Free Republic

Here's a look at what's gone wrong at both chains.. These are tough times for two big US dollar store chains. In the past month, Family Dollar said it will close nearly 1,000 stores and 99 Cents Only said it will go out of business. Both companies said inflation and shoplifting have contributed to their troubles. While inflation has pressured the companies' low-income customer base and shoplifting has squeezed their profits, those factors alone can't explain their difficulties. Years of strategic mistakes and underinvestment have plagued Family Dollar and 99 Cents Only, retail analysts say. Both brands were acquired by...

Now that the presidential primaries are over, one question is on everybody’s lips: Whom will Republicans nominate for vice president? Unfortunately, former President Donald Trump’s campaign hasn’t been cc-ing me on its internal strategy emails, so your guess is as good as mine on that one (although I recommend our recent politics chat for some informed speculation). But I might have an answer for you on when Trump will announce his running mate. Choosing a No. 2 is a big decision — so, unsurprisingly, campaigns tend to take their time making it. Since 1972, when the modern presidential primary era...

ABC legal analyst Sunny Hostin told her co-hosts Monday on “The View” that Republicans were “intentionally dumbing down our electorate” to remain in power. Hostin said, “What we’re seeing by the Republican Party, and I give it to them, we’re seeing a long game. We’re seeing that they are dismantling or attempting to dismantle institutions. All of a sudden, the most elite colleges and universities in the world, which, by the way, they all went to, everybody on the Supreme Court went there, Elise Stefanik went there, all the congresspeople went there, Ted Cruz went there. Those schools are not...

Trump was privately pressing Pence to reject certain votes at the Jan. 6 proceedings and block certification of the election -- and Trump even suggested to Pence that perhaps he should skip the session altogether, Pence allegedly told Smith's team. But, according to sources, Pence told investigators that he "clearly and repeatedly" emphasized to Trump that rejecting certain votes would violate the Constitution. "I told him I thought there was no idea more un-American than the idea that any one person could decide what electoral votes to count," Pence allegedly told Smith's team, echoing what he has said before in...

Donald Trump has claimed that he won all 50 states in the 2020 US election at a Florida event where two of his rivals for the Republican presidential primaries were booed for suggesting the party should dump the former president before his legal woes catch up with him. "We won, the last time, 50 states, think of it, 50 states," he told the Freedom Summit, outside Orlando, Florida, on Saturday night. "We won every state. We then did great in the election. We got 12 million more votes or so … 12 million more votes than we got the first...

ABC legal analyst Sunny Hostin told her co-hosts Monday on “The View” that she thinks “Jesus would be the grand marshal at the Pride parade.” Hostin said, “I keep on wondering if you don’t want to go to a gay club because you don’t like gay people, don’t go to the club. Why do you got to shoot up the club? If you don’t want to be a person married to a gay person, then just don’t get married to a gay person.”

When news hit that former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain died of COVID-19 a month after he attended then-President Donald Trump's rally in Tulsa last summer, many of the president's campaign staffers blamed themselves for his death, according to a new book. "We killed Herman Cain," one senior Trump staffer reportedly told ABC News reporter Will Steakin, who also attended the Tulsa event on June 20, 2020. That's according to an excerpt of ABC News' chief Washington correspondent Jonathan Karl's forthcoming book, "Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show," published in Vanity Fair on Thursday. The book is slated...

With the lowest COVID-19 infection rate among all states as of Friday, California, which has some of the strictest mask and vaccination mandates in the country, has managed to flip the script as the former U.S. epicenter of the pandemic. "They've been very much forward-thinking in terms of policies around vaccination requirements and mandates," said epidemiologist Dr. John Brownstein, chief innovation officer at Boston Children's Hospital and an ABC News contributor. As of Friday evening, California had an infection rate of 61.1 cases per 100,000 over the past week, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention....

The pandemic versus the economy defines the presidential contest in two key battlegrounds, with Florida holding firm to its toss-up status while Joe Biden leads slightly in Pennsylvania in the season's final ABC News/Washington Post polls. There's little change in either state. In Florida, Donald Trump has 50% support among likely voters to Biden's 48%; it was 51%-47% in an ABC/Post poll Sept. 20. Trump won the state by 112,911 votes out of more than 9.4 million cast in 2016. In Pennsylvania, the race stands at 51%-44%, Biden-Trump, a 7-point advantage for the Democrat; that compares with a 9-point margin...

Just hours before the first presidential debate, two polls released Tuesday show Joe Biden with a considerable nine-point lead against Donald Trump in the battleground state of Pennsylvania as a vast majority of nationwide voters say debate performances won’t change their minds about who they’re voting for. A Washington Post/ABC News poll taken September 21-26 shows that 54 per cent of likely voters in the swing state plan to cast their ballot for the Democratic nominee compared to the 45 per cent who say they will vote for the president. At the same time, a national survey from Politico/Morning Consult...

The bombshell claim that ABC News "quashed" a story on allegations against Jeffrey Epstein has drawn new scrutiny on the controversy's ties to its own star anchor, George Stephanopoulos. Project Veritas, whose controversial founder, James O'Keefe, has described himself as a "guerrilla journalist," published the footage that featured ABC News anchor Amy Robach claiming the Disney-owned network refused to air an interview she conducted with one of Epstein’s accusers and even suggesting she'd uncovered new information about Epstein's ties to former President Bill Clinton as his wife, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was running for president. "I've had the...

Jussie Smollett is now officially in the crosshairs of law enforcement, because Chicago PD said he's now "officially classified as a suspect in a criminal investigation ... for filing a false police report." The cops say detectives are currently presenting evidence to a Cook County Grand Jury. If Smollett is charged the felony carries a maximum 3-year prison sentence. We're told the 2 brothers are at the courthouse now and are expected to testify ... most probably today.

The hostility she’s felt from the public recently wasn’t necessarily the last straw in television news photographer Lori Bentley-Law’s decision to quit the business after 24 years, but it was one of them. Bentley-Law’s recent blog post explaining why she was leaving Los Angeles’ KNBC-TV hit home for many colleagues. While President Donald Trump’s attacks on the media are usually centered on national outlets like CNN and The New York Times, the attitudes unleashed have filtered down to journalists on the street covering news in local communities across the country. When a president describes the press as enemies of the...

Darlene to the rescue? Roughly 72 hours after cancelling Roseanne amid controversy, ABC is looking to possibly keep the franchise alive with a spinoff centered on Sara Gilbert’s acid-tongued single mom, TVLine has confirmed. The standalone Darlene series was one of five offshoots proposed by TVLine in the wake of Roseanne‘s spectacular fall on Tuesday. ABC could not be reached for comment. It was three days ago that ABC announced it was scrapping the series’ already-greenlit 11th season after its titular star Roseanne Barr tweeted a racist “joke” about Obama advisor Valerie Jarrett. In announcing the cancellation, ABC president Channing...

Attorney General Jeff Sessions today announced a plan to rescind the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA, which defers deportation for undocumented immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children. Here's a look at who makes up the 799,077 immigrants protected under the program:

What is it about ABC, MSNBC, CBS News and of course CNN that makes them think they can get away with fake news? This is the internet age, creating fake news by openly lying and editing interviews to make a fake point against Trump is not going to work any longer. The people have had it. Time to call upon Trump to call fora nationwide boycott of the fake news industry. They want to play, we can too. Time to hit back.

Wither the Tea Party? A major force in the 2010 midterm elections, the movement has stalled in public popularity, its support well below a majority and decidedly lukewarm. And Americans by a broad 23-point margin say the more they hear about the Tea Party movement, the less they like it, rather than liking it more. That negative buzz has worsened from a 9-point gap in an ABC News/Washington Post poll as the movement was gathering speed two years ago. And its avenues for resurgence may be limited: Interest in learning more about Tea Party is down 7 points from spring...