Free Republic

A federal judge said Friday he intends to temporarily block the Trump administration’s plan to place thousands of U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) employees on leave at midnight. Unions representing government employees sued to stop the shutdown of agency operations and restart the flow of foreign aid frozen by President Trump, who has accused the agency of fraud and corruption to justify its imminent shuttering. Judge Carl Nichols, appointed by Trump during his first term, said he would issue a formal order later Friday but that a “limited, very limited” order temporarily pausing the plan would be handed down....

A federal judge blocked the Trump administration from placing thousands of employees at the US Agency for International Development (USAID) on paid leave Friday, halting plans to cut its workforce down to just a few hundred. Washington, DC, US District Judge Carl Nichols imposed a “very limited” restraining order on the administration, Politico reported, sparing at least 2,200 USAID employees from being put on paid leave at midnight. Administration officials had reportedly moved to gut the agency’s more than 10,000-person workforce by the end of the week down to just 290 or so staff members. Just 500 employees at USAID...

Democrats are outraged that President Trump and Elon Musk are saving billions for the American people. On Friday we were reminded that this is not the first time Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly made headlines. Back in June 2024 Life News reported on Kollar-Kotelly’s disgraceful actions. In May, 2024, in a federal Washington, D.C. court, Kollar-Kotelly sentenced Harlow to two years in jail and 36 months of supervised release for protesting at a notorious late-term abortion clinic in Washington, D.C. with eight others. She was the tenth defendant to be sentenced by the Biden Regime related to the peaceful abortion protest. Paulette...

We’ve been reporting on how X owner and multi-billionaire Elon Musk has set the DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) loose and uncovered a wealth of ridiculous outlays by the federal government—using our tax dollars to fund things most Americans don’t support. Elon has absolutely leveled USAID, the “US Agency for International Development,” basically a slush fund for leftists to underwrite such worthy projects as pottery classes in Morocco, bat research on coronaviruses at China’s infamous Wuhan Institute of Virology, $20 million to create a "Sesame Street" in Iraq, $1.5 million to “advance diversity equity and inclusion in Serbia’s workplaces and...

Federal judges in the District of Columbia are expressing disdain for President Trump’s J6 pardons and are threatening to resist DOJ requests to dismiss open cases. It should come as no surprise that Washington, D.C. judges who have presided over the prosecutions of Trump supporters strongly object to the pardons and commutations made by the President on his first day in office. Their outrage came after the Trump DOJ requested that the judges dismiss cases that remain open.. Trump’s pardons, issued on January 20, were among his first official actions in office. They granted unconditional clemency to over 1,500 J6...

A key ally of Donald Trump filed a complaint Tuesday against a district judge out of Washington, DC, who appeared on CNN last week and took jabs at the former president. US District Judge Reggie Walton went on the cable news network to discuss Trump’s attacks on the judge overseeing his “hush money” case out of Manhattan and was openly critical of the 45th president. Mike Davis, the founder of the Article III Project, an advocacy group that pushes for the nominations of conservative judges, ripped Walton’s CNN appearance as “judicial misconduct.” “We are seeing a dangerous pattern in which...

An appeals court judge Wednesday denied a request by former President Donald Trump to pause enforcement of the $454 million judgment he was ordered to pay in his New York civil fraud case. But Judge Anil Singh’s ruling in Manhattan Supreme Court allows Trump and his two adult sons to stay in control of their companies while the former president seeks to appeal the massive fine. The Trumps can also continue to apply for loans from financial institutions chartered or registered in New York during this time, the judge ruled.

A New York state appeals court on Tuesday upheld an order finding Donald Trump in civil contempt for having failed to comply with a subpoena from New York Attorney General Letitia James in her probe of his business practices. In a 5-0 decision, the Appellate Division in Manhattan said James had established by "clear and convincing evidence" that Trump's response to the Dec. 1, 2021, subpoena was inadequate. The court said Trump's claim that a diligent search had failed to uncover relevant documents in his possession, without explaining what steps were taken to ensure nothing would be lost or discarded,...

It has been fifty years since that momentous break-in at the Watergate office complex, and it seems a good time to revisit that episode, especially in light of the current abuses of power that seem so ubiquitous. Geoff Shepard's book, The Real Watergate Scandal and the just published book by Garrett Graff, Watergate, a New History, offer different perspectives. Shepard is more interested in the legal process and its abuse, while Graff's book relies more on the infamous White House tapes. It is the more comprehensive of the two. Here are some of observations based on these histories. *** Most...

SANTA FE — The New Mexico Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered Otero County commissioners to certify primary election results by the end of this week, raising the stakes of a dispute over election integrity issues that has generated national attention. The ruling by the state’s highest court came one day after Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver fired a petition, arguing the county commission’s refusal to approve the June 7 election results violates state election law and could nullify votes. The three-member Otero County Commission, in its role as a county canvassing board, voted unanimously Monday against certifying the primary...

Organizers of the “Freedom Convoy” that has gridlocked downtown Ottawa for the last week are facing a potential $9.8-million class-action lawsuit over continuous vehicle horn noise, filed on behalf of residents of the city’s downtown core. According to a statement of claim filed with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice on Friday by lawyer Paul Champ, the lawsuit is seeking $4.8 million for “private nuisance” and another $5 million in “punitive damages.” The statement of claim focuses on the honking as one of the main “coordinated” tactics convoy participants have used to make their presence known, alleging that the use...