Free Republic

Russia is sending signals that it intends to slow-walk a peace deal on Ukraine, showing some daylight between the Kremlin and President Trump’s intentions to end the war. From a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to suggestions of security agreements for Kyiv, Russian officials have expressed doubt about some early prospects of a peace deal, parts of which are also being backed by a contingent of European Leaders. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov tamped down any progress made at a summit at the White House earlier this week where Trump met with seven foreign leaders as well as Zelensky,...

Syria is home to the world’s oldest existing Christian communities, which trace their lineage back to Apostolic times. According to Syriac Christian tradition, the Syriac Kingdom of Osroene was the world’s first political entity to declare Christianity as its state religion. King Abgar V — known as Abgar the Black — adopted the Christian faith after being healed from a devastating illness by the disciple Thaddeus in 33 AD. * On the road to Damascus, the former persecutor of Christians, Saul of Tarsus, was transformed into the Apostle Paul, further rooting Christianity in Syrian soil. * Syria has played a...

U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff said on Sunday that President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to “robust” security guarantees, including “effectively” offering Ukraine Article Five-like protection, during their historic Friday meeting. “We agreed to robust security guarantees that I would describe as game-changing,” Witkoff said in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union.” Witkoff explained that Russia agreed to allow the United States and other European countries to “effectively offer [Ukraine] Article Five-like language to cover a security guarantee,” referring to the provision of NATO that states an attack on one NATO member is seen as an...

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton are locked in a close battle in the state’s bitterly contested Senate primary, according to an Emerson College Polling survey released Friday. The poll showed Cornyn essentially tied with Paxton. He led by 1 point, 30 percent to 29 percent, with 5 percent saying they prefer another candidate and 37 percent undecided. The margin is much closer than numerous other past polls that have shown Paxton with a lead over the longtime incumbent. “Seven months ahead of the Republican Primary, the contest between the four-term incumbent and the Attorney General...

Democrats are making a play for Ohio in next year’s Senate race as former Sen. Sherrod Brown prepares an expected comeback attempt. The Buckeye State was once firmly purple but has become increasingly red in the Trump era. President Trump won the state in 2024 with 55 percent of the vote, and Brown lost his bid for reelection to Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), winning 46.5 percent of the vote. Those totals show Brown was much more popular with Ohio voters than former President Biden and former Vice President Kamala Harris, and Democrats think a lower-turnout midterm election could carry him...

The Capitol Hill battle over Jeffrey Epstein is poised to heat up when Congress returns to Washington next month. While GOP leaders left town early to avoid the radioactive issue, the conspiracy-ridden saga is set to ramp back up come September for a number of reasons. A bipartisan pair of lawmakers have vowed to force a vote on their resolution requiring the administration to release the federal files it’s withholding and plan to bring survivors of Epstein’s abuse to Capitol Hill in the first days of Congress’s return. Separately, a number of court cases surrounding the fate of those files...

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) accused President Trump of a “raw authoritarian power grab” after the president moved to federalize the District of Columbia’s police department and call the National Guard to the District’s streets. “He’s playing dictator in our nation’s capital as a dress rehearsal as he pushes democracy to the brink,” Van Hollen wrote on social platform X. “And by the way, Trump couldn’t care less about safety in DC or the people of DC. If he did, he wouldn’t have blocked DC from spending $1 billion of its OWN money to fund its OWN police department, schools...

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin “can’t tolerate” going “after his customers” ahead of an Alaska meeting between Putin and President Trump. “Putin could give a damn about sanctions. He evades them. He could give a damn about how many Russians die. The one thing that he can’t tolerate and live with, if we go after his customers,” Graham told NBC News’s Kristen Welker on “Meet the Press.” “The whole goal is to crush his customers, India, and China, and Brazil. That if you keep buying Putin’s oil and prop up his war machine, you...

White-collar layoffs make headlines while tradesmen name their price. If your sink explodes at 3 a.m., ChatGPT can’t fix it. But that’s just the start. What comes next moves in slow, silent steps. It’s harder to notice, harder to fight. Even the skilled trades, once thought untouchable, won’t be immune for long. That’s because, in the age of AI, no collar is safe forever, no matter how dirty or clean. In other words, a blue-collar bloodbath is inevitable. For now, trades thrive because machines still fumble with fine motor skills. Plumbers, welders, electricians — these are jobs that demand real...

Republican-led states are leading the charge to ban soda and candy from their food stamp programs, as Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) movement flips traditional partisanship on its head. Colorado is the only blue state to seek and have a soda ban waiver approved, and the only waiver state to propose expanding SNAP benefits in conjunction with limiting its scope. Both parties at times have expressed interest in eliminating soda from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), but the Trump administration is the first to encourage states to do so.

Former South Carolina Lt. Gov. André Bauer (R) is suspending his Senate campaign that sought to primary Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), saying he doesn’t want to further contribute to division in the country. “But I believe now, more than ever, that in order for us to truly move forward, we must stop tearing one another down with lies and division,” he continued. “I cannot and will not be part of a political climate that rewards deception over honesty, or ambition over unity. God calls us to walk in truth, to speak life, and to be peacemakers—not power seekers.” Bauer said...

Former President Obama on Tuesday blasted the Texas GOP’s attempts to redraw the Lone Star State’s congressional lines as “a power grab” that threatens democracy. “We can’t lose focus on what matters – right now, Republicans in Texas are trying to gerrymander district lines to unfairly win five seats in next year’s midterm elections. This is a power grab that undermines our democracy,” Obama said in a post on the social platform X. The former president shared a post from All On The Line, a campaign affiliated with the National Democratic Redistricting Committee (NDRC), promoting a virtual event on redistricting.

In a move that surprised many on both sides of the political aisle, progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) recently voted — with an overwhelming majority of House Democrats and Republicans — to support funding for Israel’s Iron Dome defense system. To be sure, Ocasio-Cortez’s vote made little difference to the final tally. The amendment, sponsored by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), which could have cut U.S. support, was shot down 422-6. Nevertheless, voting to support continued funding was extremely revealing for what it says about Ocasio-Cortez’s grander ambitions. Indeed, not only did her vote mark a clear break with other...

Say hello to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Say hello to a blue wave in the 2026 midterms. Say hello in 2028 to President Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. If President Trump and congressional Republicans keep this up, it will only be the start of the progressive takeover. Left-wing populists are already winning over voters by raising hell about the rising price of clothes and groceries due to tariffs. The growing appetite for populist left voices damning the high cost of living made headlines earlier this year in the successful “Fighting Oligarchy,” tour featuring Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Ocasio-Cortez.

The GOP infighting on Capitol Hill has expanded to an unusual place: Israel. For years, GOP leaders have used U.S. support for Israel as a wedge to highlight the stark divisions among Democrats, pitting Israel’s staunchest allies against pro-Palestinian liberals and challenging Democratic leaders to ease the tensions. Republicans, through it all, were virtually united on the issue. Yet Israel’s long-running war against Hamas in Gaza, where the Palestinian death toll has topped 60,000 and recent images of starving children have prompted a global outcry, is now creating headaches for GOP leaders, as well. While a vast majority of congressional...

Republican senators were appalled by President Trump’s rough treatment of 91-year-old Sen. Chuck Grassley (Iowa), the Senate’s most senior Republican, on social media and are pushing back on Trump’s attempts to squeeze the senator into abolishing an arcane procedure known as the Senate blue slip. GOP senators were not pleased that Trump piled so much pressure on Grassley, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to get rid of a long-established Senate tradition. Trump piled on by reposting on Truth Social posts accusing Grassley of being a “RINO” and “sneaky” and standing in the way of Trump’s agenda. Sen. Thom...

Unconditional American support for Israel — once the bedrock of conservative foreign policy — is crumbling in real time. From Congress to right-wing media and Trump-aligned grassroots organizations, a new tone is taking shape towards Israel: one of skepticism, impatience and in some cases outright hostility. The Republican Party’s old covenant with Israel is no longer sacred — and the cracks are widening fast. In the mid-20th century, Republicans were generally skeptical of Israel, instead favoring Arab ties. Support grew later, driven by Cold War strategy, evangelical Zionism, neoconservatism and post-9/11 alliances — ultimately transforming the GOP into Israel’s most...

Jack Schlossberg, the grandson of former President John F. Kennedy, is blasting a measure from House Republicans that would rename the Kennedy Center’s famed Opera House in honor of Melania Trump. “A nation reveals itself not only by the men it produces — but also by the men it honors, the men it remembers,” Schlossberg, quoting his grandfather, wrote in a Tuesday post on Instagram. “JFK believed the arts made our country great and could be our most effective weapon in the fight for civil rights and against authoritarian governments around the world,” Schlossberg, a vocal critic of President Trump,...

Financial markets finished the week on a high note after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell stood his ground against President Trump in a rare joint appearance by the two men Thursday. The S&P 500 finished 0.4 percent up, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 208 points or 0.47 percent. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained about a quarter of percent to close above 21,108. ... Friday’s gains followed a confrontation between Trump and Powell on Thursday in which Powell repelled an attack from Trump — this time not on social media but on television. The exchange took place at...

Fox News host Greg Gutfeld cheered Hunter Biden after the former president’s son went on a profanity-laced tirade, tearing into members of the Democratic establishment who he says undermined and mistreated his father toward the end of his presidency. “But Democrats, if you listen to him … what have Democrats been trying to do? All six months. Try to be authentic. They try to fake swear, do a lot of theater. That’s real swearing,” Gutfeld said after watching the interview Biden gave to YouTube personality Andrew Callaghan. “You gotta give it to him. That guy is authentic, he’s the real...