Free Republic

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) huddled Monday for almost two hours with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) — a marathon meeting suggesting the pair is seeking a deal to defuse tensions and preclude floor action on the Georgia firebrand’s resolution to boot Johnson from power. The two emerged from the Speaker’s office separately but bearing the same message: The discussion was constructive enough that they’ve agreed to meet again Tuesday. Greene later told reporters the huddle will take place at 12:30 p.m. Greene declined to say if she was ready to push through with her plan to force her motion to...

A former Georgia Republican official who had to defend his state’s election administration after Donald Trump tried to overturn the results in 2020 has endorsed President Joe Biden and urged other Republicans to join him in an op-ed published Monday. Former Georgia Lieutenant Gov. Geoff Duncan, who refused to give credence to Trump’s conspiracy theories about Georgia’s election results and opted not to run for reelection in 2022 due to his rift with the former president, is not an entirely surprising critic. He was drafted by No Labels to run as a third-party presidential candidate this year but ultimately decided...

The National Rifle Association of America (NRA) has announced that President Donald J. Trump will address NRA members as the keynote speaker at the 2024 NRA Annual Meetings & Exhibits on Saturday, May 18, in Dallas, Texas. This marks President Trump's ninth address on NRA’s stage, reaffirming his strong commitment to the NRA, the Second Amendment, and the rich American tradition of firearm ownership. President Trump first addressed the NRA in Nashville in 2015. Since then, he has been a steadfast advocate for the NRA, the Second Amendment, and self-defense rights—including his promise in 2016 to never let NRA members...

Jim Banks for Senator! Mike Braun for Governor! Go vote!

President Donald Trump said he'd make the "sacrifice" of going to jail to defend free speech amid the trial in Manhattan where the 45th president is under a gag order he has slammed as "unconstitutional." "I have to watch every word I tell you people. You ask me a question, a simple question I'd like to give it, but I can't talk about it because this judge has given me a gag order and [says] you'll go to jail if you violate it," Trump said in remarks outside the courtroom Monday afternoon. "And frankly, you know what? Our Constitution is...

Thirteen federal judges said Monday that they would no longer hire law clerks from Columbia College or Columbia Law School after the university allowed an encampment on its lawn to spiral into a destructive occupation of a campus building. The judges cited the "explosion of student disruptions" and the "virulent spread of antisemitism" at Columbia, which has now canceled its main graduation ceremony because of the unrest. Led by appellate judges James Ho and Elizabeth Branch, who spearheaded a clerkship boycott of Yale Law School in 2022 and Stanford Law School in 2023, as well as by Matthew Solomson on...

The prosecutor at the center of former President Donald Trump’s so-called "hush money" trial in New York received a total of $12,000 from the Democratic National Committee for consulting work in 2018, records show. According to the data collected by the Federal Election Commission, the DNC gave Matthew Colangelo two $6,000 payments in January 2018 for “political consulting.” At the time of the payments, Colangelo was working in the office of then-New York Attorney General Eric Scheiderman as a deputy, according to Fox News. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who brought the current case against Trump, also worked in that...

New technologies that will make monitoring drivers' behavior easy and comprehensive … will soon also be mandatory.H.R. 3684, an “infrastructure” bill signed by Joe Biden in 2021 included a provision mandating expanded monitoring of folks as they drive an automobile. And henceforth the intrusive technologies will be required in all new vehicles being manufactured and sold in the U.S.New vehicles will be required to have passive monitoring systems to assess each driver’s behavior. An algorithm will determine if the driver is too impaired to operate the vehicle. If so, the vehicle will either be disabled, or some as yet unexplained...

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A federal lawsuit challenging North Carolina’s photo voter identification law is set to go to trial Monday, with arguments expected to focus on whether the requirement unlawfully discriminates against Black and Hispanic citizens or serves legitimate state interests to boost public confidence in elections. The non-jury trial in Winston-Salem begins more than five years after the state NAACP and several local chapters sued over the voter ID law enacted by the Republican-dominated General Assembly in late 2018. This litigation, along with similar lawsuits in state courts, delayed implementation of the requirement until last year’s municipal elections....

If a motion to vacate the speaker of the House fails resoundingly, does it make a sound?The answer is, of course, yes — with a Capitol Hill press corps that loves nothing more than pitting all-too-willing Republicans against one another. Next week, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene is poised to finally pull the trigger on her quixotic quest to oust Speaker Mike Johnson — but she’s likely to be left holding a bag of small-dollar donations and press clippings, which is what her detractors think she is actually motivated by. On one side of the push to oust Johnson is a...

The House of Representatives on Wednesday voted overwhelmingly to advance a bill that would empower the federal government to crack down on student protests by defining antisemitism in a way that includes certain criticism of Israel. Sponsored by Rep. Mike Lawler, a Republican from New York, the bill's passage reflects a broader national trend. Earlier this year, Gov. Brian Kemp signed H.B. 30, which revised Georgia’s hate crime statute to include certain forms of speech critical of Israel. In March, Gov. Kristi Noem signed legislation into the South Dakota civil rights statute that codified some forms of speech critical of...

A disbarred, serial perjurer walks into a courtroom and asks to take an oath . . . No, seriously, this is not a joke. Michael Cohen will soon appear in a Manhattan courtroom in what is sure to be one of the most bizarre moments in legal history. Cohen nearly comprises the prosecution’s entire case against former President Donald Trump under a criminal theory that still has many of us baffled. It is not clear what crime Trump was supposedly trying to conceal by making “hush-money” payments to former porn actress Stormy Daniels. What is clear is that none of...

When a small group of “America First” House Republicans fought to block Congress from approving a $95 billion package of foreign aid, none of them questioned the aid marked for Israel. The point of disagreement was rather the additional funding for Ukraine, which these dissenters viewed, correctly in my opinion, as a waste of money on a corrupt country in a doomed, faraway struggle that has little to do with American interests. None of the Republicans questioned the aid to Israel because they know that even the mildest criticism of American support for Israel violates a taboo in American conservative...

Voters in South Carolina will have the opportunity to add an amendment to the state constitution that would allow only American citizens to vote in state elections. The amendment is titled "The Citizens Only Voting Amendment" and it was passed by the South Carolina House of Representatives 105-0 earlier this week. Last month, the Senate passed the legislation by a vote of 40-3. South Carolina voters will be able to vote on the amendment in November of this year. “Today South Carolina took an important step forward in defending the value of citizenship,” Senator Josh Kimbrell said, according to Legal...

AGeorgia lawmaker alleged during a hearing that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis spends taxpayer dollars "like the Wild West" and has misused public funds. "This is sounding to me kind of like the Wild West, very little control from Fulton County over a $36 million budget," State Sen. Bill Cowsert said after questioning Fulton County Commissioner Robb Pitts and Fulton County Chief Financial Officer Sharon Whittmore about how Willis' office receives and spends its funds. The Georgia Senate Special Committee on Investigations had a meeting on Friday to investigate allegations that Willis engaged in potential misuse of public funds...

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has issued a stern warning to the state of Iowa: halt the enforcement of a controversial new immigration law, or face a federal lawsuit. This legal showdown is poised over Iowa’s recent enactment of Senate File 2340, which criminalizes “illegal reentry” into the state by undocumented immigrants—a move the DOJ deems a violation of the Constitution. … Governor Reynolds has defended the law, Iowa needed the law because of the Biden administration’s poor record on immigration. “The only reason we had to pass this law is because the Biden administration refuses to enforce the...

Special counsel Jack Smith’s team acknowledged Friday that some evidence in the prosecution of former President Donald Trump for hoarding classified documents at his Florida home may not be in the same sequence FBI agents found it when they swept into the Mar-a-Lago compound with a search warrant in August 2022. The concession from prosecutors in a court filing Friday afternoon came after attorneys for one of Trump’s co-defendants asked for a delay in the case because the defense lawyers were having trouble determining precisely where particular documents had come from in the 33 boxes the FBI seized almost two...

Suzanne Venker’s latest book, How to Build a Better Life, distills her countercultural, practical, and effective life advice for women.Everyone wants to talk about what’s wrong with men, whether it’s “toxic masculinity,” “men without work,” “the end of men,” the longhouse, or the need for men to “clean their rooms.” Not so many people, however, want to talk about what’s wrong with women. Even the longhouse complaint is that women are too successful:As of 2022, women held 52 percent of professional-managerial roles in the U.S. Women earn more than 57 percent of bachelor degrees, 61 percent of master’s degrees, and...

If arrested and convicted under the new law, a judge can have the individual deported back to their home country. But if the person is not deported, they could be sentenced to two years in prison if its classified as a misdemeanor, or up to 10 years if its a felony and they have been arrested before. The Justice Department warned Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, a Republican, on Thursday that it would sue the state if it enforces an immigration law that bans migrants from being in the state if they have an outstanding deportation order, or if they were...

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R) reportedly signed a bill into law Thursday that would ensure President Biden will appear on the state’s November ballot. The Associated Press reported that a spokeswoman said the bill had been signed. The Hill has reached out to Ivey’s office for comment. The bill’s singing follows the unanimous approval last week from the Alabama State Senate, after a state elections official warned that Biden may miss the deadline to qualify. Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen (R) sent a letter to the state Democratic Party chair in April noting that the deadline for certifying candidates...