Free Republic

EXCLUSIVE: A top Trump agency is cutting off funding to the Los Angeles agency responsible for coordinating billions in homelessness spending after accusing it of "obvious fraud," "wanton mismanagement" and repeated failures to safeguard taxpayer dollars, Fox News Digital has learned. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which is a member of the White House fraud task force led by Vice President JD Vance, is immediately suspending the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority's (LAHSA) federal funding while HUD’s inspector general investigates potential offenses by the agency and its leadership, according to a letter sent to LAHSA's board chair...

The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is investigating what happened to $30 million it sent to a Muslim nonprofit to help resettle Afghan refugees in the US, The Post has learned. The department is the latest to look into the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) amid accusations it has ties to dangerous groups in foreign nations including terror group Hamas. In letters to the governors of California and Washington, where the $30 million was sent, HHS — headed by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — claims it has received information that “raises concerns about the business practices and...

Officials in Northern Colorado are celebrating a new project to improve energy reliability and availability in their communities ... Platte River Power Authority CEO Jason Frisbie says the project is a major step toward reducing its carbon footprint ... The facility will strengthen the county's electric system by storing energy for later distribution during periods of high demand.

Almost every day now, there is another headline warning about the collapsing birth rate across the developed world, and along with it, another think piece attempting to diagnose why younger generations seem increasingly reluctant to build families. This week, new figures out of England and Wales showed that the number of babies being born has fallen to the lowest level since 1977, with couples delaying parenthood until their thirties or deciding against children altogether. The total fertility rate dropped to 1.39 children per woman, the lowest level ever recorded. The explanations offered for this phenomenon tend to revolve around economics,...

If you believe the governor of California, the state is laying track that it hasn’t bought yet. ================================================================== It was an induced hallucination, happily shared by a crowd of professional journalists, and a useful reminder of Gavin Newsom’s tendency to swagger like a winner on the lightest of pretexts. Back in February, the California governor spoke to the media in a crowded railyard, posing in front of a long line of freight cars and the piles of construction materials they had just delivered while he bragged about the extraordinary new progress the state was making toward a functioning high-speed rail...

A UN body of researchers that puts together possible climate scenarios announced last week that one extreme scenario it put forward back in 2011 is no longer plausible. As Roger Pielke Jr. from AEI puts it, the climate apocalypse is no longer around the corner.The climate apocalypse isn’t around the corner after all. That’s the upshot of a recent report from the international panel that supplies official “scenarios” to researchers, governments and banks. It turns out that the most extreme assumptions about the future — the doomsaying predictions embodied in the worst-case scenario known as RCP8.5 — are “implausible.”...The substance...

In mid-May, after extending the executive deadline, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani released his $124.7 billion Fiscal Year (FY) 2027 Executive Budget. After warning that NYC faces a budget crisis of “historic magnitude” in late April, Mamdani now assures the 8.5 million residents of the Big Apple that the city is on “firm financial footing” after he “balanced the budget” “without raising property taxes” or “slashing services.” While it is certainly true that Mamdani did not slash services or raise property taxes even higher than they already are, it is ludicrous for him to declare that NYC’s budget is...

Climate hysteria, which was always about power and money, finally seems to have peaked, and President Trump helped lead the way. There has been a huge shift within the public and private sectors on climate change as it has dawned on governments and companies that the United States, under President Donald Trump, will no longer be a patsy to a cabal of international elites who seek to impose costly climate restrictions upon American businesses and international climate boondoggles upon nations. Trump’s actions are draining the climate swamp of resources, supporters, spirit, and momentum. These include defunding climate boondoggles across federal...

Apocalyptic climate-change predictions were box-office gold for Hollywood but they did untold damage to the public psyche, economy and the average man’s pocketbook. Now the United Nations’ influential climate change committee has quietly discarded the dire temperature-rise scenarios used in two previous reports predicting horrific consequences of global warming if greenhouse emissions weren’t curbed. For years, lefty outfits — based on dubious climate science — screamed about the coming climate catastrophe: The New York Times warned that “Climate Change Is Harming The Planet Faster Than We Can Adapt,” “Climate Change Is Speeding Toward Catastrophe” and “A Hotter Future Is Certain.”...

American Federation of Teachers boss Randi Weingarten tapped hundreds of thousands in union resources to help write her controversial book — working with a team that raked in more than $1.4 million from the labor group, a new analysis found. Weingarten used the abundance of union-fueled resources for the liberal agenda-pushing “Why Fascists Fear Teachers: Public Education and the Future of Democracy” then pocketed a portion of the proceeds, the Freedom Foundation claimed in a new report. Her team included an attorney who supposedly worked on the book pro bono but whose firm raked in $977,000 for various work for...

The climate crisis should be declared a global public health emergency by the World Health Organization, or millions more people will die unnecessarily, leading international experts have said. The independent pan-European commission on climate and health, which was convened by the WHO, concluded the climate crisis was such a worldwide threat to health that the WHO should declare it “a public health emergency of international concern” (Pheic). The international spread of vector-borne disease, such as dengue and chikungunya, as well as the health impacts of extreme weather events, global heating, food insecurity and air pollution make a Pheic necessary, said...

Key FactsNew York lawmakers are planning the tax, Bloomberg reported, citing unnamed people familiar with the state budget negotiations who noted the proposal would be levied at 1% of the buying price and be paid by buyers. The legislators are also considering expanding the tax to $1 million or more cash purchases in the state that would incorporate the suburbs and upstate New York, Bloomberg added. The tax in New York City alone could generate up to $160 million, according to the unnamed sources Bloomberg cited. A spokesperson for Gov. Kathy Hochul, D-N.Y., told Bloomberg she “announced a general agreement...

For almost the entirety of the half century I have lived on Earth, I have had experts, teachers, politicians and activists hectoring me about how climate change is going to destroy the planet. But this week, in The New York Times, of all places, is evidence that climate alarmism is finally cooling down. "Democrats Do Not Have To Campaign On Climate Change Anymore," blared the headline, this week, as author Matt Huber argues that voters are rather turned off by the subject. I would like to suggest that this is because it is the single most expensive lie in human...

A Minnesota “violence interruption” charity has collapsed after its leaders allegedly used $6.5 million worth of charitable funds to bankroll lavish lifestyles and a private liquor store. Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison announced on Friday a civil lawsuit against nonprofit We Push for Peace and its former directors, Trahern Pollard and Jaclyn McGuigan. The organization, which held lucrative contracts for community outreach and violence prevention, was driven into the ground by “rampant abuse” and blatant self-dealing, prosecutors allege. According to the complaint, Pollard personally pocketed more than $6 million of the diverted charitable funds. Instead of helping the community, the...

The Trump administration’s cancellation of more than $100 million in humanities grants to scholars, writers, research groups and other organizations was unconstitutional, and the Department of Government Efficiency had no authority to end the funding, a federal judge in New York ruled on Thursday. U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in Manhattan sided with The Authors Guild, several other groups and several people who had their grants canceled and sued DOGE and the National Endowment for the Humanities. McMahon permanently barred the administration from terminating the grants and criticized DOGE’s use of artificial intelligence in nixing the funding. Government lawyers had...

The neighborhood where NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani is planning to build a government owned grocery store already has almost 50 markets within walking distance, raising further questions about his far left pipe dreams. Is the new store even necessary? Mamdani probably does not care about that. This is merely a campaign promise and he likely sees it as something on which he has to deliver. What is often not discussed is the competition this government owned store is going to create for all of these other privately owned stores. Ask any business owner, and they will tell you it is...

As much as $16 trillion has been spent worldwide to defeat global warming. It could have been twice that and it would never be enough because the climate hustlers need to keep the dollars rolling in to line their own pockets. Now we finally have an Environmental Protection Agency chief who’s exposing the racket. Testifying last week before a Senate committee, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin told lawmakers that the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, a $27 billion stash that was created through the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act, is a con. His office found that money that was supposed to have...

“Squad” Rep. Ilhan Omar’s name appears at least six times in recently resurfaced court documents from the $250 million Feeding Our Future fraud case, fueling speculation about whether the Minnesota socialist had a hand in the widespread scam in her district. The documents were part of the 2025 federal trial of Aimee Bock, the founder of the Feeding our Future nonprofit who was convicted of wire fraud, conspiracy, and bribery for masterminding the scheme that falsely claimed to serve millions of meals to children while pocketing federal funds through bogus food sites and shell companies. Bock is in custody awaiting...

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. – Federal taxpayers helped build a $2.2 billion solar plant — now electricity customers are on the hook to keep it running. The Ivanpah Solar Power Plant, a sprawling facility near the California-Nevada border built with billions in federal support during the Obama-era economic stimulus program, is stuck in a costly dilemma. Both the Trump and Biden administrations — along with the utility company that buys its power — have sought to shut it down, saying it underperforms, produces expensive electricity and has been overtaken by cheaper energy sources. But California regulators have refused to allow it...

Nothing about California's high speed rail is moving fast, except the price. Just a few weeks ago, the estimated price of the long-delayed project was said to be $126 billion. This figure wasn't hidden in a spreadsheet somewhere, it was stated on a national news program. This week, we're hearing a new number and it's more than a $100 billion higher.California’s long-delayed high-speed rail project is now facing renewed scrutiny after state leaders revealed a dramatically higher price tag, now estimated at roughly $231 billion, nearly seven times the original $33 billion projection approved by voters in 2008.The revised figures...