Free Republic

A family of nine from Venezuela seeking asylum came to the United States asking for help. They have experienced a journey that has taken them from South America to the southern border, to New York, and now to Utah. Advocates caution that more challenges lie ahead, impacting everyone in Utah. Yurjanis Leal left her home in Venezuela in 2021. Along with her two children, siblings, mother, and friends made along the way, she arrived at the southern border in Texas on Dec. 20, 2023. From Texas, they traveled to New York, where they stayed for a month before coming to...

Delta Airlines has been hit with a lawsuit for the wrongful death of a woman whose husband fatally mowed her down in a Utah airport parking lot — with her estate claiming flight attendants overserved her beau. Representatives for the estate of slain mom Charlotte Sturgeon and her child — who witnessed the gruesome accident — say in the suit filed Thursday that the airline is to blame for her tragic death because its employees served husband Shawn Sturgeon at least two additional drinks despite him consuming “multiple” alcoholic beverages before even boarding the plane, according to a report by...

A cougar attacked a man at a ski resort Sunday outside of Beaver Mountain, Utah, but he was able to fight it off with a snowboard. Charlie Duffy was walking outside of resort boundaries with his snowboard when he noticed big cat paw prints in the snow, KSL reported. Moments later, unnerved by the paw prints, he looked over his shoulder to see the mountain lion five or six feet away from him. The cat then pounced ,... “My fight response instantly kicked in and I grabbed my board in my right hand and swung with full force at the...

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox on Friday announced he will send state troopers and Utah National Guard members to the southern border in Texas after receiving emergency aid requests from the Lone Star State. The Utah National Guard will send five soldiers from its engineer battalion on Feb. 26 to help maintain military equipment at the border, and the Utah Highway Patrol will send one sergeant and four troopers from its Criminal Interdiction Team, which specializes in drug investigations. The law enforcement officers will be deployed for 30 days, and the soldiers for two weeks. "Open borders threaten our national security...

@StephenM We all owe a deep, deep debt of gratitude to @BasedMikeLee

@BasedMikeLee 🚨 I have it on good authority that The Firm™️ intends to force through the Ukraine aid portion of the supplemental aid package (minus the border bill) tomorrow. Do you want to give $60B to Ukraine, knowing that the entire budget of the U.S. Marine Corps in FY2023 was $53.8B?🚨

Russian forces are pushing hard to take the Ukrainian stronghold of Avdiivka. But why? In this video, we do a deep analysis on Russia's staggering losses, including infantry, tanks, and heavy equipment. We talk about why Russia wants the city so badly, what Vladimir Putin's stake in it is, and how it all connects back to Russia's invasion of Crimea and the War in the Donbas.

After some haggling and much consternation among the state Legislature, Gov. Spencer Cox signed a bill Wednesday afternoon reiterating Utah's sovereignty in light of federal government actions. "Balancing power between state and federal sovereignty is an essential part of our constitutional system. This legislation gives us another way to push back on federal overreach and maintain that balance," he said in a prepared statement. Just minutes before Cox approved the measure, the ACLU of Utah issued a public plea for him to veto it

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox signed a pair of this legislative session's most controversial bills Tuesday night. The move effectively ends diversity, equity and inclusion programs in state-owned schools, and bans transgender people from accessing restrooms that differ from their biological sex except in certain circumstances in state-owned buildings. "We want public facilities that are safe and accommodating for everyone and this bill increases privacy protections for all," Cox said in a statement, explaining his reason for signing HB257. The bill requires more unisex and single-stall facilities to be created in public buildings and only allows transgender people to use gender-specific...

The Republican chairman of a congressional panel investigating a 3-million-gallon spill of toxic wastewater from an inactive Colorado gold mine said Tuesday the mine was purposely breached by a government cleanup team. The assertion by House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Rob Bishop of Utah contradicts claims by the Obama administration that the cleanup team was doing only preparatory work at the Gold King mine. Once it was breached, wastewater loaded with lead, arsenic and other contaminants fouled downstream rivers in Colorado, New Mexico and Utah. Bishop cited an email in which an Interior Department official said the spill last August...

For the past few months I’ve been reporting a big story on the copper industry for Pacific Standard. It takes a broad look at how the global economic boom of the past decade, led by China and India, is pushing copper mining into new regions and new enormities of investment and excavation. (It’ll be out in June.) But a few days ago a very local event shook the copper industry, and I thought it would be neat to look at how a crisis at a single mine can ripple through space and time, ultimately affecting just about everyone around...

Toddler twin daughters, a husband and countless others are mourning the loss of a woman gone too soon.LayCee Barnett, 28, who had just learned she was expecting another child, felt what her husband Josh Barnett described as flu-like symptoms on Jan. 10. Days later, she got news that shook her world — and then immediately took her from it. "The Wednesday before the 15th, LayCee started getting sick, so we waited a couple of days with things not changing," Josh Barnett recalled. "Fevering started happening and then her legs got really weak, so we went to the Instacare,

In a rapid legislative progression, the Utah House of Representatives has passed HB 257, a contentious bill that, if signed into law by Republican Gov. Spencer Cox, would become the first anti-LGBTQ+ bathroom ban of the year. The bill aims to stop transgender students from using restrooms and locker rooms that align with their gender identity, as well as restrict access to changing rooms in government-owned or operated facilities for transgender people of all ages. Human Rights Campaign president Kelley Robinson expressed her strong opposition to the bill in a statement. “This bill is an invasion of the privacy of...

Pro-Palestinian protesters took to the annual Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah on Sunday, attempting to capture the attention of international media, Deadline Hollywood reported. The crowd, shouting, "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free," was joined by actress Melissa Barrera. Barrera is a Mexican actress known for her roles in the film series, "Scream" and "In The Heights." Barrera joined nearly 100 protesters, chanting against President Joe Biden and shouting at protesters from the Bring Them Home movement to return Israel's hostages in Gaza.

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — Utah lawmakers say they are focused on removing barriers to overcome diversity, but educators and LGBTQ+ leaders say they’re concerned. In response to HB 257, a bill that would prevent transgender people from using public bathrooms that are different from the sex that is on their birth certificate, some in the community say it could put both trans and non-trans people at risk. “If you have a slightly masculine-looking woman or an effeminate-looking man, what’s stopping them from being accosted?” asked Samantha Parmley, acting chair of the Utah LGBTQ+ Chamber.

First Lady Jill Biden's political advance team was ridiculed on social media after she appeared to speak at a local high school in Utah, named Hunter High. . . While visiting the Beehive State to attend a fundraiser for President Biden, the first lady stopped by the school in West Valley City, southwest of Salt Lake City, to visit faculty and hear the school choir perform. During her visit, Biden — a former teacher for over 30 years — spoke about the value of education and the importance of educators. (Original picture showed young ladies wearing "Hunter Tennis" and "Hunter...

First lady Jill Biden spoke to teachers and students at a high school in Utah on Tuesday, but the visit came with some unfortunate optics that apparently no one who organized the event considered beforehand. The wife of President Joe Biden paid a visit to a school in West Valley City, a suburb of Salt Lake City. The school chosen was Hunter High School.

RINO Senator Mitt Romney (UT) trashed ‘out of touch’ voters who still support Trump even though ‘a jury found Trump raped a woman.’CNN’s Manu Raju on Wednesday said he asked Mitt Romney about the Iowa caucus entrance polls showing that a “majority of GOP caucusgoers didn’t believe that Joe Biden was elected legitimately.” (snip)“I think a lot of people in this country are out of touch with reality and will accept anything Donald Trump tells them. You had a jury that said that Donald Trump raped a woman. And that doesn’t seem to be moving the needle. There’s a lot...

Newly emerged video footage shows the spine-tingling moment Utah authorities rescued two little girls who were stuffed inside blue water barrels at the site of a bizarre doomsday cult led by their pedophile dads. Police found the confused girls, just 7 and 4, in December 2017 as they shivered inside 50-gallon barrels on sparse property used by the Knights of the Crystal Blade, bodycam footage obtained by the Explore With Us YouTube channel shows. There was also a loaded gun on the ground next to the pair, photos from the scene in Lund show. “I don’t have pants on!” one...

WEST VALLEY CITY — A man was arrested Tuesday after police say he sexually assaulted a young girl who was petting farm animals on the property where he was living.Yelsin Almonacid Canchari, 30, who is originally from Peru, was booked into the Salt Lake County Jail for investigation of rape of a child, sodomy on a child and two counts of forcible sexual abuse.The investigation began on June 18 when a girl, under the age of 13, called 911 from a West Valley gas station to report she had been raped, according to a police booking affidavit. The girl's mother...