For the past decade, the Republican Party under President Donald Trump has been overtly dedicated to accentuating traditional gender roles. This administration has gone out of its way to celebrate “masculine” virtues including high testosterone levels, strenuous physical fitness regimens and a dedication to male-focused video gaming. In 2024, that strategy seemed to work, with young men helping to propel Trump back into political power. But now, as Republicans stare down a daunting final leg of the 2026 midterm race, polling shows this once-reliable MAGA voting bloc may be decidedly less reliable.

‘Evaporated’ gains and ‘instant ramifications’

Trump may have “won young men outright” in 2024, but a Cygnal poll from September shows Democrats now leading among men between the ages of 18 to 30 by 17 points, said USA Today. Among Republican voters, men under 40 represent the “group that is most at risk” of peeling off, given their “concerns about the economy and prices,” said The Washington Post. This bloc “proved pivotal” to Trump’s 2024 “sweep of some of the same battleground states holding critical elections this year.”

Republicans were previously able to “capitalize on an environment” in which young men felt “either ignored or actively disliked by the Democratic Party,” said the National Review. But the “cultural factors” that pushed men toward the GOP two years ago “may be outweighed by economic factors this time around.”

The GOP’s 2024 inroads among young men have “evaporated” in a shift that could have “instant ramifications this November,” said Politico. While “young men alone likely won’t determine control of Congress,” their “lack of enthusiasm itself” is a “warning sign for Republicans.”

A football-based strategy

The GOP is making a “massive bet on football” as it scrambles for “midterm momentum,” said Axios. The party is “pouring millions into advertising” at NFL and college games in an attempt to “hold onto male voters — football’s core audience.”

Despite these efforts, Democrats “appear to be gaining ground with young men,” said The Hill. The Cygnal poll showed the demographic has a “negative view of the Republican Party overall.” Democrats “fared slightly better,” though the party “still had a net-negative favorability rating among these voters.”

What happened?

The U.S. election map appeared to shift in favor of Democrats recently, heightening Republicans’ fears that voters angry over the Iran war and the rising cost of living are poised to deliver the GOP a midterm drubbing. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report moved three key Senate races toward Democrats, who must pick up four GOP seats to win control of the chamber. New Hampshire went from “toss-up” to “lean Democrat”; North Carolina from “lean Democrat” to “likely Democrat”; and Kansas, where megachurch pastor Adam Hamilton is neck and neck with Republican incumbent Sen. Roger Marshall, from “lean Republican” to “toss-up.” Seemingly giving up on North Carolina, where former Democratic governor Roy Cooper has a comfortable lead over Republican Michael Whatley, the top GOP Senate super PAC canceled its ads there and shifted funding to South Carolina—which Trump carried by 18 percentage points in 2024— and Kansas, which hasn’t elected a Democratic senator since 1932. A New York Times/Siena poll found Democratic Senate candidates leading in reliably Republican Ohio, Alaska, and Texas, and one point behind in Iowa. With Democrats favored to take the House, a GOP strategist drew lines to the blue wave of 2006. “If the bottom continues falling out,” he told Politico, “this will be worse.”

President Trump floated suspending the federal gas tax to ease anger over pump prices averaging $4.50 a gallon, a move that would require congressional action. Trump, whose approval rating hit a record-low 32% in a new Reuters/Ipsos poll, held rallies in Alabama, Ohio, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Texas. The dire polls are “fake,” Trump said in Mobile, Ala., and “don’t account for the fact that Trump is out campaigning.”

What the columnists said

A huge cash advantage was “supposed to be the GOP’s ace,” said Isaac Arnsdorf in The Washington Post. Since Labor Day, Republicans have poured half a billion dollars into competitive House and Senate races. But Democrats’ advantage on a generic congressional ballot has only widened since then, from about 6 points to 9, according to one polling average. Over $190 million in attack ads aimed at Democratic Senate candidates James Talarico in Texas and Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan hasn’t moved the needle—El-Sayed’s favorability is up 5 points since August, according to Fox News surveys.

Democrats are gaining ground with several key groups, said Ruth Igielnik in The New York Times. They include voters under 30, who in the Times/Siena poll favored Democrats by 30 points, and Latinos, who favored Democrats by 24 points in a recent NBC News/Telemundo poll, up from 12 points before the 2024 election. And in nearly every state the Times polled, Democrats are winning among independents, “the bloc of swing voters that typically decides elections.” The polls could be wrong, said Jim Newell in Slate. They’ve previously “underestimated Republican energy in the Trump era,” by failing to reach enough white, noncollege voters. Since those abound in red states like Kansas and Iowa, “the error there will be greater if pollsters are missing this cohort again.”

If the polls are right, Republicans see a potential “lifeline” in left-leaning New Hampshire, said Ken Thomas in The Wall Street Journal. John Sununu—a moderate former one-term senator— is narrowly trailing Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas, who has for months “been urging the national party to avoid complacency in the battleground state.” Maine, where longtime Sen. Susan Collins is in a tight race with Democrat Troy Jackson, could give Republicans another swing-state win.

But it’s a marker of Republicans’ vulnerability that Democrats have “found an opening in one of America’s reddest states,” said Lauren Egan in The Bulwark. Trump won Kansas by 21 points in 2016, and 16 points in 2024. But Democratic Senate challenger Hamilton has “run a masterful race” pitched to the center—and he’s been aided by Trump policies. Medicaid cuts are squeezing rural health care providers in the state. Its farm industry, already hit hard by tariffs that shrunk exports, is now struggling with the soaring price of diesel for tractors and combines. And ICE raids at meat- processing plants have “enraged” those in the livestock industry.

That Kansas is in play beggars belief, said Jeffrey Blehar in National Review. “This stubborn, spiritually rhomboid state” has voted GOP in every federal statewide race “since an aberrational blip at the dawn of the Roosevelt administration.” But such is the effect of Trump’s agenda on “otherwise deep-red, agribusiness heartlands.” I believe Marshall will pull it out, but with rough weather ahead for the GOP, the state is “officially on tornado watch.” The “conditions for a freak event are now fully in place.”

The spirit of the late, disgraced President Richard Nixon is tanned, rested and ready for a four-fingered comeback. Nixonmaxxing conservatives are working to rehabilitate the 37th president’s fallen reputation — an effort that also attempts to shape narratives about President Donald Trump.

‘Nixon is back’

Republicans see Nixon as a “historical analog” for Trump, said The Wall Street Journal. If Democrats consider both men to be uniquely villainous, conservatives have another view. “The same groups of people, the same institutions” tried to take down both presidents, said Vice President JD Vance this summer at the Nixon Presidential Library, per the outlet. The Justice Department is now “reviewing” whether the Watergate special prosecutor “committed misconduct” in the case, said the Journal.

“Nixon is back,” said Nathan Pinkoski at the Washington Examiner. Boomers view the former president as the “embodiment of perfidy and villainy.” Current in-power Republicans instead view him as a symbol of a “conservative counterculture” who has been embraced by a “younger, rebellious American Right.” The new surge in Nixonphilia is “perfectly timed to tap into a broader collapse of trust” in institutions like the media and legal system.

The Justice Department’s attempt to rewrite history is “extremely dangerous,” said Nick Akerman, a former Watergate prosecutor, at MS NOW. The truth is that Nixon “tried to use the deep state to cover up his crimes.” Obscuring that story is just “another flagrant effort by the Trump administration to undermine our established rule of law.”

No big deal?

The right’s new embrace of Nixon “serves some obvious purposes,” Jonah Goldberg said at The Dispatch. Watergate ended his presidency, signaling “there’s a limit to what Trump can get away with.” But it is an “open question” if any of Trump’s scandals can be a problem if Watergate is retroactively declared to be “no big deal.”

“Nixonmaxxing” was “inevitable,” Heather Digby Parton said at Salon. One way the increasingly unpopular Trump and his GOP allies can fend off scandal is to argue the “deep state has been out to get Republicans ever since Nixon.” It might be the only way to contain a “massive revolt” against Trumpism.

Conservatives are in “revolt” over a new welfare-discouraging commercial from Arkansas Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said Fox News. The ad touts Huckabee Sanders’ proposal that “able-bodied adults without dependents” meet employment, volunteer and training standards in order to “continue receiving assistance.” But it has also enraged critics who claim casting a “young white man as the face of welfare abuse” does not “reflect reality.” Given typical conservative support for anti-welfare efforts, the furor over this ad could either signal shifting MAGA policy priorities or prove a warning sign for the GOP ahead of a potentially catastrophic midterm cycle.

What did the commentators say?

The ad depicts the character “Brad,” an “able-bodied white man” who spends his days “avoiding work while relying on taxpayer-funded benefits,” said Fox News. The commercial comes as polling shows “younger men drifting from the Republican Party” during the second Trump administration, said Forbes. But “most of the critics” were silent on the “political risks of the ad in deterring a core demographic in the GOP base” and were instead “simply angry because of the actor’s race and gender.”

Republicans “don’t have the balls to do this ad with ‘Shaniqua’ as the villain,” said far-right pundit Matt Walsh on X — “even though that would actually be an accurate portrayal of the problem at hand.” The ad “seemed to provoke some of the anger” that has fueled President Donald Trump’s political fortunes, said The New York Times: “A feeling among men, and white men in particular, that the country has turned against them.” Although the criticism prompted Huckabee Sanders to “defend the ad,” she did not “address accusations of racism.”

What next?

“Despite MAGA’s outrage,” said The New Republic, “between 52 and 54% of food stamps or SNAP recipients in the state are white, as are 57.8% of those on Medicaid.” And Huckabee Sanders’ program “won’t solve any problems” anyway, since adding work requirements “doesn’t reduce poverty, and in some cases, makes people poorer.”

After having won Arkansas “by more than 30 points in 2024,” Huckabee Sanders is still “favored to win reelection in the red state,” said The New Republic. Her campaign has “continued to air the ad,” said the Times.

President Donald Trump has dominated the GOP for a decade. But that hold may be slipping, as Republicans prepare for an anticipated “blue wave” in the midterm elections driven by his unpopularity. Conservative candidates are starting to break with Trump, and the right’s pundits are rooting them on.

‘Trumpism is exhausted’

Trump has “become a real liability” for GOP candidates, said The Boston Globe. Senate candidates Ashley Hinson of Iowa and Mike Rogers of Michigan called for an end to the war with Iran, as did incumbent Sen. Jon Husted of Ohio. (Husted voted Thursday against a measure to withdraw troops, however.) The break “isn’t about just one issue,” either. Rep. Maria Salazar (R-Fla.) last week criticized the president’s immigration policy, while Sen. John Curtis (R-Utah) called for an investigation into the Russian oligarch who paid for Donald Trump Jr.’s wedding reception. There may be nothing “stopping a full-on revolt” against Trump’s brand.

MAGA acolytes could once argue that Trump’s agenda is “what Americans voted for in 2024,” Jim Geraghty said at The Washington Post. But polls now suggest that the electorate is “sick and tired of this version of Trump” and that “Trumpism is exhausted.” The mood was especially apparent in Vice President JD Vance’s recent plea to voters to “give us another chance.” That is not a “particularly inspiring rallying cry,” Geraghty said. Republicans have to decide if they still want to be the party of tariffs, enmity toward Canada and mass deportations to remove every “agricultural worker, hotel maid and restaurant busboy.” Vance, if he wants to save his own ambitions, will need to lead the way. “The clock is ticking.”

The GOP under Trump has “blown one of the great opportunities in political history,” Gerard Baker said at The Wall Street Journal. Trump’s election in 2024 was a “real chance to establish a new governing order” favorable to conservatives, and the president could have succeeded by controlling the border, reining in prices and keeping the U.S. out of “costly, ineffective” foreign wars. Trump instead has “widened the deficit,” levied tariffs and set off on a “reckless military adventure” that is damaging the U.S. economy. All due to “hubris, vanity, recklessness” and the GOP’s “abdication of accountability.”

‘Wide open’ GOP future

Polling shows that Trump is “slipping significantly with his own party,” pollster G. Elliott Morris said at Strength in Numbers. His approval rating with Republican and GOP-leaning independent voters remains high at 71%. But that is still an “11-point drop and the lowest we have recorded.” Those GOP defections have helped drive the president’s overall voter approval ratings to new lows.

This could be the beginning of a longer process for the Republican Party. The GOP candidates breaking with one or two Trump policies today “might be repudiating parts of his legacy tomorrow,” Andrew Prokop said at Vox. If Republicans truly start to believe that Trump is a “failure,” then a full-on reassessment could occur. The party’s future “will be wide open.”

What happened

The Trump administration on Thursday defended a campaign-style ad airing on Fox News and Newsmax that features President Donald Trump and says it was “paid for by the U.S. Government.” The White House “did not say what agency paid for the spot, which includes background music with singers crooning ‘love me’ over and over,” The Associated Press said. But in a statement, it called the ad a “public service announcement” aimed at “reminding Americans to love their country.”

Who said what

“Together we will defeat communism,” and “America will never be a communist country,” Trump says in the 30-second ad as his campaign slogans flash in the background. There are “several restrictions on how public funds can be used for PSAs,” including an annually renewed “ban on using funds for ‘publicity or propaganda purposes,’” ABC News said. The ad first ran Wednesday night, as Trump “welcomed Chinese leader Xi Jinping, the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, with a red carpet,” The Wall Street Journal said.

What next?

Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) on Thursday sent White House chief of staff Susie Wiles a letter demanding details about the ad, including how much it cost and what agency was involved. JMSN, who wrote and recorded “Love Me,” said he “did not authorize” its use and was “looking for a lawyer.”

President Donald Trump won the White House in 2024 while making inroads among Latino voters despite his ardent promise of an immigration crackdown. Two years later, the reality of that crackdown is producing a backlash that could cost Republicans control of the House and Senate.

What did the commentators say?

There is “mounting political worry” among Republican candidates that the president’s “heavy-handed” immigration policies will “cost the GOP” in November, said Axios. The clearest sign of that backlash: Rep. Maria Salazar (R-Fla.) unveiled a new ad warning Trump that his policies have gone too far for Latino voters. “The same Hispanics who helped you get to the White House in 2024 feel betrayed today,” she said in the advertisement.

The 900,000 Cuban-American voters who live in Salazar’s Miami-Dade County district have long proven “reliably Republican,” said Al Jazeera, but last year’s election of Miami’s first Democratic mayor in three decades “fueled speculation of a political shift under way.” One reason for that shift: The Trump administration has deported Cubans “who have lived in the country for decades,” often to “third-party countries, where they have no ties.”

Latino Americans are “losing faith in the American Dream,” American University’s Diana Orcés said at The Conversation. Two years ago, surveys showed that 52% of those voters believed that “if you work hard, you’ll get ahead” in the United States. The number has slipped to 40%. They now feel “less safe, less welcome and more like strangers in their own country” no matter whether they are Republican, Democrat or independent.

The 2024 vote was trumpeted as the beginning of a “permanent political realignment in the GOP’s favor,” Ed Kilgore said at New York magazine. But the president has since “alienated a lot of the voters” he won in that election. A poll for The Cook Political Report and TelevisaUnivision found Democratic candidates leading among Texas Latinos by a two-to-one margin. Another survey by Hart Research and Univision found Democrats leading among Florida Latinos by 13 percentage points. A Democratic victory in November “will owe a lot to Trump’s actions alienating Latinos.”

“It’s all about dignity,” León Krauze said at The Washington Post. Democrats will have to tread carefully. Latino voters broadly have “nuanced” views on immigration and will need to be courted not just on migration issues but also with “promises of economic renewal.”

What next?

Latino voters have the “most voting power” in the districts where “Congress will be decided,” Juan Wulff said at VoteHub. Those voters could be a “defining force, especially in deciding the makeup of the House.”

But Latinos are “not necessarily turning Democrat,” said American Community Media. The demographic appears to be “swingy,” Equis Research’s María Isabel Di Franco Quiñonez said to the outlet. This, said the outlet, makes those voters “one of the most consequential and unpredictable electorates in the 2026 midterms.”

Longtime GOP official and current nominee for Texas Railroad Commissioner Bo French forced state Republicans into a defensive crouch this week after he published a racist social media post targeting nonwhite students at the University of Texas. While far from French’s first instance of online bigotry, the post garnered heavy pushback from high-profile GOP figures — and conspicuous hesitation to do so from others.

As Texas Republicans brace for what has become a particularly daunting midterm cycle, French’s outburst highlights a deepening schism. Lone Star State conservatives are waffling over how much prejudice the party can — and should — tolerate.

‘Scorched with scorn’

Republicans in Texas were “already fretting about slipping support with voters of color” before French “posted a photo of a crowd of University of Texas football fans, most of them people of color, saying, ‘the problem is now obviously far worse than anyone imagined,’” said Politico. French’s comments, which “appeared to target South Asian students,” sent state Republicans “into a frenzy” over the potential “impact the rhetoric could have on GOP candidates up and down the ballot.”

“Are other Republican elected officials going to condemn the intolerance and racism or look the other way while it becomes normalized?” said outgoing Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) on X. “This is how great political parties self-destruct. Sad.” French’s post “has crossed the line” between opposing immigration policy and “demeaning people because of their race or ethnicity,” said Republican State House Speaker Dustin Burrows on the same platform.

Burrows is also leading a “coordinated effort called the ‘One Party, One Mission’ tour” to “unify the Texas Republican ticket,” said South Plains College Associate Professor of Government Drew Landry at the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. Despite French having been “scorched with scorn” by some of his fellow Republicans, “one must question” Burrows’ campaign and ask whether a candidate like French can “fit within the Speaker’s unity message?” If those who condemned him ultimately vote for him as the Republican candidate, “then their condemnation holds no water.”

‘Anti-Bo is anti-America’

Although a “handful of high-profile Republicans” have called on French to delete his offending posts, the candidate has so far “duly ignored them and instead leaned in,” said HuffPost. French’s latest comments have “exposed a growing divide among Texas Republicans,” said the Houston Chronicle’s Chron.com.

While many GOP figures have condemned the nominee, others “have defended him or declined to criticize him,” said Chron.com. French’s post is “not my message,” said Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in a statement to The New York Times. Abbott, however, did “not explicitly condemn” French’s post, said Times reporter Bayliss Wagner on X. The Texas Oil & Gas Association “unequivocally and without reservation condemns” French’s post, said the group in a statement. But the association “has not withdrawn its endorsement” for French to head the agency that “regulates the Texas oil and gas industry,” said The Texan.

Most of the Republicans denouncing French are “just trying to feign relevancy” ahead of their own electoral losses, said Julie McCarty, an influential Republican activist and CEO of the conservative True Texas Project, per the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. “Anyone anti-Bo is anti-America.”

When French “unleashed a string of inflammatory social media posts” last year, multiple GOP officials called on him to resign as chair of the Tarrant County GOP, said Politico. Republicans today are hesitant to demand the same “because that might mean that there would be a Democrat elected statewide,” said B. Glen Whitley, a Republican former Tarrant County judge, to the outlet. “That’s the bottom line.”

What happened

The House Wednesday passed sweeping legislation to punish Russia and voted to hold billionaire Leon Black in contempt of Congress for defying subpoenas tied to Jeffrey Epstein, then adjourned until after the Nov. 3 midterms.

House Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) “decision to send the House home early — again” — exacerbated his “increasingly bitter feud” with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) over his alleged use of the calendar to “dodge politically painful votes,” Axios said.

Who said what

Massie “seized control” of the House for a “blistering hourlong speech” in which he accused Johnson of cutting out a day early to stymie “his bipartisan effort to force the release of more” Epstein files and his resolution to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, The Associated Press said. It was a “colorful capstone” to Johnson’s “tumultuous” two-year tenure, during which he “repeatedly and abruptly canceled House voting days” to avoid “disruptions from his own rebellious flank — particularly those legislative efforts that threatened to rebuke President Donald Trump.” By one count, Johnson cut a net 24 days this year, “about one-fourth of the total scheduled.”

What next?

The Russian sanctions bill, which passed 262-159, now goes to Trump’s desk for his expected signature. The legislation “targets Russia’s energy and defense industries” to “deprive Moscow of funds used to pay for its war with Ukraine,” Reuters said. But it “faced pushback because it also authorizes Trump to impose stiff tariffs ​of up to 100%” on countries that don’t “reduce their dependence on Russian oil and gas.”

President Donald Trump last week promised to send $5,000 checks to Americans if Republicans win the midterm elections. But he is seemingly intent on making the election a referendum on his increasingly unpopular presidency, doubling down on policies — data centers, tariffs, war with Iran — disfavored by voters. That leads some observers to wonder if he really cares about GOP victories in November.

What did the commentators say?

Trump is “not spending a ton of his mind share on the races,” White House reporter Maggie Haberman said to The New York Times. The president believes GOP candidates “should be doing more to defend what he sees as his many accomplishments,” and he is committing the bulk of his time to “legacy projects” like the “triumphal arch, the ballroom on the White House complex, his goldification of the Oval Office” instead of policy and governance.

Trump has reportedly told advisers that he is “proud” that Republican candidates “don’t do as well when he’s not on the ballot,” said Haberman. His administration’s efforts to exert control over the elections process, however, remains a “significant X-factor” in the midterm election outcome.

House and Senate candidates usually try to “detach themselves from the national brand” when their party’s president is down in the polls, Jonathan Chait said at The Atlantic. Trump is making that “impossible,” launching a national ad campaign “focused on himself” and holding last week’s GOP convention highlighting the “synonymity of the party and its leader” to voters. The president “probably” cares about the midterms outcome “but not enough to permit Republicans to acknowledge his lack of popularity.” All of this makes sense if it is understood that “Trump’s interest in politics is purely egocentric.” But it leaves Republican candidates in a tough spot.

The president’s ideological allies are also perplexed. Trump “often sounds as if he’s campaigning against the Republican Senate,” The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. GOP seats in “at least six races are in serious jeopardy,” and even traditional red states like Kansas and Nebraska are looking shaky for Republicans. But Trump has made it difficult for his party by launching a “tariff brawl” with Canada and working to oust GOP incumbents like Sen. John Cornyn of Texas. If Republicans lose their majority in the Senate, Trump will be the “main reason” why.

What next?

The president is “signaling that he might not accept the outcome” if Republicans lose in November, Bruce Stokes said at Chatham House. A Democratic win in the House or Senate would likely lead to two years of investigations into Trump’s “corporate donors and alleged ‘pay-to-play’ arrangements, and investments by foreign sovereign wealth funds in Trump family-linked businesses.” That provides a “powerful incentive” for Trump to “undermine the outcome of the election.” American democracy “may never be quite the same again” if the president tries once again to reject an election loss.

With the 2026 midterm elections two months away, Republicans have been ratcheting up their verbal assaults on Democratic candidates of Muslim faith. While these attacks have most notably come against Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, they may be emblematic of a larger GOP campaign against Muslims.

What are Republicans saying about Muslims?

El-Sayed has become a lightning rod for a host of anti-Muslim sentiment, including from the Trump administration. The Senate candidate is part of something “very, very evil” that is “on the rise in the United States,” Vice President JD Vance said during a speech in the Detroit suburb of Sterling Heights. President Donald Trump has referred to Democratic candidates as “jihadists” and also called El-Sayed a “communist who hates Jews and Israel.” El-Sayed has disavowed accusations of antisemitism.

Republicans in Congress have recently been pumping up similar attacks against Islam as a whole. “Every single Muslim holding public office in America is a Trojan horse” and a “threat to both national security and our republic,” Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) said on X. A similar sentiment was echoed by Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.). “The enemy is at the gates,” Tuberville said on X in response to a photograph of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who is also Muslim. In Tuberville’s own state of Alabama, Muslims “make ‌up less than half a percent of the population,” said Reuters.

Why is this the new GOP tactic?

Anti-Muslim rhetoric has “quickly become a central aspect” of the Republicans’ strategy to win the midterms, as “Muslim and Arab American political power is growing across the country,” said The New York Times. The “number of Muslim Americans running for — and winning — local, state and federal elections has steadily increased over the past decade.” There are currently 255 Muslim elected officials across 26 states, according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

There has been an “escalation of messaging designed to raise alarm about Muslim Americans and Muslim candidates,” said NBC News. The Islamophobia in politics is nothing new, as it “began cropping up more pointedly 25 years ago, in the aftermath of 9/11, and it hardened as Trump began his rise.” Since then, the “undercurrent of concern and fears raised by politicians around Muslim Americans has remained steady.”

Critics say the “rhetoric unfairly targets Muslims, while Republicans say they are raising legitimate concerns about security, extremism and the role of religion in public life,” said Reuters. “If you can wrap yourself in the flag ​and you can criticize Muslims and Islam, that means you don’t ​really have to deal with the issues,” Aaron Hughes, a religious studies professor at the University of Rochester, said to Reuters. These attacks come even though many Muslims have beliefs that “dovetail with Republican orthodoxy, such as opposition to some abortion procedures and same-sex marriage.”

Others feel that Republicans “may have trouble with anti-Islam messaging heading into the midterms,” said Spectrum News. If any “candidate in the midterms wants to engage in questionable campaign behavior and make outlandish statements, this may not be something that voters are going to go for, even in a relatively conservative area,” Matthew Eshbaugh-Soha, a professor of political science at the University of North Texas, told the outlet. Voters “care about core issues like cost of living, and social wars probably aren’t going to fly in a 2026 midterm election with a Republican president in office.”

What happened

President Donald Trump capped off the first night of an unusual Republican midterm convention on Wednesday with a movie-length speech in which he defended his Iran war and tariffs while also saying he would send all U.S. adults a $5,000 “Trump dividend” if Republicans retain both houses of Congress in the November elections. “Please pretend that I am running,” he told the partially full arena in Dallas. Trump was preceded by a string of Republican candidates and Cabinet members, many of whom attacked Democrats as “communists,” and a surprise video appearance by Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.).

Who said what

Trump “reveled in making the upcoming elections all about himself,” The Associated Press said. But his “financially and politically implausible” dividend pledge reflects his “apparent calculation that he needs bold moves to revive Republicans’ chances” amid “his low approval ratings.” The payouts would cost about $1.2 trillion, Politico said, which “would dwarf the amount distributed during the Covid pandemic and likely explode the deficit” and “worsen inflation.”

Trump’s “DOGE divided” and tariff rebate checks “never panned out,” The New York Times said. And “there’s reason to think that Republicans in Congress, like they did with his two previous promises of quick cash, could shrug off the president’s suggestion.” The “Trump dividend” is a “last-ditch bid to prevent an electoral shellacking,” The Wall Street Journal said. But the GOP’s “all-Trump-all-the-time strategy” could also “drive away independent voters.”

What next?

Vice President JD Vance is scheduled to give Thursday’s keynote address, but Trump is closing out the convention’s second and final night.

What happened

Fox News on Thursday said it had parted ways with financial journalist Maria Bartiromo, effective immediately, thanking her for “her work over the last 12 1/2 years.” She last appeared on air Aug. 9. Asked about reports that Bartiromo was fired for leaking confidential news coverage plans to the White House, a Fox News spokesperson told reporters only that the move was a “business decision.”

Who said what

After joining Fox Business in 2014, following a long career at CNBC, Bartiromo became “one of President Donald Trump’s closest allies at the network,” CNN said. She was fired, Status reported, because she “effectively betrayed” Fox by telling the White House that network bosses had instructed staff to “steer clear of giving credence to Trump’s delusional claims” in an “unhinged” July primetime speech on election security. Bartiromo “wanted to pursue a story related to China and 2020 election voting conspiracies,” Puck’s Dylan Byers reported, and when executives told her no, she “took a screenshot of the guidance and sent it to senior White House officials.”

What next?

Fox Business rebranded Bartiromo’s namesake programs and took down her contributor pages. “Her fans, of which there are many, will not be happy,” Trump said in an online post. “Social media lit up with speculation that Bartiromo might be in line to become White House press secretary,” CNN said. But asked about that possibility yesterday, Vice President JD Vance said, “No, I don’t think so.”

What happened

The Missouri Supreme Court on Thursday ruled unanimously that congressional maps redrawn by the Republican-led state legislature can’t be used in the November elections, likely thwarting a GOP effort to unseat Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D). Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins (R) “incorrectly” dismissed a “legal, sufficient and timely” referendum petition on the redistricting submitted in December, the court said in its opinion, so the new districts “did not go into effect and will not go into effect unless and until approved by the voters” in November.

In another “notable victory for Democrats,” The Associated Press said, the Maryland Supreme Court also agreed to let voters decide whether the Democratic-controlled state legislature can redraw congressional districts for the 2028 election, in a bid to defenestrate Rep. Andy Harris (R).

Who said what

President Donald Trump’s “quest for a midterm election advantage triggered an unusual mid-decade redistricting battle,” the AP said. Thursday’s rulings were among “only a few nationally to go against Republicans.”

The Missouri Supreme Court’s “surprising decision creates an unprecedented set of electoral circumstances,” because last month’s primaries “took place under the new lines,” Politico said. For “months, Missouri Republicans had signaled their intention” to stall “as long as possible while implementing the new maps,” and Hoskins waited until the day of the primaries to “declare the referendum insufficient.” The court’s “unprecedented decision” thrusts Missouri “into a full‑fledged constitutional crisis,” Attorney General Catherine Hanaway (R) said in a statement. She vowed to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

What next?

The Missouri court “did not specify how candidates would be determined for a general election,” The New York Times said. “Redistricting opponents had suggested that candidates who won their primaries” could “remain the nominees in the same-numbered districts.”

What happened

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) on Thursday vowed to halt all of President Donald Trump’s nominees until his administration eases a wetlands conservation policy aimed at protecting the breeding grounds of ducks and other waterfowl. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last weekend said it would at least temporarily retain the Biden-era program, which bars farmers from draining land near protected federal conservation easements.

Who said what

“My farmers are furious and so am I,” Cramer said in a statement to The Hill. The Trump administration’s “blind defense of a Biden rule favored by environmental extremists” just “confounds me,” particularly when farmers are “hurting so badly” amid “rising fuel and fertilizer costs resulting from limited traffic in the Strait of Hormuz.” But “other Republicans and hunters staunchly oppose any changes that would allow farmers to drain wetlands” and potentially “cause steep declines in duck populations,” said E&E News. The Upper Midwest’s Prairie Pothole region “supports more than half of North America’s ducks,” said the Washington Examiner.

What next?

“There will be no pause in my aggression” on the issue, Cramer told E&E News. “I have put a hold on all nominees, period, of all agencies. So I hope Clarence Thomas stays healthy.” Such holds “don’t necessarily prevent confirmation” of a president’s picks, said The Hill, but “they can cause a significant setback.”

The House Ethics Committee this week announced it had opened an investigation into Ohio Republican Rep. Max Miller, after ex-wife Emily Moreno accused the lawmaker of violently assaulting her and the pair’s child. While Miller has denied the allegations against him, a growing chorus of Republicans, including Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), Emily’s father, has demanded he resign from Congress. Still, not everyone in the GOP is on board with calls for Miller to step down — particularly during an election cycle in which Republicans’ narrow control of Congress appears up for grabs.

What did the commentators say?

With “public scrutiny” of Miller and the allegations against him “quickly mounting,” many of his Republican colleagues have been “slow to respond,” said Politico. The “surge of attention” surrounding Miller “presents a dilemma for Republicans.” They can either “speak out against their colleague” amid a competitive race or “face accusations of hypocrisy” after “hammering multiple similarly scandal-plagued Democrats.” The situation risks being like “Graham Platner on steroids,” said one GOP operative to the outlet. Republicans may be “struggling up and down the ballot in the Rust Belt state” in general, but Miller’s situation in particular has “muddied their prospects,” said Axios.

Intra-party debate over Miller’s behavior has “led to one question,” said Ohio Capital Journal: “Where is the line in believing accusations when an election is at risk?” Although Miller himself is “confident he will win in the fall,” other Republican officials are “not as confident of a Miller victory.” This “general reluctance to publicly engage” with Miller’s case until this week has “raised questions” for Republicans about the “standards they maintain within their own party,” said The Free Press.

“There’s all sorts of domestic events going on with 435 members of Congress all the time,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to Politico. “It’s not my business to get engaged in it.” The public should wait for the “process to play out.” Johnson’s response to Miller “raises the question of what Johnson does think the speaker’s business is,” said The Atlantic. His “reluctance to become involved” in Miller’s “messy, lurid story” is “understandable, but it’s also one of the burdens that falls on leaders.”

Despite publicly defending Miller as a “good person” whose family should “figure that out,” President Donald Trump offered a more candid take on a private call with the congressman Monday evening, said Axios. During the conversation, the president reportedly told Miller that “things aren’t looking good” and “repeatedly said his reelection would be tough.” But the president “stopped short of asking Miller to step aside,” said The New York Times, and Miller “made it clear he had no intention of doing so.” Because Trump has yet to “publicly withdraw his support” for Miller, other Republicans remain “reluctant to do so themselves.”

Miller himself has responded to the increased scrutiny by comparing the domestic violence allegations that “threaten his reelection” to the “political attacks Trump weathered in 2016,” said Cleveland.com. He mentioned the president’s “sexual assault and harassment claims” and the release of the now-infamous Access Hollywood tape.

What next?

With Miller’s “relatively safe House seat in jeopardy,” the congressman would need to “resign or drop out by Aug. 10 for Republicans to be able to replace him on the ballot,” said The Hill. “With him on the ballot,” said one Ohio GOP official to the outlet, it’s “incredibly difficult to hold a seat that they should.” Republican party chairs for the counties Miller represents have a “window” to “name a successor as the Republican candidate on the ballot,” said Cleveland.com.

Nationally, Johnson is for now “declining to bear” the burden of leadership regarding Miller, said The Atlantic. But by doing so, he may ultimately “ensure that he doesn’t have to worry about the duties of the speaker when the new Congress opens next January.”

What happened

Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-N.C.) dropped his bid for reelection on Wednesday, two days after the House Ethics Committee recommended he be censured for “persistent unprofessional and inappropriate conduct toward two young female staffers.” But Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio) reiterated his intention to stay in his race for a third term despite a House ethics investigation launched earlier this week following allegations he abused his ex-wife, Emily Moreno, and their 2-year-old daughter.

Two House Republicans in Florida on Wednesday endorsed a primary challenger to Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.), who is also under investigation by the ethics panel over allegations including domestic violence. Mills and Miller, both endorsed by President Donald Trump, have denied any wrongdoing.

Who said what

The “serious allegations” against the three GOP incumbents have fueled Republican anxieties that the “mounting political crises” could “further endanger their majority,” costing them “seats once considered mostly safe,” CNN said. Some senior House GOP campaign strategists “worry that Miller’s chances of reelection” have “vanished,” The Associated Press said.

Pressure on Miller to drop out “exploded” on Sunday, Politico said, after his ex-father-in-law, Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), said Miller needed “professional help” and shouldn’t be serving in Congress. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told Politico he would talk with Miller but the Ethics Committee process needed to “play out.”

What next?

The Republican executive committee in North Carolina’s 11th District will meet next week to select Edwards’ replacement. Miller “would have to formally withdraw by sometime Saturday” for his party to replace him by a Monday deadline, the AP said. “Privately, some top Republicans are hopeful that Mills will lose his GOP primary” on Aug. 18, said CNN.

It is hot out there. Summertime heat can take a deadly toll on workers, especially in the era of climate change and frequent heat domes. The Biden administration initiated rules to ensure that U.S. companies provide their employees with breaks to hydrate and recover while laboring in warm temperatures. Now the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress are looking to roll back those protections.

‘A matter of life and death’

Heat causes “hundreds of workplace deaths” every year, but the Trump administration is rewriting rules that “mandate breaks and access to water and shade for workers,” said The New York Times. The details of those changes are still unknown, but already the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is “curtailing workplace inspections” that had been designed to “raise awareness of heat-related illnesses.”

A House committee last month also gave approval to a bill that would block the Labor Department “finalizing any worker protections for extreme heat,” said E&E News. The Biden-era rule solves a “problem that doesn’t need solving,” Rep. Mark Messmer (R-Ind.) told the outlet. At least a few workers disagree. “We didn’t sign up for the heat to become as severe as it is,” Trina David, a baggage handler at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, said to the Times.

“Trump will cause some of you to die from the heat,” Robert Reich said on Substack. There are countless workers who toil “under the hot sun, or in stifling warehouses or in delivery trucks with no AC,” which can “trigger heat stroke, organ failure and chronic kidney disease.” Those illnesses and deaths “can often be prevented with strong safety standards,” but the Trump administration is “retreating from worker safety.” Workplace heat protections are “literally a matter of life and death.”

The Biden-era rules had a “deep benevolent paternalism” to them, Matthew Kahn said at Environmental and Urban Economics. But workers possess a “degree of choice over where they live and work, what job they take and what shifts they agree to work,” Kahn and Joseph Tracy said in a 2025 paper for the American Enterprise Institute. They can “move or switch firms” if conditions are too onerous. There is “no ‘crisis’” in on-the-job heat injuries that requires a heavy regulatory touch.

‘Can’t afford to stay cool’

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani in June signed an executive order “ensuring the safety of municipal workers in the heat,” said E&E News. Workers should not have to “choose between their paycheck and their health,” Mamdani said at the signing ceremony.

For many workers, though, the twin trends of “high temperatures and high inflation” are creating a “crisis that rarely makes headlines,” Sharon Block and Dr. Satchit Balsari said at USA Today. Cash-strapped workers increasingly “can’t afford to stay cool.” Rising prices force them to choose between paying for “food, rent and healthcare” or the electricity needed to “cool off during their off-hours.” The combination of low wages, increased costs and poor protections are forcing workers into “deadly trade-offs.”

Members of Congress are leaving Washington for their summer recess, said Calen Razor in Politico, but the break will be anything but relaxing for GOP lawmakers. With less than 100 days left before the midterm elections, and with Democratic candidates up by an average of 6.1 percentage points in the generic ballot, Republicans must now spend five anxious and “potentially grueling” weeks at home in their districts. They’ll try to somehow persuade voters not to punish them in November for the high cost of living, an unpopular war in Iran, and the failures and excesses of President Trump—whose approval rating has flatlined below 40%, and who is loudly and regularly attacking Senate Republicans for failing to pass his “SAVE America Act” package of voting restrictions. Parties in power usually lose seats in the midterms, said Liz Goodwin and Ben Binday in The Washington Post, and November was going to be “tough no matter what” for Republicans, given Trump’s sagging poll numbers. But with the Iran war heating up again, pushing gas prices back above $4, some GOP pollsters are “raising the alarm” about the widening enthusiasm gap between the two parties’ voters. While Democrats are champing at the bit, Republicans are “listless and demotivated,” with about 1 in 5 “reliable Republican base voters” saying they may stay home on Election Day, or even vote Democrat.

Republicans should be doomed, said Chris Stein in The Guardian, but Democrats have their “own woes.” For starters, the party is broke. While the Republican National Committee has nearly $130 million in cash, most of it from wealthy donors, the Democratic National Committee is $2 million in debt. If the midterms were held today, Democrats would be favored to at least win back the House, said Julia Mueller in The Hill. The latest forecast from Decision Desk HQ suggests they’ll win a 15-seat advantage in the chamber and send House Speaker Mike Johnson’s caucus back into the minority. But that’s down 10 seats from early July, and it doesn’t help that Democrats are now attacking one another in a “bitter” public argument over the party’s future.

That debate has been a “gift” to Republicans, said Mona Charen in The Bulwark. Earlier this year, the GOP had “nothing to run on” and seemed headed for a deserved drubbing in November. But candidates aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America then scored a succession of Democratic primary wins, in New York and Colorado. The DSA’s platform calls for abolishing prisons, borders, and the presidency, while pushing sky-high taxes to fund a worker’s paradise of “free everything”—a set of policies seemingly designed to repel swing voters. The DSA’s rise has given the GOP its “midterm message,” said Ed Kilgore in New York. Republicans can and will now frame the midterms as a “vast ideological struggle” against Radical Socialism, with Trump and the GOP, for all their flaws, as the “safer bet.”

Much may hinge on the “final wild card” of the season, said Hans Nichols in Axios: Michigan’s Aug. 4 Senate Democratic primary between centrist Rep. Haley Stevens and “progressive insurgent” Abdul El-Sayed. A leftist Muslim with a habit of “equivocating about terrorism” may not be able to win in a Midwest swing state, said Nick Catoggio in The Dispatch. But will this “new red scare” really make the electorate as a whole forget 21 months of rising prices, ICE killings, weaponized government, and “lascivious corruption”? Socialism may be an “albatross” around Democrats’ necks, but “it’s likely less of one than Trump is for Republicans.”

What happened

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said Tuesday it will end a Medicare subsidy program aimed at lowering prescription costs for some seniors at the end of 2026, one year ahead of schedule. The Medicare prescription drug benefit, which is expected to cost the government some $3.6 billion in subsidies this year, was introduced by former President Joe Biden in 2024. It shields some 25 million people with “Part D” Medicare plans from steep insurance premium hikes.

Who said what

Characterizing the government subsidies as a “bailout” that “gave BILLIONS of taxpayer money DIRECTLY to Big Insurance Companies,” CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz said on social media that the administration is “stabilizing the market.” All but a quarter of Part D enrollees are likely to see their premiums rise next year as a result of the change, some by $20 a month, an anonymous Trump administration official told The Wall Street Journal.

The change could “inflame the debate” about healthcare costs at a time when “voters’ concerns about the cost of living are a top campaign issue,” Bloomberg said. Republicans could find this “politically damaging” ahead of the November midterm elections, The New York Times said.

What next?

CMS will release the new monthly Part D premiums in September, which means Medicare users could be in for some “sticker shock while shopping for next year’s drug plan,” the Times said.

What happened

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) on Monday appointed Darline Graham Nordone, the younger sister of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R), to serve the rest of her late brother’s term in the Senate following his unexpected death this weekend. Her appointment “comes with the support of President Donald Trump,” who had “recommended Graham’s sister to the Republican governor,” said CNN.

Who said what

“Lindsey has always been there for me,” said Graham Nordone at a press conference with McMaster. “Now I will be there for him.” She has “largely kept out of the public eye” and has “not previously held elected office,” said Fox News.

Her appointment comes after “several prominent South Carolina Republicans” have “expressed interest in running for the seat,” said The Washington Post. That group includes Reps. Nancy Mace and Ralph Norman, as well as Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette, “all of whom lost the competitive gubernatorial primary last month.”

What next?

Graham’s death launches a “sprint primary election to replace him on the November ballot,” said CNN. “At this point,” said Fox, it’s “unclear” if his sister will run for the full term.

What happened

The death of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Saturday has triggered uncertainty over the future of his South Carolina seat and created fresh challenges for a party with a narrow Senate majority. Graham died at age 71, following a “brief and sudden illness,” according to his office, with preliminary findings from the Washington, D.C., medical examiner indicating a ruptured aorta.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) is expected to appoint a temporary replacement, while the state prepares for a special Republican primary to choose a new candidate for November’s midterm election. The winner will face Democratic nominee Annie Andrews.

Who said what

President Donald Trump already has someone in mind as a temporary replacement, but “I don’t want to say it now because it just, you know, it’s too soon with Lindsey,” he told “Meet the Press.” Graham’s death might not have any “short-term impact on the overall balance of power in the Senate,” CNN said, but he was a “key player on major issues in the chamber.” He would have been an “outspoken advocate for additional defense funding amid the Iran war.”

Without Graham, the president is deprived of “one of his most effective Capitol Hill operators,” Politico said. And his death leaves Senate Republicans “without one of their strongest links to the White House.”

What next?

The special Republican primary is slated for Aug. 11. South Carolina “leans heavily conservative,” so the next nominee “would have a strong chance of becoming the state’s next senator,” The New York Times said.

‘The dangerous myth of flexibility’

David Weil at The American Prospect

Schedule flexibility has become the “lynchpin of a well-traveled myth that corporations have spun to their employees, policymakers and the public,” says David Weil. But with AI being “explored as a replacement for many white-collar jobs, and the gig work model continuing its global expansion into new sectors like healthcare, information technology, staffing, hospitality and childcare, the flexibility myth now threatens the hard-won rights and protections afforded to tens of millions of working people.” While companies like “Uber and Lyft insist” that flexibility benefits their drivers, it actually “benefits Uber and Lyft.”

Read more

‘Republicans lean into anti-Asian racism ahead of midterms’

Ja’han Jones at MS NOW

Some conservatives are “resorting to anti-Asian racism and anti-Chinese xenophobia as the Republican Party faces a potential shellacking in this year’s midterms,” says Ja’han Jones. The attacks “underscore the exploitative posture that some in the GOP have taken toward Asian Americans.” Polls have “shown Americans broadly oppose President Donald Trump and the GOP’s agenda,” so it “seems the party is leaning into voter suppression gambits and overt racism as it tries to maintain power.”

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‘Will Iraq’s new prime minister really take on corruption?’

Mina Al-Oraibi at Foreign Policy

Corruption has “continued to grow” in Iraq, and even “wide-ranging arrests do not represent a majority of those who have siphoned money from the Iraqi state,” says Mina Al-Oraibi. Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi is “personally overseeing the anti-corruption cases” and “needs to do this in part because he remains a weak candidate.” But a “wide-ranging and impartial effort to eliminate all corruption would take time,” and al-Zaidi has been in office for “less than two months.”

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‘The tech bro-ification of marketing’

Miranda Shanahan at Time

The “tech bro-ification of marketing is underway,” says Miranda Shanahan. Beneath this “trend lies a broader pattern around how work is named, coded and valued.” The “marketing industry is a broad church, but decades of cultural shorthand have flattened it into something quite specific.” The “first inkling of recalibration came when tech bros suddenly started emphasizing the importance of taste.” It “might not seem that deep, but marketing’s rebrand is part of a bigger pattern.”

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Democratic socialists are winning Democratic primaries and Republicans see an opportunity. GOP candidates are increasingly tagging their rivals as “communists,” an approach embraced by President Donald Trump. The United States “did not fight communism on battlefields across the world only to have that menace rear its ugly head right back here in America,” Trump said during his Independence Day speech. Democrats say the attacks harken back to discredited “red-baiting” smears of earlier eras. Will the accusations help the GOP in this fall’s midterm elections?

What did the commentators say?

The attacks come as U.S. voters increasingly “take on a positive view of socialism,” said The Washington Post. The longstanding Republican accusation that Democrats are socialists is no longer an “attack that stings as much,” GOP strategist Alex Conant said to the outlet. That leaves conservatives trying a message they hope will work with voters “old enough to remember Soviet-era nuclear drills and spy dramas,” said Axios. Trump himself “came of age” during the Cold War, historian Beverly Gage said to the publication. Whether accusing opponents of being communists resonates with younger voters is an open question, however. “Is the United States actually still susceptible to that kind of political language?"

“It was only a matter of time before Donald Trump went full Joe McCarthy,” Heather Digby Parton said at Salon. Republicans have used “red scare” tactics for nearly a century, and McCarthy’s right-hand man was a lawyer named Roy Cohn who later mentored Trump. The challenge for Republicans is that the policies advocated by upstart Democrats are “standard issue Bernie Sanders-style progressivism” that is popular among young voters and “some of the more populist MAGA types.” That ideology “certainly isn’t communism.”

Despite “media dismissals,” it is actually true that the “majority of the Democratic Socialists of America’s leadership identifies with Marxist ideology,” said Stu Smith at City Journal. The DSA was “not always” aligned with communism, but the organization’s recent “leftward shift” has attracted “members with Communist political tendencies.” Trump is “correct” in linking communism to the DSA’s “toehold in the Democratic Party,” said Jonathan Chait at The Atlantic. But the president’s demand for partial government stakes in companies such as U.S. Steel, Nvidia and OpenAI reveals he has “more in common with Communists than his hostile rhetoric lets on.”

Communist accusations against Democrats are “laughably false,” Sara Pequeño said at USA Today. National Democrats “barely want” DSA members in the party. “Why on earth would they suddenly be welcoming Marxist theory with open arms?”

What next?

Polls show “most Americans disapprove” of Trump’s job performance but there are also “warning signs” for Democrats, said USA Today. A majority of battleground state voters say Democrats are “too far to the left,” a sign Republicans “could find fertile ground” by raising the specter of communism. Democrats could be hurt if the midterms become a “referendum on the craziest ideas” of democratic socialist candidates, Third Way’s Matt Bennett said to the outlet.

Historically unpopular and facing potentially catastrophic midterm elections in November, President Donald Trump has thrown an electoral hand grenade into the campaign calendar. “For the first time ever, the Republican Party will hold a midterm convention” in Dallas, Texas, Sept. 9-10 — a “rally like none other,” said Trump on Truth Social last week. And as the president tries to consolidate GOP strength ahead of a make-or-break election, Democrats see signs of desperation and political opportunities.

What did the commentators say?

Party officials have been “planning the logistics of the event for months,” after Trump became “enamored with the idea of a splashy midterm convention last year,” said The New York Times. Given that the party in power has “historically lost ground in midterm elections, Republicans see a convention so close to election day as “offering the party a large platform to make the case to stay in power.” Democrats had “briefly considered” holding their own midterm convention, but ultimately “decided against such a pricey event.”

The “Trumpapalooza” gathering will offer Republicans a “chance to highlight all the wonderful things this president has done,” said Republican National Committee Chair Joe Gruters to Fox News. GOP officials also hope the convention will “energize MAGA voters who don’t always vote when Trump isn’t on the ballot,” said the outlet. Despite being “designed to showcase Republican achievements,” however, the planned convention is “likely to have detractors, even among party officials,” said Al Jazeera. Critics fear the event could “draw resources away from key battlegrounds in the final stretch of the race,” and will “shine a spotlight on Trump himself at a moment when his poll numbers are drooping.”

Although the convention “comes at a politically vulnerable time” for Republicans, its “location in Texas is also significant,” said Time. “No further proof is needed” that the GOP is “freaking the f*** out” over their midterms standing, said Texas State Rep. Cassandra Garcia Hernandez (D) on X. While Texas has “not elected a Democrat statewide in decades,” Democratic State Rep. James Talarico is currently neck and neck with Attorney General Ken Paxton for outgoing Sen. John Cornyn’s (R) U.S. Senate seat, and has become “one of his party’s top fundraisers,” said the Times.

Whether GOP officials “appreciate it or not,” there are “two main problems they should probably keep in mind,” said MS NOW. First, “holding a national convention is extremely expensive.” Second, and “just as important,” is the fact that the goal of a national convention is “nationalizing an election cycle.” Given how unpopular Trump is, the GOP should be “going out of its way to localize the midterms,” rather than the opposite.

What next?

It is likely that “many Democratic officials are looking forward” to Trump’s event, said MS NOW. The convention will “give the minority party an opportunity to do what it wants to do anyway: connect Republican candidates and officeholders to Trump.”

While much of the event’s programming remains under wraps, officials have begun to “fill in some of the details,” said The Dallas Morning News. The convention will “blend elements of a traditional political convention” with a “Trump-centered program designed to energize Republican voters.” The event will also “include delegates from across the country,” but it will feature “no official party business.” Organizers have also not clarified “whether members of the public will be able to attend” or how ticketing might work.

Trump’s scheduled convention will also be “clashing with a pair of NFL matchups that will kick off the 2026 season,” forcing both events to “potentially compete for viewership,” said Forbes. In the past, NFL kickoff games have been rescheduled to avoid overlap with political conventions during presidential election years. It is “not immediately clear if the same will happen to this year’s season opener.”

Reports of President Donald Trump’s total capture of the Republican Party may be premature. Faced with plummeting popularity and whack-a-mole crises, the president has clashed with some of the most powerful members of his own coalition: Senate Republicans.

Whether this conservative revolt becomes a logjam for the White House remains to be seen. As Republicans face midterm headwinds to keep their congressional majorities, is the nascent push for senatorial independence for real, or will Republicans once more adopt the MAGA party line?

‘Relationship appears to be fraying’

Trump has “enjoyed unbending loyalty” from GOP lawmakers for years, said NPR. But the “strength of that relationship appears to be fraying,” particularly as some “departing members feel more uninhibited to push back” and others begin to imagine a post-Trump Washington.

Senators whom Trump had “written off, alienated or even helped defeat” are now opting to support “Senate traditions over his political demands,” said Axios. And the president’s decision this week to cancel the planned signing of bipartisan housing legislation “further inflamed weeks of tumult” that have marked an “increasingly bitter relationship between” him and high-profile Republican senators, said The New York Times. While “lawmakers from both parties were shocked by the president’s decision,” many of them saw Trump’s canceled signing as an effort to “undermine the efforts of his own party to protect its congressional majorities” before the midterms.

Trump’s push for harsh voting restrictions, which he demanded as a prerequisite before signing the housing bill, is “colliding with a newly defiant Republican Senate” and sets up a “multifront battle” ahead of the midterms, said The Wall Street Journal. GOP lawmakers “have been deferential to the president to a point,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R - Texas), to the outlet. But that deference “doesn’t seem to have done any good.” Simply having endorsed Trump’s point of view in the past “doesn’t mean he’s going to support you,” added Cornyn, whose own reelection bid was scuttled by a Trump-backed challenger.

During a closed-door lunch on Wednesday, which Republican senators hoped would “clear the air” between them and Trump, the president instead “vented his frustrations with the senators for more than an hour, leaving them no closer to detente,” said Politico. Trump “said something negative about me,” in an attempt to “bully me from asking a question that I think the American people need to know,” said outgoing Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy to the outlet, after reports of an intense argument between him and the president during the meeting. “I’m not going to be bullied.”

Sacrificing principles at the ‘altar of Trump’

Senate Republicans that same day “proved yet again that their spines are made of pudding,” said The New Republic, after both Cassidy and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul bowed to White House pressure and flipped previous votes to kill a resolution limiting Trump’s Iran war powers. The waffling shows conservative lawmakers who “claim to have principles” will “gladly sacrifice them at the altar of Trump.”

It is unclear whether the vote will be “enough to appease Trump,” said The Associated Press. But blocking efforts to restrict the president’s war powers “was a clear signal” to Trump from senators who “still want to placate him.”

Republicans in recent years have tried to match President Donald Trump’s populism with tentative steps toward union-friendly rhetoric. Their policies have not always kept pace, but that may be changing in a small way.

The House of Representatives last week passed a Democratic-sponsored labor bill with the help of 20 Republicans who “broke party lines to support the measure,” said Time. The Faster Labor Contracts Act would amend federal law to “accelerate contract negotiations between newly unionized workplaces and their employees.” The right of workers to unionize is “crucial to improving wages, hours, working conditions and so much more,” said Rep. Pete Stauber (R-Minn.). It was the latest example of union-friendly Congressional Republicans “flexing their muscles” in the face of “furious” opposition from the GOP’s traditional free-market conservatives, said The Hill. The move is part of a “larger war” over the party’s future as it has “made inroads with unions” under Trump.

What did the commentators say?

Congressional politics “are shifting in labor’s favor,” Timothy Noah said at The New Republic. The House recently passed two other bills to restore collective bargaining rights to federal workers, thanks to a “breakaway Republican faction” that joined Democrats to provide a majority vote in support of labor rights. The union-friendly bills still face “dismal odds” in the GOP-controlled Senate. Nonetheless, the House passage of those measures demonstrates that House Speaker Mike Johnson is “losing control over his caucus.” And 20 GOP votes to defy party leadership for a pro-union measure might be a “sign that labor solidarity is starting to undermine partisan solidarity.”

The latest pro-union bill is a “gift to the cultural left,” The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. Republicans who joined Democrats to pass the measure may “think they’re burnishing their populist credentials,” but they are actually “selling out their constituents to the progressive left.”

The vote to speed contract negotiations between businesses and new unions “isn’t only about wages,” said the Journal editorial. Instead, it will likely provide cover for those unions to force firms to provide reproductive and gender-affirming care coverage as part of their benefits packages. “We wonder if Republicans know what they’ve voted for.”

What next?

Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) are sponsoring the Senate version of the act, said The Washington Examiner. Hawley is a union-friendly Republican and a social conservative, but the bill is running into opposition from other religious conservatives who say it will “require employers to cover abortion and transgender medical procedures.” Those objections “show that giant corporations are desperate to kill legislation that would help American workers,” said a spokesperson for Hawley.

The debates arrive at a time when “many union voters have turned” on Trump over rising prices and the war in Iran, said The Washington Post. Trump won 45% of union voters in 2024 on the strength of “his promise to restore U.S. manufacturing jobs.” The discontent could be meaningful in November. The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations is vowing to turn out 16 million union voters for the midterm elections.

What happened

Vice President JD Vance said Monday that he and President Donald Trump had “digitally” signed an interim peace agreement with Iran and expected the text of the memorandum of understanding to be released before a ceremonial signing in Geneva on Friday. The potential breakthrough “drew cautious optimism and frustration” in Congress, where “even some Republicans were reluctant to praise a deal whose terms the administration has yet to disclose,” The New York Times said. “If it’s a secret deal, then how can I take it seriously?” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said to reporters.

In Israel, people “from across the political spectrum reacted angrily” to news of the deal to end the war that their government launched alongside Trump, The Associated Press said. And they directed their “fury at one man: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.”

Who said what

It’s unclear if Trump’s deal is “one that Netanyahu will stomach — or one he will seek to derail,” The Washington Post said. Politically, he “has every incentive to continue fighting, especially in Lebanon.” For Trump, “this is his decision,” Netanyahu told reporters. For Israel, “the struggle has not ended.”

What next?

“Early signs of bumps ahead” included Netanyahu’s insistence that Israeli forces would remain in Lebanon and Iran saying it “intended to charge ‘fees’ but not ‘tolls’” to ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz, the Times said. But “for all the confusion,” oil prices “tumbled, and Iranians expressed wary optimism that a war that has killed thousands could soon end.”

Lawmakers are exploring a new front in the electoral battle between Democrats and Republicans. Both parties have zeroed in on the other’s fundraising operations, with Republicans vowing to intensify their existing investigation into Democrats’ ActBlue online platform after Executive Director Regina Wallace-Jones repeatedly invoked her Fifth Amendment protections during a Republican-led House hearing last week. In turn, Democrats have increased calls for similar investigations into the GOP’s WinRed platform over allegations of illegal international contributions and fraud.

Foreign funds and ‘profoundly alarming’ allegations

Democrats on the House Administration, Judiciary and Oversight committees last week requested WinRed CEO Ryan Lyk sit for a “transcribed interview” and “preserve documents and communications” about WinRed’s fraud prevention, said Politico. Reports that “foreign nationals have used WinRed to donate money to President Donald Trump’s campaign” are “profoundly alarming,” said New York Rep. Joe Morelle, Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), and Robert Garcia (D-Ca.), in a letter to Lyk.

The letter is the “latest salvo in a long-running battle” between Democrats and Republicans over their respective online fundraising infrastructures, said Politico. Republicans have spent “over a year looking into ActBlue’s process for vetting foreign political contributions,” said Campaigns and Elections. Conservatives “escalated their probe” in April following a “bombshell New York Times report” that ActBlue’s lawyers had “previously warned Wallace-Jones that she may have misled congressional investigators” about ActBlue’s donation vetting practices. That warning “instigated a meltdown at the highest levels of ActBlue” and was a “key cause of the tumult” at the organization, said The New York Times.

The GOP’s pursuit of ActBlue is not “legitimate oversight,” said Wallace-Jones at The Washington Post. Rather, it is a “coordinated campaign of political retribution,” and last week’s hearing was the “latest assault in that corrupt campaign.” Democrats on the House Administration committee have meanwhile “sought to draw attention” to Ken Paxton, Texas’ Republican attorney general and Senate nominee, whom they claim has ignored questions “about any similar probes of GOP fundraising practices,” said Roll Call.

‘Defrauded, in real time’

“Dozens of political donors” have “begged Paxton’s office in recent years for recourse” against both WinRed and ActBlue, “complaining of thousands of dollars in unauthorized charges and nonstop text messages requesting more money,” said the San Antonio Express-News. But Paxton “hasn’t publicly taken action” and “deploys the same aggressive tactics” in his own WinRed fundraising.

By targeting ActBlue with a lawsuit this past spring, Paxton’s “willful blindness has come home to roost,” said Reps. Morelle, Raskin and Garcia in a letter to the attorney general demanding he preserve his WinRed documents. “Dozens of your constituents are being defrauded, in real time.”

Dueling allegations over both platforms are now “putting an otherwise bipartisan effort” for campaign finance reform “at risk,” said NOTUS. With four campaign finance bills “recently approved by the House Administration Committee,” subsequent “bipartisan progress appears strained” as partisan fighting intensifies.

Democrats, meanwhile, have only increased their threats ahead of November’s midterm elections. Congress “has a duty to investigate” cases of alleged fraud and malfeasance, said Rep. Morelle, per Politico. “House Republicans have not taken that duty seriously. But next year, rest assured, committee Democrats will.”

President Donald Trump holds firm sway over the GOP and its voters. But his grip on Republican-controlled Congress may be slipping.

Trump’s White House “appears to be losing momentum” with a legislative agenda that has “stalled in Congress,” said Vox. His proposed “anti-weaponization fund” to reward allies “went down in flames after some unusual pushback from Republican lawmakers.” And Trump’s GOP allies are pushing back on personnel picks like Bill Pulte for acting director of national intelligence and Todd Blanche to serve as attorney general. House Republicans last week also “failed to block an effort to halt the Iran war,” said Politico, the “latest sign” that some members of the president’s party are “willing to buck him” on occasion.

What did the commentators say?

Trump is a victim of his own “petty revenge tour,” Chris Hayes said at MS NOW. The president recently demonstrated his mastery over the GOP by backing successful primary challenges to party figures like Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas). Those “spurned” figures will remain in Congress through the end of the year, though they “don’t appear eager to bail out the president” and the more controversial aspects of his legislative agenda.

Republicans in Congress have mostly been “invertebrates” during the Trump years, Rex Huppke said at USA Today. They are showing the “faintest signs of embryonic spines” now that midterm elections are approaching and they will face constituents who “can’t afford gas or hamburger meat” because of the president’s policies. The GOP remains “largely in lockstep” with the president, but the “cracks will spread and deepen” the closer we get to November.

The midterm threat might be “stronger than the sway of a president who will be a lame duck” after the election, Jay Evensen said at The Deseret News. The president’s poll numbers “have dropped, even in Utah.” Congress has largely “abdicated its role” as a check on the power and corruption of the presidency, but “maybe that’s changing.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune “sounds like a man who’s had it with President Trump,” said Mike Zapler at Axios. The GOP leader has pushed back on the anti-weaponization fund and the president’s primary endorsements against Senate incumbents. “None of us controls what the president does,” Thune said to reporters, per the outlet.

Trump is reacting to the “widening rift” with Congress with a “blend of indifference and hostility,” said Isaac Arnsdorf and Natalie Allison at The Washington Post. He “lambasted” House Republicans who helped pass the Iran war measure and “brushed off” objections to his appointment of Pulte to the intelligence post. The president “does not think he needs Congress” as much as lawmakers might think and “feels no need to accommodate them.”

What next?

GOP opposition only goes so far. House Republicans this week are expected to approve long-delayed funding for immigration and border enforcement, said CNBC. The bill will fund those Trump priorities through the rest of his term.

Is President Trump finally tired of winning? asked Shawn McCreesh in The New York Times. Asked in a Cabinet meeting two weeks ago if he feels pressure to end the Iran war before November’s elections, Trump airily replied, “I don’t care about the midterms.” In the context of Iran, Trump’s “posture of nonchalance” is defensible. Presidents shouldn’t let politics sway their thinking on matters of war. But GOP lawmakers are starting to wonder if Trump couldn’t care less about their party’s bleak electoral prospects. Republicans trail Democrats by 7.6% in the generic ballot, dragged down by Iran, high gas prices, Trump’s slumping approval rating (38% and falling), and the belief—shared by 77% of Americans, including most Republicans—that Trump’s policies have driven up the cost of living. Without a course correction, the GOP could lose both the House and Senate in November, a prospect suddenly more likely after Trump’s endorsement lifted Ken Paxton, the scandal-drenched MAGA loyalist, over incumbent Texas Sen. John Cornyn in last week’s primary. But instead of assuring cash-strapped Americans that he feels their pain, Trump spends his days constructing “pricey pet projects,” from his gilded White House ballroom to a 250-foot triumphal arch. These don’t seem like the actions of someone who’s especially bothered “about what’s coming after the summer.”

“Don’t be fooled,” said Frank Bruni, also in the Times. Trump’s ego won’t let him confess his midterm anxieties. But beneath the “bluster and makeup, he’s sweating.” Look at how hard he’s pressured red-state legislatures to redraw their electoral maps to gain a handful of seats in November, and how he’s “haranguing congressional Republicans” to pass new voting laws to depress Democratic turnout. And the electoral landscape this fall might not be as grim for Republicans as it looks now, said Mene Ukueberuwa in The Free Press. Progressives are pushing Democrats toward nominating class warriors like Maine’s Graham Platner and Michigan’s Abdul El-Sayed, potentially alienating moderate voters in what would otherwise be “easily winnable races.”

I suspect Trump is relaxed about the midterms because “there might be political upside regardless of who wins,” said Abby McCloskey in Bloomberg. If the House and Senate turn blue, Trump will gain the scapegoat that his second term has lacked. He can blame “any and all shortcomings on Congress’s new Democratic majority.” And if empowered Democrats push left-wing legislation and try to impeach him, Trump will get to replay his favorite roles: “victim of the elite” and “protector against the progressive tide.” There’s a Jan. 6–size hole in such analyses, said Joel Mathis in his Substack newsletter. Trump’s indifference to the midterms more likely flows from the fact that he has plans in place—this time fully thought-out—to ignore or reverse the results “unless they are favorable to him.”

None of this explains why Trump suddenly cares so little about his popularity, said Paul Waldman in MS.now. Perhaps he’s contemplating his post-2029 legacy. He may be comfortable with being loathed by two-thirds of the country “so long as there are gigantic buildings with his name on them.” And his newfound indifference to approval ratings may be liberating. Trump has spent his life trying “to free himself of any and all constraints”—the law, civility, political norms, international alliances—“so he can do whatever he wants.” The interests of his party, and Americans, are just more things tying him down. “And he’s going to cut those cords.”

As Pride Month begins in the U.S., numerous Republican governors have “bestowed alternative titles” for Pride Month that “both supporters and opponents view as counterprogramming,” said The Associated Press. But this is just one of several ways the current Republican Party’s stance on LGBTQ+ rights has revealed itself during President Donald Trump’s time in office.

What did the commentators say?

The GOP governors of both Indiana and Tennessee “rebranded June as Nuclear Family Month to celebrate units made up of ‘one husband, one wife and any biological, adopted or fostered children,’” said the AP. Alabama deemed June Strong Families Month, whose “proclamation says fathers are ‘the head of the household.’” And Utah and Arkansas christened June as Fidelity Month, which “emphasizes fidelity to faith, country and family.” The “contest over the month of June reflects decades-long culture war questions, exacerbated by partisan polarization and a sense that red and blue states increasingly represent different values,” said Deseret News.

The current White House has also attempted to “enact a nationwide ban on transgender girls participating in girls’ sports,” expel transgender service members from the military and prevent “transgender Americans from having their gender on their passport,” said Roll Call. These efforts are a result of “rank animus against transgender people,” Jessica Clarke, a law professor at the University of Southern California, told the outlet. The “legislation dovetails with administration efforts and state laws intended to curb the rights of transgender Americans,” said Roll Call.

While both of Trump’s presidencies have been defined by anti-LGTBQ+ stances, his second term efforts are “more far-reaching and extreme than those he put in place during his first term,” said The 19th. Civil rights groups pushed back against Trump’s anti-trans executive orders during his first four years in office, but the courts are “not as friendly as they once were,” Mike Zamore, the national director of policy and governmental affairs at the American Civil Liberties Union, told the outlet. These groups shouldn’t assume that a court case “that was successful in the first Trump administration would necessarily prevail this go around.”

What next?

The Republican ramp-up against the LGBTQ+ movement is likely here to stay, as “every Democratic president since Bill Clinton in 1999 has signed a Pride proclamation each year — and no Republican president has,” said the AP. There also appear to be changing public views on whether same-sex marriage should be legal, which is “largely because more Republicans oppose them” now than before Trump retook office.

Approval of “same-sex marriage, moral acceptance of gay and lesbian relations and endorsement of gender changes are all down from peaks reached in the early 2020s,” according to a recent Gallup survey. The poll of 1,001 adults found that 65% of Americans support same-sex marriage. While this still represents a majority of Americans, it is also “down six percentage points from the peak in 2022 and 2023.”

Many people also appear to be going back on their acceptance of the transgender community, according to Gallup’s results. The “share of Americans who consider changing one's gender morally acceptable has declined eight points over the past five years, to 38%,” said Gallup.

What happened

The House of Representatives on Wednesday voted 215-208 to force President Donald Trump to stop military operations in the Iran war unless he gets authorization from Congress. Four Republicans joined all Democrats in passing the war powers resolution, which a bipartisan coalition pushed to the floor over the objections of House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.). It’s the first legislation to end the war approved in either chamber, though the GOP-led Senate advanced a similar measure in a procedural vote two weeks ago.

Who said what

The resolution’s adoption is a “remarkable rebuke” to Trump and his “handling of the conflict” from a GOP-led Congress that has “largely ceded its prerogatives” to curb his power, The New York Times said. Republicans who initially backed him on the war “have started to waver,” The Wall Street Journal said, as the conflict has “dragged on with no clear resolution in sight” and gas prices “continue to climb” while Trump’s poll numbers continue “sagging.” Later Wednesday, the House “bucked” Trump and Johnson on a “second foreign policy issue,” said The Washington Post, voting 218-204 to advance funding for Ukraine and “impose additional sanctions on Russia’s finance and energy sectors.”

What next?

The Iran war vote was “largely symbolic,” as the resolution is unlikely to gain the force of law, Politico said. But it “further stymies the White House’s political priorities” after Republicans recently “scuttled several Trump goals,” including funding his White House ballroom and paying off supporters with his $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund.

New Jersey Congressman Tom Kean Jr. won his GOP primary election yesterday, a notable event given that he has not been seen in public for months. And the question of his whereabouts is drawing increasing scrutiny.

The mystery is “frustratingly unsolved,” said The New York Times. Kean last cast a vote in Congress on March 5, then was sidelined by what his aides vaguely described as a “personal medical issue” from which he is expected to recover. Voters, journalists and House colleagues “haven’t seen or heard directly from Kean” since then, and it is “still unclear” when he might return to work or the campaign trail, said CNN.

Kean is “focused” on “recovery” and expects to return to work “within a matter of weeks,” he said in a Tuesday night post on X. But his ongoing and mostly unexplained absence is “rattling” Kean’s GOP allies, who worry the “massive public relations failure” will damage the party’s ability to defend his “critical swing seat” in November, said CNN.

What did the commentators say?

Kean “owes voters” answers about “his mystery illness,” The Bergen (N.J.) Record said in an editorial. His absence has coincided with House debates about the “Iran war, funding for the Department of Homeland Security and other critical issues.” His team spent weeks creating the “illusion of a fully functioning representative” by sending out a “steady stream of first-person social media posts and news releases” before acknowledging his medical issue in late April. New Jersey voters deserve a representative “who is straight with people about his own capabilities.”

The lack of transparency is a “slap in the face to voters,” Max Burns said at MS NOW. Kean is one of several House members who have gone “missing in action” in recent years. Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.) missed weeks of votes after undergoing eye surgery, then announced her retirement. Kean and Wilson “can’t be blamed for battling health issues,” but they owe more candor to their constituents. And if they are “unwilling or unable” to work, they should “make way for someone with the capacity to serve.” The duo has a “right to privacy” but also a “duty as public servants to represent their voters.”

What next?

The congressman’s absence has not interfered with the operation of his political machine. At least five speeches in his name “have appeared in the Congressional Record” during his leave from Congress, said Roll Call. While it is “not uncommon” for House members to publish speeches in the record they did not deliver in the chamber, Kean’s “frequent submissions” while he is away have “raised eyebrows.”

Kean’s congressional district is “among the country’s most competitive,” said The Washington Post. The GOP “cannot hold the majority without this seat,” an anonymous operative said to the outlet. Republicans urgently need to know if Kean is “capable of running for reelection and winning.”

Kean still snagged President Donald Trump’s endorsement in the midterms, said The Hill. Kean “will never let you down!” Trump said on Truth Social.

What happened

President Donald Trump on Tuesday spent more than three hours at Walter Reed Medical Center for his fourth publicly disclosed medical exam since returning to office last year. The White House did not release any details of the exam, but “everything checked out PERFECTLY,” Trump, who turns 80 next month, said on social media.

Who said what

Trump’s unusually frequent exams have put his health “under renewed public scrutiny after he has worked to dismiss concerns over his age and stamina,” The Associated Press said. He “frequently casts himself as more energetic and fitter than Joe Biden,” who left office at age 82 after “facing questions about his fitness for the job,” Reuters said.

Trump’s “health and fitness have been central to his political identity,” but as an “aging president, he now receives some of the same questions that dogged Biden — namely, whether he is mentally and physically fit” enough, The Washington Post said. “Independent doctors” have called the White House’s explanations for Trump’s bruised hands, neck rash, swollen legs and “occasional sleepiness” at meetings “insufficient.”

What next?

It was “not immediately clear whether the White House would release details” from Trump’s clinical exam to “support his claim” of good health, The New York Times said.

What happened

Republican redistricting efforts in Alabama and South Carolina were blocked Tuesday, stalling President Donald Trump’s mid-decade gerrymandering campaign. South Carolina’s GOP-led state Senate thwarted a plan to cancel an ongoing primary and swap in a new map that would erase the state’s lone Democratic and majority Black district. In Alabama, a panel of federal judges temporarily blocked the state GOP’s proposed map, saying it was “tainted by intentional race-based discrimination.”

Who said what

The 12 South Carolina GOP senators who “effectively killed” the Trump-backed gerrymander cited “numerous” concerns, from practical and political to procedural, said The Post and Courier. “Neither my conscience nor my common sense is going to let me stop an election that’s already underway,” state Sen. Richard Cash (R) said before the vote. The “rebuke from fellow Republicans came as a shock to Trump’s political operation,” Politico said. But “even without the extra seat” or two, Republicans “have an overall edge in the redistricting war.”

What next?

In Alabama, the three-judge panel, which includes two Trump appointees, said the state had to use a court-ordered 2024 map that includes two substantially Black districts. Alabama said it would immediately appeal to the Supreme Court.

What happened

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton won Tuesday’s Republican Senate primary, unseating Sen. John Cornyn despite being outspent by about $80 million. Boosted by an “eleventh-hour endorsement” from President Donald Trump, Paxton’s 64% to 36% defeat of “one of the most successful politicians in Texas GOP history” was a “political earthquake” that “will reverberate nationally,” The Texas Tribune said. Senate Republicans and political analysts believe Paxton’s victory gives the Democratic candidate, state Rep. James Talarico, a fighting chance to win in November.

In notable Texas Democratic primaries Tuesday, former Rep. Colin Allred unseated Rep. Julie Johnson, newly elected Rep. Christian Menefee beat 11-term Rep. Al Green in a newly combined Houston-area district, and former sheriff’s deputy Johnny Garcia defeated sex therapist Maureen Galindo, a controversial candidate funded by a mysterious GOP-backed super PAC.

Who said what

Republicans just nominated “the most corrupt politician in America,” Talarico said Tuesday night, in his first ad of the general election. Paxton is “known for his polarizing style, ethical travails and lousy political judgment,” but his “fealty and bombast” won over Trump, The Wall Street Journal said in an op-ed. Republicans can now “spend $100 million or more trying to salvage the seat and keep their Senate majority.” Minutes after the race was called, the nonpartisan Cook Political Report shifted its Texas Senate forecast from “likely” to “lean” Republican.

What next?

Paxton has faced “allegations of corruption, financial malfeasance and infidelity,” The Washington Post said, but he “still stands a decent chance of winning” in solidly red Texas.

What happened

President Trump’s retribution tour rolled on with two more rivals losing to Trump-endorsed challengers in primaries last week, further cementing his hold over the Republican Party. Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie, an outspoken libertarian critic of Trump’s war in Iran and his handling of the Epstein files, lost by nearly 10 percentage points to former Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein. It was the most expensive House primary in history, drawing more than $32 million in ad spending. The president intensified his attacks on Massie in recent weeks, calling him “a moron” at the National Prayer Breakfast, and urging supporters to vote for his handpicked challenger. In Louisiana, voters swept out Sen. Bill Cassidy, who tried but failed to overcome his decision to vote to convict Trump in his 2021 impeachment trial. That “disloyalty,” Trump wrote on social media, “is now a part of legend.”

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) may be next on the chopping block after an emboldened Trump endorsed his primary challenger, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Trump called Cornyn “a good man,” but said he wasn’t “supportive of me when times were tough.” Brad Raffensperger, who defied Trump’s attempt to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results, also got trounced in his gubernatorial primary, finishing behind two pro-Trump candidates. In Pennsylvania, retired firefighter and union leader Bob Brooks—endorsed by both the Keystone State’s moderate Gov. Josh Shapiro and progressives like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders—won a crowded Democratic congressional primary in a closely watched swing district.

What the columnists said

“Massie’s defeat may be the end of GOP dissent,” said Mary Ellen Klas in Bloomberg, at least among elected officials who still need to face voters. Massie voted with Trump 90% of the time. But he “dared to challenge the president over his abandoned campaign promises,” and he got crushed by Trump-faithful older voters. GOP lawmakers don’t answer to their constituents or even their own values anymore. The man in the Oval Office alone “commands absolute loyalty.”

Yet Trump has created a “conundrum,” said Shane Goldmacher in The New York Times. He seems “more keen to leverage his popularity with the MAGA base” to settle scores than “to repair his image among the independents his party will need” in November’s midterms. His approval ratings continue to crater, including in one New York Times/Siena survey that shows only 26% of independents support the job he’s doing.

The Paxton endorsement made “Chuck Schumer’s day,” said The Wall Street Journal in an editorial. The well-respected Cornyn “has been a reliable vote” for Trump for years and has shown “four terms over” that he can beat Democrats in November. The scandal-ridden Paxton, on the other hand, has been impeached by his own party, been accused of bribery, and confessed to infidelity. It’s no surprise that polls show he’s locked in a “dead heat” with Democratic nominee James Talarico, who could help flip the Senate. If that happens, “Trump will deserve ‘COMPLETE AND TOTAL’ credit, as he likes to put it.”

What happened

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) on Thursday abruptly adjourned the Senate for a weeklong break, scuttling plans to get a $72 billion filibuster-proof ICE–Border Patrol funding bill to President Donald Trump’s desk by a self-imposed June 1 deadline. The “most urgent reason for the delay” was the Senate GOP’s “boiling anger” over Trump’s $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund, Semafor said. In another “striking setback that exposed fractures within the GOP,” The New York Times said, House GOP leaders canceled a vote to compel the end of the Iran war after it became clear it would pass.

Who said what

The GOP “retreats on both the budget bill and the war powers resolution reflected a pivot” away from “unquestioningly” deferring to Trump, the Times said. The opaque $1.8 billion fund is a “Trump priority,” but it faces “widespread opposition” from Senate Republicans, The Wall Street Journal said, alongside near-universal condemnation from Democrats, so the must-pass reconciliation bill “gave senators leverage to dig in their heels.”

The special budget process Republicans are using to pass the bill “allows a long series of amendment votes,” The Associated Press said, and “as it became clear” that Democratic amendments to kill or curtail the fund would pass with bipartisan support, Thune called a timeout. The fund “is in real trouble — and it should be,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) told the Times on Thursday.

What next?

“By leaving Washington,” Republicans left the “anti-weaponization” fund “intact and without any of the guardrails they might want to impose,” the Journal said. Thune said his party “will pick up where we left off” when they return from vacation.

What happened

The Senate on Tuesday voted 50-47 to advance legislation that would halt the Iran war unless President Donald Trump obtained authorization from Congress. A trickle of Republicans began supporting the war powers resolutions over seven previous votes, and Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) joined them Tuesday, providing the crucial 50th vote.

Who said what

The vote “showed how Republicans are increasingly uneasy with a conflict” that’s “stuck in a fragile ceasefire” while “causing rising gas prices in the U.S.,” The Associated Press said. The “sliver of GOP skepticism” about Trump’s handling of the war “widened last week,” The New York Times said, a shift “fueled in part” by his “ignoring” of a 60-day legal deadline to seek congressional authorization.

Even Trump supporters are “concerned about this war,” and Congress is “in the dark,” Cassidy, who lost his primary campaign after Trump endorsed his opponent, said on social media. “Until the administration provides clarity, no congressional authorization or extension can be justified.”

What next?

This was “only the first step” toward passing the bill, and GOP leaders believe it would have failed if three Republican Senators hadn’t been absent, Politico said. The House is “expected to vote on a similar war powers resolution” Wednesday, the AP said, and “Democrats are bullish” on passing it.

What happened

Republican candidates endorsed by President Donald Trump won or advanced in primaries Tuesday night in Georgia, Alabama and Kentucky, and unseated Trump’s top target of the night, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.). A seven-term libertarian-leaning lawmaker, Massie had angered Trump by opposing his Iran war and spending bills and leading the charge to release the Jeffrey Epstein files. He lost to Navy veteran Ed Gallrein by 10 percentage points in the most expensive House primary in history.

Who said what

Trump “notched several other wins” Tuesday night, Politico said, including engineering Rep. Andy Barr’s (R-Ky.) primary victory for the Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R). Trump’s “revenge campaign” also blocked Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger from advancing to the GOP’s gubernatorial runoff.

The winner of the Georgia runoff — Trump-endorsed Lt. Gov. Burt Jones or healthcare executive Rick Jackson — will face former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms (D) in “what is expected to be another hard-fought race for the state’s top office,” The New York Times said. In Alabama, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R) and former Sen. Doug Jones (D) won their respective primaries and will face each other in the state’s gubernatorial race.

What next?

Trump’s next chance to “flex his influence” and “reshape” the GOP “looms in Texas,” said CNN. His recent endorsement of the “controversial” and scandal-plagued Attorney General Ken Paxton could crush Sen. John Cornyn (R) in next week’s runoff vote.

The redistricting battles are over for now, and Republicans won. But Democrats might still have a path to recapturing the House in November’s midterm elections.

President Donald Trump “succeeded in tilting the playing field to the GOP’s advantage” by pushing for mid-decade gerrymandered maps to defend Republicans’ House majority, said The Washington Post. As many as 12 seats shifted to the right. Democrats would now have to “dig deep into Trump territory” to win the chamber. But redistricting may have also “diluted” GOP votes in existing red-leading districts, said Axios, a possible “dummymander” in which sitting Republican members of Congress could be “swept out of office” in a “Democratic wave” thanks to Trump’s growing unpopularity.

‘The GOP’s voter problem’

The redistricting wins “won’t matter if Republicans can’t get people to vote for them,” Russell Payne said at Salon. All the shuffling leaves Democrats needing to win the national popular vote by at least 3.5% in order to have a chance at winning the House, but polling currently puts them closer to six points ahead. A Democratic victory in the midterms “would buy them time” to respond with gerrymandering of their own in blue states like Virginia, Illinois and New York. Trump’s negative approval rating will not help Republicans. Redistricting “can’t fix the GOP’s voter problem.”

The new House map is “so tilted” that a national four-point Democratic voting advantage “might not be enough for a majority,” Henry Olsen said at The Washington Post. That outcome “would be highly unusual historically.” The GOP’s gerrymandering “might be enough to let the party keep the House,” but it could “hold back public opinion forever.” If Democrats keep that but lose the House, they will “rightly feel robbed.”

Trump and the GOP may have given Democrats a “lifeline” with Black voters, S.E. Cupp said at the Chicago Sun-Times. Republican redistricting is “carving up predominantly Black majority districts” and “potentially marginalizing minority voters” who were starting to move right: Trump received 15% of the Black vote in 2024, up from just 1% in 2016. Gerrymandering “might be the catalyst” Democrats need to win them back. The GOP “war on Black districts” could do just that “at least in the short term.”

Democrats: ‘May still have upper hand’

Democrats should not despair. Republicans “likely won’t realize all the gains” they hoped for, Jim Saksa said at Democracy Docket. And if Democrats play “hardball” after this year’s midterms by doing more “partisan redraws” in blue states, they could end up with an advantage of as many as 13 seats by 2028. But “it won’t be easy.”

The president’s party “typically loses seats in midterms,” said Reuters. GOP chances in the House “have increased,” said Inside Elections’ Jacob Rubashkin to the outlet, and “none of the underlying politics has changed.” Inflation, gasoline prices and the Iran war will all be factors. Democrats may “still have the upper hand” going into November, said Reuters.

What happened

The Justice Department on Monday announced a $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” for “victims of lawfare and weaponization,” potentially including those who participated in the U.S. Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021. The fund is part of a settlement President Donald Trump reached with his Justice Department to drop his $10 billion claim over an IRS leak of his tax records. The money will be doled out by five people appointed by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, though Trump can fire them. Shortly after the announcement, Treasury Department General Counsel Brian Morrissey resigned, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Who said what

The Justice Department said Trump and his family will receive apologies but no payments from the fund. But the “highly unusual” settlement forges a “pipeline to funnel taxpayer money” to Trump’s allies, The New York Times said, and is an “apparent effort to skirt oversight by a judge” who “expressed concern” that Trump’s lawsuit “represented self-dealing between the president and a department run by his former defense lawyer.”

“This is one of the single most corrupt acts in American history,” Donald Sherman, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said in a statement. “The machinery of government should never be weaponized against any American,” Blanche said in a statement. This “slush fund” is “nothing but a racket” for Trump to hand taxpayer money “to his private militia of insurrectionists, rioters and white supremacists,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.).

What next?

Blanche is “expected to be pressed on the fund when he testifies” on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, The Associated Press said.

What happened

Democrats were left scrambling last week after a back-to-back set of redistricting losses narrowed their odds of taking back the House in November, with the Supreme Court clearing the way for Alabama Republicans to redraw the state’s electoral map and Virginia’s high court throwing out a Democratic map designed to flip red House seats blue. The ruling by the Supreme Court’s conservative majority could allow the Alabama legislature to use a 2023 voting map that eliminates one of the state’s two majority-Black districts, both of which are currently held by Democrats. A lower court had blocked that map on the grounds that it violated Section 2 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which bars racial discrimination in voting. But the high court’s conservative justices said that decision should be reconsidered in light of last month’s Louisiana v. Callais, in which the court found the creation of majority-Black districts to be an “unconstitutional racial gerrymander.” In the Louisiana legislature, a Senate committee passed a congressional map that will eliminate one of two majority-Black districts, while in Tennessee, Gov. Bill Lee signed into law a new congressional map that carves up the state’s sole Democratic-held district, based in majority-Black Memphis. It’s “unbelievable how people seem to want to turn things backward,” said Barbara Love, a Black woman who lives outside Memphis.

In Virginia, the state’s top court reversed a new electoral map approved by voters in a ballot measure in April, which was designed to flip four Republican-held House seats. The court ruled 4-3 that Democratic lawmakers had violated a procedural mandate by rushing to pass the redistricting before November’s midterms. State Democrats said the ruling amounted to “judicial defiance” of voters’ will and appealed to the Supreme Court.

In a rare setback for President Trump, who has urged red-state legislatures to redraw maps, Republicans in South Carolina rejected a redistricting plan designed to eliminate the state’s sole Democratic-held House seat. State Senate Majority Leader A. Shane Massey said carving up the district, held for 34 years by influential Rep. James Clyburn, could backfire by diluting GOP support in other districts. He also warned that the current redistricting wars may anger voters. “Too many people in power,” Massey said, “just want to do whatever it takes to stay in power.”

What the editorials said

“America’s re-gerrymandering arms race is here,” said the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and you can thank President Trump. The seed was planted last year when Trump demanded Texas and other red states rip up their maps mid-decade to boost Republicans’ midterm edge, a practice previously “unheard of.” That left Democrats in California, Virginia, and elsewhere not only justified in following suit “but virtually obligated to.” Having state maps constantly redrawn to favor the party in power “is intolerable to democracy.” But that’s what we face until Congress steps in “to impose uniform redistricting standards.”

Pardon us while we “revel in” the “comeuppance of Virginia Democrats,” said National Review. With their “lavishly funded” referendum they rammed through an “absurdly lopsided” map that stood to boost their House-seat edge in the “purplish” state from 6-5 to 10-1. But state law dictates that any referendum to amend the constitution must be passed twice, with a general election in between. The first vote came late in October 2025, after some 1.3 million early ballots had already been cast for the November election. The high court’s ruling that Democrats violated the letter and spirit of the law “isn’t even a close call.”

What the columnists said

The blitz to disenfranchise Black Southern voters is “more than a tragedy for voting rights,” said Paul Waldman in Public Notice. It’s a virtual “revival of the Confederacy.” Even as aggrieved white Republicans have revived Confederate symbols, ended diversity initiatives, and otherwise tried to walk back the civil rights movement, progressives have held faith that their foes “were fighting a doomed rearguard action.” But it’s now clear that the Right never lost its own faith that with enough determination “the 1960s could be undone—and maybe some of the 1860s as well.”

Such “hooey” makes it sound like Republicans are demanding “literacy tests at voting precincts,” said Barton Swaim in The Wall Street Journal. What they’re combating, and what the Supreme Court “rightly ended,” is the practice of “packing” Black voters into districts designed “to advantage one party.” Democrats can “gussy it up with lofty talk” of “vote dilution,” but the “ugly fact” is that such districts divide voters according to skin color.

The GOP’s strong-arming “could backfire badly,” said Henry Olsen in The Washington Post. Yes, it will boost the party in the short term. But New York, Colorado, Maryland, and other blue states could well turn the tables and rub out Republican districts. Lawmakers in many of those states are constrained by legal and structural barriers that prevent mid-decade gerrymandering. But they can be undone, and Democrats will be under “enormous pressure” to “fight fire with fire.”

“This is getting dangerous,” said Jamelle Bouie in The New York Times. The redistricting rush will push American politics to an “even more dangerous place of high partisan tension and ideological Balkanization,” where the House “looks something like the Electoral College.” A system in which a party can eke out control of a state capitol and then redraw congressional maps to lock themselves in power is “not a democracy in any meaningful sense.” But that seems to be “where the United States is headed, if it’s not already there.”

What happened

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) on Thursday signed into law a new congressional map that slices up Memphis to disperse its Black voters into Republican-leaning districts, seeking to eliminate the state’s last Democratic-held and majority-Black district. The General Assembly’s Republican supermajority approved the gerrymander earlier in the day amid raucous protests.

Who said what

Tennessee is the first state to draw a new map since the Supreme Court last week neutered the last remaining pillar of the Voting Rights Act. That ruling “opened a new front, particularly in the South, in a bitter, coast-to-coast redistricting battle” launched by President Donald Trump to protect the GOP’s slim House majority, The New York Times said.

Tennessee Republicans “defended the new map,” saying their “partisan” goal was sending “an all-Republican delegation” to Congress, NPR said. “You cannot take a majority Black city, fracture its voting power and then tell us race has nothing to do with it,” said state Sen. London Lamar (D). The new map is “Jim Crow on steroids,” political scientist Norm Ornstein said on social media. The new map likely “would never have withstood scrutiny under the Voting Rights Act under the last several decades,” said David Becker at the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation and Research. “Now, the Supreme Court almost seems to invite” these gerrymanders.

What next?

The NAACP on Thursday evening challenged Tennessee’s map in state court. Alabama, Louisiana and South Carolina are taking steps to eliminate majority-Black districts in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling.

‘Why so few babies? We might have overlooked the biggest reason of all.’

Anna Louie Sussman at The New York Times

Having kids is “not simply a matter of affordability, the buzzword so often invoked to explain why people are choosing to have smaller families,” says Anna Louie Sussman. Overall, people are “having fewer children both in countries that offer very little and in those renowned for their generous family benefits.” What “unites these disparate cultures, policy environments and demographics” is people’s “inescapable and crushing sense that the future is too uncertain for the lifelong commitment of parenthood.”

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‘Nothing to fear, much to gain from Flock cameras’

Jason Riggs at The Minnesota Star Tribune

A “common misconception when discussing license plate reader cameras is that ‘each camera records passing vehicles and compiles the license plates into a time-stamped database,’” says Jason Riggs. Police “are not here to monitor your every move.” The cameras “are designed to notify law enforcement only when a license plate connected with a crime crosses their path.” Using them “can make all the difference when searching for a vehicle,” and “throughout the country, this technology has proven to be lifesaving.”

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‘The immeasurable endurance of the women of Gaza’

Huda Skaik at The Nation

“Even in the face of such brutality, Gazan women persist,” says Huda Skaik. They “carry their communities, serving as pillars of endurance amid the ruins of a society that has been all but erased.” Women in Gaza “have become both the primary caretakers and providers, responsible for securing food, water and shelter, caring for the injured, and sustaining their families.” Their “suffering is both physical and psychological, yet they continue to care for the next generation.”

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‘I’m not a pundit, I just play one on TV’

Christian Schneider at the National Review

When “physicians get political, they damage the medical profession’s reputation,” says Christian Schneider. In “recent years, the medical profession has endured a thorough battering, with doctors exposing themselves as just as misinformed and politically motivated as the general public.” Nowhere “has this provided more comedy than in President Donald Trump’s attempt to fill the spot of U.S. surgeon general in his administration.” The “diminishment of the medical profession by a wannabe political physician class has real-world consequences.”

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What happened

Senate Republicans faced an uproar Tuesday for including $1 billion for President Donald Trump’s “East Wing Modernization Project” in their $72 billion party-line bill to fund immigration enforcement through September 2029. The East Wing project is what the White House calls Trump’s $400 million ballroom, which he has repeatedly claimed will be built only with private funds.

Who said what

Democrats “pounced” on the “surprise addition” to the GOP’s reconciliation package, The New York Times said. “Republicans looked at families drowning in bills and decided what they really needed was more raids and a Trump ballroom,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on X.

The bill, released late Monday, allocates $1 billion for Secret Service “enhancements” related to the East Wing project, including “above-ground and below-ground security features.” A spokesperson for Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said the bill “does not fund ballroom construction.” But “security costs would seem to be a significant portion” of the ballroom project, said CNN, and “no other project is mentioned in that section of the bill.”

What next?

Republicans hope to pass the filibuster-proof $72 billion package by the end of the month.

What happened

The House on Thursday passed a Senate bill funding all of the Department of Homeland Security except for its immigration enforcement arms, and President Donald Trump signed it, ending the longest-ever partial government shutdown after 76 days. DHS agencies, including the Coast Guard, Secret Service, FEMA and TSA are now funded through September. ICE and Customs and Border Protection never lost funding thanks to the GOP’s 2025 megabill.

Who said what

After weeks of delay and GOP infighting, the House “unanimously” approved the DHS bill “through voice vote with little fanfare,” suggesting Republicans were “finally ready to put the impasse behind them,” CBS News said. After Democrats refused to fund ICE and CBP without new guardrails, GOP leaders agreed to finance the rest of DHS and separately give Trump $70 billion for deportation operations through a filibuster-proof GOP-only reconciliation bill.

If the House had “waited for the Senate to pass a reconciliation bill, as some GOP lawmakers insisted, it would have left DHS closed until mid-May,” Axios said. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) had been facing a “growing revolt from centrists in his party,” CNN said, and his “major retreat” on holding out for ICE funding was a “major win for Democrats.”

What next?

After lawmakers “return in mid-May,” The New York Times said, Republicans will “try to meet the president’s June 1 deadline” to get their $70 billion ICE-CBP bill to his desk.

What happened

U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s office on Tuesday asked the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., to erase the seditious conspiracy convictions of Oath Keepers and Proud Boys leaders found guilty of playing key roles in the 2021 U.S. Capitol attack to keep President Donald Trump in power. The Trump administration has “determined in its prosecutorial discretion that dismissal of this criminal case is in the interests of justice,” Pirro’s office said. Trump pardoned most of the Jan. 6 rioters but commuted the lengthy prison sentences of the 12 covered by the new filing.

Who said what

The motion to expunge the convictions of ringleaders including Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes is the “latest effort by the Trump administration to erase the stain of Jan. 6,” Politico said. Asking the appeals court to “toss out the guilty verdicts” also lets the Justice Department avoid the “awkward situation of having to defend the convictions,” The New York Times said. That would “likely have required administration officials to assert that the far-right groups were acting on behalf” of Trump.

What next?

The request to vacate the last remaining Jan. 6 convictions is “likely to be granted because prosecutors have broad discretion to pursue or drop criminal charges,” The Washington Post said.