Free Republic

Homelessness keeps rising, homeless taxes keep rising and the money disappears. In Los Angeles County, spring is in the air and so are higher taxes. Beyond the usual punishing ritual of April 15, county residents also now face some of the highest sales taxes in the country. Sales taxes in the area have shot up from 9.75% to as high as 11.25% to fund still more services for the ‘homeless’. The permanent sales tax increase is supposed to raise $1 billion a year to replace the stolen billions spent by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority. Families will pay even...

One has to view the federal government as a criminal organization. That’s the only way it makes sense, that’s the only way to approach a rectification. Without that, with thinking that there are just some adjustments to be made in the Republican or Democrat balances in the House and Senate, nothing will happen. The government is a means of swindling the American people of taxes, promising to address their issues, but that’s like a fraud scheme designed to promise fixes to one’s house until they get the down payment and disappear into the mist. The level of transfers from the...

Undocumented immigrants who’ve been paying taxes in the US are facing an unsettling possibility: This year, that may be used against them. A recent data-sharing deal between the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Homeland Security is sparking widespread concern in immigrant communities – though some details about how the deal could work haven’t been disclosed. The agreement has left many undocumented immigrants feeling hesitant to pay taxes this year and uncertain about what to do, according to advocates. “A lot of people are feeling betrayed,” says Adriana Rivera of the Florida Immigrant Coalition. Here’s a look at what’s...

Legislation Reversing $600 Threshold for Reporting Payments to IRS Filed by U.S. Sen. Bill Hagerty April 11, 2025 Tom Pappert Bill Hagerty U.S. Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) filed legislation on Thursday to reverse the decision to require third-party payment processors to report transfers more than $600 to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Hagerty called the three-year-old policy an “egregious and unwarranted overreach” into citizens’ privacy. Hagerty introduced the Stop the Nosy Obsession with Online Payments (SNOOP) Act, which his office said would remove the provisions of the Internal Revenue Code created by former President Joe Biden’s American Rescue Plan (ARP),...

On Thursday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) said that “If you believe in capitalism, like I do, if you believe that the market has given us this incredible country,” you should address healthcare costs, housing, child care, and reducing the amount of debt the U.S. has and Congress “should be reducing some of the burden on people who make less, but actually increasing some of the corporate taxes so we can bring more funds in to do something about the debt.” Klobuchar said, “If you believe in capitalism, like I do, if you believe that the...

During an appearance on FNC’s “Sunday Morning Futures,” White House senior economic counselor Peter Navarro explained the long-term implications for the Trump administration’s tariffs and how they will function to ensure fair trade for the United States. “Let’s not forget, every economic report that’s been coming out in the last month has been pushing us towards expansion and strength,” Navarro said. “And we just had a blowout jobs number on Friday, 228,000 jobs. That was 50 percent higher than was predicted. So, again, there’s cognitive dissonance between what the media is saying, wanted to push us into recession, and what’s...

President Donald Trump shared a TikTok video on his Truth Social account that asserted that he is crashing the stock market intentionally. “Trump is crashing the stock market by 20% this month, but he’s doing it on purpose. This is why Warren Buffett just said Trump is making the best economic moves he’s seen in over 50 years,” the narrator of the video said. “Here’s the secret game he’s playing, and it could make you rich. So why is he doing this? To push cash into Treasuries, which forces the Fed to slash interest rates in May, and those lower...

Wall Street kicked off Friday with another brutal stretch of losses driven by President Trump’s new tariffs despite stronger than expected March jobs data. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down more than 1,200 points shortly before 10:30 a.m. EDT Friday, a day after the market suffered its worse single-day of trading in five years. The S&P 500 index was down 3.6 percent, and the Nasdaq composite was down 3.5 percent. All three major indexes took serious losses Thursday, the first full day of trading after Trump’s announcement of up to $600 billion in new import taxes. The scale and...

Full List of Countries Hit With Reciprocal TariffsCountryTariffs Charged to the U.S.A. (%)U.S.A. Discounted Reciprocal Tariffs (%)China6734European Union3920Vietnam9046Taiwan6432Japan4624India5226South Korea5025Thailand7236Switzerland6131Indonesia6432Malaysia4724Cambodia9749United Kingdom1010South Africa6030Brazil1010Bangladesh7437Singapore1010Israel3317Philippines3417Chile1010Australia1010Pakistan5829Turkey1010Sri Lanka8844Colombia1010Peru1010Nicaragua3618Norway3015Costa Rica1710Jordan4020Dominican Republic1010United Arab Emirates1010New Zealand2010Argentina1010Ecuador1210Guatemala1010Honduras1010Madagascar9347Myanmar (Burma)8844Tunisia5528Kazakhstan5427Serbia7437Egypt1010Saudi Arabia1010El Salvador1010Côte d'Ivoire4121Laos9548Botswana7437Trinidad and Tobago1210Morocco1010Papua New Guinea1510Malawi3417Liberia1010British Virgin Islands1010Afghanistan4910Zimbabwe3518Benin1010Barbados1010Monaco1010Syria8141Uzbekistan1010Republic of the Congo1010Djibouti1010French Polynesia1010Cayman Islands1010Kosovo1010Curaçao1010Vanuatu4422Rwanda1010Sierra Leone1010Mongolia1010San Marino1010Antigua and Barbuda1010Bermuda1010Eswatini1010Marshall Islands1010Saint Pierre and Miquelon9950Saint Kitts and Nevis1010Turkmenistan1010Grenada1010Sudan1010Turks and Caicos Islands1010Aruba1010Montenegro1010Saint Helena1510Kyrgyzstan1010Yemen1010Saint Vincent and the Grenadines1010Niger1010Saint Lucia1010Nauru5930Equatorial Guinea2513Iran1010Libya6131Samoa1010Guinea1010Timor-Leste1010Montserrat1010Chad2613Mali1010Algeria5930Oman1010Uruguay1010Bahamas1010Lesotho9950Ukraine1010Bahrain1010Qatar1010Mauritius8040Fiji6332Iceland1010Kenya1010Liechtenstein7337Guyana7638Haiti1010Bosnia and Herzegovina7035Nigeria2714Namibia4221Brunei4724Bolivia2010Panama1010Venezuela2915North Macedonia6533Ethiopia1010Ghana1710Moldova6131Angola6332Democratic Republic of the Congo2211Jamaica1010Mozambique3116Paraguay1010Zambia3317Lebanon1010Tanzania1010Iraq7839Georgia1010Senegal1010Azerbaijan1010Cameroon2211Uganda2010Albania1010Armenia1010Nepal1010Sint Maarten1010Falkland Islands8241Gabon1010Kuwait1010Togo1010Suriname1010Belize1010Maldives1010Tajikistan1010Cabo Verde1010Burundi1010Guadeloupe1010Bhutan1010Martinique1010Tonga1010Mauritania1010Dominica1010Micronesia1010Gambia1010French Guiana1010Christmas Island1010Andorra1010Central African Republic1010Solomon Islands1010Mayotte1010Anguilla1010Cocos (Keeling) Islands1010Eritrea1010Cook Islands1010South Sudan1010Comoros1010Kiribati1010Sao Tome and Principe1010Norfolk Island5829Gibraltar1010Tuvalu1010British Indian Ocean Territory1010Tokelau1010Guinea-Bissau1010Svalbard and Jan Mayen1010Heard and McDonald Islands1010Reunion7337*White House officials said the calculations...

I. DON'T. KNOW. Normally, when I don't know about something, I try not to start a post about the subject. None of us knows everything about everything, and there is a reason why God invented the division of labor. Let people who know about how to do things do them. But in this case, the REASONS why I don't know whether Trump's tariffs will help or hurt America are important, and I hope I can help clarify at least some of the reasons why people are lining up on different sides of the issue. ARE TARIFFS GENERALLY GOOD ECONOMIC POLICY?All...

President Donald Trump has stated multiple times that he wants to eliminate income taxes and replace them with tariffs. Such a decision would be one of the most significant changes to the tax code in decades, and it could help Americans save a lot of money. The government still needs to collect funds, so the tax code could shift to a combination of tariffs and sales tax. However, even if the IRS isn’t eliminated, Trump has floated the idea of no one paying taxes if they earn less than $150,000 per year. According to the TaxAct tax bracket calculator, a...

Vice President JD Vance appears on Fox News this morning to discuss the trade tariffs and the ongoing MAGAnomic trade reset.The reciprocal tariffs and global trade rebalance are two components of a much larger MAGAnomic policy. Tax structures to the benefit of the working-class, upward pressure on wages and expanded GDP growth are all elements of increasing the wealth of Main Street and middle-class Americans. WATCH:.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he will impose a new 10 percent tariff on all imported goods along with an additional punitive import tax tailored for each of about 60 countries that his advisers say maintain the most unfair barriers against U.S. products. The president’s long-awaited tariff plan is designed to spur a renaissance in domestic manufacturing and to fill government coffers with tax revenue, even as many economists warn that he is steering the U.S. economy toward slower growth and higher prices. “In the face of unrelenting economic warfare, the United States can no longer continue with a...

President Donald Trump on Wednesday unveiled a long-promised, sweeping set of baseline tariffs on all countries and what he described as "kind reciprocal" tariffs on nations he claimed were the worst offenders in trade relations with the U.S. "My fellow Americans, this is Liberation Day," Trump said as he kicked off his remarks in the Rose Garden, claiming the action will free the U.S. from dependence on foreign goods. "April 2, 2025, will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn, the day America's destiny was reclaimed and the day that we began to make America wealthy again,"...

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro estimated the U.S. would raise about $600 billion to $700 billion a year from tariffs...Economists say the true number will probably be less than half of that sum.

He wants lawmakers to issue $1,000 for each of about 5.1 million homesteaded properties in the state. The rebates would be issued in December, covering state-mandated school property taxes, which he says would prevent a loss in funding for districts. “We need to focus on our Florida residents and to focus on in this case, Florida homeowners, particularly our homesteaded homeowners and we need to focus our relief there.” The second-term Republican governor and former presidential candidate said he wants a ballot initiative aimed at lower property taxes on the 2026 ballot that he says will provide “robust protections” for...

Inside the White House, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has been perhaps the biggest proponent of ”Liberation Day,” President Donald Trump’s promised unveiling of sweeping new tariffs on Wednesday. But as the day nears, the potential fallout from those tariffs may well liberate Lutnick from his role in the administration, according to half dozen people close to the White House. While Americans and much of the world brace for a possible season of pain following the imposition of the new tranche of tariffs, Trump’s orbit is ready to play the blame game should things go poorly for the White House. And...

Historically, April 15 has not been a good day. On April 15, 1865, Abraham Lincoln died after being shot in the head the previous evening. Researchers and historians have long debated the claim that John Wilkes Booth was the assassin…and that there was a much darker truth to the story, involving a “deep state” conspiracy that the official history books will never tell us. On April 15, 1912, 1500 people died when the Titanic sank, after hitting an iceberg. The story of Titanic has captivated hearts and minds ever since this epic disaster took place. Again, many researchers and historians...

As Wall Street heads into a new quarter, a flurry of President Donald Trump’s tariffs are set to go into effect. That has traders on edge and has helped put US stocks in their worst first-quarter slump in years.Wall Street has been rocked with volatility this year as Trump’s tariff proposals have kept investors in a cloud of uncertainty. The benchmark S&P 500 index is down 4.9% for the year, its worst start since 2022.US stocks were mixed Monday as traders tried to stage an afternoon rally. The Dow was up by around 430 points, or 1%, reversing course after...

Nearly 60 percent of Americans disagree with President Trump’s handling of tariffs and trade negotiations two months into his second term, a new poll found, amid Trump’s escalating trade wars with Canada, Mexico and China. The sentiment surrounding Trump’s economic policies was the lowest among areas surveyed in the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released Monday, while Trump received considerably higher marks on his sweeping immigration crackdown. Just 38 percent of respondents said they approve of Trump’s approach to trade negotiations with other countries, while 40 percent said they agree with his handling of the economy overall....