Free Republic

As election officials across the country brace for the possibility of federal agents descending on polling sites in November, a nationwide coalition of Democratic district attorneys has vowed to prosecute any federal agent suspected of intimidating voters. The announcement, first reported by Politico, comes shortly after President Donald Trump refused to rule out sending U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to election sites during the midterms. “I’d do anything necessary to make sure we have honest elections,” Trump told reporters earlier this month. The coalition includes prosecutors from Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Dallas and Northern Virginia, among other jurisdictions. “We’re ready to...

A judge declared Cook County Board of Review Commissioner Samantha Steele not guilty of driving under the influence late Tuesday morning. While Cook County prosecutors established a “suspicion” of impairment, Judge Donald Suriano said they failed to definitively prove Steele was under the influence of alcohol when she crashed a friend’s car into two parked vehicles along Ashland Avenue in November 2024. Steele refused a field sobriety test and a blood draw that night, and did not show “obvious signs of impairment,” Suriano said, noting the bottle of wine in her front passenger seat was corked and sealed within a...

TOTALLY CLUELESS........... 0:22 VIDEO AT LINK...........

At least five officers were struck by a driver during a “teen takeover” event early Sunday in Chicago’s West Side, only the latest in the viral trend hitting American streets. Elsewhere, 19 people were shot and wounded on Memorial Day in the Windy City. Hundreds of teenagers gathered at around 3:20 a.m. along Chicago’s South Loomis Street, shutting the street down as officers responded to disperse the chaos. As officers tried to end the takeover, an 18-year-old driver hit five cops before driving over the curb and crashing into a CPD squad car, a pole, and a fence, local ABC...

Heart-stopping footage captured the moment a plane smashed through a paraglider’s canopy midair, sending a woman spiraling through the sky screaming before she miraculously landed safely on the ground. The paraglider, a 44-year-old woman named Sabrina, posted footage of her flying near the scenic Schmittenhöhe mountain in northern Austria Saturday afternoon when a small sightseeing plane suddenly plows right through her rig — just feet above her head.

Another MAGA victory took place earlier this week, but this one has flown under the radar a little bit. Lee County, Alabama, home of Auburn University, has had the same sheriff since before the turn of the 21st Century. But on Tuesday night, Jay Jones was narrowly defeated, largely because he would not participate in basic illegal immigration enforcement. Here's AL.com on the race: A former Lee County deputy that was fired after deciding to run to become sheriff will now unseat the person that terminated him. Cameron Hunt was elected to become Lee County's next sheriff Tuesday narrowly beating...

California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) declared a state of emergency on Saturday evening as experts warned that the chemical tank that is overheating in Orange County could explode. 40,000 residents in Orange County, California, were evacuated on Friday amid a chemical leak at an aerospace facility. On Thursday, a valve overheated on a 34,000-gallon tank used to make plastics. Authorities said the tank, located in Garden Grove, could either explode or spill thousands of gallons of toxic chemicals. Several evacuation centers were opened; however, many residents are still refusing to leave their homes. On Friday evening, Orange County Fire Authority...

A tiny home project in Watsonville is giving people experiencing homelessness both housing and hope for a better future. For Rosie Lopez, Hope Village, as it’s called, saved her life. “Because I had just lost my brother, you know, and I was contemplating suicide and I've been homeless for almost five years, and I was really at my worst,” Lopez said. Hope Village is a navigation center for people experiencing homelessness on both sides of the Pajaro River. The 34-bed center celebrated its grand opening this week. “Most folks, they're not looking for a handout. They really want an opportunity...

Charlotte Heimann, a 27-year-old mother with ties to Clermont County, Ohio, disappeared on Oct. 30, 1981, after leaving the Rochester Psychiatric Center in New York. More than four decades later, her granddaughter, Shyla Jump, is working to uncover what happened. "I didn’t actually know the story behind it. I didn’t actually know my grandmother. I didn’t know who she was until now," Jump said. Charlotte left her 4-year-old daughter, Jump’s mother, with her own mother in Ohio while she moved to New York to be closer to her father and attend Monroe College. Records and family accounts describe Charlotte's struggles...

The Obama Presidential Center’s grand opening next month will bring major road closures, Secret Service security and a massive public watch party to Hyde Park and Woodlawn, foundation officials said Monday. **SNIP** While the audience expressed excitement for much of the evening, the center’s impact on free street parking drew the loudest criticisms. Ronnissa Laster, a longtime Woodlawn resident and avowed Obama supporter, said living near the construction site for years had been “terrible” for parking and worried that the opening would make things worse. Yancy, whose ward encompasses the center, acknowledged the difficulties the center had created, telling the...

Millions of Americans will spend Memorial Day weekend honoring those who died while serving in the US military — but California congressional candidate Mai Vang likely will not be one of them. The lefty Sacramento city councilmember has boasted about refusing to say the Pledge of Allegiance at public meetings and ceremonies — and routinely turned her back on the flag. Vang, who is attempting to unseat longtime Democratic Rep. Doris Matsui in the June primary election, is currently polling neck-and-neck with the incumbent and slightly ahead of Republican Zachariah Wooden. But the potential of an anti-American congressmember isn’t sitting...

A former Detroit doctor pleaded guilty this week to receipt of child pornography after an FBI investigation revealed a string of sicko phone messages. Lincoln Erickson, 32, was arrested Dec. 10 after the feds discovered he was part of a larger child pornography and sexual abuse ring, US Attorney Jerome F. Gorgon Jr. announced. “I love being a pedo,” Erickson wrote in one vile message, according to Click on Detroit. “Bro, I love other pedophiles. So hot,” the former medical resident, who worked at Detroit Medical Center’s Rehabilitation Institute of Michigan, wrote in Telegram messages, according to the outlet. Erickson’s...

A notorious New York mobster became a target of the federal government after Marilyn Monroe allegedly called out his name during an encounter with Robert F. Kennedy, his son claimed. Appearing on the “Hang Out with Sean Hannity” podcast, former Colombo crime family captain Michael Franzese detailed a bombshell account passed down by his late father, underboss John “Sonny” Franzese. Franzese said Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy ordered FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to target Franzese’s father after Marilyn Monroe allegedly mentioned the mobster during an intimate encounter with Kennedy. Franzese said his father claimed he had an affair with...

Fire officials have released a clear and haunting view of what damage could look like if the toxic Garden Grove tank explodes, with its temperature increasing with each passing hour. OCFA Division Chief Nick Freeman said Friday that blast zones would be divided into severe, moderate, and light blast zones in a radius around the tank. The most severe blast zone will cause “severe structural damage and significant harm,” while the moderate zone will see structural damage and some harm. The lightest zone will see just some structural damage. In addition, an oblong circle above the tank is divided into...

When it comes to policing New York’s sprawling Medicaid program, Attorney General Letitia James has some explaining to do. As AG, James runs the state’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, which is charged with prosecuting those who rip off the taxpayer-funded program or neglect and abuse its vulnerable patients. It ought to be a busy place, considering New York spends far more per capita on Medicaid than any other state. Yet on her watch the unit has been posting metrics that range from lackluster to surprisingly low, especially when measured against the scale of a $119 billion social program. **SNIP** As...

The reclusive and disgraced Eric Swalwell has paid a law firm more than $313,000 so far to fend off his sexual misconduct claims, according to a recent campaign finance disclosure. In his most recent disclosure spanning from April 19 to May 16, Swalwell’s campaign paid Sara Azari’s New York law firm in two separate payments of $250,000 and $23,251, totaling $273,251, for “campaign legal compliance.” The payments came after he had already given her $40,000 to defend him publicly. Swalwell, who dropped out of the gubernatorial race and resigned his seat in Congress due to the claims, has been quiet...

A former Democratic megadonor blasted his party’s newly released election autopsy, arguing the party doesn't need a lengthy report to understand why voters rejected them. John Morgan, who has previously given over a million dollars to the Democratic Party, revealed he didn’t give "a penny" to the 2024 campaign once Vice President Kamala Harris took the helm. Speaking on "Jesse Watters Primetime," Morgan argued the DNC’s post-mortem report misses the mark, failing to address the party’s decision to embrace certain progressive social issues. "I don't know what they spent on this autopsy, but they could have given me nothing and...

President Donald Trump is championing the prospect of putting the kibosh on twice-annual clock changes by making daylight saving time permanent. A bill to make daylight saving time permanent has been folded into a larger measure that the House Energy and Commerce Committee advanced in a 48-1 vote on Thursday. "Big Vote today (48-1!) in the Energy and Commerce Committee on a Bill including The Sunshine Protection Act, which will be making Daylight Saving Time Permanent! This is so important in that Hundreds of Millions of Dollars are spent every year by people, Cities, and States, being forced to change...

"A French court on Wednesday delivered a dramatic verdict against Airbus and Air ‌France over France's worst air disaster, ruling that both companies were guilty of corporate manslaughter in the 2009 Rio-Paris plane crash off Brazil....." [snip]

TRINIDAD, Texas - A Facebook post about problems with the city of Trinidad's water quality led to the arrest of a resident, who now says she's filed a lawsuit against the city for what she calls a "political retaliation" arrest. What we know: Police in the City of Trinidad, located in Henderson County around an hour south-east of Dallas, arrested Jennifer Combs on May 8 and charged her with felony false alarm or report. Her arrest stems from a Facebook post she made on her ‘Southern Belle Watch' account, where she claimed that the city's water issues had led to...