Free Republic

The Biden administration is bracing for a second Trump term by rolling out a rule that would complicate Donald Trump’s pledge to fire tens of thousands of federal workers if he wins in November. The new rule is also a huge gift to the public-sector unions that Joe Biden needs firmly in his corner.The latest edict, issued by the US Office of Personnel Management, is an almost direct response to Trump’s stated plans to purge the bureaucracy. That’s not how the OPM is framing it, of course; instead, OPM deputy director Rob Shriver said it “is about making sure the...

Without so much as a whisper of pushback from Congress, the White House is bulldozing forward with a regulatory proposal that could cost the average household up to $10,000 extra in water costs. But it’s not only President Joe Biden‘s campaign that is scared of this latest forefront of the president’s green agenda — Biden’s own Pentagon is panicking over the proposal. The World Health Organization now recommends that governments limit polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as PFAS or “forever plastics” that are resistant to breaking down in either the environment or the human body, at a level of 100 parts...

The Department of Education is, like many of the departments in the federal government, a waste of time, money, and an intrusion on local control. It doens't have many good reasons for its existence and, if we're being honest, acts more as a vanity project that administrations can use to say they're doing something new and good for the kids. It should rightfully be destroyed and that's what Kentucky's Thomas Massie is trying to do. On Wednesday, Massie announced on X that he introduced H.R. 899, a bill that would obliterate the DoE. "I introduced a bill to end the...

The greatest collapse of a mighty state, a large human so­ciety and a fruitful civilization of which we possess a reasonably ac­curate record, has been immortal­ized by Edward Gibbon’s histori­cal classic, The Decline and Fall of The Roman Empire. Henry Adams remarked that Gibbon did not really explain the fall; but this criticism is not altogether just. As the following excerpts from The Decline and Fall show, the philosophic historian offered a number of reflections on the symp­toms and causes of the drama which he set out to describe: "This long peace and the uni­form government of the Romans introduced...

Remember when Sen. Joe Manchin turned his back on those who had supported him against the far-left onslaught by voting to pass the so-called Inflation Reduction Act? And remember when that boondoggle bill contained over $80 billion in new funding for the IRS? At the time, we were all assured that the funding would go to good use, expanding the enforcement ability of the IRS, raking in billions upon billions of dollars in unpaid taxes from (in my best Bernie Sanders voice) the "millionaires and billionaires." If you're wondering how that turned out, we've got some hard numbers that give...

Javier Milei caused a political earthquake in November after winning the presidency in Argentina, ending decades of socialist rule. The wild-haired economist got to work immediately after being sworn in, slashing the number of government ministries, including the nation's gender and diversity bureaucracy. He's now pushing the ball further down the field, with a sweeping executive order that eliminates many of the more communistic aspects of Argentina's government. That comes as the once-wealthy South American country desperately tries to recover from a self-inflicted inflation crisis that has seen prices rise 160 percent in the preceding year. Milei ran on a...

What is truly unexpected is that Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration has just ordered a state spending freeze. In a memo sent across California agencies and departments this week, the director of the Department of Finance wrote, “It is vitally important that state government is efficient, effective, and only expends funds that are necessary to the critical operation and security of the state. As such, all state entities must take immediate action to reduce expenditures and identify all operational savings achieved.” The department urged state agencies to take several steps to save money, including avoiding any new contracts or agreements to...

During Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s incapacity, we learned that her office was running as usual. So was Sen. Fetterman’s office. Staffers went on issuing press releases, taking positions and co-sponsoring bills on their behalf. Senator Feinstein just introduced the Women’s Health Protection Act of 2023 to mandate abortion nationwide while outlawing state restrictions on late-term abortion when babies can feel pain… but Feinstein isn’t really introducing or sponsoring bills, her staffers, who announced her retirement without her knowing about it, are legislating in her name.This is routine. Our government isn’t run by elected officials. And sometimes the elected officials aren’t even...

resident Biden is facing criticism after a bombshell report revealed that all federal agencies are less than 50 percent occupied - wasting billions in taxpayer dollars - over a year after he declared the COVID-19 pandemic over. According to a Government Accountability Office (GAO) memo to Sen. Joni Ernst, obtained by DailyMail.com, not a single federal agency has over half of its workforce in the office. That's a staggering statistic since federal agencies spend about $2 billion taxpayer dollars per year to operate and maintain federal office buildings - and over $5 billion annually in leases. The shocking findings comes...

As part of his Bidenomics agenda to lower costs for American families, President Biden is announcing nearly 30 new actions to strengthen supply chains critical to America’s economic and national security. These actions will help Americans get the products they need when they need them, enable reliable deliveries for businesses, strengthen our agriculture and food systems, and support good-paying, union jobs here at home. President Biden will announce these actions alongside members of his Cabinet and other senior Administration officials at the inaugural meeting of the new White House Council on Supply Chain Resilience. The Council, which President Biden is...

The Republican-appointed majority on the Supreme Court appears skeptical of the Securities and Exchange Commission's powers to conduct in-house adjudications without juries in a case that could disrupt the administrative state. Justices heard oral arguments on Wednesday involving hedge fund manager and conservative radio jockey George Jarkesy, whom the SEC fined and barred from the industry after determining he had committed securities fraud. In a bid to avoid commission-appointed administrative law judges deciding his case behind a bureaucratic curtain, Jarkesy appealed to the federal courts, arguing the agency's procedures infringed on his Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial. Jarkesy...

As president, I will restore American strength on the world stage and focus our attention and resources on deterring Xi’s Chinese Communist Party — the greatest economic and security threat facing America today. My goal is straightforward: We win, and they lose. My treasury and commerce secretaries will focus on American interests, not Wall Street’s access to Chinese markets. I will create an Office of Economic Security and Competition to prioritize reshoring and friendshoring critical production, protecting technologies and reducing reliance on adversaries. I will defend American workers and innovators from illicit technology transfer and intellectual-property theft. I will align...

Five hundred kilometers above the Earth, a small spacecraft is waiting patiently for permission to return home. The autonomous return capsule, made by startup Varda Space Industries, of Torrance, CA, was meant to have landed in the remote Utah desert early in September. It would have been the first commercial space company to return a drug made in space to Earth, in this case a few grams of the HIV and hepatitis C antiviral ritonavir. Instead, the satellite, about the size of a large trash can and code-named Winnebago 1, continues to orbit the planet at nearly 30,000 kilometers per...

In his new book, Government Gangsters, Kash Patel learned that rhe agents of the Deep State operate through a series of networks, violating their oaths of office, weaponizing the law, and spreading disinformation for political or personal gain. Like most Americans, Kash Patel grew up believing that the country was run as a democracy, with a government that honors the will of the people and is accountable to them. It was only much later, as an attorney and then as a senior advisor to former president Donald Trump, that he encountered – and confronted – what has come to be...

John Boyd, Jr. absolutely nailed it when he opened his piece with this:If Washington, D.C. is good at one thing, it’s making policy in the Beltway bubble that ends up hurting Americans in rural communities — communities like mine, here in Virginia.Boyd, a fourth-generation farmer in Virginia with a 1,600 acre farm and more than thirty years of experience growing tobacco, is the founder and president of the National Black Farmers Association, and yesterday, The Hill published an essay he wrote exposing the federal government’s “misguided” actions against the black community, but especially black farmer—after all, agriculture and the farmer...

Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) Today, the CRTC is advancing its regulatory plan to modernize Canada’s broadcasting framework and ensure online streaming services make meaningful contributions to Canadian and Indigenous content. On May 12, 2023, the CRTC launched its first public consultations. After thoroughly examining all the evidence on the public record, including over 200 interventions, the CRTC is issuing its first two decisions. First, the CRTC is setting out which online streaming services need to provide information about their activities in Canada. Online streaming services that operate in Canada, offer broadcasting content, and earn $10 million or more...

Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-WY) appeared on the Line Drive podcast and called for term limits for federal bureaucrats. Hageman appeared on the Line Drive podcast, which is hosted by Tim Murtaugh, former Donald Trump 2020 communications director and executive vice president at National Public Affairs; Hogan Gidley, former Trump White House deputy press secretary and Trump 2020 national spokesman; and Kaelan Dorr, a Trump White House and 2020 campaign alumni. Sonny Joy Nelson, another Trump 2020 communications official, also hosts the show. Hageman called for term limits for federal bureaucrats on the Line Drive podcast. She said that the lawmakers...

The Biden administration wants to make it difficult for future Republican presidents to decrease the size of the federal bureaucracy. What is the background? Most career federal civil servants are competitive service employees hired under a merit-based system typical of the nongovernment marketplace. They receive tremendous employee rights against demotion or termination. Excepted service employees, on the other hand, work jobs requiring specialized qualifications or skills, such as in law enforcement, intelligence, science, and the law. However, excepted employees do not receive the same job protections as their competitive service counterparts unless they meet strict criteria. In 2020, then-President Donald...

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced that his administration is moving forward with new rules meant to push insurance companies to increase their coverage of mental health treatments. The new regulations, which still need to go through a public comment period, would require insurers to study whether their customers have equal access to medical and mental health benefits and to take remedial action, if necessary. The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act requires that insurers provide the same level of coverage for both mental and physical health care — though the administration and advocates argue insurers' policies...

Are Hong Kong's liberties gradually being taken away? THROW a frog into boiling water and it jumps out; gently bring it to the boil, and the frog, never noticing the incremental increases in heat, allows itself to be cooked. Is Hong Kong a frog in a pot in Beijing's kitchen? If so, then on September 24th the temperature rose another notch. On that day, Hong Kong's government formally began—by circulating a consultation paper—the process of enacting a controversial set of laws against subversion, sedition, treason and other ills, as required by Article 23 of the Basic Law, the territory's constitution....