Free Republic

Trump's supporters loved his promise this week to create a "deportation force” to remove all 11 million illegal immigrants living in America, and his repeated declaration that everyone here illegally will “have to go." But his supporters tend to overlook is his other promise - repeated in a recent debate - that under his immigration plan "they will come back." That's right. Under Trump's immigration plan almost all of 11 million illegal aliens (save for a small minority with criminal records) will get to return and get permanent legal status to stay here in America. Trump supports amnesty. On the...

When female students arrived at a New York school, their hoodies were replaced with hijabs. They were told that they had to wear the religious garb all day, but his wasn't a school for Muslim students. They were kids with mostly Christian beliefs, but all that was shoved to the side to make way for Islamic propaganda, and parents didn't know about it. Now, they've surprised the school with something of their own. Thanks to the urging of one student, Eman Muthana, and an apparently progressive principal at World School of Inquiry in Rochester, administrators caved to the idea of...

Just yesterday, I had a Mexican woman on the phone ask me if I knew Spanish. When I responded that I indeed did, and could I help her in (in fluent Spanish), she had the audacity and gall to ask me if I "...really knew Spanish." I told her in no uncertain terms in fluent Spanish that I spoke it like a native and did she want help or not. She calmed down. Such a thing is completely unprecedented. I have NEVER heard of or observed such behavior in a foreigner to a country confronting someone from that country and...

The State Department's inspector general last year subpoenaed the Clinton Foundation for documents related to work that required approval from the Hillary Clinton State Department, making it now at least four investigations involving the Democratic presidential candidate being conducted by federal agencies.

Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren has asked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to consider the role legal marijuana could play in the prescription opioid epidemic.Warren asked for more research into medical marijuana and painkiller addiction in a letter to the CDC director, Thomas Friedan."Opioid abuse is a national concern and warrants swift and immediate action," Warren wrote. Her request comes as politicians, including the presidential nominees, search for the best response to the opioid epidemic. The use of prescription opioids doubled between 2000 and 2014, according to the CDC. And Massachusetts experienced its highest number of unintentional opioid...

Pope Francis meets with Patriarch Kirill in Havana, Cuba. - EPA Joint Declarationof Pope Francisand Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia   “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God the Father and the fellowship of the holy Spirit be with all of you” (2 Cor 13:13). 1. By God the Father’s will, from which all gifts come, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the help of the Holy Spirit Consolator, we, Pope Francis and Kirill, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, have met today in Havana. We give thanks to...

Big Brother wants to be an “equal partner” with American parents in the raising of their own children, starting before they are even born. He wants to send his agents to your house for “home visits,” too. Believe it or not, two powerful arms of Obama administration, the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), explicitly say so themselves.In a draft policy statement on “family engagement,” the two unconstitutional bureaucracies openly state their joint position: families are “equal partners” in everything from children's “development” and “education” to their “wellness across all settings.” Virtually...

The Palestinian Authority (PA) Security Forces have been revealed to be actively policing in Arab suburbs of the capital city of Jerusalem, in a region classified as Area B in the 1994 Oslo Accords. The Palestinian Wafa news agency reported on Thursday that the PA's Al-Quds (Jerusalem) suburb police were active in Eizariya, a neighborhood located east of Abu Dis between Jerusalem and Ma'ale Adumim. In the suburb, the PA force seized illegal drugs, consisting of 55 pills of Ecstasy (MDMA) as well as other drugs including crystal meth and hashish. The myriad of regions in Judea and Samaria classified...

EDITOR'S NOTE: In much of the world, Friday's historic meeting between Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia in Havana, Cuba, will be hailed as a breakthrough. Attitudes are more mixed, however, in Ukraine, long the front line of tensions between Catholics and the Russian Orthodox. There, the 5-million-strong Greek Catholic Church has suffered terribly for its loyalty to Rome, constituting the world's largest underground religious body during the Soviet era, and it's also a leader in civil resistance to the current Russian invasion of eastern Ukraine. In this essay commissioned by Crux, the Rev. Andriy Chirovsky,...

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said that he intends to retake "the whole country" from rebel forces. In a rare interview, he told AFP news agency that defeating the groups ranged against him could take some time due to the involvement of regional powers. World powers have agreed to push for a cessation of hostilities in a week's time. The UN says it hopes to start delivering aid to some besieged areas in Syria within the next 24 hours. Mr Assad expressed support for peace talks but said negotiations did not mean "we stop fighting terrorism". US State Department spokesman...

"Medicare for all," or single-payer healthcare funded by the government. This would be a gargantuan change that would put health insurers (which employ more than half a million people) out of business, end employer-provider insurance and disrupt many other elements of the healthcare system. It would cost the government somewhere between $1.4 trillion and $2.8 trillion per year, according to the Center for a Responsible Federal Budget. The government spends about $4 trillion today, so Sanders plan would add sharply to that. The Rebuild America Act.This would fund the sort of infrastructure development President Obama is a big fan of,...

Like clockwork, whenever anyone at National Review — including the editors — writes in opposition to opening all combat jobs to women or (even worse) drafting women into ground combat, there is predictable hue and cry from the Left. “But Israel! You conservatives couldn’t possibly be criticizing Israel, could you?” Perhaps the worst example comes from New York magazine, where writer Eric Levitz accuses NR of “anti-Jewish propaganda” and painting Israelis as “savagely cruel primitives” because our editors had the audacity to rightly label the proposal to draft mothers and daughters into ground combat “barbaric.”

ormer Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore announced he is suspending his campaign for president. "My campaign was intended to offer the gubernatorial experience, with the track record of a true conservative, experienced in national security, to unite the party." Gilmore said, "My goal was to focus on the importance of this election as a real turning point, and to emphasize the dangers of continuing on a road that will further undermine America's economy and weaken our national security."

The Rev. Al Sharpton — who sipped tea at Sylvia’s Restaurant in Harlem on Wednesday with Bernie Sanders — said he is meeting with Hillary Clinton next Tuesday in New York City, along with National Urban League President Marc Morial and NAACP President Cornell Brooks. The sitdown with establishment black leaders is part of a new push by her campaign — following Clinton's crushing defeat in the New Hampshire primary — to shore up the African-American vote it has identified as the most critical voting bloc to win the Democratic nomination. Attracting black voters is taking precedence over any attempt...

I don't like being bothered or bossed around. I hated that anyone, for any reason, could interrupt my life, and I could interrupt my life just the same The phone rings: it's my friend checking to see if I can pick her up on the way to a dinner party. I ask her where she is and as she explains, I reach as far as I can across the countertop for a pen. I scribble the address in my trusty notebook I keep in my back pocket. I tell her I'll be at her place in about 20 minutes, give...

In order to meet with the patriarch of Moscow, the pope has given support to Russia's policies in Ukraine and in the Middle East, disappointing the expectations of the Christians of those regions. As he did before in Cuba.

Former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore is suspending his presidential campaign.

Tuesday night in New Hampshire went as well for Donald Trump as anyone could’ve possibly imagined. He won big, and the Republican establishment clearly lost. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor, were all given enough reason to remain in the primary, prolonging a bitter fight to become the true counterweight to the billionaire real estate developer and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, an insurgent reviled by his Senate colleagues. Rubbing Mar-a-Lago sand in the open wound, the establishment’s best hope, the former Tea Party darling Rubio, polled behind Mr. Bush...

At Halal Speed Dating, all matchmaking sessions begin with a talk on marriage in Islam. Women must be accompanied to the event by a chaperone - typically a parent. Imagine going on a first date with someone and having your parents beside you to give you advice. That is what happens at Halal Speed Dating, a matchmaking service founded in 2015 in Muslim-majority Malaysia. The goal is to provide a respectable, Sharia-compliant way of finding a spouse through a process similar to typical speed dating, where men and women are given five minutes to get to know each other before...

Last night, President Obama held a fundraiser in the San Francisco Bay area, where he told presumably wealthy donors to be concerned about inequality and the wave of populism that's sweeping the nation. Oh, and did I forget to mention that one ticket to this event cost $33,400 (via the Hill): Obama has previously expressed surprise by the enthusiasm generated by Trump and Sanders. But he urged donors attending the $33,400-per-ticket fundraiser to understand that populist candidates in both parties are tapping into something real. "Despite all the progress we've made ... what is true is that people are anxious,”...