Free Republic

Shift in tone dominates at final Trump-Biden clash BY BRETT SAMUELS AND MORGAN CHALFANT - 10/22/20 11:11 PM EDT President Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden on Thursday clashed for a final time before Election Day, exchanging blows on the public health and economic crises facing the country in what was a decidedly more orderly — though still at times personal — contest than the first debate. The proceedings, which took place in Nashville, Tenn., were aided in part by a mute button that allowed each candidate to speak uninterrupted for two minutes about each of the six topics before...

Israel's minister of regional cooperation said Wednesday that he expects normalize relations with another Arab state before the U.S. elections. Reuters reported that Ofir Akunis, who is also a member of Israel's parliament, the Knesset, told Army Radio that the announcement would come before Nov. 3. "I have a reasonable basis to believe that the announcement will come before November 3 - that, if you'll permit me, is what I understand from my sources," he said, according to the news service. "I will be very happy if the announcement will happen - and before the elections in the United States,"...

The Intercept co-founder Glenn Greenwald told Megyn Kelly that he was "formally banned" from MSNBC because of his criticism of the network's coverage of Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election. "I used to be really good friends with Rachel Maddow," Greenwald told Kelly on the inaugural episode of her new podcast. "Before she got her MSNBC show and was on Air America, I used to go on all the time and we used to bash Democrats from the left as a fraudulent political party." "She's very, very smart. Same with [MSNBC host Chris Hayes], who's been a longtime friend...

The Senate will vote Monday on confirming President Trump's nominee, Judge Amy Coney Barrett, to the Supreme Court. "With regard to the Supreme Court justice ... we'll be voting to confirm justice-to-be Barrett next Monday," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said during a weekly press conference, confirming the timing of a final vote on her nomination. ... Top GOP senators and aides had previously indicated to The Hill that they were likely to set up the final vote for Monday, allowing vulnerable GOP senators to spend the final week before the election back on the campaign trail. To set...

The Biden campaign is facing renewed criticism over its deep connections with Big Tech after both Twitter and Facebook censored a story from The New York Post detailing allegedly corrupt business deals by Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden. The move prompted fresh criticism on social media over the Biden transition team’s hiring of top Facebook executive Jessica Hertz, which reportedly came days after the 2020 Democrat’s campaign penned a letter to the social media giant urging them to censor President Trump’s posts. Twitter’s suppression of the Hunter Biden revelations also came days after the company’s director of public policy, Carlos...

A progressive push to expand the Supreme Court is running into an unusual buzzsaw: fellow Democrats. Calls for Democrats to remake the judiciary are ramping up as Republicans appear poised to put Amy Coney Barrett, a sixth conservative justice, on the bench. It’s a decision that will have decades-long reverberations, progressives warn, unless Democrats make systemic changes to the judiciary next year if they win back the Senate majority and White House in November, something they are feeling increasingly bullish about. “If Republicans proceed as expected, Democrats will have every right to consider Barrett illegitimate and pursue structural reform to...

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden leads President Trump by 7 points in Georgia, according to a new poll. The latest Quinnipiac University survey finds Biden's support at 51 percent and Trump's at 44 percent, with 4 percent of respondents undecided. Biden led by only 3 points in the same poll in September, before the first presidential debate and Trump’s coronavirus diagnosis. Biden is now viewed favorably by 51 percent of Georgians, compared to 46 percent who view him negatively. Trump is underwater at 43 positive and 54 negative. Trump will campaign in Georgia, which last went for the Democratic nominee...

The Trump campaign released a new ad Saturday featuring infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci as it looks to present a positive portrait of the White House's pandemic response. In a 30-second ad titled "Carefully," a narrator notes Trump's own recovery from the coronavirus and includes a clip of Fauci, the director of the National Institutes for Allergies and Infectious Diseases, touting the administration's efforts to blunt the virus's spread

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday ruled that President Trump’s use of emergency powers to allocate millions of dollars in funding for the construction of a southern border wall was illegal, the latest blow to the Trump administration’s effort to limit immigration. In the 2-1 decision, the court upheld a December 2019 district court summary judgment in favor of a request from the advocacy groups the Sierra Club and the Southern Border Communities Coalition against Defense Secretary Mark Esper, acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and “all persons acting under their direction ... from using military construction funds...

Firearms experts say that a ballistics report from Kentucky State Police supports Attorney General Daniel Cameron’s (R) claim that Breonna Taylor’s boyfriend fired the shot that wounded a Louisville officer in the raid that resulted in Taylor’s death. According to the Louisville Courier Journal, the report challenges previous analysis that Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly was wounded by “friendly fire” from other officers involved in the March incident. Instead, experts are saying the 9 mm round that hit Mattingly came from the gun of Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker. Walker had previously admitted to firing one shot from his legally owned handgun. Experts...

A militia group planned to violently depose Michigan’s government and abduct Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), the FBI said in a federal affidavit filed Thursday. "Several members talked about murdering 'tyrants' or 'taking' a sitting governor," an FBI agent wrote in the affidavit, obtained by the Detroit News. "The group decided they needed to increase their numbers and encouraged each other to talk to their neighbors and spread their message." Federal prosecutors plan to make a fuller statement on the alleged plot later Thursday, according to the newspaper. At least five men have been charged in connection with the alleged plot,...

The Jewish Democratic Council of America (JDCA) compared President Trump's America to the rise of fascism and anti-Semitism in 1930s Germany in a new ad targeting Jewish voters in swing states. The 30-second ad released Tuesday includes images and video footage from Nazi Germany in a split-screen with images and photos of Trump rallies in addition to examples of anti-Semitism and white supremacy in the U.S. since Trump took office. The ad will target Jewish voters in states including Florida, Michigan and Pennsylvania, according to the JDCA. Trump won all three states in 2016, but recent polls have shown the...

The Hill just did some vomit-inducing PR for Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden and other Democrats on the economy. It cited economists from an organization that had predicted economic disaster under Trump in 2016. Also, one of those “economists,” is a Hillary Clinton donor. But, don’t expect The Hill to disclose that. The outlet pushed a propaganda piece headlined, “Analysis: Biden victory, Democratic sweep would bring biggest boost to economy.” Reporter Sylvan Lane Lane referenced Moody’s Analytics Chief Economist, “registered Democrat,” and Hillary Clinton donor Mark Zandi and associate economist Bernard Yaros, who reportedly modeled four potential outcomes of the...

On the first day of my political philosophy class at Shawnee State University in the spring of 2019, a biologically male student raised his hand and I called on him, unwittingly using the now-incendiary words, “Yes, sir.” As a professor of philosophy, I view the classroom as a place of dynamic discussion and exchange. And I work hard to foster an atmosphere of civility and rational discourse, a place where students can seek truth. This student approached me after class and said that he identified as a woman and demanded, from that point on, that I refer to him as...

Supreme Court fight pushes Senate toward brink BY JORDAIN CARNEY - 09/26/20 01:02 PM EDT The burgeoning fight to fill Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Supreme Court seat is pouring fuel onto already simmering tensions in the Senate and threatening to fundamentally reshape the institution. Senators in both parties acknowledge the level of dysfunction in a chamber where the bulk of their time is spent processing nominations amid failures to break stalemates on pressing national issues such as coronavirus relief and police reform. “I’m praying to God that the better angels start flying with my colleagues. That’s all I can tell...

President Trump: "The Democrat Party has been completely taken over by socialist, Marxist, and far-left extremists."Video..

FBI Director Christopher Wray described Antifa as "a real thing" during a hearing Thursday on Capitol Hill, noting that the bureau has open cases against individuals who self-identify as anti-fascist activists. Wray, who was testifying before the House Homeland Security Committee as part of its Worldwide Threat hearing, was responded to questions about the level of threat the movement poses. "Antifa is a real thing. It’s not a fiction," Wray said of the far-left group. "We look at Antifa as more of an ideology or a movement than we do an organization. We do have quite a number of properly...

Is Donald Trump summoning his inner Richard Nixon? One could draw that conclusion from the Trump administration’s recent announcement that it is withdrawing 2,000 U.S. troops from Iraq – more than one-third of the total deployed – which follows a similar statement on the exit of one-third of some 36,000 troops from Germany. That, in turn, followed announced troop withdrawals from Afghanistan in June, reductions from Syria, ongoing threats to remove U.S. troops from South Korea and implied threats to Japan as well if Tokyo doesn’t contribute more to the U.S. presence there of some 50,000 troops.

A watchdog group is requesting that media outlets release their plans for election night coverage amid heightened scrutiny over vote counting and the prospect that a winner in the presidential race may not be named until days after Election Day. The (*SELF DESCRIBED*) National Task Force on Election Crises, a group of election experts and academics, released a letter Thursday that it sent to The Associated Press, Fox News and the National Election Pool, which includes the three broadcast networks and CNN, urging them to explain to the public how they intend to incorporate the expected avalanche of mail ballots...

MTV will reportedly pay for the printing and mailing of ballot applications requested through the network’s voter initiative campaign. MTV will pay for costs through Oct. 6, the deadline for voters to receive applications and return them on time, network executives told Axios. Voters can access applications on the campaign websites www.VoteForYourLife.com or www.VoteEarlyDay.org. The VoteForYourLife campaign is sponsored by ViaComCBS, MTV’s parent company, and the Ad Council. Viacom’s Vh1 and Comedy Central are also partners in the campaign. The campaign’s website is also accessible in Spanish. The VoteForYourLiife campaign will also feature PSAs across the company’s networks, including MTV,...