the idea is for real and is outlined in a 35-page program pitch put together in coordination with the DHS secretary, DailyMail.com can exclusively reveal. Noem is even offering up officials from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to tally votes for the made-for-TV contest. The pitch comes from Rob...

Rock megastar Bruce Springsteen has made a series of critical remarks about US President Donald Trump and the policies of his administration, calling the American leader “unfit” for office. “The mighty E Street Band is here tonight to call upon the righteous power of art, of music, of rock n’ roll in dangerous times,” Springsteen said at the beginning of a concert in Manchester, northern England, on Wednesday. “In my home, the America I love — the America I’ve written about that has been a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years — is currently in the hands of...

Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine could not accept US recognition of Russia’s annexation of Crimea as he visited South Africa, while both he and Donald Trump criticised a deadly missile and drone attack on Kyiv. Though he did not mention Crimea – the contested Black Sea peninsula occupied by Russia since spring 2014 – by name, Ukraine’s president diplomatically returned to the topic a day after Trump accused him of intransigence on the issue.

So far, American consumers have been shielded from much of the impact. But as the world of international shipping adjusts to his policies, the president is facing a potential reckoning. With the US-China trade war starting to gum up container traffic between the world’s two biggest economies, freight companies are warning of plunging bookings and a surge in “blank sailings” – where ports are skipped or voyages are called off altogether. Earlier this week, America’s most powerful retail executives trooped into the White House to deliver a blunt prognosis: tariffs on Chinese goods risked causing “empty shelves” in two weeks...

The UK’s largest teaching union has called Reform UK “far-right and racist” and its leader has dismissed Nigel Farage as “a poundshop Donald Trump,” as the union pledged funds to oppose the party’s candidates in elections. Delegates to the National Education Union’s annual conference backed a motion stating that “far-right and racist organisations, including Reform, seek to build on the despair, poverty and alienation in our society by scapegoating refugees, asylum seekers, Muslims, Jews and others who do not fit their beliefs”. The motion also committed the NEU to use its political fund for campaigns against Reform election candidates and...

Ukraine started today with, for once, the diplomatic wind in its sails. It had finally agreed a mineral deal "framework" with Washington. An agreement that would see the US invest in Ukraine's recovery, in return for a share of the country's future profits from its natural resources, energy infrastructure and its oil and gas. There had also been a first round of peace talks between American, European and Ukrainian officials in Paris, which had been hailed as "positive". That was until the both US President Donald Trump and his Secretary of State Marco Rubio threatened to pull out of brokering...

"Trump is a crazy man," says Lionel Xu, who is surrounded by his company's mosquito repellent kits – many were once best sellers in Walmart stores in the United States. Now those products are sitting in boxes in a warehouse in China and will remain there unless President Donald Trump lifts his 145% tariffs on all Chinese goods bound for the US. "This is so hard for us," he adds. Around half of all products made by his company Sorbo Technology are sold to the US. It is a small company by Chinese standards and has around 400 workers in...

President Donald Trump on Sunday insisted there will be no exemptions in the tariffs after there was some confusion when it came to electronics. 'NOBODY is getting “off the hook” for the unfair Trade Balances, and Non Monetary Tariff Barriers, that other Countries have used against us, especially not China which, by far, treats us the worst!' the president posted on Truth Social. A notice released late on Friday suggested gadgets would avoid Trump's 125 percent import tax on Chinese goods and even his sweeping 10 percent global tariffs. But his administration clarified on Sunday that electronics would be subject...

Strolling in bright sunshine across the immaculately raked gravel of Paris's Tuileries gardens, Barbara and Rick Wilson from Dallas, Oregon, were not exactly in disguise. But earlier that morning, on their very first trip to France, Rick, 74, had taken an unusual precaution. Before leaving his hotel, he'd taken a small piece of black tape and covered up the Stars and Stripes flag on the corner of his baseball cap. "We're sick about it. It's horrible. Just horrible," said Rick, as he and his wife contemplated the sudden sense of shame and embarrassment they said they now felt, as Americans,...