Today’s edition of quick hits.

* In light of the latest economic data, this decision was hardly the obvious one: “The Federal Reserve kept its key rate unchanged Wednesday at about 3.9% despite stubbornly high inflation, as Chairman Kevin Warsh suggested its policies are already showing signs of having an impact.”

* A remarkable turn of events in Brazil: “Defeated Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro and his family landed in Miami on Wednesday after fleeing Brazil. The stunning move came after 48 hours in which Bolsonaro refused to concede to Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and then threatened to attempt to annul the election result.”

* In related news: “A Brazilian Supreme Court justice on Tuesday ordered a police investigation into alleged ties between a donor network co-founded by Vice President JD Vance and the presidential campaign of Flávio Bolsonaro in the run-up to Sunday’s election.”

* A devastating disaster: “One high-speed Spanish train slammed into another that had stopped on the tracks Wednesday, killing at least 68 people and shredding carriages in the country’s second deadly rail collision this year. The regional government for Castilla La Mancha confirmed the death toll and said another 58 people needed medical treatment in hospital.”

* A case of ongoing interest: “Three news organizations that sued the White House after President Donald Trump banned them from the grounds have amended their lawsuit. They are now asking a federal judge to permanently restore their access, not just to the White House but to other areas including the Oval Office and Air Force One. The amended complaint filed by the news outlets — MS NOW, CNN and Politico — comes two weeks after U.S. Judge Timothy Kelly indefinitely reversed Trump’s ban and restored their access to the White House.”

* The need for secrecy in this case is hardly obvious: “The U.S. attorney’s office in Washington said on Tuesday that it would not unseal a search warrant executed by federal agents at the home of Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota this month. The office also asked a federal judge to deny requests for the warrant’s release.”

* The White House sure has lost a lot of cases like this one: “A federal judge ruled Tuesday that a Donald Trump-backed lawyer has been ‘unlawfully serving’ as the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles. The decision regarding Bill Essayli’s service does not immediately take effect, and Essayli said the Supreme Court ‘will ultimately decide’ the legality of his tenure.”

* A little something to keep democracy advocates up at night: “As Election Day nears, recent events have prompted some FBI agents to express concern, according to seven people with knowledge of internal discussions among the ranks, that they may be ordered to seize voting machines or take other actions that disrupt election results.”

* The passing of a legend: “Dolores Huerta, an icon of the labor movement in California who co-founded the United Farm Workers, died Wednesday at the age of 96, her family announced.”

See you tomorrow.

The post Wednesday’s Mini-Report, 10.28.26 appeared first on MS NOW.

Ahead of the 2020 elections, Donald Trump told anyone who would listen that a Joe Biden victory would lead to “a depression the likes of which you’ve never seen.” The then-president’s claim was obviously foolish and quickly discredited by reality.

The Republican is nevertheless recycling the line, declaring at a campaign rally in Mississippi this week, “If the Democrats win, you will have a 1929-style economic depression. What they want to do is so bad for our country, you’re going to end up with a massive recession or depression.”

The incumbent president never got around to saying how this economic calamity would happen, which parts of the Democratic agenda are so dangerous or why he was so spectacularly wrong when he made the same prediction six years earlier.

But what struck me as especially notable was that even Trump doesn’t seem to believe his own fearmongering.

Just hours before his event in Mississippi, the president briefly spoke to reporters, one of whom asked how he’d “work with Democrats if they have control of the House or the Senate.” He replied:

We’ll figure a way. Look, I have strong veto. I hope that that won’t be the case, but if it is, that’s happened before with many presidents. And you have strong veto and you end up working out deals.

Oh.

So on the one hand, Trump wants Americans to believe that a Democratic majority on Capitol Hill would transform the nation into a hellscape in which transgender Muslim immigrants come to your home to turn your children into communists.

But on the other hand, Trump also wants Americans to believe that if there is a Democratic majority, he’ll veto bad ideas while working on possible bipartisan agreements — which is unlikely to sound all that scary to many voters.

The president made similar comments in early September, telling Fox News’ Laura Ingraham, “I’ll block all their bad stuff for two years. It won’t be the same, but I’ll be a blocker, what can I tell you?”

He then added that he’ll “probably be able to make deals” with the possible Democratic majority.

The Republican Party’s line is that the stakes in this election cycle are effectively existential — but Trump’s line is that it just won’t be that big a deal if Democrats prevail. That’s quite a message for the incumbent president to take to the electorate in the cycle’s closing days, but here we are.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

The post Trump downplays concerns about a possible Democratic majority, stepping on his message appeared first on MS NOW.

Headed into Election Day, it’s not exactly a secret that House Republicans are likely to lose their majority. Democrats only need a net gain of a handful of seats, and all of the available evidence suggests that won’t be a problem.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, however, keeps taking issue with the evidence.

“Republicans are no longer responding to polls,” the GOP leader told Fox News over the weekend. He added, “I’m telling you these polls are off — all of them.”

On Monday night, the Louisiana congressman returned to the network and pushed effectively the same line. “I’m telling you the polling is inaccurate,” the House speaker said.

Maybe so. Maybe Johnson’s right — we can probably all think of instances when polls have been off to one degree or another — and it could be the political world is in for an enormous surprise next week.

But if that were to happen, Republicans themselves would be among those who are shocked.

As a matter of campaign strategy and tactics, I can appreciate why Johnson is pushing this line with so much enthusiasm. He is, after all, Congress’ top GOP lawmaker. If he were openly accepting the available data on public attitudes, the House speaker would effectively have to admit the odds of him holding onto his gavel are poor, which wouldn’t exactly motivate his party’s rank-and-file voters to cast a ballot.

But regardless of Johnson’s motivations, even his own party doesn’t genuinely believe his talking point. We know this for certain because Republicans keep moving campaign money around to protect vulnerable GOP incumbents — not based on pleas and anecdotal evidence, but because of their own polling data.

The same is true for Donald Trump’s campaign schedule. The president hasn’t invested his time in states such as Texas, South Carolina, Mississippi and Kansas — states he won by enormous margins two years ago — because he finds local conditions pleasant this time of year. The White House political operation is deploying Trump in response to polling data, even as Johnson insists that Republicans “are no longer responding to polls.”

Of course they are. There’s nothing else for them to use when making difficult electoral decisions.

The post Speaker Johnson says the polls are wrong. His own party doesn’t appear to agree. appeared first on MS NOW.

Amid a flurry of Justice Department efforts to target people whom Donald Trump doesn’t like, two former FBI officials were charged late last week with lying to Congress — in a case of particular interest to the president.

Remember the story about Hunter Biden’s laptop? As part of a Republican investigation into the matter, Nikki Floris, the former deputy assistant director of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division, and Bradley Benavides, another FBI official, briefed members of Congress about the contents of the computer. Last week, Trump’s DOJ charged them with allegedly making false statements about their level of involvement into the investigation.

Their attorneys condemned the charges as political “nonsense,” announced 10 days before closely watched elections, and it didn’t help matters that the president told reporters after their arrest, “I heard they were bad people.” He did not say from whom he’d heard this.

Nevertheless, the case appears to be off to a rough start. After prosecutors added an obstruction charge to the case, for example, a federal judge dismissed it.

But just as notable was what we learned from Bryan Witt, a veteran FBI agent, who testified Tuesday and shed light on what transpired behind the scenes. The New York Times reported:

In mid-July, President Trump gave a prime-time speech in which he raised concerns about a disputed F.B.I. report that China had tried to interfere in the 2020 election in an effort to defeat him.

At the heart of his address was a bitter complaint: that some of the bureau’s intelligence officials had purposefully sought to play down the report to undercut his claims about the race.

According to Witt’s testimony, one day after Trump targeted FBI officials in his remarks, FBI Director Kash Patel directed prosecutors immediately to investigate the officials for obstruction and conspiracy.

Witt conceded that FBI officials saw the inquiry as a “witch hunt,” and he personally saw the effort as a “huge distraction,” but the push ultimately led to charges against Floris and Benavides.

The Times report went on to note that Witt “asserted from the stand that he had never before worked on a case where instructions came directly from the F.B.I.’s director. He added that Mr. Patel and his deputies often checked on his progress, pressing him and his colleagues to move as aggressively as possible.”

Time will tell what becomes of the case, though it’s a safe bet that the defendants’ attorneys have taken a keen interest in what Witt had to say. But the broader takeaway from the agent’s testimony is unavoidable: Trump snaps his fingers, and Patel follows the president’s orders.

White House control over the Justice Department has been well-documented, but its control over the FBI is just as overwhelming. Patel, best known as a podcast personality before Senate Republicans elevated him to his powerful role, may lead the bureau, but there is fresh reason to believe he’s effectively a DINO — Director in Name Only.

The post In court testimony, FBI agent sheds new light on the White House’s control over the bureau appeared first on MS NOW.

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

* In South Carolina’s U.S. Senate race, there has been very little independent polling, though that has finally changed: The latest New York Times/Siena poll found Dr. Annie Andrews, the Democratic nominee, tied with Republican Sen. Darline Graham, with both garnering 48% support.

The poll comes on the heels of Andrews picking up an endorsement from former Gov. David Beasley, a Republican, and it coincides with Republican Rep. Ralph Norman, who lost to Graham in a competitive special election primary, declaring that South Carolina voters “deserve better” than Graham.

* In Minnesota’s U.S. Senate race, there also has been a dearth of high-quality recent polling, which made it all the more notable to see the latest New York Times/Siena poll showing Democratic Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan leading conservative media personality Michele Tafoya, the Republican nominee, 54% to 40%.

* In Florida’s statewide races, the latest New York Times/Siena poll showed a competitive gubernatorial race, with Republican Rep. Byron Donalds leading former Rep. David Jolly, the Democratic nominee, 48% to 44%.

The same polling found incumbent Republican Sen. Ashley Moody with a six point advantage over state Rep. Angie Nixon, 50% to 44%.

* In Alaska’s gubernatorial race, Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski officially endorsed Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins’ candidacy, cementing his front-runner status in the race to succeed Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who is term limited.

As for Alaska’s U.S. Senate race, The New York Times reported that the political operation of the Democratic nominee, former Rep. Mary Peltola, was more involved in finding someone named Dan Sullivan to run against Sen. Dan Sullivan, the Republican incumbent, than previously known.

* In Texas’ competitive gubernatorial race, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott is benefiting from another $5 million investment from GOP megadonor Elon Musk in the contest’s final week.

* In Ohio’s statewide races, the latest USA Today/Suffolk University poll found the Democratic nominee, former Sen. Sherrod Brown, ahead of the Republican incumbent, Sen. Jon Husted, 47% to 44%.

The same poll showed Democrat Amy Acton leading Republican Vivek Ramaswamy by a slightly larger margin in Ohio’s gubernatorial race, 48% to 44%.

* And in Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District, which Republicans expect to flip after approving a gerrymandering scheme, there’s a new problem for the GOP nominee: State Sen. Brent Taylor reportedly sent an unsolicited nude picture, to someone who was not his wife, as recently as 2021.

When the Nashville Scene, an alternative weekly newspaper, asked the Republican about what transpired, Taylor said, “As I near 60 years old, the expiration date has come and gone on any of my youthful indiscretions.” The incident in question happened when he was 53 — which is generally not seen as “youthful.”

The post Wednesday’s Campaign Round-Up, 10.28.26: Poll shows tied race in South Carolina appeared first on MS NOW.

Among the many questions surrounding the war with Iran is just how much this disastrous and destabilizing conflict is costing American taxpayers. The answer continues to be a moving target.

Last month, for example, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office concluded the war had cost $38 billion, but it was clear almost immediately that figure was incomplete: It didn’t include the costs associated with repairing U.S. military bases hit by Iranian strikes, replacing munitions stockpiles, the economic costs imposed on the American public or the interest on the national debt (among other things).

The CBO might have come up with a better number, but the office was hampered by the Defense Department’s refusal to provide any information.

Nevertheless, the Pentagon told lawmakers in mid-September that the conflict had cost $43.6 billion. This week, the DOD revised that total. The New York Times reported:

The cost of the war in Iran rose to $47.1 billion through Oct. 16, with bombs, missiles and other munitions accounting for more than 60 percent of the expenses, the Pentagon told Congress last week.

Even with President Trump holding back on restarting major combat operations, at least for now, the Pentagon still incurred about $3.5 billion in additional costs in the roughly six weeks since the Pentagon shared estimates with lawmakers last month.

The Times added that the department’s latest price tag is “almost certainly on the low side” and failed to include a variety of related costs.

Noting that the Republican White House launched the war exactly eight months ago, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement, “For eight months, American families have been buried by the heavy cost of Trump’s disastrous war in Iran. Twenty-one servicemembers have died and hundreds more have been wounded. Prices are skyrocketing, and families are struggling to make ends meet. Meanwhile, Republicans continue to look the other way.”

The New York Democrat added, “Trump and his ego led us into this war with no plan, no authority, and no exit strategy. Senate Democrats will continue to do everything in our power to end this disaster of a war and stop the costs, chaos, and corruption seeping from the White House.”

Meanwhile, as the ninth month of war gets underway, there’s new reason to believe the conflict is poised to turn hot again. The Wall Street Journal reported, “The U.S. has told several Gulf Arab countries to be prepared for a short, intense military campaign after the U.S. midterm elections, people briefed on the conversations said.

“The communications through diplomatic and military channels are among a growing number of indications that the U.S. and Israel are readying to launch a new round of heavy combat operations against Iran, risking a major escalation in hopes of degrading Tehran’s strength and pushing it toward negotiations.”

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

The post Eight months into the conflict, the U.S. war with Iran gets a revised price tag appeared first on MS NOW.

It’s apparently called the “Cabinet Travel Competition.” According to a report published by The Atlantic last month, the White House came up with the contest, which is exactly what it sounds like: The White House “encourages” Cabinet secretaries to “traverse the country to promote President [Donald] Trump’s agenda” and “tracks their visits to politically competitive congressional districts or states ahead of the midterm elections.”

Cabinet members, the article added, are awarded “points” based on their performance.

Although there are ethics laws such as the Hatch Act that appear to limit secretaries from engaging in such partisan election-season politicking, there’s ample evidence that a) the administration has pushed the gambit anyway; and b) several secretaries have taken the “Cabinet Travel Competition” quite seriously.

Indeed, it’s been quite jarring to see so many powerful officials — from Attorney General Todd Blanche to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to Energy Secretary Chris Wright — allow themselves to serve as pieces on an electoral chessboard, to be moved around for the benefit of the Republican Party.

In each instance, these secretaries’ predecessors from both parties went out of their way to avoid electioneering, recognizing that it was not their place to use their taxpayer-financed positions to travel from state to state, participating in partisan campaign events.

And yet, in 2026, a new normal is taking shape.

For his part, Secretary of State Marco Rubio appeared to know better. The Florida Republican, who has been tapped to serve in a cartoonishly long list of positions on Trump’s team, has spent the year steering clear of the “Cabinet Travel Competition,” perhaps because he saw it as unseemly, or perhaps because he simply couldn’t squeeze time into his busy schedule to appear at campaign events.

Either way, Rubio earned some “points” on Tuesday afternoon, traveling with the president to some campaign events in Texas. He even delivered remarks at a rally in Corpus Christi, where he told Trump’s devotees, “It’s an honor to work for the greatest country in the world, for the greatest president in the history of the United States of America.”

Marco Rubio gets on stage and says he works for the "great president in the history of the United States"

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-10-27T20:48:58.021Z

As Tuesday got underway, Politico reported that Rubio was not expected to speak. Hours later, either he changed his mind or someone changed it for him. (A State Department official told The Hill that Rubio was traveling in his capacity as White House national security adviser, though that was hardly a compelling excuse, since he doesn’t have the luxury of simply pretending he’s not the current secretary of state.)

Almost exactly six years ago, then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo faced an investigation from the Office of Special Counsel after engaging in election-season partisan activities. Six years later, Rubio is apparently picking up where his Republican predecessor left off, seemingly confident that he won’t have to worry about the consequences.

The post Marco Rubio becomes the latest Cabinet official to brush off ethics limits, hit the campaign trail appeared first on MS NOW.

During a brief Q&A with reporters on Tuesday afternoon, Donald Trump was asked whether he’ll “respect the results” of the midterm elections, “whatever happens.” Before we get to the president’s answer, it’s worth taking a moment to dwell on the question.

Not to put too fine a point on this, but we used to be a country in which questions like these weren’t even asked. It was a foregone conclusion for generations: The United States was a stable democracy and the world’s pre-eminent superpower. There was no real need to wonder: American candidates for powerful offices agreed to honor election results. The entire line of inquiry was unnecessary since the answers were assumed.

But as the radicalization of Republican politics intensifies, and GOP rejection of election results becomes more common, it’s no longer considered outlandish to ask Republican leaders whether they’ll accept voters’ judgment — just as it’s no longer surprising when they fail to say “Of course I’ll honor the will of the electorate.”

All of which brings us to Trump’s response on Tuesday afternoon.

Q: You'll respect the election results whatever happens?TRUMP: If they're honest elections(That's a no!)

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-10-27T15:40:17.338Z

“I will,” the president replied, indicating that he’d accept the election results, before quickly adding, “if they’re honest elections.”

And who gets to decide whether the elections are “honest”? According to Trump, he does.

To be sure, this isn’t altogether new. As The Washington Post reported, “In 2016, Trump said he would accept the election results ‘if I win.’ In 2020, he repeatedly declined to commit to accept the results, saying ‘We’re going to have to see what happens.’ In 2024, Trump said he would accept the results if the election was ‘fair and legal and good.’”

In other words, when it comes to conditional respect for democracy — the results are only legitimate if he likes and agrees with them — the Republican is at least consistent.

But this isn’t just a matter of Trump giving a Trumpian answer during a brief exchange with a reporter. On the contrary, there’s a more systematic effort underway, which appears designed to deliberately undermine confidence in the elections themselves. The Post separately reported:

President Donald Trump and his allies have spent the final weeks before the midterms showering his supporters with a relentless stream of doubt about the legitimacy of the election, priming them to question results if Republicans lose.

In court, the administration is telegraphing its readiness to challenge results based on alleged fraud. In podcasts and social media posts that are delivered nonstop to Trump’s core backers, right-wing influencers are telling supporters to expect cheating.

The newspaper’s analysis also found that the misinformation campaign is twice as intense as it was ahead of the 2024 elections.

It might be tempting to shrug this off, since Trump lies to so many people about so many things, and the president’s deceptions tend to have limited practical effects. But let’s not forget that the last time he tried to lay the groundwork for rejecting election results he didn’t like, and Republican candidates fared poorly, thousands of the president’s followers launched an insurrectionist attack on the U.S. Capitol.

The post Asked if he’ll respect the will of American voters, Trump gives a Trumpian answer appeared first on MS NOW.

In legal circles, it’s known as “no bill.” That’s the label used to describe what happens when prosecutors go to a grand jury to secure an indictment and regular people serving as jury members decide to reject the effort.

If it seems as if the phrase has come up quite a bit over the past year or so, it’s not your imagination. Donald Trump’s Justice Department tried to indict New York Attorney General Letitia James, for example, but grand jury members balked. The same thing happened when the Republican administration tried to indict several congressional Democrats, as well as in the case against Sean Dunn (better known as the “sandwich guy,” who was later charged with a misdemeanor).

In each instance, federal prosecutors tried to bring dubious charges against a perceived presidential political foe. In each instance, the nature of the process was slanted against the accused. (Grand juries don’t even hear from the defense.) In each instance, Trump’s DOJ failed anyway — despite the fact that a “no bill” is almost unheard of for most career federal prosecutors.

This week, it happened yet again. MS NOW reported:

A federal grand jury on Tuesday rejected an indictment against former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson after the Trump Justice Department tried to charge her over her stunning testimony on the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

Prosecutors in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division sought to charge Hutchinson with a crime based on claims she made false statements, according to two people with knowledge of the case. They were granted anonymity to describe normally closed-door proceedings.

To be sure, the developments are humiliating for the DOJ, and it will no doubt be tempting for the administration’s many critics to point and laugh at the failure.

But while that’s understandable, it’s also worth appreciating what a scandal this is.

There’s no reason to believe Hutchinson, who delivered stunning testimony more than four years ago about what transpired on Jan. 6, did anything wrong. But because we’re in a twisted political environment in which people can expect to face prosecutorial scrutiny for having wronged the incumbent president, Attorney General Todd Blanche pushed prosecutors to investigate the former White House staffer, whose case ended up in the hands of Harmeet Dhillon, the controversial Trump loyalist who runs the Civil Rights Division, which wouldn’t appear to have any relevant jurisdiction over a case like this.

What we’re witnessing, in other words, is unambiguous evidence of a hyperpartisan, weaponized Justice Department, controlled by the West Wing, trying (and failing) to prosecute a baseless case against someone Trump doesn’t like.

The developments come against a backdrop in which the same politicized DOJ went after former FBI Director James Comey yet again and charged Democratic state Sen. L. Louise Lucas of Virginia after she spearheaded an electoral effort the White House didn’t like, in the run-up to the midterm elections, when politically sensitive prosecutions are traditionally delayed.

I’m glad the case against Hutchinson flopped, but the larger context matters: The fact that this case was pursued at all reflects crisis conditions in federal law enforcement.

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