Free Republic

Christopher Wray, President Donald Trump's FBI director nominee, seems a perfectly nice man. But nothing he has said during confirmation hearings, on July 12, distinguishes him as someone who would reform Barack Hussein Obama’s Islamophilic FBI. President Trump ran on a quixotic set of ideas about aggressively stopping Islamic terror. Like a fly-in-amber, the Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) governing the Obama Federal Bureau of Investigation guarantee to preserve the same systemic, intractable failures that unleashed mass murderer Omar Mateen or Syed Farook and bride Tashfeen Malik, to maim and murder dozens of Americans. From Wray's comments to the Senate Judiciary...

**SNIP** “(The witness) was not sure if the baby was bouncing or if they were having sex,” the report said. “(The witness) stated he flushed the toilet on purpose to let the man hear him in the bathroom. (The witness) stated, if he panics, then he must be doing something wrong.” The customer then told he flushed the urinal and saw Gray panic when he realized someone else was in the bathroom with him. Gray, who was in a motorized wheelchair at the time, quickly attempted to get dressed and then pulled out a stun gun to keep the customer...

Full title: "As FBI investigates Vegas attack, remember its FAILED investigations of Orlando jihadi mass murderer, Boston bombers, Garland jihadis, Boston beheaders" If previous FBI history of jihad terror investigations is any indication, it’s that they are incompetent or complicit. Whatever their motives, they are deeply compromised, and clearly the worst agency to lead this Vegas investigation. The Orlando jihadi who opened fire on gay nightclub revelers at the Pulse Nightclub called 911 during the attack and pledged his allegiance to the Islamic State. The FBI investigated the Orlando mass shooter for 10 months and found nothing. The FBI was...

At least 19 people have been arrested across Florida for trying to loot empty businesses and homes that have been evacuated in preparation for Hurricane Irma. Two people burst into an Orlando sporting store and allegedly stole guns, before facing off with SWAT in a standoff. Shocking videos also emerged of gangs trying to break into stores and take advantage of deserted properties. Police were called to the scene after witnesses reported a burglary at Academy Sports near the Mall at Millenia in Orlando, WESH reported. Soon afterward, SWAT team officers arrived when it became clear the looters were allegedly...

EDITORPope Francis speaks during his general audience in St. Peter's Square at the Vatican March 15. (Credit: CNS/Paul Haring.)If all you had to go by in judging Catholic reaction to Pope Francis were press treatments and social media, you'd think it's an all-or-nothing war between devoted supporters and fanatical critics. In the trenches, however, what you find is a spirit of root enthusiasm and loyalty, tempered with a critical edge on specific points depending on what's most important to a particular person. Share: Saturday, Romans awoke to find a provocative image staring out from their neighborhood newsstands. On the...

In the early morning hours of June 12, 2016, Tiara Parker of Philadelphia was out on the town – but this wasn’t just any night out. She was inside the Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, a place that would become the scene of a mass shooting terrorist attack by 29-year-old Omar Mateen. On that night, 49 people were murdered and another 58 were wounded in what has been called the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil since the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001. Parker was with U.S. Sen. Bob Casey in Ardmore Monday morning, speaking on what has...

One year ago this week, a radical Islamist terrorist, in solidarity with the ISIS, walked into a bar in Orlando, Florida, and murdered 49 people. During the course of the attack the monster was unambiguous about his motives, telling the police outside exactly why he murdered those people, and still the Obama administration labored over what the motive was. That fight against reality continues to this day. After the attack, under public pressure, the FBI released a partial transcript of the communications between the monster and police, but they removed all references to Islam and ISIS.On the orders of then Attorney...

It’s hard to imagine that it’s been one year since the tragic events that befell attendants at Pulse, a gay bar in Orlando, where a disturbed individual and terrorist opened fire upon patrons, killing 49 people and then himself. I, as a gay man, was shocked at the sheer carnage of the incident and believed it was a personal attack upon me and my people.... The time for a respectable, adult discussion for combatting gun violence has long since passed. Let us not wait for the next Orlando or Dallas before we start this whole cycle over again."

An event organised by Gays Against Sharia to mark the anniversary of the Orlando shooting has been branded “divisive” and “Islamophobic” by LGBT activists planning a counter-protest. The organisers of the Unite Against Hate march, set to take place in Manchester on Sunday, say they organised the event to “honour the victims of hate”, including the 49 people who lost their lives at Pulse, a gay club in Orlando, Florida, at the hands of an Islamic terrorist on June 12, 2016. Planned speakers include author Shazia Hobbs, a Glaswegian who was forced into an arranged marriage at 18 with a man who...

John Robert Neumann Jr. has been identified as the disgruntled former employee who opened fire at an Orlando company Monday morning, killing five people, police say. The 45-year-old man was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside the business, Fiamma Inc., Orange County Sheriff Jerry Demings said at a press conference. Demings said the man was fired earlier this year and the incident appears to be “workplace violence.”

The Orange County Sheriff's Office is responding there are multiple fatalities involving a shooting on North Forsyth Road near Hanging Moss Road. "OSCO working shooting scene that has stabilized. Multiple fatalities. Situation contained. Sheriff will brief soon

Police are investigating a shooting in Orlando Monday morning with "multiple fatalities," officials said. MASSIVE TRAFFIC backups along Forsyth Rd in Winter Park. OCSO working shooting investigation #Fox35 pic.twitter.com/5UzhfrVTq0

FLORIDA — Officers rushed to the scene after multiple reports of a gunman at Orlando International Airport Tuesday. Orlando Police and Orange County Deputies have the scene contained at a rental car area. According to News13, the armed suspect ‘has threatened to do harm to himself and to others.’ Passengers were diverted from the area.

Long time CTH readers will note we extended well over a year of benefit-of-the-doubt to the motives of former FBI Director James Comey with regard to the severity of his politicized nature and disposition. Throughout the entire Clinton investigation we remained ambivalent to Comey’s motives. Indeed it wasn’t until after the Pulse nightclub terrorist attack when Comey obtusely noted the FBI had been contacted (prior to the attack) about the sketchy behavior of Omar Mateen by a ‘random concerned citizen’ -and our finding that the actual ‘citizen’ was the far more substantive St Lucie county sheriff Ken Mascara– that we...

The region’s toll-road agency on Thursday will consider killing a big toll increase for drivers on its 109 miles of roads in the region. A 15 percent toll increase slated for July 1 was set in motion years ago when the Central Florida Expressway Authority was struggling financially. Axing the hike would hold down driving costs for both frequent and occasional travelers on toll roads in the Orlando area. Those using transponders and paying about $100 a month in tolls would be spared a total annual increase of nearly $200, according to the agency, while those who toss quarters into...

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - A proposed bill to ban express lanes in Florida died Thursday in the House Transportation and Infrastructure subcommittee. Despite causing an increase in crashes and confusion, express lanes, according to the Florida Department of Transportation, help move people faster, and that if they were eliminated the state would lose $1.5 billion over 10 years. All of that money is used to improve and fix roads. Sen. Frank Artiles, R-Miami, filed SB 250 in January. It that would have allowed the express lanes to remain in operation only until tolls are collected to pay off the bonds that...

The widow of a shooter who killed 49 people in a Florida nightclub last year is reportedly on her way to Orlando, Fla., to face federal charges of aiding her husband in the attack. Salman's lawyer, Charles Swift of the Texas-based Constitutional Law Center for Muslims in America, said Wednesday it will be up to the Marshals Service to decide when she will be transferred. The charges are aiding her husband in providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, namely the Islamic State; and obstructing justice by misleading local police and the FBI when she was questioned in the...

An Orlando judge has overruled the arranged release of Noor Salman, the wife of the Islamic gunman who killed 49 and injured 69 at the Pulse nightclub last year.  On Wednesday, a district judge in California ordered that Salman be released pending trial.  Judge Donna Ryu argued that Salman wasn't a flight risk or a danger to public safety and had no connections to ISIS.Prosecutors in Orlando argued the contrary.  In the court filing, they said Salman has shown little remorse for her husband's actions, calling her a “cold person” who wasn't worried about the victims in the immediate aftermath of the attack, but was mainly concerned with “how...

At the urging of parents and others from the College Park neighborhood, the Orange County School Board voted 7-1 to change the name during a regular meeting Tuesday night.

(CNN)Samantha Taylor was at Orlando's Jewish Community Center for a morning meeting when she heard reports of a bomb threat crackle from the director's walkie-talkie. Her daughter attends preschool there; she ran to the classroom and evacuated with the students and teachers. While police and bomb-sniffing dogs searched the building for several hours, the teachers kept the children calm and happy at a safe spot down the street, Taylor said. No explosives were found. On the same day, January 4, an Orlando Chabad center also received a threatening call, marking the first trickle in what would soon swell to waves...