Free Republic

SummaryJudicial reform raises concerns over rule of law in Mexico Critics fear reform may increase organized crime influence Election agency could disqualify ineligible candidates after vote CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico, May 24 (Reuters) - When residents in the state of Durango vote in Mexico's first judicial elections next weekend, Leopoldo Chavez will be on the ballot for federal judge - despite the nearly six years he served in a U.S. prison. Chavez was convicted on drug offenses: for smuggling over 4 kilograms of methamphetamines in 2015. Durango is part of Mexico's Golden Triangle, a cartel-controlled region growing marijuana and opium poppies....

President Donald Trump this week enjoyed one of his biggest legislative victories during his second administration. "THE ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL" has PASSED the House of Representatives!" Trump touted in a social media post Thursday. The president's post came soon after the GOP-controlled House passed Trump's sweeping tax and spending cuts package by a razor-thin margin. The Republican-crafted measure is full of Trump's campaign trail promises and second-term priorities on tax cuts, immigration, defense, energy and the debt limit. Ahead of the House vote, two surveys released earlier in the week indicated that the president's poll numbers remained underwater.

Germany may reinstate compulsory military service if a revamped volunteer system fails to meet recruitment goals, the defense minister said in comments published Saturday. In an interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, Boris Pistorius laid out a timeline for Germany’s new military service model, which aims to bolster the understrength army. The initial program will rely on voluntary enlistment, but Pistorius warned that could change. "If the time comes when we have more capacity available than voluntary registrations, then a decision may be made to make recruitment mandatory. That is the roadmap," he said. He said the government of Chancellor...

The Saudi newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat reports that Hamas is facing a severe financial crisis amid ongoing fighting with Israel across Gaza. Sources within the terror group revealed that Hamas is struggling to pay salaries — not only to government employees, but also to members of its military wing and staff in other affiliated bodies at all levels. The sources added that the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas' military wing, have not paid salaries to terrorists for approximately three months and are facing serious financial difficulties in acquiring essential equipment...

Former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) pressed Senate Republicans to advance President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” which the House passed earlier this week. Gingrich said that GOP senators have “every right” to formulate their version of the president’s mega bill, but if they care about the United States economy and their constituents, they will eventually vote to pass it through the upper chamber and get it to Trump’s desk for signing. “It blocks a huge tax increase, it creates much better regulatory environment. It takes out a great deal of the waste in government. It’s not perfect. Look. We balanced the...

Ukraine’s former top general warns against false hopes of restoring 1991 borders and says only tech-driven warfare can overcome Russia’s war resources. Ukraine’s Ambassador to the UK and former Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces (AFU), retired Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, has cautioned against hoping for a return to Ukraine’s 1991 borders, warning that Russia still possesses the resources to continue the war. Speaking at the “Export of Security: Ukrainian Weapons in the World” forum, Zaluzhny said, as quoted by Ukrainian media: “I hope that there are no people in this hall who still hope for some miracle or wonder, for some...

U.S. President Donald Trump will attend the G7 leaders’ summit in Canada next month, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed in a briefing. Trump will be in Canada from June 15 to 17. More details of his visit will be announced shortly, Leavitt said. On May 6, during Mark Carney’s meeting with Trump at the White House, the prime minister noted that the two leaders “look forward to meeting next month at the G7 Summit in Kananaskis.” The 51st G7 summit will be held from June 15 to 17 in Kananaskis, Alta., attended by the core members of the...

Democratic National Committee (DNC) Vice Chair David Hogg is drawing attention after publicly praising Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX), calling her the "type of leader we’re looking to support." Hogg’s, who the DNC is currently trying to oust, endorsement reflects the left’s establishment’s ongoing shift toward more progressive, outspoken figures, despite it backfiring on the Democratic Party. During an appearance on The Breakfast Club radio show, Hogg said that the Democratic Party needs a “hell of a lot more people” like Crockett, gloating over her. “I love her. She is amazing,” Hogg told host Charlamagne tha God. “I think that people...

During an interview with Telemundo 47 on Friday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) argued that the state is going to lose money under the Republican tax and spending bill and people will lose health care and responded to if she’ll have to cut services to some immigrants by saying, “I don’t want to go there.” And “This is something we have to look at very seriously for how we can not leave these people without essential care.” Hochul said that “no state will be able to make up those kind of cuts. We just don’t have enough money. And...

A Colorado man who founded and directed an orphanage in Haiti has been sentenced to 210 years in prison for sexually abusing children there. Michael Karl Geilenfeld, 73, founded the St. Joseph’s Home for Boys in 1985, which housed orphaned, impoverished, and vulnerable children in Haiti. In the over two decades that Geilenfeld operated the orphanage, the Department of Justice said that he "repeatedly traveled from the United States to Haiti, where he sexually abused the boys entrusted to his care." The children also suffered physical and emotional abuse at the hands of Geilenfeld. A federal jury convicted Geilenfeld in...

India may not be majority Muslim, but it remains host to the world’s third-largest Muslim population. Although Indian officials focus largely on Pakistan’s efforts to recruit and radicalize Indian Muslims, increasingly Qatar takes advantage of New Delhi’s relative blind spot to its efforts to further radicalize millions of Indian Muslims. While Qatar’s ties with and efforts to mediate for terror outfits such as the Muslim Brotherhood, the Taliban, Al-Nusra Front, and Hamas are well-documented, Indian security forces no longer can afford to ignore Qatar-based individuals and institutions that pose a threat to India. Qatari interests today fund Kashmir-based jihadist groups,...

In a sharp escalation of trade negotiations with the European Union (E.U.), Trump took to social media. on Friday and announced that he is “recommending a straight 50% tariff on the European Union, starting on June 1, 2025.” “The European Union, which was formed for the primary purpose of taking advantage of the United States on TRADE, has been very difficult to deal with,” Trump claimed. “Their powerful trade barriers, VAT taxes, ridiculous corporate penalties, non-monetary trade barriers, monetary manipulations, unfair and unjustified lawsuits against Americans companies, and more, have led to a trade deficit with the U.S. of more...

The debt downgrade put immediate pressure on bond prices, sending yields higher on Monday morning. The 30-year U.S. bond yield traded above 5% and the 10-year yield topped 4.5% ...Treasury bonds influence rates for a wide range of consumer loans like 30-year fixed mortgages, and to some extent also affect products including auto loans and credit cards. “It’s really hard to avoid the impact on consumers,” said Brian Rehling, head of global fixed income strategy at Wells Fargo Investment Institute. ...“When our credit rating goes down, the expectation is that the cost of borrowing will increase,” said Ivory Johnson, a...

Back to spending 24/7 at work and sleeping in conference/server/factory rooms. I must be super focused on 𝕏/xAI and Tesla (plus Starship launch next week), as we have critical technologies rolling out. As evidenced by the 𝕏 uptime issues this week, major operational improvements need to be made. The failover redundancy should have worked, but did not.

Across Los Angeles, the Inland Empire and the Coachella Valley, one community health center is extending its services to immigrant patients in their homes after realizing that people were skipping critical medical appointments because they’ve become too afraid to venture out. St. John’s Community Health, one of the largest nonprofit community healthcare providers in Los Angeles County that caters to low-income and working-class residents, launched a home visitation program in March after learning that patients were missing routine and urgent care appointments because they feared being taken in by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.St. John’s, which offers services through...

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Concerns raised in a confidential planning document appear prescient, with humanitarian groups, possible donors and some senior IDF officers questioning the plan. May 24, 2025 at 2:00 a.m. EDTJERUSALEM — Last year, a group of former U.S. intelligence and defense officials and business executives, working in close consultation with Israel, prepared a proposal for supplying humanitarian aid to Gaza that would address Israeli government claims that assistance was being diverted by Hamas. In previously unreported internal documents, the group detailed a radically new and ambitious model: It envisioned the creation of an organization called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) that...

The Trump administration sees tariff talks as a chance to pressure a rival into concessions. E.U. officials have acted as though they were dealing with an ally. The European Union has been following tried-and-true rules of global commerce as it tries to negotiate with the Trump administration to avert painful tariffs on cars, pharmaceuticals and just about everything else.The problem? President Trump is ripping up that rule book.Mr. Trump announced in a Truth Social post on Friday morning that he is recommending a 50 percent tariff on European imports as of June 1, claiming that the bloc’s trade barriers, taxes,...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s early selections for U.S. attorneys have drawn strong pushback from Democratic senators who have considerable power to block them, setting up another fight over personnel picks from a president who places a premium on loyalty as he staffs his administration.His choices for the top prosecutors in Nevada, New York and New Jersey are opposed by Democratic senators, and at stake is the Republican president’s ability to have the team he wants for positions with enormous sway over which cases and crimes are investigated and what penalties the government seeks. The power they wield was...

SummaryTrump administration accuses school of 'coordinating' with China U.S. lawmakers have expressed worries about Chinese government influence on campuses Harvard accused of training sanctioned Chinese officials WASHINGTON, May 23 (Reuters) - Harvard University's links to China, long an asset to the school, have become a liability as the Trump administration levels accusations that its campus is plagued by Beijing-backed influence operations. On Thursday the administration moved to revoke Harvard's ability to enroll foreign students, saying it fostered antisemitism and coordinated with the Chinese Communist Party. Among them are Chinese nationals who made up about a fifth of Harvard's foreign student...