A Day in the Life of the Universe

vdB 141

2026-10-30T13:02:16.605-07:00

Spooky shapes seem to haunt this dusty expanse, drifting through the night in the royal constellation Cepheus. Of course, the shapes are cosmic dust clouds visible in dimly reflected starlight. Far from your own neighborhood, they lurk above the plane of the Milky Way at the edge of the Cepheus Flare molecular cloud complex some 1,200 light-years away. Over 2 light-years across and brighter than most of the other ghostly apparitions, vdB 141 or Sh2-136 is also known as the Ghost Nebula. It lies at lower right in the starry field of view. Inside the Ghost Nebula are reddish telltale signs of dense cores collapsing in the early stages of star formation. With the eerie hue of interstellar dust reflecting bluish light from hot young stars of NGC 7023, the Iris Nebula stands out against the dark just left of center. In the broad telescopic frame, these fertile interstellar dust fields stretch almost six full moons across the sky.

Like to spoiled little turd he is...........

2026-10-30T12:57:25.327-07:00

Trump fumed at coverage of rally cancellations before ordering the events back on

By Kevin Liptak, Kaitlan Collins, Adam Cancryn, Alayna Treene

Flying on Thursday to South Carolina to headline his 25th midterm rally this month, President Donald Trump and his political team made a decision, according to one of his advisers: Instead of holding an in-person rally this weekend in Kansas — a red state where Republicans appear vulnerable — Trump would deliver his closing argument there over the telephone.

A few hours later, another weekend rally in Iowa was similarly scrapped. It was a dramatic and sudden shift in the president’s closing-stretch strategy, which had relied on boosting enthusiasm among his base through an exhausting blitz of conservative districts.

When Trump returned from South Carolina, he told reporters he didn’t “feel I have to go to Kansas” because GOP Sen. Roger Marshall was “doing really well.”

The decision relieved some political operatives on the ground, who were happy to hear Trump would be engaging in telerallies that tend to be more scripted.

“Thank God,” one top Republican official told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid alienating the White House. “He hasn’t moved the needle anywhere.”

Less than 24 hours later, the plans changed again. The rallies in Kansas and Iowa were back on, both now scheduled for Sunday. And the frenetic pace that White House officials had signaled was abruptly ending was now ramping back up.

Officials said the schedule had merely been rearranged to allow more time for Trump to dial into virtual events. But people familiar with the matter described different motivations to CNN.

After signing off on the changes, Trump had grown irked over the media coverage about his decision to cancel his final rallies, those people said. His irritation was apparent when he returned from South Carolina and lashed out at a reporter who questioned why he called off the events.

“You’ve been following me for two weeks. I feel perfect,” Trump said when asked how he was feeling and whether he was sick of campaigning. The reporter who asked, Trump seethed, looked “like hell.”

The president demanded the rallies be reinstated, the people familiar said, sending staff who had just worked to pull the events off the calendar scrambling to put them back on.

“Rallies are BACK ON!” read a statement confirming the change.

The episode only underscored how heavily Republicans’ midterm prospects have relied on Trump’s personal whims, from endorsements of his preferred candidates — some of whom are now struggling — to his signature rallies, which regularly veer away from the issues and talking points many candidates have tried to highlight.

Even some Republican candidates have scrambled to keep up.

“I think that I’m doing so well in the polls that he’s got, probably got better places to spend his time,” Marshall told reporters after news of the Kansas cancellation emerged Thursday.

Trump advisers insist the president remains a sought-after presence on the campaign trail, and his political team continues to field calls from GOP campaigns asking if he would visit their states in the sprint to Tuesday’s elections, one adviser told CNN.

That was what Trump officials argued was the original rationale for canceling his events this weekend: by skipping in-person events, Trump could maximize his time conducting telerallies for candidates across multiple states. Multiple sources familiar with the planning did not contradict that rationale.

By Thursday evening, Trump’s super PAC, MAGA Inc., had announced the president would headline virtual events in 19 states intended to “energize voters, drive turnout, and help deliver victories.”

The switch to virtual events was not unwelcome in some Republican corners. In the 21-hour stretch of time that the in-person events were canceled, several GOP operatives in battleground states quietly expressed a sigh of relief that the Trump roadshow would no longer be coming to their states.

Many pointed out that Trump is less likely during telerallies to meander into the obscure topics that now consume major chunks of his rallies: the cognitive tests he claims to have aced, the White House ballroom, the bodies of various Republican men.

One Republican official said the Trump rallies were too time-consuming during a peak period when GOP activists would otherwise be door-knocking, canvassing and doing other get-out-the-vote activities.

Trump has pressed his aides at times to schedule more travel in the campaign’s closing weeks, people who have spoken with him said, invigorated by the adoring crowds he’s encountered in deep-red districts and encouraged by friends and advisers who have told him his presence is directly boosting Republican enthusiasm.

Yet at other moments during the monthlong barnstorming, those people said, he’s bemoaned the breakneck nature of a tour that has taken him to a new town nearly every day — oftentimes to rally voters in college arenas or civic centers that appear downright miniature compared with the sold-out stadiums he played during his own campaigns. Trump has also griped privately, and increasingly in public, about how hard he’s having to work down the stretch for a campaign that’s not his own.

“I have to tell you a little secret,” Trump said during an October 23 rally in a Florida arena that sat fewer than 5,000 people. “Outside, there’s a crowd about two or three times this size, and I looked at my people with anger. I said, couldn’t you have gotten us a larger arena than this?”

Later, as Trump boasted about the economy, he joked that he was “wasting my time” with the speeches and should just go home and let his accomplishments speak for themselves — a bit that he repeated at subsequent rallies.

The president has visited nearly every state on the Senate battleground map aside from Maine — many more than once. The initial White House decision to cancel the weekend Midwest appearances caused tremendous buzz, but few complaints among party stalwarts.

“Everyone has seen the president who wants to see him,” the second GOP official said.

Trump will travel Friday to Daytona Beach, Florida, for a rally with Republican candidates for Senate and governor, and he is expected to spend part of the weekend at Mar-a-Lago, where an annual Halloween party is planned.

Including Sunday’s events, Trump will have headlined 28 rallies since the start of October. Even he has acknowledged the schedule is a grind and that it has taken a toll on his voice.

“I don’t need to do this. But I have to because if (Democrats) win the midterms, all of a sudden you’re gonna see a slide and all of the crap that we talk about,” he told a crowd in Kentucky this month. “That’s why I’m here working my ass off for you.”

In a fiery hearing.........

2026-10-30T12:54:16.285-07:00

Judge tears into senior DOJ official and orders investigation into Trump’s golf course plans

By John Fritze, Katelyn Polantz

A federal judge opened a formal investigation Friday into whether Justice Department attorneys and others within the Trump administration misrepresented the president’s plans to renovate a golf course in Washington, DC, ratcheting up a dramatic showdown between the White House and the courts.

In a fiery hearing that lasted nearly three hours, US District Judge Ana C. Reyes pressed Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward on whether the administration had tried to evade the court’s review, including by offering a last-minute notice before felling hundreds of trees at East Potomac Golf Course and by insisting there was no formal plan to renovate the course despite President Donald Trump’s repeated insistence he was moving ahead.

“Let’s not play games anymore, Mr. Woodward,” Reyes, a nominee of former President Joe Biden, said as the third-highest ranking official at the Justice Department stood at the lectern, his hands locked together behind his back.

Highlighting the split priorities of the White House, Woodward appeared at the hearing despite the fact he’s also leading the DOJ’s efforts on the midterm elections, including its unprecedented lawsuit seeking to halt certification in the Alaska Senate race if the GOP incumbent doesn’t win.

At one point, Woodward attempted to explain that he had “endeavored to answer the court’s questions as honestly and effectively as I can” and launched into an argument about why he felt the judge’s questions weren’t relevant to the legal questions in the case.

“Are you done?” Reyes fired back. “Can you answer my question now?”

In a signal of how the hearing would unfold, Reyes took the bench and began reading from the professional conduct rules for lawyers practicing in Washington, eyeing Woodward directly as she stressed lines concerning making factual assertions in court. The not-subtle implication was that Woodward or other attorneys involved with the case could be sanctioned.

A brutal back-and-forth developed from there, with Reyes leaning into Woodward about how the Justice Department had handled the case. The inquiry, which will likely be handled by a special master appointed by the court, could lead to sanctions. Reyes stressed that she was not finding that DOJ lawyers had misrepresented anything, only that she intended to consider that possibility.

The remarkable exchange underscored that the case was less about the golf course itself, which Trump has said he intends to renovate into a “world class” facility, and more about how the administration has represented itself in court following a challenge from preservationists and golfers who want to keep the course as it is.

Woodward was caught between the judge’s blistering ire and the president, who has frequently taken to social media to claim that the golf course project would begin “immediately” and attack Reyes as a “crazed lunatic.”

Reyes had already blocked further tree removal at the course in a scathing 70-page opinion earlier this week, and she required the Interior Department to notify the court before making any other irreparable changes to the site. That decision is being appealed.

There was audible laughter in the courtroom and snickers as Woodward seemed to try to take back words he had just spoken.

At one point, he seemed to suggest that the sudden removal of more than 400 trees on October 10 was part of a broader plan to update the course — a position the administration had previously denied. At times, Reyes turned to the transcript to read back comments Woodward had made only seconds earlier.

“Are you kidding me right now?” Reyes said.

Reyes has previously expressed deep skepticism that the tree removal was separate from Trump’s stated desire to renovate the course, even though the new course would have a significant reduction in trees.

The judge also ordered the attorneys to retain any documents related to the case.

Flaying...

2026-10-30T12:51:26.550-07:00

"Do whatever you have to do." Trump urges mail-in voting in deep-red Montana

By Andrew Kaczynski

President Donald Trump, who has spent years railing against mail-in voting — falsely claiming it undermines the integrity of elections and invites massive fraud — is now urging voters in deep-red Montana to mail in their votes.

“Early voting is underway,” Trump told participants in a MAGA Inc. get-out-the-vote telephone rally, in which voters received automated calls inviting them to stay on the line or press 1 to join a call from the president. “If you have your mail-in ballot, walk in and do whatever you have to do, or you can show up on November 3rd.”

The call, which CNN obtained from the robocall- and text-blocking application Nomorobo, featured Trump alongside Republican US Senate candidate Kurt Alme and congressional candidate Aaron Flint.

Trump carried Montana in 2024 with approximately 58% of the vote, defeating Kamala Harris by nearly 20 percentage points in a race that also saw longtime Sen. Jon Tester ousted.

Just in..........

2026-10-30T12:50:05.590-07:00

Appeals court rejects DOJ lawsuit targeting thousands of California ballots

By Tierney Sneed

A federal appeals court has again rejected a Justice Department demand that election officials set aside ballots from 20,000 people the administration claims, using a controversial data matching program, could be noncitizens.

The vote count was 2-1.

California is one of several Democratic-led states that have been targeted with claims from the administration that election officials have not done enough to take non-citizens off the voter rolls, as Republicans prepare for an election that expected to cost them control of at least one chamber of Congress.

DOJ has also threatened criminal prosecutions of election administrators and recently sent grand jury subpoenas to officials in California.

Several courts now are scrutinizing the process the Department of Homeland Security went through to assemble lists of non-citizens they say are registered to vote in California and other states.

Local officials who have had a chance to begin analyzing the names say that the lists include people who are not registered to vote in their jurisdiction, have had their registrations suspended, or who have indicators in their records of being citizens.

California also argues it’s far too late in the election cycle, with ballots having gone out nearly a month ago to be upending its election procedures. Even if it wasn’t, California says there is no federal law or Constitutional authority giving the administration the right to ask for the court order it is seeking.

Emergency hearing

2026-10-30T12:49:30.901-07:00

Judge to hold emergency hearing on Trump administration's alleged noncitizens voter lists

By Katelyn Polantz

A federal judge in Washington, DC, will hold an emergency hearing on Saturday about whether the courts should block the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security from attempting to flesh out lists of possible noncitizens on some states voter rolls.

The emergency hearing, set by Judge Tanya Chutkan on Friday, comes as the Justice Department has lodged complaints with Washington state and California about how they are managing their voter rolls. In California, the DOJ is suing to try to set aside 20,000 ballots so those voters can be vetted for their citizenship, but a judge there has refused, saying it would disenfranchise voters.

The lawsuit in Washington, DC, before Chutkan builds on those arguments, saying the federal government’s compilation of lists this year of possible noncitizens on state voting rolls are unreliable, and creates an “illegal policy trying to dictate who gets to vote.”

“Defendants’ Voter Data Transmission Policy is a flagrant power grab that will, unless enjoined, upend the states’ authority to run elections and disenfranchise untold numbers of eligible voters across the country,” lawyers for the League of Women Voters and other groups wrote to the judge yesterday.

Chutkan is most known for being the presiding judge two years ago on the criminal indictment against President Donald Trump when he was accused of inciting the Capitol riot in 2021 as an attempt to overturn the presidential election results and stay in office. The case was dismissed by the Justice Department after Trump won the presidency again in 2024.

Supreme Court may be next stop

2026-10-30T12:49:00.214-07:00

Supreme Court may be next stop in DOJ's lawsuit targeting ballots of 20,000 Californians

By Tierney Sneed

The 2-1 appeals court ruling against a Justice Department lawsuit targeting the counting of ballots for potentially thousands of voters in California sets up the possibility that President Donald Trump will now go to the US Supreme Court.

The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals said that the administration does not have the legal right to second-guess how the state was verifying voters’ citizenship status. The majority pointed to the Constitution’s Election Clause, which says states are in charge running elections while giving Congress the option to pass regulations.

“Because Congress has not exercised the specific power granted to it under the Elections Clause to override California’s established laws for challenging ballots or removing ineligible voters, the State Legislature’s statutory scheme remains the only method to do so,” the majority opinion, issued by Judge Mark J. Bennett, a Trump appointee, and Gabriel P. Sanchez, a Joe Biden appointee, said.

The majority’s ruling also pointed to a Supreme Court legal doctrine regarding federal court rulings that would create chaos in elections when voting is near or already underway.

In the case, DOJ is demanding that California officials not count any ballot that comes in from individuals on a list of 20,000 people until the individual’s citizenship status is confirmed.

“Major concerns remain that granting the United States’s requested relief might result in immense hardship to Defendants and harm the public interest by risking the disenfranchisement of eligible voters and putting the entire tabulation process in jeopardy,” the majority wrote.

Judge Patrick J. Bumatay dissented. He wrote that the Justice Department’s request was “a modest remedy—stopping California from mixing the ballots of citizens and suspected noncitizens.”

“California decided long ago that aliens can’t vote in its elections,” he wrote. “Today, the federal government merely seeks to safeguard that decision. We should have let them try.”

Pushing suspected Russian disinformation

2026-10-30T12:48:15.815-07:00

X suspends 15 accounts pushing suspected Russian disinformation about the midterms

By Marshall Cohen

The social media platform X has suspended more than a dozen accounts promoting suspected Russian disinformation about the midterms, though some influential accounts are still active, a disinformation watchdog says.

Russian interference in the 2026 midterms has been limited so far, experts say. But they’ve noticed a recent spike from suspected Russian-connected accounts on social media, pushing false claims about multiple Democratic candidates running for Senate.

Disinformation experts said the suspensions on X, formerly Twitter, occurred Thursday and included some accounts with over 100,000 followers. But many of the most influential accounts peddling the disinformation were still online as of Friday.

“X has shown that they have a beat on this, to some degree,” said Bret Schafer, senior director at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, which flagged the suspensions. “A lot of the covert Russian posts that we’ve seen go up have been taken down quickly. But other parts of the infrastructure have been left up.”

The online activity is similar to past disinformation efforts during the 2024 election cycle that US intelligence agencies believe were linked to Russian government operatives.

CNN has reached out to X seeking comment about the takedowns.

$36 million for eleventh-hour push

2026-10-30T12:47:41.847-07:00

Bloomberg gives Democrats another $36 million for eleventh-hour push

By David Wright

Michael Bloomberg, the billionaire former New York City mayor, has now given at least $116 million to support Democrats in the midterms, after an eleventh-hour surge of more campaign cash.

Bloomberg gave a $36 million to Democrats this week, amid growing optimism within the party about its prospects in next Tuesday’s election. That’s on top of $80 million he had already given, which his team detailed last week.

New contributions went to House Majority PAC, the principal Democratic super PAC focused on House races, which received $16 million. Bloomberg also put $12 million more into his own group, Everytown For Gun Safety, which, alongside HMP, has been a major player in several battleground districts, including in Iowa, Michigan and Florida.

In addition, the liberal billionaire sent $2.5 million to Keisha Lance Bottoms, the Democratic gubernatorial nominee in Georgia; $750,000 to Gina Hinojosa, the party’s Texas gubernatorial nominee; $2.5 million to James Talarico, the Texas Democratic Senate nominee; and $2.5 million to Adam Hamilton, the Democratic Senate nominee in Kansas.

Bloomberg’s cash infusion helps Democrats least partially offset the avalanche of outside spending funded by GOP megadonor Elon Musk, who has accounted for more than $446 million in political giving this cycle, becoming one of the largest donors in US political history.

DC golf course dispute

2026-10-30T12:47:03.801-07:00

DOJ lawyer behind Alaska ballots case faces inquiry in DC golf course dispute

By John Fritze

A top Justice Department official who is a leading force behind an effort to halt certification in Alaska’s Senate race if the GOP doesn’t win endured a brutal hearing Friday in which a federal judge opened an investigation into whether he misrepresented the president’s plans to renovate a golf course.

In a fiery hearing that lasted nearly three hours in Washington, DC, US District Judge Ana C. Reyes pressed Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward on whether the administration had tried to evade the court’s review, including by offering only a last-minute notice to the court before felling hundreds of trees at East Potomac Golf Course earlier this month.

“Let’s not play games anymore, Mr. Woodward,” Reyes, a nominee of former President Joe Biden, told the third-highest-ranking official at the Justice Department.

Now Woodward will have to pivot back to the Alaska case, where the Justice Department has filed a placeholder civil case to challenge the results of an election in which Democrats allegedly recruited a candidate with the same name as the Republican incumbent, Daniel Sullivan, to siphon away votes. The department has also accelerated a criminal probe into that effort.

A federal judge in the civil case ordered DOJ to file new paperwork in that case later Friday.

Transfers funds

2026-10-30T12:46:33.784-07:00

Ocasio-Cortez transfers funds to Democratic Senate hopefuls in Maine, Alaska and Florida

David Wright

New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez transferred a total of $450,000 to Democratic Senate candidates in Maine, Alaska and Florida this week, giving a boost to her party in a series of key races.

According to AOC’s team, she transferred $150,000 to Troy Jackson in Maine, $150,000 to Mary Peltola in Alaska, and $150,000 Angie Nixon in Florida.

It’s the latest instance of influence building from the progressive icon, whose national prominence has made her both a fixture of GOP attack ads and a frequent subject of presidential speculation.

Earlier this month, AOC also transferred $1 million to the campaign of Abdul El-Sayed, the party’s Democratic Senate nominee. And she’s hit the campaign trail for Democrats across the country, including in Michigan, Maine and Florida.

Ocasio-Cortez’s most recent report to the Federal Election Commission showed her with more than $17.5 million on hand as of mid-October – a sizable cash reserve for a popular Democrat in a safe House district.

And those funds would be directly transferrable to any other campaign for federal office, including a run for US Senate in 2028, or even a White House campaign.

Trump's rescheduled rallies

2026-10-30T12:45:56.619-07:00

Details released for Trump's rescheduled rallies in Iowa and Kansas on Sunday

By Kit Maher

President Donald Trump’s rescheduled red-state rallies will be held on Sunday in Dubuque, Iowa, and Salina, Kansas, officials announced today.

Trump heads first to Dubuque for remarks at 2 p.m. central time, 3 p.m. eastern time at the Five Flags Events Center.

He then heads to Salina for an evening rally, which starts at 6 p.m. central time, 7 p.m. eastern time at the Salina Regional Airport Hangar.

The president’s cancelling and re-scheduling of campaign events in the final days before the midterm has raised questions about his strategy to help propel GOP candidates to victory.

Yesterday, Trump told reporters that he wasn’t traveling to Kansas anymore because GOP Sen. Roger Marshall was “doing very well,” and instead planned to do several telerallies. He later canceled a planned Iowa appearance, too.

But less than 24 hours later, sources told CNN events in both states were back on. Officials said the schedule had merely been rearranged to allow more time for Trump to dial into virtual events. But people familiar with the matter said Trump grew irked over the media coverage about his decision to cancel his final rallies and demanded they be reinstated.

Trump–Putin Story

2026-10-30T09:27:09.423-07:00

What’s MIA in the Trump–Putin Story

And how the mainstream media continues to tell only part of the tale.

David Corn

A version of the below article first appeared in David Corn’s newsletter, Our Land. The newsletter comes out twice a week (most of the time) and provides behind-the-scenes stories and articles about politics, media, and culture. Subscribing costs just $5 a month—but you can sign up for a free 30-day trial.

As an adult, I have had two recurring dreams for decades. The first is that I must return to college to complete my studies and earn a diploma. (I left school a semester shy of graduating but ended up taking courses elsewhere, transferring the credits, and snagging that sheepskin.) The second is that I appear on an episode of Saturday Night Live and—most important—attend the afterparty. There’s not much I can do to address the anxiety of unfinished business underlying the college dream. As for the second, I say it’s never too late. And the closest I’ve come to realizing that dream occurred earlier this week when I was a guest on The Daily Show.

Jon Stewart invited me on to discuss my new book, How Russia Won: Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and the Fight for America, and the latest news about Trump, Putin, and the war in Ukraine. I’ve never had such an entertaining and amusing chat about a profound threat to American democracy and global order. Stewart was a generous host, allowing me plenty of time and opportunity to respond to his smart questions and sharing the laughs. The crowd was supportive.

At one point, Stewart posed an intriguing query. After I noted that Trump was now consummating his “man crush” on Putin, he asked whether it was possible Trump was pursuing the theory that it would be good for the United States, in terms of stability and prosperity, if the world were divided into spheres of influence dominated, respectively, by Russia, China, and the United States. I countered that Stewart was giving Trump too much credit. He replied that there’s “a first time for everything.” The audience laughed. He added, “He was very good on The Apprentice.” Stewart then remarked that he believes a line from Peaky Blinders explains Trump’s view of the world: “Big fucks small.” That became a tagline for the rest of the interview.

Stewart displayed a firm grasp of the big story of Trump’s yearslong infatuation with Putin and what it might mean for the rest of us. But even as Trump’s recent full-throttle embrace of Putin and his abandonment of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy have become headline news these past two weeks, much media coverage still lacks the full context of what’s occurring—that this is the triumph of Putin’s decadelong shadow war against the United States (which I detail in the book).

A few hours before The Daily Show taping, I appeared on Nicolle Wallace’s MS Now show to discuss Trump’s capitulation to Putin, and she asked me, “Why do you think people can’t get their brain” around the complete tale of Putin’s assault on the United States and Trump’s complicity? I answered: “The fact of Russia intervening in our democracy—which [Putin] did in 2016, 2020, 2024, and he’s doing right now…may be too tough a truth for people to get ahold of.”

I explained that Trump has succeeded in the messaging war:

I will give him credit: This whole messaging, that this is all BS, it’s all a hoax, a witch hunt. If the Democrats are not pushing this issue—and they stopped after the Mueller report—he’s had a wide-open field for seven years now to try to discredit this story. Some reporters, politicians, and others think it’s the past. If you write a book like I did, then you’re obsessed with it, you’re looking backwards. Those are the kinds of criticism I get from the MAGA right. But I did the book because I think it’s a major part of the Trump story that hasn’t been fully presented as a coherent narrative.

In the following days, I realized that even though Trump’s recent accommodation to Putin—the diesel deal, his absurd defense of Russia’s actions in Ukraine, his shocking denunciation and abandonment of Zelenskyy and Ukraine—was drawing much media notice, the overall story of Trump and Russia was still not being conveyed. As Wallace might say, brains still were not wrapping around it.

Two striking examples of this were major analyses of the recent developments by a pair of top New York Times reporters. David Sanger, the White House and national security correspondent (with whom I went to high school in White Plains, New York), wrote a smart piece, noting: “Trump’s intensifying effort in the past few weeks to rehabilitate Russia and usher President Vladimir V. Putin back into diplomatic society is remarkable for its speed, its characterization of Mr. Zelensky as the primary obstacle to peace, and its brazen denial that Russia is continuing the war that Mr. Trump says he is trying to end.”

There’s no sense of history or of the overarching narrative in those New York Times analyses. They sharply capture the moment. But they do not place it in full context.

Correspondent Valerie Hopkins sagely noted: “Mr. Trump has set aside years of U.S. foreign policy by openly embracing Mr. Putin and easing the economic pressure on the Kremlin. At the same time, Mr. Trump has vilified President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, the putative American ally trying to defend his nation against a Russian invasion.” She pointed out, “Putin has never been so close to his goal of normalizing relations with Washington without having to make any compromises on Ukraine.”

These were solid and perceptive takes. But neither mentioned that Russia attacked the 2016 election to help Trump win the White House.

Or that Trump aided and abetted that attack by accepting and echoing Putin’s false denials. Or that in subsequent elections, Putin, as part of his ongoing twilight war against the United States and the West, continued to mount disinformation and influence operations for Trump’s benefit. Or that Trump has never acknowledged this gray-zone warfare and has thus been complicit in this assault waged by a foreign adversary on the US. Or that Trump, during his second stint in the White House, has run his own disinformation operation that releases formerly classified information that he and his minions falsely claim shows that there was no Russian assault in 2016. Or that Putin is currently meddling in the midterm elections by having his disinformation operators spread fake videos pushing scurrilous allegations against Democratic candidates. (See here and here.)

What’s now happening is both the culmination of Putin’s long-term operation to weaken the United States and the West, and the fulfillment of Trump’s yearslong craving to forge a bond with Putin—a yearning Putin has exploited.

There’s no sense of history or of the overarching narrative in those New York Times analyses. They sharply capture the moment. But they do not place it in full context. What’s now happening is both the culmination of Putin’s long-term operation to weaken the United States and the West, which is part of his grand scheme to restore the Russian/Soviet empire, and the fulfillment of Trump’s yearslong craving to forge a bond with Putin—a yearning Putin has exploited. The Russian tyrant has been scheming for over a decade to accomplish this. And for that same stretch, Trump has betrayed the nation by repeatedly covering for Putin and declaring all talk of Russia’s hybrid warfare against the US is a Deep State conspiracy.

The Russians get this. “Well done, Trump,” one of Putin’s pundits proclaimed on state-controlled television. “Today, he’s on our side!” And in her article, Hopkins quotes pro-Putin journalist Marina Akhmedova: “In my personal view, victory has already been achieved.”

The title of my book seems a reasonable appraisal these days. But that’s because it’s attached to a thorough telling of what has led to Trump’s surrender to Putin. Even though there’s much shock and anger over Trump’s appeasement of and submission to the dictator he once asked to be his “new best friend,” perhaps a bigger outrage is that for 10 years, Putin’s operation and Trump’s collaboration occurred in plain sight and the media and political world for most of this time have neglected or ignored this story. And that’s still happening today.

I’m talking to voters right now so I have to run away and hide...

2026-10-30T09:24:56.260-07:00

I Just Confronted Vivek Ramaswamy About His Controversial Ad

Does he believe his opponent Amy Acton lied about her childhood rape?

Abby Vesoulis

At the conclusion of a crowded campaign event at K’s Hamburger Shop in Troy, Ohio, on Thursday, I approached the state’s Republican nominee for governor, Vivek Ramaswamy, with a simple question.

“Do you think Dr. Acton lied about being raped?” I asked him.

It’s not something I ever thought I’d have to ask a politician. But last week, Ramaswamy’s campaign released a controversial advertisement that strongly suggested his Democratic opponent, Dr. Amy Acton, fabricated the story that she was raped by her stepfather when she was 12, which is well documented in court records, as well as her account of experiencing homelessness.

“She lies about her past. She says she grew up living in a tent. None of that is true. She’s lied her entire life,” Acton’s estranged mother, Donna Arthur, said in the ad bankrolled by Ramaswamy’s campaign. “Don’t vote for people who lie.”

Ramaswamy did not answer my question directly.

“Our ad was about her lying about me, and I can confirm she has lied about me extensively in this race, and it’s shameful,” he told me.

“Can you answer the question?” I said. “Did she lie about rape?”

“I’m talking to voters right now,” he said, before being shooed away by campaign staff.

Acton has said she hasn’t seen her mother since 1978, the year her stepfather was indicted by an Ohio grand jury for “engag[ing] in sexual contact” with Acton when she was “less than thirteen years of age.” The man, Cledith Arthur, fled Ohio with Acton’s mother and was able to evade warrants for his arrest until he died in Pennsylvania in 2004. “After he was arrested and Amy and I were removed from their custody, our birth mother stayed married to Amy’s rapist until he died,” Acton’s brother, Philip Stearns, said in a statement defending Acton after the ad was released.

Much to my disappointment, I didn’t have the chance to ask Ramaswamy anything else about his decision to exploit his opponent’s traumatic childhood by featuring the woman who stood by the man charged with raping her daughter.

But 20 minutes before my interaction with the billionaire biotech entrepreneur—as I snacked on a tasty $4.40 cheeseburger—Ramaswamy clapped as Ohio State Auditor Keith Faber, the GOP nominee for state attorney general, characterized Republicans as the political party that protects children from sexual abuse.

“We passed the strongest laws in the country to go after human trafficking and to lock up sexual predators. In fact, we passed the law that said if you molest our children, you go to prison for life without a chance of parole,” said Faber.

“I am proud of being the guy who will stand with the men and women who keep our families safe. That’s Republican values. That’s what Republicans stand for,” Faber continued.

A woman from Xenia named Susan came up to me as I was leaving. She said she was grateful I confronted Ramaswamy about the ad. Despite previously voting for Republican candidates, she told me she can’t see herself supporting Ramaswamy next week. “My family puts people who protect predators in prison,” she told me through tears, explaining that her family works in law enforcement. “Giving that woman a platform—it’s disgusting.”

It’s the Corruption, Stupid!

2026-10-30T09:20:51.791-07:00

It’s the Corruption, Stupid

From Trump to Epstein to data centers, Democrats have seized on a rigged system as the unifying message of the midterms.

Tim Murphy

A little more than three weeks before Election Day, Gina Hinojosa, the Democratic nominee for governor of Texas, sat back in her chair in a small conference room at a community center in the Houston suburb of Cypress. The 52-year-old Democratic state representative had just spoken for 45 minutes and fielded questions from a roomful of educators and their allies on everything from vouchers to data centers to traffic. She had been criss-crossing the state for months, while beaming into podcasts and TV shows outside it to build buzz and try to persuade national donors to spend money on a contest that was never supposed to be this close. When I walked in, Hinojosa was powering through her first migraine in years and had slathered her hands, she told an aide, with honey Throat Coat, thinking it was sanitizer. But when I asked her to describe her opponent, three-term Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, in a word, Hinojosa brightened. If you’ve been paying any attention to national politics this year, you could probably guess what she said:

“Corrupt.”

Could she elaborate? She would love to. “He has given a billion dollars in no bid contracts to his donors,” she said. “He’s waived competitive bidding laws in the state of Texas every month since 2020.” Abbott had taken $12 million in campaign funds from “an out-of-state billionaire” voucher activist and pushed through a $1 billion-a-year subsidy for private schools. During Winter Storm Uri, when a massive power failure led to hundreds of deaths, Abbott allowed companies to “make billions in record profits” through a sudden price surge, and then received large campaign checks from the CEO of the company that received the greatest windfall. In Austin, she said, “the only bills we’re really allowed to vote on that are of real consequence and have dollar figures attached to them are bills that are pushed by the moneyed interests who donate to Greg Abbott.”

Corruption is the filter through which voters are processing politics right now. Pick any race and you’ll find a Democrat spending millions to connect the dots between voters’ economic pain and the Republicans they say are on the take.

To Hinojosa, this intermingling of state business and donor service explained why everyone else was paying more and getting less these days. Taxpayers paid Abbott donors to build National Guard barracks and staff migrant processing centers on the border. Ratepayers got the invoice for grid repairs after Uri. Regular Texans lost out on both ends when Abbott lavished the world’s richest companies with incentives for data centers. And everyone was sharing the tab for Abbott’s misplaced priorities through rising property taxes at the local level.

“It is the Greg Abbott corruption tax,” she said, “and we all pay it.”

I had come to Cypress to figure out what the hell was going on. While the US Senate race between Democratic state Rep. James Talarico and Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton was always expected to be close, Abbott’s quest for a fourth term was supposed to be a steamroller. That wasn’t a knock on Hinojosa. A state legislator from Austin by way of Brownsville, she first got involved in local politics when she found out her son’s elementary school was slated to close, and ended up leading the school board in one of the largest districts in the state. She was well respected and well connected: Her father, Gilberto, was the longtime state Democratic Party chair; her sister, Xochitl, was a DNC spokesperson. But Abbott had won every election by double digits and his nine-figure war chest was enough to persuade national Democrats to take one look at Texas and give Kansas a chance.

But despite $281 million in spending from Abbott, much of it on attack ads, the race remains close. Although the incumbent is still favored, Hinojosa boasted at the town hall that she had led in four different polls in recent weeks. (“And not minor polls, big dog polls,” she said.) Her own fundraising had taken off—nowhere close to parity, but close enough to have a shot. A win would be a generational upset. Even if she loses, she would likely outperform every Democratic candidate for governor since Ann Richards. Just as significant is how she has done it. Ever since Zohran Mamdani started talking about “halalflation,” you’ve been hearing a lot about affordability. But $5.99-a-gallon diesel, rising rent, and higher bills are data points in need of a plot. Across the country, up and down the ballot, against an unprecedented tide of billionaire cash, Democrats like Hinojosa have supplied one: The story of the 2026 election is corruption.

Watch enough midterm ads, or literally just watch the local news programs they’re airing on, and you may get the distinct impression that America is not well. As my colleague Russ Choma recently reported, most Americans seem to think so too. In a recent Fox News survey, more voters said they were “extremely” or “very concerned” about government corruption than they were about inflation and gas prices. According to Gallup, the percentage of Americans who believe corruption is “widespread throughout the government” is the highest on record—up 16 points in two years, and 30 since 2006. A survey last December found that 70 percent of Americans thought the government was covering for powerful people in the Epstein files. The belief that high-level members of Congress are habitually cashing in on inside information is so pervasive there are subway ads about it.

Years of declining trust in load-bearing institutions propelled Donald Trump to the presidency, and sustained him in office. But now that tide of distrust is coming for him, too. (Do I really have to explain why?) Corruption is the filter through which voters are processing politics right now. Pick any race and you’ll find a Democrat spending millions to connect the dots between voters’ economic pain and the Republicans they say are on the take.

A recent NBC News analysis found more than 500 ads about Epstein or other pedophiles—often from Democrats, accusing Republican opponents of doing political favors for sex offenders.

“We can’t afford Mike Turner’s corruption anymore,” says a voiceover in an ad targeting the longtime Republican incumbent in another Ohio district. Ads attacking Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur’s Republican opponent in another Ohio race say, “We’re paying more because of Derek Merrin’s corruption.” A Democratic super-PAC backing Roy Cooper against Michael Whatley in North Carolina says, “The more you pay, the more Whatley makes.” Kansas Democrat Adam Hamilton says Sen. Roger Marshall is selling democracy “to the highest bidder while Kansans can’t afford groceries.” Ohio Democrat Amy Acton promises to “take on the corruption that’s raising our costs.”

Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff has risen as a Democratic Party star this cycle by turning his stump speeches into little mini episodes of Frontline, regaling audiences with stories about “Prince Eric and Prince Don” acquiring a taxpayer-subsidized tungsten mine in Kazakhstan, “while you pay more for gas, for groceries, for healthcare.” The corruption Rob Sand talks about during his run for governor of Iowa is stripped of the proper nouns and repackaged as a kind of affront to neighborliness. He says he is seeking a new job in part because Republicans limited his ability to find misspent tax dollars as state auditor. Before an event in June, as Sand was admiring a trophy buck at a small county history museum, I watched the museum’s director walk up to him and begin talking about an embezzlement crisis in her town of 88 people, which the auditor’s office had helped clean up. She understood the situation well—she was the new mayor.

Some of the corruption narratives are of a boutique, candidate-specific variety, of the sort currently bogging down a certain Maine Republican. (Still, the uni-message pokes through: “Susan Collins,” a former supporter says in a new ad, “is enriching herself while voting with Trump to raise our costs.”) A disturbingly high percentage of these attacks, it turns out, are about predators. A recent NBC News analysis found more than 500 ads about Epstein or other pedophiles—often from Democrats, accusing Republican opponents of doing political favors for sex offenders.

It almost feels like cheating to talk about Paxton here, but it’s illustrative. He is corrupt, in Talarico’s telling, in a way that manages to tie all of these disparate threads together. It is intersectional grift. The Democrat and his allies have invoked Paxton’s “Epstein-style sweetheart deal” for a pedophile; hundreds of taxpayer-funded trips; soaring net worth; 15 homes; impeachable favors for a campaign contributor; fealty to a giga-donor; shady investments; legislative self-dealing; stolen Montblanc pen; and, of course, the ultimate corruption, the corruption of the heart.

For Talarico and so many others, corruption supplies both the line of attack and the slate of solutions. It is practically expected right now that a battleground candidate will campaign against Big Pharma, congressional stock trading, and billionaire handouts, and that at one point or another they will sum up their campaign like the seminarian from Round Rock did on a recent Thursday night under the lights:

“We have an affordability crisis,” he said, “because we have a corruption crisis.”

In Texas, and almost everywhere else, the defining image of the corruption election is the data centers that have been crowding out the landscape, ever since Abbott promised to make the state the “epicenter” of the AI boom. The campaign for agriculture secretary is about data centers. The campaign for Senate is about data centers. The campaign for land commissioner is about data centers. The campaign for railroad commissioner does not really have much to do with data centers, actually, but the Democrat got so many questions about them he put out a position anyway. I picked up a free newspaper in San Marcos on my way to see Talarico, and the cover story was about a data center. The billboards on I-35 were about data center construction. The race for governor, as much as perhaps any other race in the country, has been about data centers. To voters, Hinojosa told me, they have become “the physical manifestation of a governor who has sold them out.”

Although data centers were beginning to flare up at community meetings in 2025, as AI companies embarked on a historic building boom in the quest for “superintelligence,” they were not something that Hinojosa was particularly fixated on when she launched her campaign. “I’ve had to be responsive,” she said. “I’ve had to learn what is happening. I’ve had to visit with impacted communities to understand what was going on and to understand what the solutions were.”

There is nothing inherently scandalous about large buildings filled with servers. But over the last few years, Americans have turned against them to an extraordinary degree. Seven in 10 Americans oppose building data centers in their own communities. What’s happened is that a story about logistics has become a story about corruption: The pace of development, and the opaque nests of shell companies and NDAs, has heightened people’s suspicions that government is in thrall to powerful interests. And in Texas, the scale of investment is striking. Companies are building more data centers there than in any other state, with nearly twice as many projects announced as its next-closest competitor, Virginia. Tech firms have been lured by generous incentives. Under Abbott, Texas is ceding more than $1 billion a year in state revenue on data center tax breaks, while companies and individuals with ties to data centers have showered the governor with $9 million in contributions in his current campaign alone, according to The Texas Tribune. (In October, Elon Musk chipped in $5 million more.)

Outside Amarillo, Hinojosa walked the grounds of what is projected to be one of the largest data center campuses in the country—a 7,570-acre complex named for Donald Trump, backed by Rick Perry, and powered by four nuclear reactors. In the town of Red Oak, about 30 minutes south of Dallas, she sat with members of an opposition group that had formed to try to slow the spread of data center campuses in an otherwise quiet exurban community of 20,000 people. Abbott had once championed Red Oak as the “centerpiece” of Google’s investment in the state, but with seven different campuses in some stage of development—and data center sites covering more than a quarter of the town’s footprint—residents were fed up.

The tightening polls suggest that the Democrat’s data center attacks have struck a nerve. But Abbott’s response may be the clearest indicator of their salience. In September, not long before I made my way out to Texas, Abbott announced that he was declaring a pause on new data center permits until the state could evaluate their impact on water and power. Hinojosa was happy to take credit for the shift, but unwilling to accept that the fundamental conditions were changing.

“Most people understand that the pause is lifted November 4,” she said.

School vouchers represents a similar story in a more analog form. When Abbott pushed the program in 2023, Hinojosa and other Democrats teamed up with rural Republicans to block the effort. Ahead of the next election, the Pennsylvania-based TikTok investor Jeff Yass, a major proponent of vouchers, donated $12 million to Abbott (including one check the Tribune characterized as “the largest single political donation in Texas history”). The governor, in turn, used that money to defeat voucher opponents in Republican primaries and elect his allies to the legislature.

“When I first launched this campaign, I was talking about public schools, and people were like, ‘You talk about public schools too much,’” she said. “I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m going to talk about them some more.’ And I’m glad we did because I think it’ll be the difference in this election.”

Hinojosa believed that Democrats had sometimes made the mistake in the past of talking about public education like it was a “program”—something to fund, or reform—when it was more like an extension of identity. It gave communities their purpose, and their football. At the same time Abbott was pissing off parents and educators by taking control of school districts in Fort Worth and Houston, the voucher law was riling voters up in rural areas that tend to vote Republican. It presented an opportunity for a Democrat willing to connect the dots and make new friends. One of the most striking ads of the entire cycle was a pro-Hinojosa spot that featured a woman named Lynn Davenport, a self-described “MAGA mom” from Dallas who has testified at the legislature against vouchers.

“I was at the January 6th rally,” Davenport said—but she could no longer support Abbott. He was “bought and paid for by the billionaires and the corporations.”

If Democrats like Hinojosa have managed to turn the election into a referendum on corruption, it’s also because Republicans have struggled to make the election about anything else. So much of the fight in Texas since 2010, if not longer, has been over culture issues. Republicans have criminalized abortion. They are bullying trans kids and literally censoring Plato. One Republican statewide candidate wants to expel all Muslims from the United States; Abbott has endorsed him. Against Talarico and Hinojosa, Republicans are feeding voters a steady diet of anti-trans messaging, hoping to repeat their success in 2024, when TV ads claimed that “Kamala is for they/them, President Trump is for you.”

But voters aren’t so sure about that second part anymore, and Hinojosa has to some degree turned the tables; the campaign’s central message is that Abbott is for Them—the out-of-state billionaires, the profiteers, the tech lords. At the same time, she and other leading Democrats are not talking much about the GOP’s culture-war agenda at all, in a marked shift from previous cycles, when Democrats ran ads about abortion rights in South Texas. Like Rob Sand in Iowa, she emphasizes that if she wins, the state will almost certainly have a divided government, necessitating a detente.

In one notable ad, she spoke about her decision to carry to term a child she was told would not make it. Her daughter, who died shortly after her birth, “gave me the strength to fight,” she said. The things she was fighting for, at least explicitly, were universal—for “the right to send their kids to good neighborhood schools,” for “an economy where their kids can afford to stay,” and above all, for a Texas “where the powerful don’t get to tell the rest of us how to live.”

In Republican-leaning Red Oak, Hinojosa told me, some residents challenged her on her position on Shariah law (she does not believe it poses a threat to Texas), and on background checks for gun possession (which she supports). But they “agreed to disagree.”

“We’ve been so torn apart by these culture wars, that really the only winners are like 15 billionaire tech dudes,” Hinojosa said. “That is exactly what these data centers are about—it is about billionaires controlling our land, our lives, our future. And if we don’t come together fast to save ourselves, like, they’re about to blow up the world if you believe recent reports.”

On the other hand, the people funding the culture war, judging by Abbott’s campaign contributions, do not appear to be giving up. I asked Hinojosa if she was worried that she would cede the fight to people like the right-wing Christian billionaire Tim Dunn—whose money, along with Yass’, helped clear the way for Abbott’s voucher push.

“That fight is not winnable,” she told me. “You can’t win the culture war issues because the culture wars are about our differences. They’re about our lived experiences, and in Texas, we’re such a diverse community in all sorts of ways, right? Not just racially, and ethnically, but regionally… We’re like a country. So, if we know there’s no winning the culture wars, why do we keep arguing about them? I’m tired of arguing culture wars for 10 years, and most people are.”

Instead of fighting a forever war, she is promising to tap the Rainy Day Fund to give every household a $1,500 “corruption tax refund” and “freeze the rates” set by the public utilities regulator. She told me she believed Texas had a chance to usher in a new “post-partisan” politics this election, although that sounds like something many Republicans might disagree with. I mentioned that her campaign seemed to break from the theory that a successful Democratic candidate in Texas would pitch themselves as a sort of business-friendly moderate.

“It’s not about moderating, it’s not about being more progressive, it is about recognizing what is the fight of our time,” she said, chopping her hands down on the table. “And it is: Who does Texas, who does America belong to? That’s it. Does it belong to the people or the billionaires?”

Hinojosa threw her hands in the air.

“That’s it,” she said. “That’s the fight.”

Judge strikes down Trump. Again...

2026-10-30T09:18:02.060-07:00

'Contrary to law': Judge strikes down Trump admin's definition of 'medically frail' in Medicaid work requirements

The judge sided with a coalition of 25 Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia in a lawsuit challenging the requirement that states force chronically ill people to prove they can't work.

By Alice Miranda Ollstein and Robert King

A federal judge in Boston sided on Thursday with a coalition of 25 Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia in a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s requirement that states force chronically ill people on Medicaid to prove they are unable to work.

During oral arguments last week, the states said that unless the court blocked that piece of the rule before January and allowed them to exempt people with certain diagnosed illnesses, they would be “forced… to bear the costs and burdens of operationalizing this unlawful limitation.”

Judge Richard Stearns, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, said the guidance the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services released in June went beyond what Congress passed in 2025 in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and is “thus contrary to law.”

“There is an inherent public interest in ensuring that the government follows the law,” he said, adding that “enforcement of an unlawful definition of ‘medically frail’ may lead to the disenrollment of otherwise eligible vulnerable individuals relying on Medicaid coverage for continuity of care.”

Distract...

2026-10-30T09:16:16.389-07:00

Hegseth bets on defense industry to influence midterms

Administration officials are focusing on defense manufacturing, not the Iran war, to influence voters ahead of the midterms.

By Jack Detsch, Paul McLeary and Leo Shane III

Most Republican candidates don’t want to talk about the Iran war. Instead, the president and his allies are pitching a different security message to voters — the economic benefits of American military might.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has spent the closing stretch before the midterms crisscrossing swing states like Ohio and Wisconsin to promote a renewed defense industrial base. Vice President JD Vance declared a “manufacturing renaissance” at a defense tech factory in Maine. And President Donald Trump took a rare trip to Baltimore to announce a new shipyard for autonomous submarines.

Their messages never mention the knock-on effects of the military conflict in Iran, such as surging gas prices or the depletion of weapons stockpiles. But they give the administration a platform to champion U.S. jobs and shift voters’ attention from the uncertainty of a floundering war to the economic bonanza of military strength.

“I wish all Americans could be in the Oval Office and watch the president behind the Resolute Desk look at defense companies and tell them, ‘I don’t want one more shift,” Hegseth said last week in Dayton, Ohio. “‘I want a new plant. I want two new plants. I want three new plants. I want 3 times, 4 times, 5 times more.’”

The political nature of the effort reinforces the difference between Hegseth and previous Pentagon chiefs, who did not campaign for candidates — as the Defense secretary did this year — or focus their messages on swing states. While Hegseth has spent the past year embarking on a defense industry buildup tour known as the “Arsenal of Freedom,” he has spent recent weeks almost exclusively in battleground states.

But it’s unclear whether highlighting a rejuvenated American defense industrial base will prove effective given the war’s spiraling unpopularity. Numerous Republican candidates in tight races — from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to Ohio Sen. Jon Husted — have avoided even mentioning the conflict, despite the possibility of renewed hostilities between the U.S. and Iran after the election.

“Do you think with less than a week there’s enough time for them to be able to amplify that sort of message?” said a defense official, who like others was granted anonymity to speak candidly about internal decisions. “They’re holding off on reengaging Iran until afterwards in an effort to dampen the impact of that deeply unpopular venture and the economic fallout.”

The Pentagon, in a statement, said Hegseth was “accelerating and scaling our defense industrial base. This has been a priority since Day 1.”

The White House said the administration was highlighting its efforts to strengthen the country.

“Democrats destroyed our military; President Trump has rebuilt it and continues to strengthen our defense industrial base,” said Olivia Wales, a White House spokesperson. “President Trump and Secretary Hegseth are unleashing the Arsenal of Freedom to restore defense manufacturing strength, increase production speed, and accelerate weapons production.”

The administration has only a handful of days left to convince voters that a GOP majority improves their lives. But industrial projects have notoriously long lead times, which makes the defense focus especially unusual.

Some of the announcements appear to repackage years-old news, including Hegseth’s visit to examine progress on the “Doomsday” aircraft in Dayton, a contract first handed out during the Biden administration. A submarine components repair center Trump touted in Ohio this month was first championed by former Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, who’s running this year to reclaim his spot.

The retail-style promotion of new projects also has a classic campaign note about it: High spending creates jobs at home.

“It’s no different than touting any other program or grant,” said Douglas Heye, a veteran GOP strategist and former communications director for the Republican National Committee. “It allows candidates to talk about getting results for their state or district.”

The administration has tied the defense buildup to job growth, even as the cost of the eight-month war with Iran has climbed to more than $47 billion.

Trump and Hegseth announced this summer that the Pentagon would invest $10 billion in weapons production in Pennsylvania — which features several decisive races —- and create 4,000 jobs. The Pentagon this month agreed to fund a guided missile destroyer built at Bath Iron Works in Maine, where Republican Sen. Susan Collins faces a tough reelection fight.

“It’s pretty transparently transactional to me,” said a Democratic congressional candidate in a battleground state. “My sense is not many people, if any, believe it at all given it is so close to the midterms.”

But if Democrats win, the next Congress may have little appetite to boost defense spending, including Trump’s $1.5 trillion defense budget.

“It helps for [the White House] to keep attention on the national security base,” said Eric Fanning, Army secretary under former President Barack Obama and now CEO of the Aerospace Industries Association. “But there is only so much you can do to influence Congress.”

A defense spending boom also doesn’t directly translate to more money in voters’ pocketbooks, at least in the short term.

“Investing defense dollars is less efficient than other forms of economic development — full stop,” said a former defense official.

The defense emphasis may also carry limited sway with voters worried about their long-term economic security. A Marquette Law School poll released Wednesday found that just 16% of Wisconsin voters said they were better off from a year ago, and 42% said they were worse off. That number has dropped steadily since the start of the Iran war.

“It’s partly opposition to the war itself,” said Charles Franklin, a professor of law and public policy at Marquette who directed the poll. “But it’s also especially dissatisfaction with the consequences that the war has had economically.”

Not Funny

2026-10-30T09:14:32.440-07:00

You think?

2026-10-30T09:07:41.772-07:00

A GOP wipeout could loosen Trump’s grip

Donald Trump faces a series of tests on his ironclad grip over congressional Republicans.

The first, and biggest, will be the party’s midterm performance next week. A decisive loss in either chamber, unlike his last midterm drubbing in 2018, would officially usher him into “lame duck” status — and potentially impact his ability to bend Republicans to his whims in the final weeks of a GOP governing trifecta.

“He’s in trouble,” one GOP senator said of Trump.

Granted anonymity to speak frankly before the election, many of the 15 GOP lawmakers interviewed about the future of Trump’s influence said they believe his days of dictating outcomes with Truth Social posts and late-night phone calls could be coming to an end.

“It’s not like his persuasion is growing,” said a Republican senator. “Political capital is earned and lost the same way.”

It’s hardly the first time Republicans have predicted that Trump’s days of dominating the GOP were on the wane. A broad swath of the party turned on him after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack only to come back to the fold as he regained power.

And few expect him to actually change his high-pressure style during his final two years in office. In fact, many think he’ll play a loud role in 2028 congressional primaries and the party’s presidential nomination process — as well as in day-to-day machinations on Capitol Hill.

But a midterm battering would put decisive pressure on the president’s sway, starting with GOP leadership elections that could devolve into a bitter intraparty clash.

A House GOP wipeout amid widespread dissatisfaction with the Iran war could also lead some Republicans to support impeaching Trump’s Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, which the chamber is expected to vote on soon after they return.

And Trump could face headwinds if he tries to muscle a final party-line spending bill through Congress. The effort has already struggled, and ousted GOP lawmakers would have little reason to rally together on their way out the door.

It all may come down to the size of Democrats’ majority if they win the House. Trump could “still carry a lot of sway” if there’s a small margin, another House Republican said.

But a “shellacking,” they added, will have Trump “looking for our help more than we’d be looking for his.”

Gets shamed, so now he has to try to look strong.

2026-10-30T09:07:15.656-07:00

Trump’s Kansas and Iowa rallies are back on after being canceled

Megan Messerly

President Donald Trump’s weekend rallies in Kansas and Iowa are back.

The Midwest swing was canceled Thursday to make time for the president to host roughly 20 tele-rallies, according to two people familiar with the president’s plans.

But on Friday the plans changed — again.

Trump will now rally supporters Sunday in the two states — which both have tight Senate contests — in addition to, not instead of, the tele-rallies, said the people, who were granted anonymity to share details of the planning.

“Back by popular demand. Feeling bullish about both states, but it’s about giving the people what they want,” one of the people said.

White House aides had said Thursday that the switch to tele-rallies over in-person trips was made in response to high demand from campaigns across the country clamoring for the president to return. The Republican National Committee also framed the decision as a response to the party’s “strong” position in Iowa and Kansas, with the latest polls showing both races within the margin of error.

Preparing for a $400 billion cut, should be $800 billion....

2026-10-30T09:04:20.295-07:00

Pentagon plans for death of Trump’s record military budget

The administration insists it has support for a $1.5 trillion defense budget. Officials are privately anticipating less.

By Mark Satter, Paul McLeary and Audrey Decker

The Pentagon is quietly preparing for a $400 billion cut to President Donald Trump’s military budget, as officials realize the president’s record-breaking request is effectively dead.

The administration has pushed Congress for a supersized $1.5 trillion investment in the military — the largest in history. The money would overhaul weapons stockpiles and realize Trump’s dreams for everything from a sprawling missile shield to a fleet of nuclear-powered battleships.

But the Pentagon and congressional spending committees are drafting a smaller $1.1 trillion defense budget, according to a defense industry official, two former officials and one other person familiar with the matter. The planning — which runs contrary to what administration officials are saying publicly — is a clear indication of the political headwinds facing Republicans after the midterm elections.

“The Pentagon can’t admit this,” said one of the people who, like the others, was granted anonymity to speak about internal discussions.

The administration has hinged its unprecedented defense budget on a party-line process called reconciliation. This would allow Republican lawmakers to add $350 billion to a $1.15 trillion defense base budget, despite objections from Democrats.

Now, Pentagon planners are evaluating what defense programs they will be forced to prioritize in the face of reduced funding, the people said.

“None of them expect anywhere close to 1.5 trillion,” one of the former officials said. “They are absolutely developing plans [for less] and that is much more the expectation than anything close to 1.5 trillion.”

The White House referred questions to the Pentagon, which did not respond to a request for comment.

The cuts could scramble the Defense Department’s efforts to procure new weapons platforms, enter into new agreements with the defense industry or even continue existing programs.

It could also affect how quickly the U.S. can rebuild weapons stockpiles severely depleted by the Iran war. The Pentagon’s latest estimates show at least $47 billion in costs associated with the conflict, with the lion’s share of that bill, $29 billion, stemming from critical munitions replacements.

Trump administration officials have not offered any alternatives — at least not publicly.

Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought insisted this month that “we’re not planning on failure.” The administration has not developed alternatives to fund critical Pentagon programs if Congress doesn’t back the White House’s plan, he said.

But GOP infighting in both chambers has already imperiled the odds of passing even one piece of the $1.5 trillion total. Top Senate Republicans have warned they don’t have enough votes to pass a party-line spending package. And House Republicans have threatened to withhold their votes over the administration’s handling of foreign policy and a reluctance to devote more money to the military.

“Republicans are increasingly angry at the administration on the defense front,” said the former official. It’s “unlikely that anything drastic, a $1.5 trillion budget, would happen.”

Lawmakers will return to Washington next month with fewer than five legislative weeks to accomplish a wide range of objectives before the year’s end. If Democrats win control over one or both chambers next week, the GOP will have less than two months to push their priorities through.

Aggressive corruption hunt

2026-10-30T09:02:15.641-07:00

Fear of a Democrat takeover has tech, crypto and industrial firms rushing to K Street

Companies are bracing for an aggressive corruption hunt led by social media-savvy Democrats hungry to scrutinize dealings with the Trump administration.

By Oliver Ward and Daniel Barnes

Donating to President Donald Trump’s pet projects may have seemed like a savvy corporate investment 18 months ago.

But today, companies are hiring lobbyists and crisis communications experts out of fear that their efforts to stay in the administration’s good graces may expose them to a hail of partisan crossfire if Democrats take over Congress.

Top congressional Democrats have already expressed interest in probing how technology giants like Meta, Nvidia and Amazon have worked with the Trump administration, rattling executives in other industries who fear they could also get targeted.

A broad range of technology, financial, cryptocurrency and industrial companies are now scrambling to get ahead of Democrats’ aggressive congressional oversight agenda if the party wins power next week, according to nine lobbyists, lawyers, public relations professionals and former congressional staffers who spoke to POLITICO.

They’re taking on outside legal counsel and contacting PR firms, particularly companies that donated to projects including the White House ballroom and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s road trip video series.

Law and lobbying firms on K Street have gone on an oversight-focused hiring spree in recent months, adding staff to handle increasing demand from clients. Some firms are reviewing their written communications with the White House to prepare for potential legal or reputational risks. Others are hiring lawyers who specialize in congressional investigations, arranging crisis communications plans or rehearsing for hearings.

Several are also meeting with Democratic offices as part of feverish preparations for the outcome of November’s midterms.

“The smart companies have not been waiting for the election results,” said Brian Bartlett, a partner at Kekst CNC, a strategic communications firm. “We’ve really been treating November as the deadline versus the starting gun.”

Corporate lobbying in advance of a new party takeover is a cherished election season tradition in Washington. Yet many of the lobbyists, PR advisers and lawyers POLITICO interviewed sense this time is different as their clients brace for an aggressive corruption hunt led by social media-savvy Democrats eager to scrutinize private-sector dealings with the administration.

“The most damaging allegations are allegations of a quid pro quo,” said Matthew Miller, a partner at strategic advisory firm Vianovo.

Democrats may be able to tie a company donation, gift or concession to the president to a favorable policy outcome. Companies will face pressure to demonstrate everything was above board, Miller said, even if they can show a legally justifiable cause for the favorable outcome.

Actual lawmaking will be tough in the immediate future. Even if Democrats walk away from November with House and Senate majorities, presidential vetoes and a Senate filibuster will pose a persistent constraint.

While some Democrats caution the party against using its investigative authority too broadly against corporate America, oversight-hungry lawmakers are signaling that they want to dig into everything from Trump’s trade pacts to a luxury jet gifted by the Qatari government.

But administration officials will “aggressively” resist these efforts, said Nathaniel Wienecke, a former House Oversight Committee aide who later founded Conscience Point Consulting.

“The only way that overseers are going to be able to get the information they’re looking for,” Wienecke said, “is to get it from individuals and companies who aren’t a co-equal branch of government and can be compelled to respond via subpoena.”

That dynamic leaves private companies vulnerable.

“[Democrats] can ask the administration all the questions they want — I doubt they’re going to get any answers,” said one Republican lobbyist at a major firm granted anonymity to speak candidly. “But companies are in a different spot. For the most part, they’re going to have to answer the mail when Congress asks them those questions.”

Congressional Democrats have spent much of 2026 previewing potential targets.

Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), who is in line to chair the House Oversight Committee if Democrats win the House, demanded answers in August on a Defense Department loan to permanent magnets manufacturer Vulcan Elements.

Garcia also asked Taylor Farms, the company at the heart of this summer’s massive cyclospora outbreak, to turn over the firm’s communications with Trump officials connected to its donations to MAGA Inc. The company donated to the Trump PAC around the time the administration delayed a food safety rule related to tracing contaminated products.

Democrats will have no shortage of executives who cozied up to the Trump administration and may be able to shed light on its dealings with private companies.

Meta, for example, has donated to several administration projects, including Trump’s inauguration, the ballroom, Trump’s presidential library and the Kennedy Center, according to analysis from government watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

Companies in the prediction market, artificial intelligence, technology and cryptocurrency, and pharmaceutical spaces, among others, have also attracted Democrats’ attention.

Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) suggested one potential line of inquiry could target Amazon, the technology giant founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos.

“If federal contracting decisions are made not because a vendor has the best product or is offering it for the best price but because, in the case of Amazon, it was willing to pay $40 million for a crappy movie about Melania [Trump], is that resulting in Amazon getting an advantage in cloud computing contracts or other defense contracts?” Schiff told POLITICO in a September interview.

“That’s the kind of thing that costs taxpayers money, costs consumers more money, and there have been so many business payoffs of one sort or another,” Schiff said.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has sent prying letters to Meta, Amazon, Google and Microsoft over subsidies they received for data center development. She’s also queried Nvidia over its compliance with antitrust laws and prediction market giants Kalshi and Polymarket over a deal Trump made with the Treasury Department to secure immunity from tax audits.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the ranking member on the Senate Finance Committee, has been equally aggressive in pushing private companies for details on their links to administration policy actions.

Wyden pressed health insurers including Cigna and UnitedHealthcare this week for details on whether they worked with the administration to remove patients from Affordable Care Act coverage.

“Sen. Wyden will pursue the facts about Donald Trump’s corrupt dealings within the administration and with the private sector,” Wyden spokesperson Keith Chu said in a statement. “To do that he plans to seek information from any government or third-party entity who has relevant information. Everything is on the table.”

Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) also warned Elon Musk earlier this month that “subpoenas are coming” to scrutinize Starlink’s relationship with Russia after Ukrainians reported interrupted service.

The risks for companies getting caught up in these fact-finding efforts extend well beyond the legal realm.

The prospect of Democrats taking control of the House is causing particular angst in C-suites and company boards because a crop of committee chairs adept at creating viral committee hearing moments is set to receive gavels and subpoena powers.

Hearings “create exposure” said Emily Loeb, a leader of the congressional oversight practice at law firm Jenner & Block. “An engagement with the administration that is lawful can still be brand-damaging if it’s portrayed as improper or as a reason for higher consumer costs. So we’re constantly thinking about the 360-degree risk of engagement with Congress and what are the downstream impacts.”

Companies view the 2023 House Education and Workforce Committee hearings on campus antisemitism as a cautionary tale, said Jonathan Becker, a partner at law firm Mayer Brown. The hearings garnered national attention and prompted powerful university officials to resign.

“You get a viral moment,” Becker said, “the reputational hit that normally is associated with a congressional hearing is that much more pronounced.”

Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee have already demanded information from more than 20 companies that sponsored events celebrating the country’s 250th anniversary this summer — including defense contractors, tech companies and the Ultimate Fighting Championship — forecasting investigations into allegations that fundraisers sold access to the president.

Companies on the receiving end of stern letters from lawmakers are not waiting for subpoenas to drop. They’re working with outside law firms to prepare documents, witnesses and messages for potential hearings, said Robert Kelner, the co-head of the congressional investigations practice at law firm Covington & Burling.

“There’s a great variety of approaches that companies take,” Kelner said. “Some companies are trying to reestablish connections on the Democratic side of the aisle. Other companies are battening down the hatches.”

Kalshi said it has been “building relationships” with lawmakers from both parties and their offices for more than a year.

“We have a sense of what members of Congress are interested in and where some questions lie,” a company representative said in a statement. But they stressed Kalshi has done “nothing intentional” to prepare for Democratic control, saying the company does not see oversight “as a partisan issue.”

The other companies mentioned in this story did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Some companies are also lining up customers, suppliers and local chambers of commerce to publicly amplify their messages and stress their importance for local jobs and communities should they get caught in the interparty crossfire.

There are advantages to putting these allies on alert and building those relationships now, Bartlett argued.

“If you start to try to do those in February, then it looks like damage control,” he said.

Tariffs and Middle East strikes.

2026-10-30T08:59:38.529-07:00

Trump tried not to roil the economy before midterms. He's about to be unleashed.

After several months of relative economic stability, Washington is bracing for the president to double down on tariffs and Middle East strikes.

By Oliver Ward, Paul McLeary and Meredith Lee Hill

Voters are expected to send a very clear message on Tuesday that they want the U.S. to stop fighting wars — on the military and economic front. President Donald Trump is unlikely to listen.

Trump still wants to bring tariffs close to where they stood before the Supreme Court struck down a broad swath of them in February, according to nine current and former officials, congressional aides and industry representatives. He has teed up trade measures that could lead to new duties in the weeks after the election. The Pentagon, meanwhile, has been sending more forces to the Middle East, and Trump has been hinting that more action is coming in Iran.

Republican and industry officials don’t believe the president is going to slow his agenda because of a poor showing by his party in the midterms. If anything, he may speed it up.

“The possibility is that it could actually get worse, be more tumultuous, more unpredictable and higher tariffs,” said one industry lobbyist, who, like others quoted in this article, were granted anonymity to speak candidly.

Many Republicans want the party to take away the opposite message from next week’s elections, where they are expected to take a beating over the economy and Americans’ concerns about affordability. Trump’s new actions could not only trigger Main Street angst, but could also sink stock markets and drive oil prices even higher, with impacts that are likely to reverberate not just in the next Congress but in the 2028 contest for president.

An additional round of levies after the election would be exactly the wrong lesson, one House Republican said, noting that if any Midwest Republicans eke out wins at this point, it will be “in spite” of Trump’s tariffs

A White House official said in a statement that “any tariff announcements will come directly from the Administration. Until then, any discussion or reporting about tariffs and tariff rates should be regarded as baseless speculation.” The White House did not respond to separate questions on its post-midterm plans for Iran.

The president’s political window for achieving some of his most polarizing objectives is fairly narrow, according to three of the people who spoke to POLITICO for this story.

GOP candidates in competitive midterm races in border states have already sought to distance themselves from Trump’s renewed trade war with Canada that flared up in August, after trade talks between Washington and Ottawa broke down.

“The tariffs are hammering us,” said one Republican in Michigan, where GOP Senate candidate Mike Rogers and gubernatorial candidate John James are battling for open seats.

The spike in gas prices since the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on Iran in the spring also has been a drag on Republican candidates, both in rural areas, where steep diesel prices have created new headaches for farmers, and among drivers in the suburbs. Oil prices have remained elevated despite the White House pause in strikes this fall and a rebound in Middle East crude flows, Goldman Sachs analysts noted this week. If active fighting flares back up, they would only surge higher.

Trump’s first-term Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross predicted the president would be unfazed by a further increase in gas prices after the midterms wrap. “It will cause controversy and will cause criticism, but it doesn’t have a direct, immediate, political effect,” he said. “It frees them up.”

But it’s likely to alarm many members of his party as the 2028 primaries gear up next year and the post-Trump political landscape comes into view.

“After the midterms, there’s going to be some Republican senators who are like, ‘Okay, I’m going to outlast Trump now,’” a former GOP aide said.

Some Republicans, on the other hand, think Trump — and Congress — should go even further.

“The president has done an amazing job using the tool that he has, but he hasn’t had all the tools at his disposal,” Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) said in an interview. “ We have them in Congress, and so I’m hoping that we do that and put those tariffs in place as a permanent part of our laws.”

The administration appears to be preparing to move with or without lawmakers’ support.

“The president has a lot of powers, even if we lose the House or the Senate,” said a senior administration official, who, like others, was granted anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.

The Pentagon could be in position to launch new attacks in the Middle East in a matter of weeks. The USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group left port in Japan Oct. 19 and will likely arrive in the region by the end of November, according to a U.S. defense official. More than 2,000 Marines are also on the way from the Pacific to the Middle East.

The Pentagon and State Department have also pulled some staff out of the region, echoing the run-up to the February U.S. and Israeli bombing campaign against Iran and adding to speculation that they may re-escalate the war.

The administration also delayed a number of trade measures this summer and fall, which it could roll out at any time after the Nov. 3 elections.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer is preparing to publish the results of an investigation into 16 trading partners’ manufacturing overcapacity, paving the way for new tariffs on major economies including China and the European Union. The report has been delayed multiple times, in part because of the elections, according to four people familiar with the planning.

A USTR official pointed to that trade investigation when asked about plans to roll out more tariffs. “The Administration will continue implementing policies that level the playing field for American workers, ranchers, and businesses and the livelihoods of all Americans,” the official said in a statement.

The Commerce Department, meanwhile, is sitting on a trade investigation into health equipment and medical devices that was due to be completed in September and could result in higher tariffs. The administration punted on two other probes — one into industrial machinery and robotics, and one on wind turbines — earlier this month, but could come back and hike duties in a matter of months. Officials are required to report back to the president within 180 days on any new developments.

The administration has other tariff powers it’s still deciding how to use. The Russia sanctions bill Congress passed in September also gave the president broad new tariff powers, which he waived in mid-October, while preserving the ability to levy duties of up to 100% in the future. A former GOP aide argued that whether the administration acts on its new tariff abilities largely depends on the state of trade negotiations with India, which could be hit under the new law because it is a major buyer of Russian oil.

“They’ll save it,” the former aide said of the tariff powers. “If they get an India deal, I think they’ll probably be held off.”

The Russia sanctions law would also give Trump the power to hike tariffs on China, another major Russian energy buyer. China and the U.S. agreed earlier this fall to extend a trade truce until early January, but they continue to struggle to resolve key differences over high-tech export restrictions, rare earth access and other issues.

Manufacturers have used the last few months of relative trade policy stability to build up inventories, said Kip Eideberg, senior vice president of government and industry relations at the Association of Equipment Manufacturers, which represents construction and agricultural equipment producers.

“That tells you that folks are nervous,” Eideberg said.

Officials helped criminal Bolsonaro get out of Brazil

2026-10-30T08:57:12.332-07:00

Democrats demand answers from State about taking in Bolsonaro

They want to know if administration officials helped Bolsonaro get out of Brazil, and why he was granted a U.S. visa.

By Eric Bazail-Eimil

House Democrats are probing the State Department’s role in facilitating former Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro’s escape from Brazil to the U.S. amid ongoing criminal investigations into him and his family.

A group of House Democrats, including many prominent members of the Foreign Affairs Committee, sent a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday night with a list of questions about the State Department’s involvement in Bolsonaro fleeing Brazil and the process it underwent to approve a U.S. visa for him as he departed.

In the letter, shared first with POLITICO, the Democrats ask Rubio to clarify how the State Department coordinated with other agencies to grant the visa, whether officials were aware of the pending probes against Bolsonaro and the degree to which the State Department and its officials helped Bolsonaro leave Brazil and come to the United States.

“The American people and Congress have a legitimate oversight interest in understanding whether U.S. diplomatic and immigration resources were used to facilitate the travel of a foreign political figure under these circumstances,” the lawmakers wrote. “Transparency is particularly important where the reported events implicate a foreign judicial proceeding, sensitive bilateral relations, and the consistent application of U.S. immigration and diplomatic policies.”

The letter, led by Reps. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Calif.) and Dina Titus (D-Nev.), was signed by 25 members in total.

The State Department did not respond to a request for comment about the letter.

Bolsonaro, the scion of a right-wing political dynasty in the South American country with close ties to key Trump administration advisers, is under investigation in Brazil for alleged money laundering. After he lost the second round of the presidential election to incumbent left-wing President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Sunday, a Brazilian judge ordered that he surrender his passport and remain in Brazilian territory. Instead, he fled the country with his wife and children, traveling first to Argentina and then Miami.

POLITICO has not been able to independently confirm those reports. The White House directed a request for comment about administration involvement to the State Department as well as Customs and Border Protection.

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees CBP, did not address reports of administration involvement directly, but did say in a statement that “Bolsonaro arrived in South Florida with his family and were met and inspected by U.S. Customs and Border Protection in accordance with applicable immigration laws and procedures. At the conclusion of the inspection, Mr. Bolsonaro and his accompanying family members were released.”

Brain damaged

2026-10-30T08:55:25.204-07:00

Inside Trump’s midterm ‘dog fight’ and the scramble for his attention

The president regularly asks staff about turnout and polling in the states he’s visiting, wondering how Republican efforts are “playing.”

By Megan Messerly

Republicans are competing for President Donald Trump’s time and attention in the final days of the midterms as they shore up red seats they never expected to defend.

They’re jockeying for his support with a stream of hopeful updates, including encouraging early-vote numbers and optimistic assessments of challenging races. Good news, some White House allies say, makes a better sales pitch than you’re-my-only-hope desperation.

Those pitches often flow to White House political director Matt Brasseaux and, on the outside, Trump’s longtime political adviser James Blair, among other top aides responsible for allocating finite resources in the campaigns’ final stretch.

“Typically the underperforming squeaky wheel gets the grease,” said one veteran GOP operative working in midterm races across the country, who has shared early vote data with the president’s team. “But there’s also a way to squeak, like, ‘Hey, things are going better than expected.’” The operative and others in this article were granted anonymity to discuss sensitive dynamics in the final stretch of the midterms.

White House aides are relying on the information to determine where to devote resources in the final weeks — be it a visit from Trump, a Cabinet member, robocall or social media post, according to six people familiar with communications between the White House and campaigns.

The White House, for instance, selected the location for the president’s Friday rally in Daytona Beach following conversations with campaigns in Florida, according to one of the six people, a White House official who is also familiar with the president’s campaign planning.

Trump will regularly ask staff about turnout and polling in the states he’s visiting, wondering how Republican efforts are “playing,” the official said.

Inside the West Wing, the midterms are still viewed as a “dog fight,” the official added, a sense of urgency reflected in the president’s recent travel schedule. Trump has held 19 rallies in the last 20 days, from Alaska to Mississippi.

This weekend, Trump pushed to add campaign appearances, including on Thursday in South Carolina, to an already busy closing schedule, the official said, after the president questioned why he had days off so close to the election. He’d already been once to South Carolina, which he won by double-digits in 2024 and where the Senate contest was not initially expected to be competitive.

“We understand the historic headwinds the party in power faced during midterm elections, and we know exactly what we’re up against,” the official said. “That’s what makes the urgency real. It is the catalyst behind conversations like, why are we taking Thursday off? Add it to the schedule. What are we doing? Let’s go.”

Still, the better-than-feared figures are offering Republicans hope that they will avoid a complete wipeout.

POLITICO spoke with 20 campaign advisers, officials and donors involved in competitive races across nine states, many of whom pointed to encouraging turnout patterns in states such as Iowa and Kansas. Public early vote data shows increased Republican participation in several states compared with 2022, while GOP strategists say their internal modeling also shows higher than expected turnout of the less reliable voters who helped put Trump back in the White House two years ago.

Alex deGrasse, a senior adviser to Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall, said the number of Republicans voting early has already exceeded the party’s 2022 total by nearly 50 percent, while much of the Democratic early vote advantage is coming from voters who participate regularly.

“The GOP apparatus has put an unprecedented effort into pushing less likely voters out,” DeGrasse said. “Dems are cannibalizing their vote. We haven’t.”

Trump officials, feeling “bullish” about Kansas, canceled a planned Saturday rally in the state, a White House official said. Instead, the president will host more than 20 tele-rallies in the final days to expand his reach.

Tom Bonier, a veteran Democratic data analyst and senior adviser at TargetSmart, a political data firm that tracks early voting nationwide, said Republicans are correct about their increased early vote turnout compared to 2022 in states like Kansas. But he cautioned that they’re drawing optimistic conclusions based on assumptions of what Election Day turnout will look like.

Kansas Democratic Senate nominee Adam Hamilton’s campaign referred requests for comment to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. Asked about the early vote data, DSCC spokesperson Tommy Garcia said in a statement that “Democrats are in the strongest position yet to win a Senate majority.”

Republican National Committee spokesperson Natalie Baldassarre, in a statement, described Trump as “the greatest force for turnout in American politics” and said “the momentum is on our side.” White House spokesperson Olivia Wales said that the president will “continue crisscrossing the country with unmatched energy and enthusiasm” to deliver his message.

Trump, who has seen some of the encouraging data, has also sounded more optimistic.

“I think you’re going to be pleasantly surprised on Tuesday. People are coming home. They’re coming home,” he said at a Tuesday rally in Lubbock, Texas.

There is some real hope among Republican operatives, even in a forbidding environment: While the party expects to lose the House and faces a difficult fight to preserve its Senate majority, some strategists close to the toughest races believe Republicans can avoid a complete wipeout.

In Iowa, three GOP strategists working on campaigns in the state pointed to increasing early vote participation as another encouraging sign. Absentee ballot requests from registered Republicans were up nearly 40 percent compared with the same point in 2022, according to data from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office. Requests from Democrats were also up, though more modestly.

“I feel a lot better today than I did two weeks ago. Dems have spent an inordinate amount of money and In a lot of these races they’re still not running away with this — look at the Iowa Senate,” said longtime Iowa GOP strategist Luke Martz.

The RNC also canceled a planned weekend rally in Iowa, saying Republicans are similarly in a “strong” position there.

The encouraging numbers are not universal. In Georgia, where there are key Senate and gubernatorial races, one Republican strategist who has reviewed internal campaign data described the early vote numbers as “really, really bad — wipeout bad,” pointing to weak turnout among less reliable GOP voters and in rural areas.

In Michigan, GOP strategist Jason Roe said early vote participation has steadily caught up with an initial surge of Democratic ballots in the congressional district where he’s working. But he cautioned that Republicans are still struggling with independent voters, a problem that could outweigh their gains in turnout.

“It felt like we hit rock bottom a couple weeks ago and the only direction to go from there is up,” said Roe, who is working on the reelection campaign of Michigan Rep. Tom Barrett. “But we might just be gaslighting ourselves.”