Free Republic

Dartmouth councillor says trees ‘spread a little joy,’ but could not withstand Maritime wintersIt appears, perhaps predictably, that palm trees cannot survive in Nova Scotia. In 2018, Halifax Regional Municipality experimented with planting seven palm trees across Dartmouth, a community of just under 100,000 people that borders the eastern shore of Halifax harbour. The trees normally associated with sandy beaches and coconuts stood out in the landscape, drawing the curiosity of locals. Municipal spokesperson Ryan Nearing said the intent of the project was to see if the tropical trees could adapt to the province's Maritime climate, known for its wild...

Exit polls show a historic win for Marine Le Pen's National Rally in France and is on course to trounce President Macron's party Far-right parties have also made substantial gains in Austria and Germany, exit polls say We will have a first projection of the new European Parliament at around 19:30 BST as the mammoth four-day, 27-country European election is coming to a close About 360 million eligible voters are choosing 720 new Members of the European Parliament (MEPs)

Minister Benny Gantz (National Unity) announced on Sunday that he, together with his party, would be leaving the emergency government which he joined at the onset of the war. "Months after the October tragedy, the situation in the country and in the room of the decision-makers has changed. Netanyahu and his partners have turned unity into a moving call, without real-world action. Fateful strategic decisions are met with hesitancy and procrastination due to political considerations," Gantz stated in an address announcing his decision. He claimed that "Netanyahu prevents us from proceeding to true victory. Therefore, today, we are leaving the...

A Gaza journalist who wrote for Al Jazeera was holding three hostages in his home with his family before he was killed by Israeli commandos during a rescue operation on Saturday, according to the Israeli military. Abdallah Aljamal, who also worked as a spokesman for the Hamas-run labor ministry, was killed when special forces soldiers stormed his home in central Gaza and rescued hostages Almog Meir Jan, 21, Andri Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 41, the Israeli military said. Aljamal’s death was originally reported by Rami Abdu, the head of the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, who claimed Israel Defense Forces...

I've been asked to chime in, so I'm chiming. But you're not gonna like it. The state of discourse on FR is totally up to you. You know the guidelines and rules. I don't need to repeat them again and again and again. We are mostly adults here and mostly Christian conservatives. We all know how to behave in a mixed public setting. We don't need and don't want to be supervised. Before you post that next profane post or personal attack just ask yourself, what would Jesus do. Can't we all just get along? Thank you all very much...

Declaring that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is “preventing us from reaching true victory,” National Unity chairman Benny Gantz says that his party is pulling out of the government, making good on an ultimatum. His party joined the coalition following October 7 for the sake of the country even though “we knew it was a bad government” and has since seen strategic considerations pushed aside for political reasons, he says.

A member of Israel's three-man War Cabinet announced his resignation on Sunday over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's handling of the war in Gaza. Benny Gantz, a popular former centrist military chief and one of the prime minister's most prominent critics, joined Netanyahu's government shortly after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack in a show of unity. His presence also boosted Israel's credibility with the country's international partners as he has good working relations with U.S. officials. Gantz said Netanyahu is making "total victory impossible" and that the government needs to put the return of the hostages seized Oct. 7 by Hamas...

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem shrugged off reports that she hasn’t made the cut for finalists in former President Donald Trump’s veepstakes — but appeared to throw her support behind one candidate for the job. Noem, 52, who has continued to campaign for the 45th president, was adamant that she will continue to back him nonetheless and urged him to tap a woman for his ticket. “I’ve told President Trump over and over again he needs to pick whoever helps him win. I have been loyal to him since the very beginning,” Noem told CNN’s “State of the Union” on...

Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said Sunday on CBS’s Face the Nation” that if elected “on day one President Trump will deport people here illegally by the tens of thousands.” Partial transcript as follows: BRENNAN: In this past year, the Biden administration deported, expelled or repatriated more than 740,000 people, which they say is more than any year since 2010. You this week said there need to be mass deportations. Aren’t those numbers mass deportations? GRAHAM: Well look. They’ve had 10 million people coming to this country illegally. It’s the highest level of ill- illegal immigration in the last three years...

ABC News’ “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz confronted Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Sunday over the Biden administration’s failure to secure the border. Partial transcript as follows: RADDATZ: But that’s been something you’ve been doing all along. You’ve been trying to do that with people. I want — I want to go back to an interview I did with you in March… MAYORKAS: Yes. RADDATZ: … of 2021, two months into your tenure as DHS secretary. You seemed totally confident then that you had that under control. Let’s listen to what you told me.

A former Atlanta city attorney who was sentenced to seven years in prison over a massive $15 million pandemic loan fraud donated to Trump prosecutor Fani Willis’s campaign after applying for the government handouts, records show. Shelitha Robertson, 62, used some of her ill-gotten windfall for lavish purchases — including a massive 10-carat diamond ring and a Rolls Royce, according to federal prosecutors. But, she also donated $1,000 to Willis’s Democratic primary election campaign around the time she got the massive payouts from the Paycheck Protection Program, Georgia campaign filings show. **SNIP** A judge ruled that the relationship did not...

Former President Trump is scheduled to sit for a virtual interview on Monday with a New York City probation officer from his home at Mar-a-Lago with his attorney Todd Blanche at his side after he was found guilty on all counts in the hush money trial against him last month, three sources familiar with the matter told NBC News. Duncan Levin, a former Manhattan prosecutor turned defense attorney, said the prosecution is likely to ask for jail time. “To the extent that an E felony is punishable by jail, this case screams out for jail time, he has shown no...

A Gaza journalist was holding three hostages in his home with his family before he was killed by Israeli commandos during a rescue operation on Saturday, according to the Israeli military. Abdallah Aljamal, who also worked as a spokesman for the Hamas-run labor ministry, was killed when special forces soldiers stormed his home in central Gaza and rescued hostages, Almog Meir Jan, 21, Andri Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 41 …

After two days with a mudslide and landslide, Wyoming State Highway 22 over Teton Pass has “catastrophically failed” and is expected to be closed for the long-term, according to the Wyoming Department of Transportation. On Thursday, the road was temporarily closed after eight-inch cracks developed in the roadway at milepost 12.8. Department crews and a contracted team from Evans Construction started working in the region to “construct a detour around the damage, but the landslide continued to move, taking out the whole road,” the department reports. On Friday, due to “continued movement, the crews had been working to remove asphalt...

President Donald J. Trump will hold a MAGA rally in Las Vegas on Sunday, June 9, 2024. RSBN will have all-day LIVE coverage starting at 10:30 a.m. ET. President Trump will speak at 3:00 p.m. ET.

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan denied that the US provided direct military assistance during Israel’s operation that rescued four hostages from the Nuseirat refugee camp Saturday. Sullivan acknowledged that the US did provide the Israel Defense Forces with general intelligence as it has done throughout the Israel-Hamas war, but was adamant that the US was not involved in the operation. “One thing I can say is that there were no US forces, no US boots on the ground involved in this operation. We did not participate militarily in this operation,” Sullivan told CNN’s “State of the Union” in a pretaped...

Approximately 10,000 jobs have reportedly been slashed at California fast food eateries after the minimum wage was hiked to $20. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) law to pay workers $20 an hour went into effect on April 1 and has apparently taken a devastating toll on the industry, Fox Business reported Wednesday. The outlet continued: The California Business and Industrial Alliance (CABIA) said nearly 10,000 jobs have been cut across fast food restaurants since Newsom signed California Assembly Bill 1228 into law last year. To highlight what it says are the unintended consequences of the law, CABIA has taken out an...

HARARE, ZIMBABWE — Leaders of the United Methodist Church expressed regret over last week's decision by the branch in Ivory Coast to leave the union following the church's decision to repeal a long-standing ban on LGBTQ+ clergy but pledged to accept it. … On May 28, Ivory Coast's church voted to split from the United Methodists. With over 1.2 million members, the West African country's church has one of the denomination's largest overseas followers. The United Methodist Church has about 5.4 million members in the United States, and about 4.6 million in Africa, Europe and the Philippines, according to church...

Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD) said Sunday on MSNBC’s “Velshi ” that “The Handmaid’s Tale” was the guidebook for Republicans if former President Donald Trump won the November election. Raskin said, “I like to think about the Sharpie in the hurricane, when Donald Trump tried to override and in some sense did override the scientists at NOAA and the National Weather Service saying that hurricane will hit Alabama causing mass chaos in places where the hurricane was going to hit and in Alabama where it was not going to hit. That is what they wanted to do to the federal government,...

Now that former President Donald Trump's trial has wrapped up, all eyes are on Hunter Biden, who's facing trial in Delaware for federal gun charges. The sitting president's son is the first child of a president to be indicted on federal charges. According to Breitbart, Hunter Biden might have something to worry about, as the judge overseeing the case previously sentenced someone in a similar case to one year of prison. [snip] Judge Maryellen Noreika has experience sentencing defendants with similar crimes, including an instance recently in which she sentenced Zhi Dong for lying on his federal background check form...