Free Republic

George W Bush has issued a rare critique of Donald Trump over his shuttering of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The former president joined Barack Obama and U2 singer Bono in an emotional video call farewell with staff at the agency on Monday when it officially ceased operations. After six decades, the humanitarian organisation created by former president John F Kennedy to promote US national security by boosting prosperity and goodwill abroad, is being absorbed into the State Department under the supervision of Marco Rubio. Speaking to thousands of agency staff on the video conference, Mr Bush...

President Donald Trump indicated Tuesday morning that he is open to deporting Elon Musk — amid his renewed battle with the Tesla boss. Speaking with reporters ahead of a flight to Florida on Tuesday, the president was asked about whether he would consider deporting the South African mogul. “We’ll have to take a look,” Trump said. “We might have to put DOGE on Elon. You know what DOGE is? DOGE is the monster that might have to go back and eat Elon! Wouldn’t that be terrible?” After a brief detente between the president and his former DOGE lieutenant, the war...

President Trump’s feud with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) is showing no signs of abating as the president seeks to oust the GOP congressman for his history of regularly breaking with the administration. Massie recently opposed the administration by denouncing its strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities and refusing to support the president’s legislative agenda, leading Trump’s political operation to launch a targeted campaign against Massie. On Friday, a Trump-aligned super PAC, led by the president’s co-campaign manager Chris LaCivita, rolled out its first ad as part of a $1 million ad buy targeting Massie. The 30-second ad — titled “What happened...

The US joining Israeli strikes would cause "hell for the whole region", Iran's deputy foreign minister has told the BBC. Saeed Khatibzadeh said this is "not America's war" and if US President Donald Trump does get involved, he will always be remembered as "a president who entered a war he doesn't belong in". He said US involvement would turn the conflict into a "quagmire", continue aggression and delay an end to the "brutal atrocities". His comments came after the Soroka hospital in southern Israel was hit during an Iranian missile attack. Iranian state media reported that the strike targeted a...

... I urge President Trump to stay the course, keep putting America first, and to not join in any war between other countries. Every American should hope and pray for peace.

Iran Revolutionary Guard chief Hossein Salami has been killed in an Israeli strike, Iranian state media is reporting. He is among several senior leaders who have died in the attack. Fereydoon Abbasi, the former head of head of the Atomic Energy Organization has also been killed, state media has reported. As we reported earlier, an Israeli official said that its strikes targeted "Iran's nuclear programme and other military targets".

Even wars have rules. They don't stop soldiers killing each other but they're intended to make sure that civilians caught up in the fighting are treated humanely and protected from as much danger as possible. The rules apply equally to all sides. If one side has suffered a brutal surprise attack that killed hundreds of civilians, as Israel did on 7 October 2023, it does not get an exemption from the law. The protection of civilians is a legal requirement in a battle plan. That, at least, is the theory behind the Geneva Conventions. The latest version, the fourth, was...

@RepThomasMassie Massie plan: Throw the big beautiful bill in the trash. Start over… skinny! Extend 2017 tax cuts End Green New Deal cold turkey No bloat for military industrial complex No SALT No pork Realistic border funding Serious Medicaid reform $1 spending cuts for $1 new tax cuts

President Trump slammed conservative Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Tuesday for pledging to vote against his “big, beautiful bill”, accusing the Kentucky lawmaker of voting “NO on everything” and “never” having “practical or constructive ideas.” Paul said he could vote for the 1,116-page budget reconciliation bill that passed out of the House last month if it didn’t include language to raise the federal debt ceiling by $4 trillion. Paul’s comments sparked Trump to fire back on social media, accusing Paul of having “crazy” ideas. “Rand votes NO on everything, but never has any practical or constructive ideas. His ideas are...

@RandPaul The American people, like the Great People of Kentucky, do not support Biden spending levels and $5T in new debt. Therefore, I will not. It’s simple.** My Notes / paraphrasing for FR Only *** Rand: This (BBB) is a Military Industrial Complex bill... They love it as it's padding out defense spending by around 320 billion dollars in new money... (I can't vote for that) On tariffs: I spoke to the President about the tariffs this week. He did most of the talking and we dont agree.... I talk to people in Kentucky and none of them support the...

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) told Breitbart News exclusively that the neocons have lost the hearts and minds of the American public who are firmly with President Donald Trump’s America First vision on foreign policy, but that they are still very powerful behind the scenes in the swamp in Washington and trying to secretly “undermine” the president’s push for peace worldwide. “I think in the first term, one of the most remarkable achievements, and it really wasn’t so much anticipated, was the Abraham Accords,” Paul told Breitbart News. “A lot of that was Jared [Kushner], but also President...

@RandPaul The national debt is over $36.9 TRILLION! That equates to: 👤More than $107,000 per citizen 💰More than $323,000 per taxpayer 💸Debt-to-GDP ratio of 122%

@krassenstein BREAKING: Ron Johnson reportedly has enough votes to block Trump’s “big beautiful bill” including Mitch McConnell & Lindsey Graham. Republicans are in disarray.

Sen. Ron Wyden (Ore.), the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said Tuesday he has recordings of business associates of President Trump’s pick to lead the IRS, former Rep. Billy Long (R-Mo.), saying they expect to get favors from him once he is in office. Wyden cited recordings of two instances of people saying they expect to receive favorable treatment from Long. “Our staff investigators have on tape now tax promoters saying you met with them at the inauguration and promised [them] a favorable private letter ruling,” Wyden said Tuesday during Long’s confirmation hearing in the Senate Finance Committee....

President Trump has returned from the Middle East to mounting questions about whether it’s appropriate for him to accept a luxury Qatari jet to serve as the next Air Force One, including from Republicans increasingly dubious that the move is a smart and worthwhile idea. Republicans have given the president a wide berth on a multitude of issues throughout his first four months in office as they push to enact his agenda. However, very few are rushing to his defense after he made clear he plans to accept the $400 million gift. “It’s an unnecessary distraction,” one Senate Republican told...

"GOP Sen. Rand Paul says he expects to have enough votes in Senate to pass resolution to effectively block Trump’s tariffs. But Paul, who expects the vote Wednesday, attacked Speaker Johnson’s move to block such resolutions as “dishonesty.”" *** The background to this, via Politico: The White House warned that Trump will veto a bipartisan Senate resolution that would terminate his sweeping global “Liberation Day” tariffs. The statement of administration policy from the Office of Management and Budget, sent to congressional offices Monday, comes ahead of an expected vote this week forced by several Democrats led by Sen. Ron Wyden...

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...

Vladimir Putin initially denied having anything to do with Russia's capture of Crimea in February 2014, when mysterious masked commandos in unidentified green uniforms seized the local parliament and fanned out across the peninsula. Those "little green men" marked the start of Russia's war on Ukraine, which culminated in the 2022 full-scale invasion. The future of Crimea is now at the centre of President Donald Trump's peace plan and has prompted Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky to rule out recognising Russian control of the peninsula. The exact terms of his plan have not been published, but reports suggest it would include the...

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is continuing his push against President Donald Trump's tariffs, with legislation he is co-sponsoring against them to come before the Senate next week. Paul says lawmakers should be in control of tariffs, rather than Trump, through the use of a national-emergency law. The discussion will come less than a month after Paul was one of the only two chamber Republicans to vote against his party's budget, which is seen as a key part of the president's tax cuts, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday. "I don't have any bad feelings towards the president, but this is...

WASHINGTON — Many Republican lawmakers lie low when they have differences with President Trump. Sen. Rand Paul has taken the opposite approach. “Congress needs to grow a spine, and Congress needs to stand up for its prerogatives,” the Kentucky Republican told reporters, complaining that Trump relied on a national-emergency law to impose tariffs that Paul believes should be controlled by lawmakers. His comments came just days after he was one of only two GOP senators to vote against the party’s budget framework that is key to Trump’s tax cuts, saying it didn’t do enough to reduce the deficit. The libertarian...