2026 Midterm Elections

A federal appeals court ruled the Trump administration has no legal right to demand voters' private data, dealing a fresh blow to its unlawful bid to control American elections.

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down the 2-1 decision Wednesday, siding with Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D-MI), who refused to turn over the birthdates, partial Social Security numbers, and driver's license numbers of every registered voter in the state.

There's a peculiar dialect spoken only at Donald Trump rallies, one where "winning" and being "loved" mean roughly the same thing, observed a new column.

The Bulwark's Andrew Eggers pointed out how the 80-year-old president, greeting supporters this week at a factory in Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley, declared “I won this place so much," attacked "Dumocrats" and murmured "there’s so much love in the room." His followers lapped it all up – and the president's spirits got a much-needed boost, according to the analyst.

Postmaster General David Steiner admitted Wednesday that he wants a rule allowing his agency to block mail-in ballots from states that refuse to hand over their voter rolls.

The concession came under questioning from Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) at a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing — one ostensibly about the U.S. Postal Service's finances but quickly consumed by a bigger question: whether President Donald Trump has turned the mail service into a weapon against democracy.

Analysts were left stunned Wednesday morning after a trio of progressive congressional candidates backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani swept Tuesday’s Democratic primary elections in New York, many of whom drew comparisons to the late 2000s Tea Party movement that reshaped the Republican Party.

“CLEAN SWEEP FOR ZOHRAN!!!” wrote progressive political commentator and former congressional candidate Krystal Ball in a social media post on X to her more than 625,000 followers. “It's a new day in the Dem party.”

An announcement by influential podcaster Tucker Carlson that he is done with the Republican Party as the midterm election looms is bad news for both Donald Trump and GOP as the splintering of the MAGA movement casts an even bigger cloud over efforts by the party to hold onto majority control of both chambers of Congress, an analysis argues.

In an interview with the "Can't be Censored" podcast Thursday, Carlson announced he will not vote Republican this fall, citing Trump's war in Iran as the breaking point. "There's no chance I would support the Republican Party" this fall because he cannot back "a political party that's not loyal to the United States, that puts the interest of a foreign country above those of its own citizens," Carlson said.

A trio of progressive Democratic congressional candidates swept their respective races in Tuesday’s New York primary elections, and a number of right-wing figures – including Fox News’ own Sean Hannity – were said by critics to be experiencing a full-on “freakout.”

“Incumbent congressman Dan Goldman (D-NY), who was just banned from a New York City coffee shop because of his support for Israel, has now lost his primary to a radical socialist backed by [New York City Mayor Zohran] Mamdani,” Hannity said Tuesday night on Fox News, his voice cracking. “It appears that a pretty scary transformation is now fully underway in the Democratic Party.”

In most Republican primaries, President Donald Trump's endorsement settles the race. In one state, it barely moves the needle.

The 80-year-old president has backed Rep. Celeste Maloy on Truth Social — the same blanket endorsement he gave two other Utah GOP incumbents, one of whom doesn't even have a primary opponent, but Brigham Young University political scientist told NPR the backing won't hurt those candidates but won't provide the decisive advantage it might have elsewhere.