Today’s edition of quick hits.

* Getting to the bottom of the Starlink matter: “Elon Musk weighed in on Saturday with his first explanation of the disruptions to the Ukrainian military’s satellite system, saying in a post on X that Ukraine had violated the terms of service for his Starlink internet service by using it ‘for offensive drone strikes to kill people.’”

* In related news: “Ukraine’s military Starlink system was working normally again on Saturday morning, the country’s defense minister said, raising hopes that the 10-day disruption of the country’s vital satellite internet service by Elon Musk’s SpaceX was ending.”

* Conditions in France: “Protests across France over a worsening cost-of-living crisis and growing inequality descended into violence for a second straight weekend. France’s Interior Ministry said 410,000 people took part in protests in several major cities, including Paris.”

* The obviously right call: “A federal judge on Monday ruled that Maureen Comey, a former senior prosecutor at the Justice Department and the daughter of former FBI Director James Comey, was unlawfully fired and is entitled to back pay.”

* There’s credible excuse for withholding this evidence: “The federal government has stopped sharing evidence with Minnesota authorities who are investigating the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal officers, state officials said in recent court filings.”

* This buyout initiative would reduce Microsoft’s global workforce by roughly a fourth: “Microsoft said Monday that it’s offering buyouts to a wide swath of employees as it strives to balance a costly artificial intelligence infrastructure build-out with capital efficiency. The software maker announced a new voluntary exit offer for certain workers in the U.S., Canada, India and the United Kingdom at its experience level of 70 or below. Microsoft will offer buyouts to about 60,000 workers, part of the company’s efforts to trim costs and retool its workforce for the AI era.”

* Doellner should probably keep in mind that Democrats and independents buy cars, too: “Audi chief Gernot Doellner drew heavy criticism on Monday for ​appearing alongside US President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in the battleground state of Georgia, with the head of Germany’s top union saying it violated the ‌automaker’s company guidelines.”

See you tomorrow.

The post Monday’s Mini-Report, 10.26.26 appeared first on MS NOW.

Over the course of Donald Trump’s second term, there have only been a handful of prominent officials who have resigned in frustration and expressed public concerns about the president and his administration. One of them is Marc Rosenblum.

Rosenblum served as the executive director of the Department of Homeland Security’s statistics office. When he resigned over the summer, he declared in a LinkedIn post, “I’m thrilled to end my relationship with the current administration. … Between the war on immigrants, the war on feds, and the war on facts (not to mention the crazy war in Iran and the brazen corruption), I just need a change.”

Luis Miranda, a top DHS spokesperson during the Biden administration, told Wired, “Marc was exactly what every American should want in a career public servant. The Trump administration has governed by silencing or ignoring facts and information they believe doesn’t line up with their extreme rhetoric, and that has damaging implications, so it’s no surprise career officials whose job is transparency are unable to do those jobs.”

All of this came to mind last week when Rosenblum made headlines for a new and related reason. The Washington Sun reported:

A former top statistics official who resigned from the Department of Homeland Security this summer says the government is overstating how many unauthorized immigrants have left the country during President Donald Trump’s second term.

Marc Rosenblum, whose blistering resignation letter from a decade-long career at DHS garnered national attention, is behind a new estimate published Thursday that says between 790,000 and 1.9 million immigrants departed the U.S. from Jan. 20, 2025, to July 31, 2026.

According to the Republican administration’s official line, Trump and his team have pushed out more than 3 million undocumented immigrants during that period. According to the official who directly oversaw the Department of Homeland Security’s statistics office, that number simply isn’t believable.

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin could help shed additional light on what’s true by releasing detailed information to bolster the administration’s claims, but so far he has refused to do so. In fact, last month, when pressed by CNN’s Dana Bash on the lack of data transparency, Mullin said, “Every time we give numbers out … you guys want to go in there and pick it apart.”

In other words, according to the DHS chief, the administration could provide the public with information, but then people might scrutinize the information — and that’s just not a door that Team Trump is prepared to open.

The problem, however, isn’t limited to DHS. At the FBI, Director Kash Patel and his team have faced accusations for months about manipulating statistics for political purposes. And just two weeks ago, MS NOW reported that the Patel-led bureau had padded its total number of arrests by including ones that were made by state and local police forces.

Making matters worse, when the administration isn’t inflating data, it’s hiding. In fact, Politico reported two weeks ago that the IRS was supposed to have released detailed data on the impact of the Republicans’ 2025 package of tax breaks, but Team Trump decided to delay the release for reasons it did not want to talk about.

This came on the heels of Trump’s Commerce Department announcing sweeping new changes to the proposed 2030 census, including plans to exclude undocumented immigrants and immigrants who are in the United States legally but have yet to secure green cards or citizenship.

What we’re dealing with, in other words, is a Republican administration that lies about data, inflates data, hides data, fires those responsible for compiling data and in some instances even makes up data.

The public, here and around the world, has long been able to rely on the integrity of statistics from the United States government. Less than two years into Trump’s second term, that confidence is evaporating.

The post On multiple fronts, the Trump administration faces accusations of data manipulation appeared first on MS NOW.

For those concerned about Donald Trump trying to derail election results he doesn’t like, Friday was an unsettling day: The Justice Department filed a preemptive lawsuit aimed at blocking certification of Alaska’s U.S. Senate race — but only if the Republican incumbent, Sen. Dan Sullivan, loses while his rival with the similar name remains on the ballot.

Usually, Trump waits until after Election Day to try to overturn the will of the voters. As of late last week, he took a step toward doing so before the votes are tallied.

Legal experts from the left, right and center took a good look at the litigation, and the reaction was universal amazement at how ridiculous the case is. Richard Pildes, a New York University law professor who specializes in election issues, went so far as to say, “It is one of the weakest election lawsuits I’ve ever seen.”

The question then became why in the world the Justice Department would embarrass itself with such an absurdity. We didn’t have to wait too long for an answer.

On Monday afternoon, the president boasted to reporters that the case was filed at his behest. “I’m the one that said, ‘Do it,’” Trump declared. On Saturday and Sunday, he continued to not only defend the lawsuit — his argument was rooted in part on the idea that Alaskan voters might not know what “incumbent” means — but also claimed that he was directly responsible for the case’s existence.

The president’s public comments helped shed light on the unfortunate origins of this foolish case, and why it’s a bad idea for federal law enforcement to file lawsuits based on the whims of a former television personality whose only legal background is being charged with dozens of felonies. But Trump also offered a timely reminder about who’s pulling the strings at Main Justice. The New York Times reported:

Mr. Trump has grown increasingly agitated about the dueling Sullivans, among other election-related grievances. He has demanded the department take legal action, even as some department officials raised concerns about the merits and constitutionality of the case, according to two people with knowledge of the situation, speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid retribution.

Vanita Gupta, the associate attorney general during the Biden administration, told the Times, “The department is taking commands from the president and throwing spaghetti at the wall to file meritless lawsuits. The ultimate goal is undermining faith in the election, intimidating voters and discrediting results the administration doesn’t like.”

It has long been obvious that the West Wing effectively controls this Justice Department, but to the extent that any pretense existed, it’s now gone. Indeed, it wasn’t long ago when the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington abandoned Reflecting Pool prosecutions, drawing outrage from the president who expected to be personally consulted about developments in a baseless vandalism case.

“From the moment President Trump was re-elected, he has muscled his way into the driver’s seat at the Justice Department, leaving tread marks on its time-honored independence from the White House by demanding, and sometimes directing, investigations into his enemies,” the Times reported in August. “But his tight grip on the steering wheel has often threatened to lead the department off a cliff.”

Two months later, the problem appears to be intensifying.

During Blanche’s confirmation process, Blanche made it clear that he, unlike Trump’s first-term attorneys general, envisioned his role as that of an instrument of the president’s will. Indeed, while Trump has ended up clashing with all of his other attorneys general, Blanche was positioned to succeed where others failed because he willingly accepted the idea that his office is an extension of the West Wing.

But recent events have brought into sharp relief the fact that Blanche’s goal is to serve one American, not 340 million Americans. It’s precisely what makes Trump’s former defense lawyer the AGINO — the Attorney General in Name Only.

The post Who runs the Justice Department? Blanche and Trump aren’t bothering to hide the answer. appeared first on MS NOW.

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.

* In Ohio’s gubernatorial race, the editorial board of The Plain Dealer in Cleveland announced months ago that it would no longer make endorsements in top-of-the-ballot races. After seeing Republican Vivek Ramaswamy’s notorious attack ad, the editors changed their mind and endorsed Ramaswamy’s Democratic rival, Amy Acton. From the endorsement:

There are moments when a community must decide what it stands for, when its institutions have a duty to speak and when silence itself becomes a statement. Ohio has reached such a moment.

Vivek Ramaswamy, seeking the highest office in this state, has produced a campaign advertisement that weaponizes the sexual abuse his opponent, Amy Acton, suffered as a child. People across the political spectrum have rightly condemned it.

But condemnation has to mean something. Our politics have been debased for a decade, but this we will not accept. A candidate who uses childhood sexual abuse as a weapon against the person who endured it has crossed a line that Ohioans should defend, whatever their party.

For his part, the GOP nominee is still airing the disgusting attack, though his campaign has switched from a 60-second version to a 30-second version.

Ramaswamy also appeared on Fox News on Monday morning and accused Acton of being “crazy” and “unstable,” which came after Donald Trump spent part of the weekend reiterating his support for the vile attack.

Also on Monday morning, Acton appeared on MS NOW and said, “I can tell you that decency is on the ballot in this election.”

* In Mississippi’s unexpectedly competitive U.S. Senate race, Democrats supporting local prosecutor Scott Colom began investing in the contest last week. And soon after, the Senate Leadership Fund, the top Senate Republican super PAC, announced that it’s spending more than $1 million in the hopes of rescuing Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith.

These moves precede the president’s scheduled rally in Mississippi in support of Hyde-Smith.

* In Texas’ U.S. Senate race, Democratic state Rep. James Talarico continues to pick up some GOP endorsements, including a new one from Thomas Phillips, the former Republican chief justice of the Texas Supreme Court.

“Paxton’s longstanding reputation will embarrass Texas in ways our state simply cannot afford,” Phillips wrote in an op-ed for The Beaumont Enterprise, referring to Republican state Attorney General Ken Paxton.

On a related note, ProPublica reported last week that the scandal-plagued GOP nominee’s trust invested $600,000 in a convicted fraudster’s company, Paxton’s “tough on crime” claims notwithstanding.

* In South Carolina’s U.S. Senate race, a new super PAC representing the data center industry is scrambling to try to help appointed Republican Sen. Darline Graham in South Carolina.

* And in North Carolina, The New York Times reported that new mail ballot rules are opening the door to thousands of ballots not being counted.

“At issue is a requirement that voters seal not only the outer envelope of their mail ballot but also an inner envelope that contains the ballot itself,” the article explained.

The post Monday’s Campaign Round-Up, 10.26.26: Fallout from Ramaswamy ad continues appeared first on MS NOW.

Last week a judge ordered the Department of Homeland Security to release the Rev. Edward Nalwamba, a Ugandan priest who had lived in Colorado for more than 25 years before being sent to an immigrant detention center 13 months ago. The priest’s health deteriorated during his detention, to the point that he now relies on a wheelchair.

After a court set him free, the private prison company that operates the detention center for Immigration and Customs Enforcement reportedly wouldn’t provide Nalwamba with a wheelchair, so fellow detainees literally carried him from the facility.

Days earlier, a federal judge blocked DHS from carrying out a variety of field operations focused on uncovering alleged voter fraud in nine states as part of a broader push to identify noncitizen voters. The New York Times report on the developments noted:

[Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguin], who was appointed by President Joseph R. Biden Jr., wrote that the scope of the operations also raised concerns about voter intimidation. She noted that according to agency memos, the Homeland Security Department “surveils, covertly infiltrates and interrogates the staff of nonprofits and churches conducting voter engagement” and had targeted nearly 150 such nonprofit groups as of July.

The Trump administration, in other words, was found to have conducted covert surveillance inside houses of worship, in addition to conducting interrogations of the churches’ staff.

This was not the first time the Republican administration was found to have spied on churches.

A few months into Donald Trump’s second term, the president’s team launched a task force that was intended, according to the White House, to eradicate “anti-Christian bias” within the federal government. At a launch event in April 2025, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi began by attacking Joe Biden, whom Bondi said had “abused and targeted Christians.”

The slander was baseless. What’s more, when the task force tried to bolster its accusations with a lengthy written report, the allegations against the former president and his Democratic administration largely fell apart.

But more than a year after Team Trump started making a concerted effort to convince Americans that Biden and his White House “abused and targeted Christians,” it’s the incumbent president and his Republican administration that continue to clash with faith communities — up to and including surveillance of churches.

It’s hard not to forget the incident from July, when ICE agents hauled off a nun who was wearing her habit and walking down a public sidewalk en route to Sunday Mass (she was released from federal detention after a backlash from members of Congress), but such examples keep cropping up.

Indeed, there have been related controversies surrounding Team Trump suing a Catholic diocese in New Mexico to seize 14 acres of land for additional border barriers; the Pentagon’s narrowed list of officially recognized religions; Trump picking fights with Pope Leo XIV; the administration stripping funding from Catholic charities; a White House offensive against the Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde for her defense of marginalized communities; and instances in which federal agents have shot faith leaders with pepper balls.

If these developments had unfolded during a Democratic administration, is there any doubt Republicans and conservative media outlets would have launched hysterical campaigns about the “Democratic war on religion”?

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

The post The Trump administration keeps clashing with faith communities appeared first on MS NOW.

One of the recurring themes this election cycle is a sense of betrayal: There are a growing number of constituencies that backed Republicans two years ago, only to feel abandoned by Donald Trump and his party.

Farmers, for example, voted for the president by lopsided margins in the 2024 race, and many have been let down by an administration that’s repeatedly made matters worse for the agricultural industry. Latino voters also shifted to Republicans in large numbers two years ago, confident that Trump would focus his deportation agenda on violent criminals. They now know better.

Similarly, many Muslim voters also took at enormous risk in 2024, moving toward a GOP nominee who championed a Muslim ban in his first term. Two years later, it’s a community that feels used and betrayed by a party that has seized on Islamophobia as the foundation for its closing message in the midterm elections.

But it’s also worth sparing a thought for those who believed Trump when he promised he was committed to “making America healthy again.” An overwhelming body of evidence leaves little doubt that he didn’t mean a word of it. The New York Times reported on the findings of a devastating investigation:

In total, since taking office again, Mr. Trump exempted 202 facilities in 39 states and Puerto Rico from clean-air regulations that were going into effect. Some were among the country’s worst industrial polluters, including chemical manufacturers, copper smelters and coal-burning power plants. About 3.3 million people live within three miles of at least one affected facility.

The exemptions represent the biggest presidential intervention in enforcement of the Clean Air Act in the half-century since President Richard M. Nixon signed the bedrock environmental law. And that is only one of the ways the Trump administration is dismantling a variety of federal environmental protections.

The Times documented in great detail the degree to which the Republican administration has systematically dismantled public safeguards to champion the wishes of polluters and chemical manufacturers, in ways without precedent in American history.

I’m mindful that much of the “MAHA” movement’s base is comprised of activists who are focused almost entirely on opposition to vaccines. But to the extent there are others who are genuinely interested in making America healthy again and who have sincere concerns about the spread of cancer-causing pollution, the Republican White House has gone to stunning lengths to express total indifference to those issues, instead elevating chemical industry lobbyists to leadership roles inside Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency.

“Donald Trump and [Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.] keep treating MAHA activists like disposable political pawns and now wonder why many resent it,” Protect Our Care President Brad Woodhouse recently said in a statement. “There’s not one MAHA promise Trump hasn’t been willing to break once the checks clear from his big chemical, food and tobacco donors. Food, air, water safety and kids’ health have all been compromised to feed profits for makers of addictive fruit flavored vapes, cancer-linked pesticides, and PFAS forever chemicals. And every time RFK Jr. proves himself a phony by making excuses for Trump’s latest MAHA double-cross, like making glyphosate great again.”

Time will tell how many of these constituencies move toward Democrats in the midterms or decide not to cast to ballots at all; but after the dust settles on the election cycle and the president and Republican leaders assess what went wrong, they might want to start by acknowledging the Americans who felt betrayed after counting on the GOP to deliver.

The post As Election Day nears, a growing number of constituencies feel betrayed by Trump appeared first on MS NOW.

As October got underway, Donald Trump threw an online tantrum by way of his social media platform, lashing out at Sen. Tom Cotton because the Arkansas Republican hedged on a daylight saving time proposal supported by the White House. The president, however, didn’t just throw around some juvenile names.

After making the case that Cotton was focused on his “ego” and failing to put “Arkansas first,” Trump publicly released the senator’s cellphone number and encouraged Arkansans to use it.

Nearly two weeks later, as the president expressed fears about Texas’ U.S. Senate race, he threw another online tantrum, this time targeting Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, whom Trump labeled a “WEAK and INEFFECTIVE” political hack who would deserve the blame if state Attorney General Ken Paxton loses.

On Friday, after Trump’s Justice Department filed an outlandish lawsuit targeting Alaska’s U.S. Senate race, Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska (who is not up for re-election this year) denounced the radical gambit, declaring in a statement, “Alaskans don’t need any help voting for their preferred candidates, and the State of Alaska has already handled this by clearly distinguishing the candidates on this year’s ballot. The Department of Justice should never have filed this lawsuit.”

Naturally, the president who demanded the lawsuit wasn’t pleased. In yet another lengthy online rant published Saturday night, Trump labeled Murkowski “the Republicans’ Worst Senator, by far,” before falsely saying that the senator “only got elected” because of the state’s system of ranked choice balloting, which he falsely described as “corrupt” and a “total Democrat [sic] scam.”

He added that Murkowski “probably wants” Democrats “to steal the Election,” before adding, “Lisa Murkowski is a DISGRACE to Alaska and our Country. You just don’t get any worse!”

Trump concluded that if incumbent Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan loses, “everything we’ve done for Alaska will come to an immediate hault.” (In context, I suspect he meant “halt.”)

For good measure, shortly before midnight, the president kept going, adding in a follow-up tirade, “They’ve been trying to get rid of Lisa Murkowski forever in Alaska, then she came up with the Ranked Choice Voting SCAM.” (Again, it’s not a scam; Murkowski isn’t the one who came up with it; and the system was not responsible for rescuing her career.)

That Trump holds the GOP senator in contempt is not exactly new, but the recent series of harangues directed at senators from his own party is a timely reminder that this guy, 11 years into his political career and nearly six years into his presidency, still has no idea how to deal with Congress.

Evidently, as the president sees it, if he can just harass his ostensible allies enough through online antics, then maybe they’ll succumb to his intimidation efforts and follow his demands.

Except, as he probably ought to know by now, his harassment efforts tend not to work. Cotton didn’t change his mind about daylight saving time; Cornyn hasn’t become a Paxton cheerleader; and Murkowski hasn’t backed off her criticisms of an indefensible lawsuit.

What we’re left with is a president who keeps picking pointless fights with intraparty allies, whose support he might yet need in the near future, in the run-up to critically important U.S. elections — which is every bit as foolish as it sounds.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

The post ‘A disgrace’: Trump finds yet another Republican senator to condemn ahead of the midterms appeared first on MS NOW.

As last week neared its end, struggling consumers confronted yet another discouraging development: Oil prices reached levels unseen since April. With so little time remaining in the midterm election cycle, and with affordability on the minds of so many Americans, common sense suggested this would be a topic Donald Trump would avoid at his latest campaign rallies.

And yet, the Republican president apparently couldn’t help himself.

Trump: "While oil prices are temporarily high … the United States oil and gas business is making hundreds of billions of dollars"

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-10-25T00:27:47.633Z

Saturday night in Georgia, Trump began by assuring his supporters that gas prices would “be falling dramatically” just as soon as he figured out a way to end the war he launched against Iran. If he had stopped here, it would not have been notable.

But then he kept going.

“The United States’ oil and gas business is making hundreds of billions of dollars,” the president said, conceding that he wasn’t sure whether to bring this up, and that members of his own team advised him, “Please don’t mention that, sir.”

He blew off the good advice.

Trump’s own team told him not to celebrate higher energy prices shortly before Election Day, since Americans generally don’t want to be told to be happy about their pain at the pump. He decided not to listen, evidently because he’s delighted to see Big Oil cash in, regardless of the impact on unhappy consumers.

The president first rolled out this talking point just two weeks after launching the war, using his social media platform to argue, “The United States is the largest Oil Producer in the World, by far, so when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money.”

That line proved wildly unpersuasive and was quickly dropped from the White House’s talking points, before making an unexpected comeback at an event in Arizona two weeks ago. “Our country is making more money than it’s ever made because of the fact that oil is so high,” Trump boasted, effectively telling American consumers to be glad they’re paying more at the pump.

As a substantive matter, the problem with Trump’s claim that “we’re making a fortune” is that the word “we” is doing a lot of work in that sentence. It’s true that the United States is producing a lot of oil, and it’s also true that higher prices help generate oil industry profits. But since the number of Americans who benefit from oil industry profits is very small, few will likely celebrate the ongoing hit to their wallets.

But as a political matter, it’s remarkable to see the Republican — who has gone out of his way to make the midterms a referendum on himself — execute such a bizarre strategy at the worst possible time.

“I can just see the fake headlines: ‘President Trump is talking about all the money they’re making while people are suffering at the pump,’” he said. The trouble is, there’s nothing fake about such headlines: Trump really did talk about all the money Big Oil was making while people were suffering at the pump, which he then promptly followed with, “I don’t give a damn.”

If Republicans are very lucky, voters won’t hear about this.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

The post Trump ignores his own team’s advice, celebrates higher oil prices appeared first on MS NOW.

In the recent past, countless international observers had ample reason to fear the ascendancy of strongman leaders in nations around the globe, as democracies suffered one setback after another. Donald Trump’s return to the American presidency offered a dramatic example for the West, but the broader authoritarian pattern extended elsewhere.

This year, however, democracy and its champions are starting to turn the tide.

In April, then-Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán suffered a lopsided defeat, ending his radically regressive 16-year reign, despite the White House’s intervention on his behalf.

Six months later, the 14-year reign of Serbian strongman Aleksandar Vucic also crashed, thanks in large part to a student-led progressive movement. The Associated Press reported:

The long-ruling authoritarian leader on Sunday conceded the defeat of his right-wing Serbian Progressive Party to a grassroots movement of university students who led protests for almost two years against him before unseating him in a historic change of government. […]

The diverse youth movement’s message that rampant corruption, cronyism and organized crime under Vucic were eating away at the country resonated widely with voters.

Sounding a rather pitiful note after having been rejected by his own country’s electorate, Vucic attributed his defeat to a series of perceived enemies, including “the deep American state, the one that is also against President Trump.”

The celebrations in Belgrade continued anyway.

People in Belgrade celebrated following Serbia's Aleksandar Vucic speech conceding defeat to a student-led protest movement in a historic election that ends his long grip on power and heralds a new political era in the Balkan country. reut.rs/4zkXvww

— Reuters (@reuters.com) 2026-10-26T05:03:08Z

“I ​have just spoken by phone with the leaders of the Students’ List, who won the elections in Serbia, to congratulate them on their victory,” Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar said in a statement. “I assured them of Hungary’s support. I was delighted ​to hear how much strength our victory in April had given them during this difficult struggle.”

Hours later, the world learned that Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won a surprising fourth term, defeating his right-wing rival, Flávio Bolsonaro, four years after Bolsonaro’s father attempted a coup that ultimately sent him to prison, and who also enjoyed the White House’s backing.

As The New York Times noted, Bolsonaro refused to accept the outcome, “increasing the risk of unrest over the election result.”

Time will tell what becomes of conditions in Brasília and who ultimately succeeds Vucic. But as the dust settles on these elections, there is an obvious and heartening through line connecting the election results out of Hungary, Serbia and Brazil: Democracies defeated autocracies.

Every country has its own unique political dynamics, and the victors in these countries are hardly identical. But when leaders of the global authoritarian movement lose, it’s worth celebrating — because when voters reject candidates like Vucic and Bolsonaro, it’s not just a setback for them and their parties, it’s also a failure for the movements they help represent.

That said, there’s fresh evidence to believe the White House hasn’t yet gotten the message: The Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump administration is eyeing Orbán to serve as the next United Nations secretary-general, which is both bonkers and evidence that the broader democratic fight remains ongoing.

The post Voters in Serbia and Brazil add to the losing streak of authoritarian candidates appeared first on MS NOW.

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* The highest oil prices since April: “Oil prices rose further on Friday, as hostilities across the Middle East continue to raise fears in the energy markets that the oil supply from the region would remain throttled. The price of Brent crude, the international oil benchmark, jumped above $117 a barrel on Friday, taking its increase for the week to almost 6 percent.”

* A relatively quiet hurricane season is picking up: “Vance became a hurricane Friday and the National Hurricane Center said it would strengthen rapidly as it nears Mexico’s Pacific Coast. Vance was a Category 1 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 90 mph (150 kph) as it churned about 455 miles (730 kilometers) south-southwest of Acapulco, and could become a major Category 3 hurricane before the end of Friday, the center said.”

* The Starlink matter is not yet resolved: “Ukrainian interceptors still cannot use the internet at high speed to shoot down Russian attack drones or conduct mid-strike operations as of Friday morning, Ukrainian officials and a drone operator said, despite U.S. President Donald Trump saying SpaceX founder Elon Musk had lifted speed restrictions on his Starshield service.”

* A twisted sense of entitlement: “Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday cited genetics to declare that Russians and Ukrainians are ‘one people’ and reiterated his claim to Ukrainian territory, saying, ‘I think that it is not their territory but the historical territory of Russia.’”

* There’s a sentence I didn’t expect to read: “First lady Melania Trump has brokered a ceasefire deal between Russia and Ukraine in the war-ravaged city of Oleshky to allow for humanitarian aid and the evacuation of civilians, the White House announced on Friday. The localized ceasefire is set to begin Oct. 29.” (Let’s note that the White House announces a lot of things, many of which aren’t true.)

* In the Middle East: “Israeli soldiers shot and killed two men who the military said had launched an attack near the city of Hebron in the occupied West Bank on Friday morning. At least five people were injured, including some critically. A few hours later, Israel ordered the army to prepare for a full closure of the West Bank.”

* Keep an eye on this one: “The Department of Justice on Friday charged two former top FBI officials with lying to Congress about their involvement in the agency’s investigation into Hunter Biden. The charges against Nikki Floris and Bradley Benavides, who worked on the FBI’s now-disbanded Foreign Influence Task Force, stem from a brief they gave to members of Congress about the task force’s investigation of Biden, the son of former President Joe Biden.”

* Heartening scientific research: “A groundbreaking vaccine reduced the risk of death or recurrence of melanoma by almost half, an encouraging signal for a treatment seeking federal approval that has boosted the fortunes of drugmakers Moderna and Merck and could usher in a new wave of cancer treatments.”

* And The New York Times published a fascinating report on the Pentagon setting up review boards at bases around the world, specifically designed to kick transgender troops out of the military. Uniformed service members on these panels, however, keep doing the opposite, agreeing to keep the trans troops rather than firing them.

Have a safe weekend.

The post Friday’s Mini-Report, 10.23.26 appeared first on MS NOW.

Among the more amazing things about Donald Trump’s crusade against Rep. Ilhan Omar is how utterly brazen it is. The president and his team could at least try to keep up appearances, to maintain some kind of pretense that the scrutiny of the Minnesota Democrat is legitimate — but the Republican officials have largely decided not to bother.

On the contrary, Trump publicly demanded an investigation into a political opponent — which is itself an abuse — all the while making clear that he hoped to strip Omar of her citizenship and to deport a sitting congresswoman who dared to cross him. Soon after, federal departments did as they were directed to do, in pursuit of the president’s stated goal.

“It is a basic principle of American democracy that the government can’t selectively target individuals simply because of their political beliefs or what they say,” Barack Obama said in a statement. “But that’s exactly what the Trump Administration is doing to Congresswoman Ilhan Omar of Minnesota.”

Despite highly dubious evidence of wrongdoing, federal agents seized the laptop, cellphone and passport of a sitting member of Congress, at which point the president who demanded this probe received a highly unusual briefing from Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin.

While there’s still no evidence that the Minnesotan has done anything wrong, Trump took some time during his Thursday night rally in Iowa to insist that Omar resign. The Republican added that “the Democrat [sic] Party has conceded her seat” and she will no longer be permitted to serve in Congress.

Trump calls for Ilhan Omar to immediately resign & says, "please inform our great Speaker, James Michael Johnson that the Democrat Party has conceded her seat … she will not be allowed to me a member of that body any longer"Trump's crowd in Iowa then starts chanting "Lock her up! Lock her up!"

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-10-23T00:27:55.342Z

At that point, as if on cue, his followers chanted, “Lock her up! Lock her up!”

After the event, the president published a statement to his social media platform, again calling on Omar to “IMMEDIATELY resign from Congress,” adding that someone should inform House leaders that the congresswoman has “openly admitted to FRAUD, and she will not be legally allowed to be a Member of this August Body.”

In reality, of course, Omar has not “openly admitted” to any wrongdoing and has repeatedly denied the White House’s allegations. No one has conceded their seat — Omar is likely to be re-elected in 11 days — and she is absolutely still permitted to serve on Capitol Hill, doing the job Americans in her district elected her to do.

I have no idea what, if anything, will come of this relentless campaign. Given that Team Trump also ordered an investigation into Omar’s records in his first term and that probe was eventually abandoned for lack of evidence, the president might want to temper his expectations.

But that this is happening at all reflects unmistakable authoritarian tactics.

“The investigation of her is a chilling example of the federal government using its immense power to silence a critic,” the editorial board of The New York Times explained. “It is an affront to free speech, the rule of law and American ideals.”

The editorial added, “In the case of Ms. Omar, the administration has gone back more than a quarter-century to investigate a prominent critic. If her naturalization can be revisited, it suggests that no naturalized citizen is safe. It also indicates that the federal government can go searching for any decades-old problem to hound somebody who has criticized the White House. Those are the tactics of authoritarian societies.”

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While many Republican candidates are keeping Donald Trump at arm’s length, Iowa’s Joe Mitchell has moved in a far more obsequious direction, despite running in one of the nation’s most competitive congressional districts.

The 29-year-old former state representative, hoping to succeed Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson in Iowa’s 2nd District, joined the president during a rally Thursday night and offered the kind of gushing praise Trump likes to hear. Mitchell said Trump has “kept this country more safe than any other president, ever,” before expressing outrage that Trump hasn’t been given a Nobel Peace Prize.

It was at that point when the Iowan decided to give the president a different honor — one he had made up.

Joe Mitchell gives Trump "the man of the century" award (that he just made up)

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-10-23T01:40:34.634Z

Mitchell held up a framed certificate and said, “So what I came up with, Mr. President, is a new award. It’s called the ‘Man of the Century Award.’” The congressional hopeful went on to insist that Trump has “fought more for humanity and for America than any other president ever” and has become “the greatest president we’ve ever had.”

The president accepted the certificate, handed it to an aide and continued with his rally.

Time will tell whether locals in one of the nation’s true toss-up House races are impressed with such sycophancy, but the presentation got me thinking about the larger pattern: Trump has struggled to earn the kind of awards he desperately wants, but he has managed to receive all kinds of fake honors.

Earlier this year, for example, several coal industry executives and miners in hard hats presented Trump with a trophy that labeled him the “Undisputed Champion of Beautiful Clean Coal.”

This was not an isolated incident. Shortly after Trump lost his re-election bid in 2020, the National Republican Senatorial Committee made up an honor for him called the Champion for Freedom Award.

More recently, after the president’s begging didn’t lead to a Nobel Peace Prize, soccer’s global governing body, FIFA, concocted its own peace prize in the hopes of making Trump feel better.

A month after Trump picked up a trophy from coal industry representatives, House Speaker Mike Johnson held an event in which he announced another made-up honor, called the America First Award. The Louisiana Republican then handed the president, the first recipient, with a giant eagle statue.

Let this be a lesson to those hoping to curry favor with the White House: If you haven’t already visited a store that makes trophies and prizes, you’re making a mistake.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

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Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.

* In Mississippi’s unexpectedly interesting U.S. Senate race, former Vice President Kamala Harris headlined a rally in support of local prosecutor Scott Colom, the Democratic nominee.

“Mississippi matters!” Harris shouted to thunderous cheers at Thursday’s event.

The rally came on the heels of Donald Trump’s political operation confirming that the president will hold a rally on Monday in hopes of boosting Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, who’s struggling to a surprising degree in a race the GOP long assumed would be easy.

The news coincides with an Axios report that said Senate Republicans are so concerned about the Mississippi race that it’s “weighing a cash infusion” for the contest.

* In Maine’s closely watched U.S. Senate race, the latest Fox News poll found Democrat Troy Jackson and incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins tied, with each garnering 49% support.

* In Kansas’ closely watched U.S. Senate race, incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall has finally sold his house in Florida. The sale was finalized the same day early voting began in Kansas.

* In Texas’ closely watched U.S. Senate race, The New York Times reported that a covert Russian influence operation is targeting Democratic state Rep. James Talarico’s candidacy as part of an apparent effort to boost Republican state Attorney General Ken Paxton.

* Speaking of Texas, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott recently boasted about endorsements he received from several Democratic sheriffs, but The New Republic reported that some of them deny having endorsed the GOP incumbent.

* While voter turnout is expected to be strong in New Hampshire this year, there is a new hurdle for voters to keep in mind: The Supreme Court granted New Hampshire’s emergency request to block the use of student IDs for voting in the midterms.

* Over the first two weeks of October, Republican megadonor Elon Musk invested an additional $76 million to boost GOP candidates. Five months after the billionaire publicly vowed to curtail his campaign spending, Musk has now donated more than $442 million to advance the Republican cause in the 2026 cycle.

* Speaking of Republican megadonors, billionaire Jeff Yass has now invested nearly $110 million to boost GOP candidates in the midterms. Yass is also the top donor to Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican’s gubernatorial nominee in Ohio.

* And speaking of Ramaswamy, to appreciate the scope of the controversy surrounding his scandalous attack ad, it’s worth noting that 10 sitting Democratic female governors issued a joint statement on Thursday, condemning the candidate’s vile commercial as “an insult to survivors everywhere.”

The post Friday’s Campaign Round-Up, 10.23.26: Kamala Harris rallies for Colom in Mississippi appeared first on MS NOW.

After months of arguments, a state judge in Alaska ruled in late June that retired teacher Dan J. Sullivan could run against incumbent Republican Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, overturning the ruling from the Alaska Division of Elections. A few months later, after the first round of balloting, state election officials finalized the top four candidates for Alaska’s unique system, and both Dan Sullivans advanced to the general election.

That Donald Trump and his political team are worried about the race is obvious, but what the president’s team is doing about it is another matter entirely.

Late Thursday, Trump’s Justice Department filed a preemptive lawsuit that intends to block certification of the Senate race — but only if the Republican incumbent loses while the rival with the similar name remains on the ballot.

As The Associated Press reported, the litigation kicks off “what many have feared could become a lengthy battle between the U.S. government and states over certifying an election where the president’s party is struggling.”

What’s more, it’s entirely possible that former Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola will win this race and the efforts by Trump’s DOJ will determine whether she’s seated — and which party ultimately holds a majority in the Senate.

The lawsuit is a dramatic escalation, but it didn’t come out of nowhere. At a White House event in early September, the president publicly urged Attorney General Todd Blanche to pursue a case in Alaska specifically focused on the competing candidates with nearly identical names.

Last week, Trump went further, claiming that federal authorities were “looking into” the matter and pushing assorted conspiracy theories for which there was no evidence. As recently as Wednesday of this week, the president used his social media platform to publish a statement that read, in part, “Dan S. Sullivan is leading by a lot, but this is CHEATING in an Election, and the Judge that allowed this to happen should be ashamed of himself. We are looking at powerful legal options to remove the fraudulent Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. from the Ballot, and holding the Democrats accountable for their Election Interference, in the pursuit of Justice and Fairness.”

The statement included obvious falsehoods — most recent polling in Alaska shows the Republican incumbent trailing, not “leading by a lot” — and there is nothing to suggest Democratic officials have engaged in “election interference,” other than championing their party’s nominee.

Nevertheless, there have long been concerns that the Trump administration might try to derail election results it doesn’t like, and the DOJ’s new lawsuit regarding Alaska suggests those concerns are well grounded.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

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Any story about a family dispute is bound to be complex, but the politics surrounding Vivek Ramaswamy’s abhorrent attack ad are relatively straightforward. Amy Acton, the Democratic gubernatorial nominee in Ohio, was allegedly raped by her stepfather when she was a child.

Her Republican opponent, Ramaswamy, is trying to weaponize this in despicable fashion, pushing a campaign commercial that features Acton’s estranged mother, who sided with the stepfather even after his arrest and stayed with him until his death.

But in recent days, it’s become clear that this ad has taken on far greater significance than one commercial in one gubernatorial election. As The New York Times’ Michelle Goldberg summarized in her latest column:

It’s quite a feat, in this numb and debased era, to create a political advertisement so shocking and indecent that people from across the political spectrum feel the need to denounce it. The Ohio gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who has long fashioned himself as a kind of Donald Trump 2.0 — younger and brainier but just as brash — has managed it.

By releasing what may be the most disgusting ad in American political history, he’s done more than just reveal his own low character. He’s opened a kind of proxy debate on the right about whether a post-Trump conservatism should try to reclaim some base-line morality or continue along its current smashmouth course.

Donald Trump has changed his party and his nation’s politics in a great many ways, but among the most important shifts is the degree to which the president has championed the politics of cruelty and dishonor. There are messages — from attack ads to speeches to social message postings — that Republican officials used to avoid, even when they agreed with the underlying point, in part to avoid backlash and in part to maintain their public reputations and credibility.

In recent years, however, those scruples have been cast aside. GOP officials and candidates no longer hedge on depraved messaging: After having seen Americans twice elevate a malicious television personality to the nation’s highest office, they now routinely echo his amorality and cynicism, seeing it as a way to satisfy the party’s far-right base, to advance their own ambitions or both.

Most decent people can and will agree that Ramaswamy’s attack ad is indefensible, but the ad has also taken on totemic value.

“What the ad represents … is an opening salvo in the post-midterms fight for the Republican Party’s future,” Politico’s Jonathan Martin explained. “It’s a battle that will accelerate next year but may not culminate until the 2030s. Put simply, what sort of party does the GOP want to be — and what will the market bear?”

Trailing in polls and short on options, Ramaswamy made his choice, and the stain on his character is likely to be permanent. What the Ohioan might not have anticipated, however, is just how much his disgusting tactic has divided his own party.

Several prominent Republicans in the state, including outgoing Gov. Mike DeWine, have publicly condemned the ad, and others outside of Ohio have taken similar steps. Former GOP presidential contender Nikki Haley, for example, said via social media that Ramaswamy is “a bad guy.” A day later, Rep. Ashley Hinson, the party’s Senate hopeful in Iowa, called the commercial “absolutely terrible.”

On the other side, there’s the White House, where the politics of cruelty and dishonor still thrive, and where there are Republican leaders who still believe repugnant messaging will dominate for the foreseeable future.

JD Vance, for example, declared this week that he’s “a little bit disgusted,” not by Ramaswamy’s gutter politics, but by members of his own party who are “whining” about civility.

The vice president’s reaction itself drew swift rebukes — The Bulwark published a piece that described Vance as a “sociopath” — but that didn’t stop Trump from picking up where his vice president left off.

On Wednesday, the president told reporters he didn’t “know anything about it,” before shifting gears and talking about how important he considers it to see a mother “hate her daughter that much.”

A day later, Trump went much further and spent much of Thursday defending the ad, urging Ramaswamy to keep running it, demanding the public take the underlying claims “seriously” and at Iowa rally, predicting that the ad would work in the GOP candidate’s favor.

In other words, Trump took care to keep dividing Republicans — with less than two weeks remaining, during the early voting period — in one of the nation’s most important gubernatorial races, by leaning into support for one of the most repulsive campaign ads in recent memory.

Election Day is 11 days away. Watch this space.

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It seemed like a straightforward task. The Department of Health and Human Services set out to file an argument in an arbitration case, presenting claims about alleged mistakes made by an arbitrator. Such documents are filed all the time, and under normal circumstances, none of this would be notable to the public at all.

But these are not normal circumstances. The Washington Sun reported:

The Trump administration apparently still hasn’t learned its lesson about double-checking sources.

A federal labor agency flagged so many problems in a recent arbitration filing that it suggested the Department of Health and Human Services used artificial intelligence to draft its brief.

There’s a lot of evidence to support those allegations: The Federal Labor Relations Authority identified 10 “entirely fictitious” citations in the filing; and as the Sun’s report added, 22 of the HHS filing’s 29 footnotes and 35 of the 42 total legal or record citations were deemed “fictitious, erroneous, or irrelevant.” There were also “incorrect page numbers, case numbers and other details.”

The Trump administration’s embrace of artificial intelligence has a long track record of sloppiness. In July, for example, a State Department representative delivered a presentation at an AIDS 2026 conference and referred to a map of Africa that mislabeled multiple countries. A Reuters report noted that the image “contained an artificial intelligence watermark that ⁠signals it was made with OpenAI tools.”

This was embarrassing, but it was not an isolated incident. Border Patrol officials, for example, were caught misusing ChatGPT last fall. Around the same time, Tulsi Gabbard, then the director of national intelligence, used an AI program to determine which documents to release related to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy, and that process did not go well.

But Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s HHS has suffered more than its share of humiliations on this score.

Last year, for example, the department produced “The MAHA Report: Making Our Children Healthy Again,” which cited multiple nonexistent scientific studies after staffers misused AI. Soon after, the Food and Drug Administration unveiled an AI tool intended to speed up drug approvals, but the tool did not work.

As recently as last month, HHS included nonexistent, AI-generated citations to support sweeping changes to federal teen pregnancy prevention programs. The Washington Post reported that a federal judge discovered that the department cited seven articles, two of which were made up entirely and three of which did not exist in the journals to which they were attributed.

Now, the list has grown a little longer.

“While nothing prohibits parties from using AI tools when preparing filings for submission to the Authority, we caution those who do so to be aware that AI continues to present significant risks of error,” the Federal Labor Relations Authority reminded HHS in its ruling.

The warning was worthwhile, though if recent history is any guide, the department is not likely to take the reminder to heart.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

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Virginia Senate President Pro Tempore L. Louise Lucas is generally known to national audiences as the Democratic leader who spearheaded a redistricting effort in the commonwealth. This week, however, she made headlines for a very different reason. The Associated Press reported:

Virginia state Sen. L. Louise Lucas, one of the state’s most powerful Democrats, was charged on Thursday in connection with what federal authorities alleged was a role leading a criminal enterprise that acquired and distributed large quantities of marijuana and laundered the proceeds.

An indictment unsealed on Thursday charged Lucas and six other defendants, including several of her relatives, the Department of Justice said in a statement ahead of a scheduled news conference. Lucas surrendered, a Justice Department spokesperson said.

The charges come roughly five months after the FBI searched Lucas’ office and a cannabis shop in which she invested.

“I grew up under Jim Crow,” Lucas said in a statement. “I’ve seen what happens when people in power try to silence those who stand up to them. I spent my life fighting back, and I’m not stopping now.”

Time will tell what, if anything, comes of this case. What’s more, I’ll concede that it is entirely possible that investigators have worked in good faith as part of a responsible law enforcement operation, and that there’s no reason to question the legitimacy of the probe or the motivations of those behind it. But while I don’t know whether the case against Lucas has merit, I do know that the hyperpartisan leaders of the Justice Department and the FBI have failed to earn the benefit of the doubt.

Not to put too fine a point on this, but this is why we don’t politicize federal law enforcement. Because even if the underlying case is legitimate, it’s impossible to avoid the larger context and the degree to which this looks like a retaliatory investigation against a Democrat, launched by a weaponized department known for its retaliatory investigations against Democrats, with less than two weeks remaining in a critical election cycle.

There have simply been too many abuses, launched too frequently, against too many Trump targets, even as other corruption cases against White House allies have been cast aside.

That Fox News, an outlet aligned with Republican politics, apparently received a heads-up about the FBI’s operation in May and was able to air live footage of the search further reinforces concerns that this case is political.

But perhaps most notable of all is the timing. “While federal officials have historically avoided taking public steps in politically fraught cases ahead of elections,” a Washington Post report added, “the case against Lucas is the second prominent action the administration has taken against a Democratic critic of Trump in the past 10 days.”

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

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For nearly two years, Donald Trump’s Justice Department has been unusually aggressive in pursuing the White House’s political opponents. Now, however, it appears that a presidential ally is the one facing scrutiny from federal law enforcement.

MS NOW has confirmed that the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general has sent a criminal referral to the Justice Department over allegations that Corey Lewandowski profited from his role at DHS.

A Lewandowski spokesperson issued a statement Thursday saying that the former DHS official hadn’t been contacted by the Justice Department, adding that Lewandowski “denies any wrongdoing when he was proudly serving his country in a voluntary capacity.”

For those who would benefit from a refresher on Lewandowski, around this time 10 years ago, it appeared that his role as a member of Trump’s team had run its course. The Republican operative was Trump’s campaign manager for several months in 2016, but after clashing with his colleagues and facing a criminal charge after a confrontation with a reporter, the future president ousted Lewandowski from his political operation.

Although it seemed implausible, the operative gradually worked his way back into Trump’s good graces, and when the president returned to power after the 2024 election, Lewandowski received a striking reward: Trump tapped him to serve as a “special government employee” to help run the Department of Homeland Security alongside then-Secretary Kristi Noem.

Predictably, Lewandowski’s tenure proved controversial — in part because of the policy agenda he championed; in part because he wanted to carry a gun (for reasons that were never fully explained), to the alarm of DHS officials; and in part because of the nature of his close relationship with Noem.

But it’s the corruption allegations that are of particular and ongoing significance.

In July, for example, The Wall Street Journal reported that federal investigators found evidence that Lewandowski “may have been involved in improperly awarding government contracts” during his time at DHS. Last month, the Journal published a separate report, alleging that the operative used his role in the department to pursue side deals for himself with officials in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. (Lewandowski slammed the reporting as “fiction.”)

Time will tell what, if anything, comes of the inquiry, though if it reaches a more serious stage, it will create a difficult test for the president and his political operation.

Indeed, if Trump’s former campaign manager faces a possible federal criminal indictment, it’s an open question as to whether the president will intervene and derail the case, or whether he’ll add Lewandowski to his list of close allies whom he pretends not to know.

Complicating matters further, it was just last week when Trump sat down with Newsmax for a lengthy interview, and when the discussion turned to pardons, the Republican said, “I can tell you this, I don’t want to see my people go through — because these people are lunatics on the, on the left — I don’t want to see people that work for me go through years of nonsense, hire lawyers and everything else, all for nothing.”

This came a few weeks after Trump also told Time magazine that he’s prepared to issue pardons to members of his administration. Watch this space.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

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Today’s edition of quick hits.

* An intensifying outbreak: “The Ebola epidemic that began in the Democratic Republic of Congo earlier this year has achieved a grim new milestone, turning up in a third region of the African continent, the widest footprint of any Ebola outbreak to date. This week, health officials identified a new case in Abuja, Nigeria, more than 2,000 miles west of the outbreak’s epicenter in Central Africa. The news came the same day as the announcement of a ninth case of Ebola in the East African country of Kenya.”

* The latest in a series of key departures at the department: “Calley Means, a top aide to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., announced Thursday that he is resigning. … The Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter, reported Thursday that Means was unhappy about the White House dragging its feet on some of Kennedy’s policy ideas and blamed other administration officials for allowing special interests to have too much influence. The Journal was the first to report Means’ departure.”

* A prosecution worth watching: “Virginia state Sen. L. Louise Lucas, one of the state’s most powerful Democrats, was charged on Thursday in connection with what federal authorities alleged was a role leading a criminal enterprise that acquired and distributed large quantities of marijuana and laundered the proceeds.”

* This report probably won’t be the final word on the subject: “President Trump called Elon Musk on Wednesday and asked him to lift restrictions on a military-grade version of Starlink in Ukraine that the SpaceX chief had throttled, U.S. officials said. The system was working more normally Thursday, shortly after their conversation, U.S. and Ukrainian officials said. Some Ukrainian officials said the system wasn’t restored to full functionality but was working at higher speeds than under the cap.”

* The White House’s war on the free press is ongoing: “The White House this week launched new broadsides against the news media, blocking a reporter from serving in the pool covering the president and sending a letter threatening Politico over its coverage of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles.”

* Another case worth watching: “Top Democrats and allied organizations filed a lawsuit on Wednesday against President Donald Trump and his administration over their attempts to stymie the midterm elections, including by removing voters from state rolls.”

* The White House won’t like this honor one bit: “The International Criminal Court and its embattled staff have won the European Union’s top human rights honor, the Sakharov Prize, an official said Thursday. The award came just days after the Trump administration announced sweeping new sanctions on the court, which is based in The Hague, Netherlands, as part of its campaign to dismantle the tribunal over investigations into the United States and its allies, including Israel.”

* A Washington Post investigation identified “at least 11” instances in which “government officials have discovered unauthorized users have gained access to Flock databases and searched them without permission, sometimes to track the locations of romantic partners.” The more common the abuses, the more intense the public backlash becomes.

See you tomorrow.

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