Free Republic

The US has carried out strikes on Iran's Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz, US officials have told CBS, the BBC's US partner. The officials described the strikes as limited and defensive, and said they were in response to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) firing on a US aircraft. Iranian state news agency Irna reported explosions on Qeshm on Monday. The IRGC did not comment but said its forces had shot down two US MQM-170 drones south of the island and a US MQ-9 drone east of the Strait of Hormuz. The US military has not commented on...

Members of the audience at a town hall glowered as former President Donald Trump described January 6 as a 'day of love' and tried to minimize the seriousness of the violent clash at the Capitol. Questioner Ramiro Gonzalez, a Republican construction worker from Tampa, said he wanted to give Trump 'the opportunity to try and win back my vote,' then issued a series of blunt statements during the Univision town hall this week... The Kamala Harris campaign later posted about it on X, in a post that zooms in on the puzzled expressions of audience members during the broadcast by...

hile Donald Trump made baseless, dangerous claims that immigrants in Ohio were eating people’s pets in front of millions of viewers at Tuesday night’s presidential debate, Johnson Salomon, a Haitian man who moved to Springfield in 2020, was watching cartoons with his kids before putting them to bed. He got a text from a friend telling him to turn on the debate. When he saw the headlines about what the former president and Republican nominee in November’s election had said, he was in total shock. “This was a false claim. I couldn’t believe that such a high official could make...

Former President Donald Trump is facing backlash for holding rallies in places described as "sundown towns." A TikTok user pointed out a "troubling pattern" in the locations of Trump's recent rallies in a video that has gone viral on social media. It was also shared on X, formerly Twitter, where it amassed millions of views. "Howell, Michigan; La Crosse, Wisconsin; Johnstown, Pennsylvania," the man said in the video. "What do these places have in common? They're all sundown towns." He added: "This is where Donald Trump is choosing to hold his rallies... You got a presidential candidate for the GOP...

Former U.S. President Barack Obama called in at the British Prime Minister’s official residence on Monday, but the office is keeping tight-lipped about the purpose of the one-hour meeting. Barack Obama surprised when he turned up at Rishi Sunak’s front door on Monday, going inside the historic Downing Street residence for an hour and meeting with the Prime Minister. Former President Obama walked up to the famous black door alone but later emerged alongside the U.S. Ambassador to London Jane Hartley. Former US President Barack Obama has arrived at 10 Downing Street for a private meeting. pic.twitter.com/l9hZEHyYvp — Harry Stedman...

ussian spies have developed an artificial intelligence tool that Moscow is using to meddle in elections in Britain and the United States on a scale “exponentially greater” than ever before, Ukraine’s national security adviser has warned. In an interview with The Times, Oleksiy Danilov said that AI had enabled Russia to substantially ramp up its disinformation campaigns, designed to sow division and influence public opinion, and that Moscow now had specific units dedicated to every country holding an election in Europe. He said: “Artificial intelligence is a huge step forward for Russia and it makes the impact [of their meddling]...

As Donald Trump fights a mountain of criminal charges, a separate battle over his eligibility to run for president in 2024 is fast emerging.The US constitution sets out just a handful of explicit requirements someone must meet to be the president. They must be at least 35 years old, a “natural-born” citizen, and a United States resident for at least 14 years. The constitution also bars someone who has served as president for two full terms from running again.None of those requirements disqualify Trump, or anyone else charged with a crime, from running for federal office.But one provision in the...

Facebook is rolling out its rules for the midterm elections in a post from Meta about how it plans to throw its weight around in the weeks leading up to the November midterm elections. According to a post published last week from Nick Clegg, Meta’s president of global affairs, 40 teams will be monitoring the elections. The post cites one side of the forces allegedly trying to disrupt an election by noting that Meta has “banned more than 270 white supremacist organizations, and removed 2.5 million pieces of content tied to organized hate globally on Facebook in the first quarter...

On Tuesday, Donald Trump referred to Kamala Harris as a “nasty woman”, referencing her 2018 grilling of Brett Kavanaugh over allegations – denied by Kavanaugh – that the now supreme court justice attempted to rape Dr Christine Blasey Ford when they were teenagers. Nasty or “not nice” seem to be words Trump reserves for women who hold men in power to account: Trump similarly insulted Hilary Clinton during the 2016 election race, when she hinted at his reluctance to publish his tax returns. Trump also ordered female reporters who question him to “be nice” and has previously said it was...