With less than one week until the midterms, many have projected that Democrats could win in a 2018-style "blue wave," when they won 41 House seats, due to their almost 9-point lead in the generic congressional ballot and a national environment that has tilted drastically in their favor.

That is the wrong term for what is occurring.

Indeed, what we are looking at now is a red retreat, a red collapse, and a potential red defeat, not an overwhelming victory for Democrats or their policies.

FOX NEWS POLL: SQUEEZED BY COSTS, FRUSTRATED VOTERS TURN TO THE DEMOCRATS

Make no mistake, to the extent that we can determine the eventual outcome, Democrats are almost certain to take the House and have nearly a two-thirds chance to take the Senate.

Democratic candidates are ahead or tied in virtually all of the battleground Senate races – North Carolina, Michigan, and Maine among them – while there are signs of a red retreat in typically safe states like Kansas, Texas, and even possibly Alaska.

LIZ PEEK: FIVE REASONS REPUBLICANS COULD DEFY THE POLLS AND SHOCK DEMOCRATS ON ELECTION DAY

At the same time, early voting numbers favor Democrats, as does the enthusiasm gap, which shows Democrats are more motivated to vote than Republicans.

This has shown up in primaries as well. In the twenty-two states that held competitive primaries this year, seventeen saw increases in Democratic voter turnout. In Texas alone, whereas in 2022, Republicans cast 900,000 more votes than Democrats, this year, Democrats cast 150,000 more – a 1.5 million vote swing.

LEE CARTER: AMERICA IS ANGRY AT EVERYONE — BUT WHO WILL ACTUALLY VOTE?

Likewise, President Trump’s approval, averaging just 38%, is contributing to growing pessimism. When asked whether the country is on the right track or headed in the wrong direction, 32% now say the country is headed in the right direction, versus 63% who say it is on the wrong track, a net-negative 31 points.

In March 2025, that was just under a net-negative 9 points, underscoring the decline that has occurred and just how much Americans have soured on this administration.

SCHOEN, COOPERMAN: DEMOCRATS COULD BE RIDING A MIDTERM WAVE. THESE NUMBERS SHOULD TERRIFY THE GOP

To be sure, if a red retreat turns into a red collapse, Democrats will win the Senate.

However, the data also make clear that the shift in national sentiment can, in no way, be read as an endorsement of Democrats’ policies, to the extent that they have offered an agenda.

DEMOCRATS SAY THEY'LL MAKE LIFE AFFORDABLE. YOUR WALLET MAY DISAGREE

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries came closest in the New York Times last weekend, outlining priorities on costs, health care, and checking the administration. But that was more a case against Republican rule than a governing blueprint with broad public support.

Indeed, if Democrats win the Senate, it will primarily be a product of frustration with the administration, inflation, and the war in Iran – not because voters endorse a sweeping Democratic agenda.

MAINE, KANSAS SENATE RACES NECK AND NECK AS DEMOCRATS LEAD IN TEXAS, MICHIGAN, POLL SHOWS

Currently, just under 40% of Americans have a favorable view of the Democratic Party. That is statistically tied with President Trump as well as the Republican Party.

Democrats should therefore resist treating victory as a license to move sharply left. Troy Jackson (Maine), Abdul El-Sayed (Michigan), and James Talarico (Texas) are running in different states and may win for different reasons, but no faction can claim ownership of the national result.

INDEPENDENT VOTERS AREN’T PICKING A POLITICAL TEAM, THEY JUST FEEL PICKED ON

The test will be whether Democrats turn public anger into a disciplined agenda: lowering costs, restoring stability, checking executive overreach, and attracting support beyond their base. If, instead, they spend two years relitigating ideological fights, their majority will be short-lived.

In fact, in a recent ABC survey, democratic socialism was deeply unpopular, with ratings bordering on Trump’s. Less than 4 in 10 (37%) of Americans had a favorable view, while 59% did not.

LEE CARTER: 2026 ELECTION COULD ALL COME DOWN TO JUST ONE TYPE OF VOTER

In that same vein, even Democratic voters are not sold. When asked whether they prefer the Democratic Party to move further to the political center or the political left, 48% of Democrats preferred the center, versus 27% who preferred moving to the left, according to New York Times polling.

Among independents, arguably the most critical bloc, the findings are even more stark. More than 7 in 10 (72 percent) of independents want Democrats to move to the center, whereas just 11% want the party to go further left.

Even if Democrats do sweep both chambers of Congress, they will have won on a rejection of Trump and Republican governance – not a blank check to govern from the left. Victory would create an opportunity to provide competent, practical leadership, not a mandate.

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All of this will matter for Democrats because the 2028 elections will unofficially start next Wednesday.

Democrats still lack a single recognized leader and remain divided between the far left and establishment wings, and the midterms will not resolve that fight. Their immediate task is proving they can govern competently, appeal to independents, and improve Americans' daily lives.

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Ultimately, these midterms will be a referendum on President Trump and Republicans. Voters will cast their ballots with gas prices, mortgage rates, and other costs foremost in their minds, not with what it means for 2028.

A red retreat may deliver Democrats power. But if they mistake backlash for ideological conversion, they will squander the opening. Governing from the pragmatic center-left – focused on affordability, stability, and results – is how they rebuild trust.

Carly Cooperman is CEO of Schoen Cooperman Research.

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Watching the broadcast news networks report on campaigns makes you think they’re not creating news as much as they’re trying to make the political weather. On every day, in every way, they labor to place the blackest clouds over the heads of President Donald Trump and the Republicans. Good news is not news.

There is no balance of good and bad. Any hint of neutrality is despised as "normalizing" Trump. Nonpartisanship somehow becomes partisanship. So, resistance against Trump is the norm. A Media Research Center study of the 2024 campaign from July 21 through Oct. 25 found ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts punished Trump with 85% negative coverage. Meanwhile, the Democrat nominee, Kamala Harris, received 78% positive coverage. One choice sounded like doom, and the other was painted as hope and joy and "vibes."

With that kind of stark difference in tone, does that sound like news, or campaign advertising?

HUGH HEWITT: LEGACY MEDIA LEFT HALF OF AMERICA OUT. FOX NEWS LET THEM IN

Leading the themes two years ago was the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, including Trump’s insistence that the 2020 election was rigged – 47 minutes of coverage. Another 30 minutes was spent amplifying claims that Trump is a "danger to democracy" and/or a "fascist."

It's happening again in 2026. The Media Research Center just found ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts from Sept. 28 to Oct. 26 gave Trump and the Republicans almost 57 minutes of negative coverage on the evening news, while the Democrats received almost 19 minutes of negative coverage – a three-to-one ratio. That math could be a little misleading, since the bad scandal news for Democrats, like the immigration agents raiding the home of Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., came wrapped in framing against the Trump administration for doing this in the closing weeks of an election. (These results came before the new eruption over "Decoy Dan" Sullivan in Alaska.)

DEMOCRATS' FURY OVER ILHAN OMAR RAID DRAWS STINGING GOP REMINDER ABOUT RAID FROM THE PAST: ‘SET THE PRECEDENT’

It was the same pattern on the formerly taxpayer-funded "PBS News Hour." From Sept. 1 to Sept. 30, the GOP received 94% negative spin, to 6% positive. The Democrats received far more balanced coverage – 53% negative, 47% positive.

No one would say the network news should avoid negative news. Consumers inherently don’t trust happy news any more than they trust gushy positive campaign commercials. Stubbornly high gas prices and a lack of a decisive victory in the Iran war aren’t positive stories. But the overwhelming tone of news coverage should force viewers to understand these broadcast network stars aren’t neutral referees, calling balls and strikes. They’re throwing beanballs at the Republicans.

BROADCAST BIAS: NETWORKS SHOW FRANCE BURNING BUT HIGHLIGHT ‘PEACEFUL’ PROTESTERS

Inside the broadcast network news bubble, democracy is mentally associated with the Democrats, autocracy with the Grand Old Party. If the Republicans show party unity, that’s a failing. They are weakening democracy by not weakening Trump. When the Democrats show party unity, that’s not controversial at all.

In fact, the elitist media help enforce party unity. Republicans dissenting from Trump quickly draw positive media attention. "Lifelong Republicans" who endorse Democrats get promoted as the zeitgeist. Democrat dissenters would be ignored and gain no advantage.

The growing radicalism of the Democrat party and its Democratic Socialists of America faction, and what they plan to do if they gain a majority in one or both houses of Congress, have not been serious topics. If the voters are casting ballots for Democrats because of the economy, do the Democrats have an actual solution? The networks weren’t focused on what happens next.

Anyone perusing social media can see the Democrats salivating at more impeachments of Trump, and maybe an impeachment for Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., not to mention some very aggressive hearings into how the Trump family is personally prospering in Trump’s second term.

TERRY MORAN SAYS NETWORK REJECTED HIS BIDEN HEALTH STORY AFTER HE WITNESSED PRESIDENT’S FRAILTY

During President Joe Biden’s presidency, the broadcast networks obsessed over the House’s Jan. 6 hearings, including incessant live coverage, even in prime time hours. In the last two years, House oversight hearings into subjects like Biden’s use of the autopen and his declining mental fitness, were largely ignored. Republican hearings aren’t news. Democrat hearings will surely be big news – again.

The networks have focused most of their attention on Trump’s rallies, often noting that when he campaigns in red states, it’s a sign that Republicans are anxious about losing in states they should be winning. If former President Barack Obama campaigns in a blue state, like appearing with radical Democrat Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, that’s not painted as desperation.

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PBS reporter Liz Landers oozed on Oct. 26: "Former President Barack Obama brought his own firepower to the trail, rallying Democratic voters in two Midwestern battlegrounds on Saturday, telling crowds in Michigan and Ohio that Trump was responsible for rising costs because of the war with Iran."

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Trump canceling rallies in the closing days of the race is drawing negative coverage. When he rallies, it’s negative. When he moves to "tele-rallies" from Mar-a-Lago for a larger audience, that’s also negative. ABC’s Jonathan Karl warned, "Trump lashed out at a reporter who asked if he was sick of traveling." Most Republicans are sick of the network news manufacturing nightmares for their party on a daily basis.

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If Eskamani wins her mayoral bid next year, progressive Democrats will have another municipal toehold in the largely red Sunbelt. 

If Eskamani wins her mayoral bid next year, progressive Democrats will have another municipal toehold in the largely red Sunbelt. 

Democratic sweep or not, politics are about to change.

© The New York Times

Montevideo, 31 oct (Prensa Latina) La aprobación en la Asamblea General de Naciones Unidas de una resolución que pide el cese inmediato del bloqueo de Estados Unidos contra Cuba provocó celebraciones en Uruguay y llamados a redoblar la solidaridad con la isla caribeña.

The post Resolución contra bloqueo a Cuba repercutió en Uruguay first appeared on Noticias Prensa Latina.

It’s become screamingly obvious who represents billionaires and unchecked plutocratic power.

© Damon Winter/The New York Times

In late October, I fell into a conversation with Susie Tho after an appearance by Los Angeles mayoral candidate Nithya Raman at the Mid-Wilshire restaurant Gritz N Wafflez. Tho, a mom and an entrepreneur, told me she voted for former reality show star Spencer Pratt, a Republican, in the city’s June primary. She attended the Raman event, she said, because she’s still undecided on who to support in the upcoming election.

Tho’s indecision highlights the unsettled state of the mayoral race in America’s second-largest city. Polls show that the race is tightening — and that many voters still appear less than enthusiastic about their choices. Do they go with unpopular incumbent Karen Bass, who swears she has really, really learned her lesson since the 2025 Palisades fire? Or do they pull a lever for Raman, the younger, left-wing challenger aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America, who radiates earnestness but is often verbally flat-footed and struggles to get along with her fellow City Council members.

It’s hard to know where the trouble with Los Angeles starts, or how it will be fixed.

It’s no small irony that in this famously liberal city, the answer will come down to Pratt voters like Tho. The candidate continues to maintain an outsize presence in the race, still rage-posting about the Palisades fire, where he — along with thousands of other city residents — lost his home. He seems to despise both Bass and Raman; “Dumb and Dumber” is one of the more polite ways he has described his former rivals.

But Pratt has also given voice to a long unspoken anger almost all Angelenos, no matter their political leanings, feel with the city’s direction — or, more properly, perhaps, lack of direction. Tho, for instance, cites a growing rat problem in her Koreatown neighborhood. And the pest issue is just the tip of the iceberg. “Sanitation’s horrible, homelessness is horrible. Businesses are closing and the community is kind of tired of it,” she said.

It’s hard to know where the trouble with Los Angeles starts, or how it will be fixed. Despite a surge of spending, homelessness increased last year (after two years of declines). More than $2 billion in funds to address the issue went missing. While Hollywood struggles, the state of New York is on the verge of overtaking California on film production spending. Average response time for 911 calls is woeful: More than 40% of emergency calls go unanswered within the state-mandated 15 seconds, and less urgent calls can take up to an hour to reach an operator.

Basic maintenance is lacking: Water mains break constantly; street repaving, in this city of drivers, is all but nonexistent. The people mover at Los Angeles International Airport, originally scheduled for completion in 2023, is more than $1 billion over budget and still MIA — unless, that is, you count the endless test runs of an empty train.

Cronyism, questionable dealings and incompetence are all but endemic.The local zoo, the last major U.S. zoo run by a city government, is mired in scandal and near collapse.

Even the city’s famously lovely weather has failed to cooperate. This year’s “super” El Nino has brought unprecedented humidity and mosquitos — the latter a true menace in a region where, until the past few years, mosquitoes were so rare many homes had no screens on their windows. The heat wave, in turn, resulted in epic power bills, which are hitting mailboxes now.

Raman, who moved to Los Angeles in 2013, sometimes shows a remarkable unfamiliarity with the city she now wants to lead.

Residents find themselves wondering how it all went wrong. Comedian Heidi Prazloff voted for Bass in 2022, but is now casting her ballot and knocking on doors for her opponent. “LA could be the coolest city in the world, but it feels like nothing is changing and some change would be really good,” she told me when I ran into her at an Eagle Rock pastry shop as she was taking a break from canvassing for Raman. “Karen Bass has been given her chance.”

Bass appeared all but oblivious to the growing fury and despair — until, that is, Pratt attracted a following and Raman entered the race. It took her more than two years to appoint a film liaison for the city, during a period when two Hollywood guilds went on strike and film shoots fell off a cliff. She announced a plan to help expedite restaurant permitting this week; as one X user asked, “Did she just remember she was the mayor?”

Raman is campaigning on increased accountability and an Elizabeth Warren-esque enthusiasm for plans: to make film-shoot permits easier to obtain, and to make it easier to open and operate restaurants and to build housing. These plans impressed me enough that I made a donation to her campaign during the primary.

But Raman, who moved to Los Angeles in 2013, sometimes shows a remarkable unfamiliarity with the city she now wants to lead. During a recent debate, for instance, she praised the policing under former police chief Daryl Gates, whose tenure was marked by mass arrests and brutal treatment of Black and Hispanic residents. A number of her current constituents say her City Council office is unresponsive, something Bass points out repeatedly. And her plan to address homelessness — which includes backtracking on the city’s crackdown on encampments near schools — is highly unlikely to appeal to Pratt voters.

It’s also worth noting that not one of Raman’s colleagues on the council has endorsed her, including the other three members aligned with the DSA. Then again, at least in my experience, the typical Angeleno appears to think of their City Council member as someone who isn’t there for them, so this may well turn out to be a selling point for Raman.

The DSA itself also has become something of a wild card in the equation. The national organization is threatening to rescind the Los Angeles chapter’s endorsement of Raman over the fact it believes she needs to more explicitly endorse the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. The local chapter continues to support her — hardly a surprise in a city where voters say their top concerns are quality of life, affordability and getting a grip on the seemingly intractable homelessness problem.

Ultimately, many Los Angeles voters appear to be weighing a less-than-pleasant choice: Do they stick with the known quantity in the ineffectual Bass, or do they vote for Raman, even if they disagree with her left-leaning politics, in the hopes she can make positive change? The only thing that seems certain is that no matter the outcome, Pratt will remain a virtual thorn in the winner’s side.

The post Los Angeles is in crisis. Now a former reality star could swing its mayoral race. appeared first on MS NOW.

On Wednesday, Nicki Minaj tweeted that New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, who is currently running for reelection, is an “evil woman,” endorsed Hochul’s Republican opponent, and suggested Democrats should “forfeit her seat” even if she wins. Three days earlier, Minaj appeared at a Michigan campaign rally — ostensibly on behalf of local Republicans — but spent most of her speech gushing over President Donald Trump, whom she vowed to support “forever and ever.”

Minaj’s MAGA makeover is now so well established that it’s easy to forget it’s a bit of an about-face. In 2018, Minaj used the same social media account to endorse Hochul for lieutenant governor on a ticket with then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, and condemned Trump’s immigration policy, describing herself as a former “illegal immigrant.” Today, Hochul’s still on the same political page and Trump’s immigration policy is no less cruel. So what could have led to this change?

Minaj’s political conversion sure can seem a lot less about ideology than geography — that is, who holds pardon powers and where. The Queens, New York-reared rapper has two close family members with criminal convictions, and the only politicians capable of granting them clemency happen to be the governor of New York and the president of the United States.

It’s true that Minaj has, in the past, espoused an ideologically incoherent, if MAGA-leaning outlook — including vaccine hesitancy, persecutory delusion, Christian hypocrisy — before she fully embraced her current conservative boosterism.

Though there’s no public evidence that Minaj has requested pardons in either case, I’m hardly the first to make the connection. It’s apparently been brought up enough that in May, Trump advisor Alex Bruesewitz bothered to call the suggestion a “disgusting and disgraceful smear” on social media, adding that “Nicki has never once asked the President for anything. She has only offered assistance and support. The insinuation that she’s looking for anything in return is total garbage.”

Kenneth Petty, Minaj’s husband, pleaded guilty at the age of 16 to attempted rape; in 1995, he was convicted of mulitple charges related to that assault and served four and a half years in prison. In November 2019, Petty — now married to Minaj and living in California — was pulled over in Beverly Hills for a traffic violation. That’s when authorities discovered he had not registered in the state as a sex offender, a federal violation under the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act. Because that failure to register is a federal crime, only the president can pardon it.

Minaj’s older brother, Jelani Maraj, is currently serving 25 years to life after being convicted of repeatedly raping his 11-year-old stepdaughter. Those assaults allegedly took place at his house in Long Island, and the trials were consequently held in New York state courts. That means the only person who could grant Minaj’s sibling clemency is the governor of New York.

One relative needs Trump. The other needs Hochul or, perhaps, for Hochul to be defeated so a Trump-compliant Republican governor can step in. Maybe it’s just a crazy coincidence that Onika Tanya Maraj, aka Nicki Minaj, has spent the last year calling herself Trump’s “number one fan” and pledging — as she did in Michigan on Sunday — to support the president if he undertakes an illegal third-term run. It’s possible that Minaj’s professed grievance about Hochul saying in 2024 that Black kids in the Bronx “don’t even know what the word ‘computer’ is,” is real. Although, that would mean it took her two years to learn of it and suggests she’s unaware that the governor apologized for that absolute gaffe almost immediately. (I mean, in just the past week the Trump White House has posted a neo-Nazi slogan and a racist Jack-o-Lantern to social media, making Minaj’s supposed outrage at bigotry seem a little…selective.)

It’s also true that Minaj has, in the past, espoused  an ideologically incoherent, if MAGA-leaning outlook — including vaccine hesitancy, persecutory delusion, Christian hypocrisy — before she fully embraced her current conservative boosterism.

Sure. I am not a seer, nor am I a mind reader. But I have read the clemency statutes, and they would certainly explain the calculations undergirding this new political stridency we’ve seen from the Trinidad and & Tobago-born Minaj — who, as recently as January, shared that she still isn’t an American citizen and therefore can’t vote U.S. elections.

But that’s not the sort of thing Trump would get hung up on in any case. This is a president whose pay-to-play approach in all things has led to such prolific pardon-peddling that it’s been dubbed a “pardon economy.” (The White House denied it is influenced by “pardon brokers.”)

There is now an entire ecosystem of political fixers, lobbyists, lawyers and other corrupt brokers who charge exorbitant fees for the promise of presidential pardons, at least 1,700 of which Trump have been granted across his two terms. Rapper Boosie Badazz said he was swindled out of $600,000 by two operatives, who never delivered on the pardon. (Both vigorously denied the allegation.)

And what does Trump get in return?

The optics of having A Very Famous Black Person with Street Cred — a former critic, even — performing public displays of loyalty.

Minaj becomes his evidence, to black voters, of how wrong they are about how beloved he is among them, while also serving as the reason they should vote for him. Her tweet aboard Air Force One, and the accompanying staged video-op that led to headlines suggesting she was being considered as the next press secretary? That, too, was a joke — which the Trump administration thinks it’s playing on what it considers America’s dumbest electorate: black voters.

Asked about Minaj’s hostile tweets by the media on Thursday, Hochul touted the rapper’s 2018 endorsement and suggested — not for the first time — that MAGA has been bad for her brain.

“You can ask her how she’s been poisoned by Donald Trump,” the governor stated. “That is an issue she has to deal with, and after Donald Trump and MAGA world has vanished and they go back into their dark holes where they came from, hopefully we can have a reawakening and people like her and others will realize that they were fed a vision of this country that is not what Americans feel. And so being an outlier right now, that’s her choice. And I’ll just say, too much time at Trump rallies is pretty bad for people’s mental health.”

The post What Nicki Minaj’s rage against Kathy Hochul is really about appeared first on MS NOW.

The latest charges against James Comey, made public Monday, accuse the former FBI director of transmitting national defense information in violation of the Espionage Act. Prosecutors say Comey directed staffers to talk to the New York Times about a Reuters story regarding email surveillance that Comey believed to be inaccurate — an allegation that doesn’t sound much like espionage.

The Comey case may be short-lived, as prosecutors appear to have blown their deadline to bring charges, but it’s the latest example of the Espionage Act being used for politicized prosecutions and government efforts to silence whistleblowers.

The statute has been employed by and against officials from both political parties: President Donald Trump was charged under the law for hiding classified documents in a Mar-a-Lago bathroom; former President Joe Biden was investigated under it for retaining a smaller set of files. Hillary Clinton was investigated for potential violation of the law for using private email servers to conduct official business as secretary of state. More recently, former national security adviser John Bolton was charged under the act over his retention of diary entries for his book. (He pleaded guilty in June.)

So how did this archaic statute become the go-to weapon for political and censorial prosecutions? The provision of the Espionage Act used against Comey and many others, which is only about 130 words, criminalizes conduct having nothing to do with spying. The 1917 law makes a felon of anyone who “communicates, delivers, transmits … or willfully retains” national defense information. It doesn’t matter if the information is classified because, like sliced bread and penicillin, the classification system did not exist when the statute was drafted. The law’s scope is so broad it makes motive irrelevant — a whistleblower exposing illegality to a journalist as an act of conscience, or an intelligence officer talking to domestic reporters, fares no better than a spy selling secrets to a foreign adversary.

The statute has been employed by and against officials from both political parties.

And its wording is so vague that, taken literally, it could permit imprisoning people who merely read national security reporting based on leaks in the newspaper.

The Nixon administration probably would have locked up Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg for life had its case against him not collapsed due to prosecutorial misconduct. Other administrations contemplated using the statute to stifle reporting. But it was really during the Obama administration that government reliance on the act flourished. The Obama Justice Department indicted multiple journalists’ sources and whistleblowers under the act and cited these investigations as reasons to surveil reporters. The Obama DOJ prosecuted far more “leakers” under the Espionage Act than all prior administrations combined, normalizing the practice for future administrations.

Trump has continued that tradition. In January, feds raided the home of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson and seized terabytes of data, citing alleged Espionage Act violations by a source. Prosecutors contended they had probable cause to believe Natanson herself had violated the act by retaining the data, although she wasn’t charged. A New York Times freelancer was subpoenaed earlier this year in connection to his reporting on North Korea. In October, Ian Brinksman, a former CIA contractor who allegedly told an independent journalist about intelligence assessments of political strife in Israel, was charged with violating the act.

There are fears that Trump will go even further. His Defense Department demanded that journalists pledge not to report unauthorized information by arguing that soliciting such information violates federal law, i.e., the Espionage Act. More recently, the Trump administration cited the act as part of its argument for banning MS NOW, CNN and Politico from the White House. When the Biden Justice Department continued Trump 1.0’s prosecution of WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange, officials said that Assange was a unique case and that more conventional journalists would never be similarly charged. But Trump is reportedly seeking the ideal test case to prosecute a journalist for reporting.

The reality is that officials share sensitive information with reporters all the time, no matter which political party is in control. If nearly everyone in Washington is technically breaking the law by sharing or receiving national defense information, then prosecutors can essentially charge whoever they want, whenever they want and overlook violations when convenient. This is a potentially dangerous status quo anytime — but even more so with an openly politicized Justice Department.

Absent reform, future administrations will inherit the same vague statutory language and the same unchecked discretion, to perhaps misuse against a fresh set of enemies. In this context, reforming the Espionage Act should be an easy sell, especially when considering how the public has become more informed through journalism enabled by alleged Espionage Act violations or benefited from resultant reforms, such as the policy changes and increased awareness and scrutiny of domestic surveillance that followed Edward Snowden’s revelations or the changes to public perceptions of the Vietnam War after the Pentagon Papers were published.

The next Congress needs to learn from this bipartisan history of Espionage Act abuse and get behind Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s Daniel Ellsberg Press Freedom and Whistleblower Protection Act. The bill would limit the Espionage Act’s reach to legitimately classified information and to government employees with a legal duty to protect it. It would require the government to prove that a defendant intended to harm the United States or benefit a foreign power, and it would allow those charged to argue that they were acting in the public interest.

None of the Ellsberg Act’s reforms would interfere with prosecutions of actual espionage. But they would make it much harder for any administration to use a World War I-era law to settle modern-day political scores or to censor criticism.

The post James Comey’s latest charges highlight a longstanding problem with the Espionage Act appeared first on MS NOW.

It still feels bizarre to unironically compare a U.S. president with the head of an organized crime ring. Yet President Donald Trump has transformed the White House into the command hub for unparalleled corruption and self-enrichment. He has grown immensely wealthier since retaking office last year — but still gets upset when the (metaphorical) capos and soldiers under him do the same without paying the tribute he believes he’s owed.

Alina Habba Mildon, a former personal lawyer for Trump, is the latest to draw the president’s ire for profiting off her place in his orbit. Mildon, who also briefly served as the U.S. attorney for New Jersey, reportedly signed a $50 million contract last year to serve as general counsel for a billionaire Venezuelan family.  The New York Times reported Thursday that the president “has told aides and allies that she should donate a portion of that money to his future presidential library or another Trump-related entity, according to multiple people briefed on the conversations.”

The quasi-voluntary donations mark a shift in the relationship that Trump and his supplicants have held.

Trump’s jealousy over money that he feels was unfairly earned on his coattails is legendary. Brad Parscale, Trump’s digital strategist in 2016 and campaign manager in 2020, raked in millions via his strategy company’s contracts with Trump-affiliated groups. “That’s my money!” Trump reportedly exclaimed after learning about the high-spending lifestyle Parscale had cultivated. (Parscale was demoted in July 2020 and then stepped down entirely before Election Day.)

Earlier this month, 2024 co-campaign manager Chris LaCivita and adviser James Blair took heat for their political work in Republika Srpska, a Balkan territory whose nationalist government is aligned with Russia. This side hustle taking their focus off the U.S. midterms was bad enough, but the hundreds of thousands of dollars they each reportedly earned certainly didn’t help matters. Chief of Staff Susie Wiles’ daughter also did contract work for the Serbian enclave inside Bosnia and Herzegovina, something Wiles’ enemies have reportedly been happy to remind Trump when currying his favor.

Trump threatened to cut LaCivita and Blair off entirely but allowed them back into his good graces through an act of, as the president put it to reporters last week, “charity.” The two men donated the money they made consulting in Republika Srpska to the Trump presidential library, posting in gushing terms on social media how happy they were to do so. While the Times made clear Thursday that “it is not known whether [Trump] explicitly asked [Mildon] to make a donation or only suggested it to others,” it seems as though the tactic pleased him enough to want a repeat.

The quasi-voluntary donations mark a shift in the relationship that Trump and his supplicants have held. For years, would-be influence buyers have funneled money into Mar-a-Lago memberships and booked meetings at Trump properties, lining his pockets in exchange for potential access. Most of the money Trump has made this term is through questionable crypto deals, and he has repeatedly offered the chance to win a dinner with him to those who purchase the useless currency.

Trump has also used private donations to federal projects as a pathway to get on his good side. Earlier this month, The Washington Post revealed the donors behind the $330 million in funds for Trump’s White House ballroom project. The list had previously been kept under tight wraps thanks to contract provisions guaranteeing anonymity for those who wished to provide their cash in secret. The Post emphasized that its reporting did not “establish a connection between the donation commitments and favorable actions by the Trump administration” but did “show that the vast majority of the funds raised came from companies and wealthy individuals with interests before the federal government.”

But at least in the other examples many of those opening their wallets to Trump this term hoped to gain something tangible in the future. Call it a quid amateur quo — while a wish may not expressly be stated, the hope is still there for some kind of reward. It seems now that being removed from Trump’s potential enemies list is enough of a prize to be worth writing a check.

It seems now that being removed from Trump’s potential enemies list is enough of a prize to be worth writing a check.

The money flowing to his presidential library instead of his businesses or personal bank account makes it no less of a racket. There still have been no good answers as to where millions of dollars pledged to the library went after the initial fund was dissolved last year. A second nonprofit group established in December said it has collected $50 million in contributions for Trump’s library, less than the roughly $63 million that was previously pledged. Several of those millions had come from media outlets and social media companies who’d agreed to donate the money to settle lawsuits Trump brought in a personal capacity.

A sitting president even considering a tithe of this nature from a former staffer necessary is shocking, but it fits perfectly into Trump’s zero sum understanding of the world. If someone else is benefiting from being near him, he is losing out. And after all, Trump’s personal brand is the thing he’s cherished the most over the years — and licensing some of that clout requires him receiving a share of the gains. The alternative is risking Trump harnessing the full power of his office to collect what he sees as his due.

The post Alina Habba got a big payday. Now Trump wants his cut. appeared first on MS NOW.

On this Resident Podcast ‘Big Interview’, host Carl Munson talks with Steve Andrews – the Welsh-born musician, author, poet and environmentalist better known as the Bard of Ely – about

The post Green Beard, Green Living: Steve Andrews Saving the Planet One Song at a Time appeared first on Portugal Resident.

As millions of Ukrainians weigh what comes after displacement, a new platform aims to help people make informed decisions about returning home without telling them they should.

For Ukrainians living across Europe, the hardest part of returning may no longer be the journey itself, but deciding where to begin with

Moving to Portugal is a dream for many, and a reality for over a million foreign residents in the country, but once you have secured your visa and finally arrived

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The Democratic candidate for Senate has led in polls. But because it’s Texas, he remains the underdog.

© Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times

Voters see Dan Osborn, the independent seeking to unseat Senator Pete Ricketts, as more like a Democrat than an independent, a Times/Siena poll found.

© Jillian Vordick/The New York Times

While some watch election outcomes in Michigan, Texas and other high-profile campaigns, defense planners should closely watch election results in another part of the United States. The US territory of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) is also going to the polls and will elect a new Governor, Attorney General, and more, as […]

The post Marianas midterm vote a referendum on China’s murky influence appeared first on Asia Times.

There’s a drama playing out across American screens in 2026. But not the sort you might expect. There are villains and heroes, yes, high finance and political intrigue, too. There may even be a surprise ending—but we’ll have to wait until the November 3 season finale to find out. The actual plot, though, is not […]

The post Billionaires shouldn’t be allowed to buy and sell US midterms appeared first on Asia Times.