Free Republic

CNN host Jake Tapper said Tuesday on “News Central” that White House aides were hiding how much President Joe Biden was struggling to do his job because of his “deterioration both physical and cognitive.” Tapper said, “The White House physician, Doctor Kevin O’Connor, was telling White House aides that President Biden’s deterioration of his spine, the degeneration was so significant that if he fell one more time that he might have to be in a wheelchair and serve in a wheelchair for his second term but everybody pushed off the notion that he used a wheelchair until after the election....

Several instances of Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) seemingly mocking Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s disability resurfaced on Tuesday after she received backlash for referring to the wheelchair-bound Republican as “Governor Hot Wheels.” In an August 2022 post, Crockett weighed in on the Texas gubernatorial race between Abbott and Beto O’Rourke with a remark about Abbott “rolling.” “The new nickname I have for @BetoORourke is the king of the clap backs!” she wrote. “Beto is rolling all around the state… where is Abbott rolling to 👀?” Crockett shared another post about Abbott “rolling” this month, which read, “Rolling up to the White...

Outspoken Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) faces criticism from Republicans after referring to Governor Greg Abbott as "Governor Hot Wheels" in a recent public statement. Speaking at a fundraising dinner for LGBTQ advocacy group, Human Rights Campaign, Crockett took a jab at her state's Republican governor, who has used a wheelchair since a 1984 accident. The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) was swift to condemn Crockett's remarks as an attack on Abbott's disability, taking to X to share the clip and indict the Democratic Party. However, commenters questioned the outrage, pointing out the GOP's history of name-calling and campaigns against language-policing....

Two men have been arrested on suspicion of murder after a man in a wheelchair was stabbed to death with a machete Wednesday in east London. The BBC reports the Metropolitan Police confirm officers were called to reports of an altercation in Clapton at 15:38 and found a man with a stab injury. Jade Anthony Barnett, 38, was treated by paramedics but later died at the scene, police say. Air ambulance resources were also called in. His sister Simone Barnett described the deceased to the outlet as a “cheerful and caring” man, explaining her brother had lived in Clapton with...

A shocking video exposed American Airlines employees for carelessly flinging custom wheelchairs off an aircraft and down a baggage chute while laughing. In the video taken at Miami International Airport - an employee perched at the top of the wheelchair ramp lazily chucks the devices down the ramp and lets them bounce off the ground. Another employee waited at the bottom of the ramp - but made no effort to save the wheelchair after his coworker's reckless behavior. American Airlines released a statement after video of the incident saying they were investigated and the visuals were 'deeply concerning.' More than...

A 12-year-old Westchester County girl with a rare neurological condition has raised enough money to buy a new motorized wheelchair after her previous mobility aid was cruelly stolen from her front yard. Family friends of Aliyah Rivera, of Ossining, launched a fundraiser days after her wheelchair, laptop and other belongings were swiped just outside her house Thursday as she was getting ready for school. The preteen has been fighting Acute Flaccid Myelitis, an uncommon condition that attacks the nervous system – particularly a part of the spinal cord that causes the muscles and reflexes in the body to weaken, the...

Air Canada has been forced to apologize after a man with spastic cerebral palsy was forced to drag himself off a plane when the flagship carrier failed to provide a wheelchair for him. Rodney Hodgins, 49, a hardware salesman from British Columbia who requires the use of a motorized wheelchair, flew to Las Vegas with his wife, Deanna, to celebrate their anniversary in August. But when the plane landed, the flight attendant told the couple there wasn’t time to get a wheelchair on board before the plane had to prepare for takeoff again, Deanna Hodgins wrote in a recent Facebook...

<p>Cops have launched an investigation into a series of mysterious assaults on crippled astrophysicist Stephen Hawking. The probe reportedly began after the author of the best seller "A Brief History of Time" was left stranded in his wheelchair in the garden of his country home last summer on the hottest day of the year.</p>

A social media user waiting to board a Southwest flight recently cried foul over an apparent “pre-boarding scam” involving wheelchairs — while the airliner stresses that its policy complies with the law. Passengers are known to get antsy boarding and exiting planes, but Paul, whose Twitter handle is @trendready, complained about how some fellow flyers are possibly attempting to game the system by requesting wheelchair assistance and be the first ones on a flight before takeoff. “Pre-boarding scam at @SouthwestAir,” he claimed in a Saturday tweet with a photo of a line of people lined up in wheelchairs. “20 passengers...

NYPD video released Sunday shows a crook roughing up a diabled man in a wheelchair and stealing from him on a Staten Island bus earlier this month, police said. The brazen robbery happened around 9 p.m. on Aug. 13 on the S40 MTA bus, cops said. The thief stood up directly behind the 64-year-old victim, who was sitting in a wheelchair, and removed $250 cash from his shirt pocket as the bus stopped at Clinton Avenue and Richmond Terrace, cops said.

Engracia Figueroa, an impassioned activist for people with disabilities, died after complications from injuries she sustained in July when her custom wheelchair was destroyed by United Airlines. Figueroa's passing was announced by Hand in Hand, a national network of domestic workers who advocate for dignified working conditions, of which she was a member of the California chapter. “Engracia Figueroa, a fierce advocate for people with disabilities, passed away on Sunday due to complications from injuries she sustained when United Airlines destroyed her custom wheelchair last July.” #FlyingWhileDisabled #Disability..... "Her struggle to maintain her balance over that length of time in...

An Ohio mother is speaking out about her 12-year-old daughter suffering extreme reactions and nearly dying after volunteering for the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine trial. Stephanie De Garay told "Tucker Carlson Tonight" Thursday that after reaching out to multiple physicians they claimed her daughter, Maddie De Garay, couldn’t have become gravely ill from the vaccine. "The only diagnosis we've gotten for her is that it's conversion disorder or functional neurologic symptom disorder, and they are blaming it on anxiety," De Garay told Tucker Carlson. "Ironically, she did not have anxiety before the vaccine."

12-year old Maddie de Garay was excited to be partof the Covid vaccine trial. Her parents are in medicine & engineering andwanted their kids to help bring an end to thepandemic. But now, Maddie is in a wheelchair and needs afeeding tube. They want her to be believed. (Video of mother in the link below)https://twitter.com/SenRonJohnson/status/1409704740213166080

A woman in a wheelchair was punched in the head and sprayed with a fire extinguisher after trying to block protesters - allegedly with a knife in her hand - during the George Floyd riots in Minneapolis last night. The woman claimed she was 'peacefully protesting' to stop people from looting a Target store, but she was quickly set upon by a crowd who subdued her in angry scenes on the second night of violence in the city. The crowd outside the Target store shouted that the woman had a knife, and footage showed her holding what appeared to be...

Gregory Beck was on his way to his St. Louis home in his wheelchair when tornado sirens sounded. Beck lost both of his legs last year and is legally blind, according to CNN affiliate KMOV4. It would normally take him 25 minutes to get back home from the supermarket, and he would need to stop as many as 10 times to rest. "Everyone kept telling me the storm is coming and you need to hurry up and get home," Beck told the station. While other drivers honked and yelled at Beck as he tried to cross the street Tuesday and...

A man was arrested after allegedly beating a 63-year-old man in a wheelchair in Santa Ana on Sunday morning. The witness said the attacker then fled the scene on foot, leaving the victim bleeding heavily from the head. Orange County Fire Authority Medics arrived and transported the victim to a local hospital. Police said the victim suffered severe head injuries and “remains in grave condition.” Santa Ana Police Department Homicide Detectives ask anyone who witnessed the incident or has additional information to please contact Corporal M. Lemmon at MLemmon@santa-ana.org or 714-245-8340.

A wheelchair used by physicist Stephen Hawking has sold at auction for almost £300,000 ($393,000), while a copy of his doctoral thesis fetched almost £585,000 ($767,000), auctioneer Christie’s said Thursday. The motorized chair, used by Hawking after he was paralyzed with motor neuron disease, raised £296,750 in a Christie’s online auction. It had been expected to fetch up to £15,000. Proceeds from the chair’s sale will go to two charities, the Stephen Hawking Foundation and the Motor Neurone Disease Association. Hawking’s 1965 Cambridge University thesis, “Properties of Expanding Universes,” sold for £584,750, more than three times its pre-sale estimate, in...

This disabled man was seen recently climbing inside his own modified form of transport in Thailand. The handicapped motorist wheeled himself into a trailer welded to a moped which he turned on as normal with keys. He had modified the vehicle with the handlebars attached to the trailer for him steer the motorcycle. Onloooker Singthong Nammala, 36, who filmed the footage in Chonburi, Thailand, last Sunday said: ''I couldn't believe what I was seeing, but it was real. It's very clever what he had done.''

The suit, filed against FremantleMedia and NBCUniversal, says that Maureen Allen was volunteering at the Pasadena Convention Center, where "AGT" was also preparing for a taping, when she attempted to roll over a power-cord protector that was obstructing the sole unblocked access ramp at the venue in her motorized wheelchair. According to the suit, filed by Allen's estate, the front wheel of her scooter got caught and turned suddenly, causing it to flip on its side. "Maureen Allen was violently thrown off her scooter onto the hard pavement, and she sustained severe injuries, including injuries to her head and her...

ALBANY - Denying an inmate a motorized wheelchair is discriminatory under the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act, a federal judge has ruled. Northern District Judge Mae D'Agostino found that the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision...failed to show that there were such safety risks in giving Nathaniel Wright the electric wheelchair that they outweighed his right to have the device.... Wright, 55, will complete a five-year sentence from Monroe County for first-degree sexual abuse next month.