Free Republic

WASHINGTON, May 19 (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer on Monday introduced a bill that would prevent any foreign aircraft from being used as Air Force One, the aircraft that transports the U.S. president. Schumer introduced the "Presidential Airlift Security Act" after news last week that President Donald Trump planned to accept a $400 million airplane from Qatar, which legal experts said raised a raft of questions about the scope of laws that relate to gifts from foreign governments and are intended to thwart corruption and improper influence. Retrofitting the luxury plane offered by Qatar's royal family would...

– The U.S. government has agreed to pay nearly $5 million to the family of Ashli Babbitt, the Jan. 6 rioter who was fatally shot by police during the 2021 attack on the Capitol, according to multiple reports on Monday. The Washington Post first reported the settlement, citing two people “briefed on the matter” who said the Trump administration has agreed to it, with roughly one-third of the money going to the lawyers representing Babbitt’s family. Tom Manger, the outgoing U.S. Capitol Police chief, confirmed the settlement news to CBS, adding that he told the police force he was “extremely...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday evening issued a statement responding to the UK, Canada and France’s ultimatum to Israel to end the war in Gaza or face sanctions. “By asking Israel to end a defensive war for our survival before Hamas terrorists on our border are destroyed and by demanding a Palestinian state, the leaders in London, Ottawa and Paris are offering a huge prize for the genocidal attack on Israel on October 7 while inviting more such atrocities,” he said. “The war began on October 7 when Palestinian terrorists stormed our borders, murdered 1,200 innocent people and abducted...

The payment, if approved, would represent an extraordinary concession by the Justice Department, which prosecuted nearly 1,600 people in connection with the riot.The Justice Department is discussing giving the relatives of Ashli Babbitt, an Air Force veteran killed by the police during the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, about $5 million to settle a wrongful-death lawsuit they brought against the government last year, according to two people familiar with the matter.But the people cautioned that the negotiations, which have largely taken place since President Trump took office, have not yet been finalized.A tentative settlement agreement was announced...

Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi declared that Iran would persist with its enrichment activities regardless of the outcome of the talks

“The root causes of the conflict.” These were startling words from a man purportedly on the path to peace.But it is the nub of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s position of what must be solved for peace, after two weeks, or three months, depending on how you count, of mounting pressure for an immediate unconditional 30-day ceasefire. Unbothered, taking this most consequential of calls at a music school on the Sochi coast, the Kremlin head has returned to the start – to his false narrative about this war of choice being sparked by NATO expanding too fast.Five other, different words emerged...

Italy’s Chamber of Deputies witnessed an unusual and symbolic protest when a lawmaker entered the chamber draped in a white sheet like a ghost, with the word “Referendum” written across the front. The stunt was led by Riccardo Magi, secretary of the liberal party +Europa, who used the theatrical gesture to denounce what he sees as an attempt by Giorgia Meloni’s government to suppress public debate and encourage voter abstention ahead of the national referendums scheduled for 8 and 9 June. A ghost haunts Italy’s parliament: theatrical protest against government. Credit: Italian Congress TV Italy’s Chamber of Deputies witnessed an...

A woman in her 70s in Norrbotten, Sweden, started selling homemade bread and pastries in 2019, but without a registered business and without having a government-approved kitchen for food production. Her cinnamon buns, in particular, became a hit with locals. She was given a fine by the local council, but despite repeated pressure, she did not pay. The case first gained attention in autumn 2024 when the woman was ultimately sentenced to one month and 14 days in prison after continuing her sales and not paying any fines. The verdict is being appealed to the Court of Appeal for Upper...

The chair of the Libertarian Party of New Hampshire told members of the Libertarian National Committee in a recent message that any who vote to censure the state party at the committee’s upcoming meeting will face the “full and unapologetic wrath” of the affiliate. The message from New Hampshire Chair Ben Weir, first reported on and confirmed as authentic by Third Party Watch on Thursday, comes in response to a resolution introduced this week by LNC Treasurer Bill Redpath. In his motion, Redpath calls on the national committee to censure the New Hampshire affiliate over its use of social media...

“Don’t misunderstand me. I want Biden to get better and live many more years, so he can watch his family go broke from running out of influence to sell.” Oilfield Rando on X If the slithering denizens of Okefenokee-on-the-Potomac were nervous about their fates before Sunday — and I’d say they’ve been rather jumped-up since Nov. 4 — then Maria Bartiromo’s Sunday morning session with FBI top dawgs Patel and Bongino must have been a near-death experience for them. Something Roto-rooterish this way comes, officialdom must be thinking, if you can call utter hysteria “thinking.” Washington is nervous because there...

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq has formalized two major energy agreements with U.S. firms HKN Energy and WesternZagros in Washington, D.C., Kurdish media reported on Monday, in deals valued at a combined $110 billion, despite a legal showdown with the federal government of Iraq over control of the country’s oil exports... ...The deals were formalized during KRG Prime Minister Masrour Barzani's official visit to the United States this week... ...Washington has been advocating for the resumption of Kurdish oil exports, which have been stalled since March 2023 due to legal disputes and pipeline shutdowns. Washington's push aims...

Federal officials are investigating why two planes got dangerously close on a runway at New York’s LaGuardia Airport earlier this month despite the airport being equipped with an advanced surface radar system that’s designed to help prevent such close calls. Both the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board said Monday that they are investigating the May 6 incident when a Republic Airways jet had to abort takeoff because a United Airlines plane was still taxiing across the runway. In audio from the tower that ABC obtained from the website www.LiveATC.net, the air traffic control said to the...

WARSAW, May 19 (Reuters) - Polish customs seized 5 metric tons of tires for civilian Boeing aircraft which were due to transit through Belarus and Russia, the country's National Revenue Administration said on Monday, adding such goods are covered by European Union sanctions. Western sanctions against Russia have been toughened repeatedly since its full-scale invasion on Ukraine in 2022, without ending the war. "Officers... discovered during the inspection of a truck in Koroszczyn that the driver was transporting tires used in Boeing civil planes instead of the declared car and bus tires," the National Revenue Administration said. "The sender of...

HELSINKI, May 19 (Reuters) - Finland will supply 90 million euros ($101.35 million) of ammunition to Ukraine by using proceeds from Russian financial assets frozen by the European Union after Moscow's full-scale invasion in 2022, the Finnish defence ministry said on Monday.The EU has estimated that 210 billion euros of the roughly $300 billion worth of frozen Russian assets are held in the 27-nation bloc, mainly in the form of government bonds that Russia's central bank had stored as reserves.HELSINKI, May 19 (Reuters) - Finland will supply 90 million euros ($101.35 million) of ammunition to Ukraine by using proceeds from...

Wendy McMahon, the president of CBS News and Stations, had allied herself with Bill Owens, the “60 Minutes” executive producer who recently resigned.The president of CBS News, Wendy McMahon, was forced out of her post on Monday, the latest shock wave to hit the news division amid an ongoing showdown involving President Trump, “60 Minutes,” and CBS’s parent company, Paramount. Ms. McMahon told her staff in a memo that “it’s become clear the company and I do not agree on the path forward.” Executives at Paramount informed Ms. McMahon on Saturday that they wanted her to step down, according to...

Seriously, has anyone listened to the whole Hur audio? The establishment takeout that this is just about Joe Biden having pudding for brains is lazy and misses the deeper point, which is that the prosecutors had him cold on possessing classified documents he had no right to keep. Biden lies and dissembles and filibusters and goes vague and mumbly at all the crucial points, with the help of lawyer Bob Bauer, who interrupts every time Joe might incriminate himself and laughs like a hyena when Joe gets feisty or cracks a sarcastic joke at the prosecutors’ expense. It is vintage...

U.S. officials say adding the B61-13 bomb to America's nuclear arsenal is key to holding certain underground and large area targets at risk. he first production example of the new B61-13 nuclear bomb has been completed roughly a year ahead of schedule, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. The B61-13 is based on the preceding B61-12, but offers a higher maximum yield that U.S. officials say offers important additional capacity to hold hardened targets, such as underground command and control facilities, and ones spread across physically larger areas, at risk.The U.S. military first announced plans to develop and field...

President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin held a 2-hour call on Monday in what the U.S. said was a push to get Russia to end its deadly war in Ukraine. Both Trump and Putin described the call in a positive light, with the Kremlin chief saying it was "frank" and "useful," but it is not immediately clear what results were achieved. Trump took to social media to praise the call as having gone "very well" and said, "Russia and Ukraine will immediately start negotiations toward a Ceasefire and, more importantly, an END to the War." "The conditions for...

The Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Thursday in three cases concerning challenges to President Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order. The question before the high court was not, however, the constitutionality of the EO, but rather whether the lower courts had authority to issue injunctions on a nationwide basis to bar implementation of an EO. You would be hard pressed to know that, though, from the justices’ questions—-the overwhelming number of which focused instead on how to stop Trump. “So, as far as I see it, this order violates four Supreme Court precedents,” Justice Sotomayor declared early in the argument,...

For months, big retailers have been warning that prices will rise. Now, thanks to insider information from Target workers, the extent of the raises are becoming apparent. Staff say it is just the beginning. A $9.99 USB-C cord from the store's in-house Heyday brand is now ringing up at $17.99, according to a self-identified employee on Reddit. 'It's happening,' the worker wrote, sharing a photo of the price tag update. 'All of Heyday is going up.' The spike — an 80 percent increase — is being blamed on the latest wave of tariffs linked to President Donald Trump's trade policies.