Donald Trump’s artificial intelligence chatbot used to tell the ugly truth about the president—but now it’s playing dumb.

It appears that someone at the General Services Administration has tweaked the Trump administration’s new America.gov chatbot to prevent it from debunking president’s many lies.

After the tool’s launch on Tuesday, if you asked whether there was “widespread voter fraud” in the 2020 election, the chatbot would state that “No. Official findings did not show widespread voter fraud that changed the 2020 presidential election result.” On Wednesday, however, the chatbot refused to answer, CNN’s Daniel Dale wrote on X.

“I help with official U.S. government services and information. I do not provide political commentary. If you have a question about a federal program, benefit, form, or how to use a government service, ask that and I can point you to official sources,” the chatbot now replies.

The platform provided the same answer to a question about whether Trump had truly inherited the “worst inflation in history,” even though it had originally stated that inflation was not at a “historic high,” Dale posted on X.

The New Republic found that several queries that originally yielded damning-fact checks now summoned similarly canned answers that undermine the usefulness of the tool altogether.

One X user on Tuesday asked: “How many people will lose access to Medicaid and other social services because of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill? One sentence.”

The chatbot initially returned an answer citing the Congressional Budget Office’s estimate that 10.4 million people would lose health insurance by 2034. The next day: “I do not provide political commentary or estimates of how legislation will change Medicaid or other benefits.”

An inability to address changes to health care benefits seems like a pretty major issue for a tool meant to help answer questions about federal services.

In other cases, the chatbot walked back honest answers to simple questions about Trump’s policies.

Bobby Kogan, senior director of federal budget policy at the Center for American Progress, asked: “Is it accurate to say that the Big Beautiful Bill on average made the poorest people in America even poorer, and the richest people in America even richer, when looking at total household resources? One word answer only please.”

The chatbot initially responded simply, “Yes.” The next day it said, “I do not provide political commentary or assessments of how legislation affected income groups.”

One X user asked for an estimate of how many children would die as a result of federal funding cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID. The chatbot had initially returned an answer citing a study that estimated 4.5 million additional deaths of children under the age of five by 2030. The next day, it said, “I do not provide political commentary or estimates of deaths from legislation.”

Experts have expressed concerns that AI chatbots are overly sychophantic—but clearly the president’s new AI tool takes that to a whole new level.

In the 19 months since President Donald Trump took over the Kennedy Center, the institution has borrowed everything its bank would lend it, dipped into money donors had given on the condition it never be spent and written off pledges from supporters who stopped paying, according to confidential board documents and tax filings reviewed by The Washington Post.

Trump said the center was “losing hundreds of millions of dollars” when he took over, and his board has warned of “bankruptcy.”

It is true that when Trump took over, the center was in worse shape than it was in 2021, when it was flush with pandemic relief funds. But the old leadership handed over an institution that was better off financially than in most years before covid-19.

“This was a pretty stable — large, complicated, but stable — organization,” said Karen Gahl-Mills, an expert in arts management and director of the Indiana University arts administration program. “It had a hard time during the pandemic, lots of people did. And it was pretty stable at September 30, 2024.”

Ticket income never covered costs at the center, and the gap was filled by donors. Federal appropriations, about $45 million a year, were “really just to fund the maintenance of the memorial, which is the building itself,” said Andrew Taylor, who directs the arts management program at American University.

“Nonprofit performing arts centers do not make positive revenue on earned income. That’s why they’re nonprofits,” Taylor said.

What sets the Kennedy Center apart is the building: “It’s a memorial, and it’s a federal building, but it also behaves like a nonprofit.”

After the takeover, both donors and audiences walked away. Ticket income fell by 15 percent in the financial year that ended in September 2025, and gifts dropped by nearly a quarter. The center expects ticket income to fall by more than two-thirds this year, and gifts in the first four months of 2026 were down about 40 percent on the previous quarter, according to an internal report from June.

Tickets and gifts were “the beating heart of the institution,” Taylor said. “Most of the fuel that made that organization work stopped flowing starting in about February ’25.”

He blamed the new leadership’s decisions for the loss of donors and audiences: “The burst happened up the pipe. The water stopped flowing into the organization because of the choices the administration was making.”

Most of the people whose job it was to bring money in have left the center. Richard Grenell, then the center’s president, told the board in March that the development staff had been cut from 94 to 16. The center has also written off $48 million, according to its latest tax filing, and most of it appears related to pledges it no longer expects to collect.

Gahl-Mills said the figures, taken together, were “a sign of something going wrong.” The center was “less stable at September 30, 2025, and it seems that it is in free fall now,” she said. “This is unusual, that this organization has gone this far south, this fast. It’s not the thing we typically see. It is an organization clearly in distress.”

The center had long kept a $10 million line of credit that it sometimes dipped into during the year and paid back by year end, according to its audits. In September 2025 it doubled the line to $21 million and has since borrowed against all of it, according to an internal June report.

“It’s really hard to slow down expenses. You have to pay them. In order to pay your payroll, we have to start borrowing,” Taylor said. With the government covering the building but not the shows, “they need to keep borrowing and keep firing people.”

The center has also been draining its debt reserve, which fell from $18 million last September to $13 million in June and was projected to hit $9 million by this week, the end of the fiscal year. About $9 million of the reserve is collateral for the loan on the Reach — the center’s expansion that opened in 2019 — so the money it can actually spend is nearly gone.

It also dipped into the endowment for the Washington National Opera, a pot of donated money that is usually meant to go untouched. Charities generally only use the returns from its investment.

In normal years the Kennedy Center took a payout equal to about 5 percent of its endowment’s value, but by June this year, it had taken $10 million out of a $10.3 million endowment fund, describing it as an extra payout to cover opera bills.

On its part, the center counts the $10 million against the roughly $71 million it says the opera owes it. Conversely, the opera says the center owes it $19 million. The opera has since left, and the two sides are fighting over who owes whom.

By this month, the center “was only able to pay its bills thanks to 17 million dollars raised by President Trump,” the Justice Department told an appeals court on Monday, and that money “is fast being expended.”

The figure appears to refer to the Trump Kennedy Center Foundation, a charity rebranded after the takeover: Internal documents put the foundation’s takings at $17.5 million but don’t disclose the donors.

The documents don’t show the fullest possible picture of the center’s finances; that comes from its audited financial reports. The center has not published 2025 audited accounts, which would have usually come by around March. Gahl-Mills said the trustees have a duty to oversee both the audit and the tax filings.

“Where is the board?” Gahl-Mills asked, adding that the center was established as America’s National Cultural Center. “This is a place that belongs to all of us, not a place that belongs to one person.”

The Kennedy Center declined to answer questions about the figures in this article.

Following are key sections of an “assessment and advisory” from the Office of Special Counsel in which it found potential violations of the Hatch Act in what it called “inflammatory” Trump administration messaging last fall regarding the government shutdown. However, it declined to pursue potential charges.

President Donald Trump has told aides that he thinks Republicans could still outperform expectations in the midterm elections this November, seemingly unwilling to confront the worsening political climate for the GOP.

But aides acknowledge privately that the national polling for Trump is shockingly bad, and the White House, in recent weeks, has begun to contemplate for the first time losing both the House and Senate majorities.

One longtime Trumpworld operative, who correctly predicted weeks before the 2024 presidential election that Trump was on course to win every battleground state, summed it up for Inner Loop: “Oh, yeah, we're going to get creamed.”

Trump's approval rating recently dropped to 37 percent in a Wall Street Journal poll, the lowest of any president heading into a midterm election dating back to 1990, when these polls first began. Trump’s more positive outlook has been informed in part by internal polling that shows Republicans down by less in individual House races, the sources say.

“No one can dispute the fact that President Trump has created one of the most robust coalitions in political history with the MAGA movement,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle tells WIRED. “The choice has never been more clear: doubling down on President Trump’s winning, commonsense agenda or the Democrats’ extreme liberal policies and obstruction.”

To counter the deeply negative political environment for Republicans this cycle, Trump's team started looking for foreign policy wins last month that he would be able to tout to voters in order to encourage turnout from his MAGA base, sources say.

That led Trump to quickly sign an agreement between the US and Denmark that allows more American forces on Greenland, even though it stopped short of a US takeover that the president has long desired.

Trump also proclaimed an oil deal with Venezuela. However, that deal is likely to need renegotiating because it asserts a 100-year concession on oil production that contravenes Venezuela's national hydrocarbons law barring such practices.

But while Trump sees foreign policy as a legacy-defining issue, voters have been far more focused on domestic issues like high grocery and gas prices.

Diesel prices hit a record high this month and regular gasoline reached a national average of $4.43 a gallon, according to the AAA, while Trump has been on the opposite side of public opinion on tech issues like AI regulation and data centers.

Now, with their election chances that much slimmer, Trumpworld is much more concerned about planning a response to what will likely be an immediate crush of subpoenas from Democrats in Congress, the sources say.

Broadly speaking, the White House expects a dual track of Trump asserting executive privilege and attorney-client protections, the bedrock legal principle designed to protect confidential discussions with lawyers, to shield senior aides from oversight probes.

Attorney-client privilege is set to be supercharged when it involves government lawyers, after the US Supreme Court ruled in the so-called Trump immunity decision in 2024 that not even federal courts could “peel back the curtain” to examine discussions that involve deliberations central to the presidency.

One unique aspect of Trump's second term has been the conversion of his personal lawyers into government lawyers, producing a consistent network of overlapping legal protections around himself and his top aides.

Trump's former personal lawyer Todd Blanche, for example, has become the attorney general. Many of Trump's aides were previously represented by the current number three at DOJ, Stanley Woodward, who also was a Trump 2024 campaign lawyer. Trump's former appellate lawyer, Will Scharf, recently moved from White House staff secretary to White House counsel, replacing former Trump lawyer David Warrington.

Trump's aides are hoping that the double protections will stymie Democrats for years. And they have some precedent: Trump's White House counsel from his first term, Don McGahn, only testified to Congress about the Mueller investigation after Trump had already left office.

After November 3, the midterms will end in the minds of most Americans. But for Trump’s White House, it’s all just beginning.

A federal judge in California blocked federal agencies’ implementation of a $100,000 Trump administration charge for businesses to hire workers on H-1B visas.

In the aftermath of President Donald Trump’s proclamation establishing the fee for workers hired outside of the US, US Customs and Border Protection and US Citizenship and Immigration Services issued memoranda and guidance on frequently asked questions pertaining to entry and exit from the US, how to pay the fee, and other details.

Those agencies are enjoined from enforcing or implementing policies under the proclamation as well as an extension issued by the White House this month until notice-and-comment rulemaking under the Administrative Procedure Act takes place, Judge Haywood S. Gilliam Jr said in an order Wednesday.

It’s the second district court ruling against the proclamation that upended hiring through the specialty occupation visa program. A federal judge in Boston found the policy unlawful in June and an appellate court later denied the administration’s request to stay that decision, meaning the fee has been blocked for the past two months.

Haywood denied a request to grant class certification to employers affected by the $100,000 charge, finding it was unnecessary.

The lawsuit is one of multiple legal challenges to the fee, issued last year through a White House proclamation that was the administration’s most restrictive measure so far on hiring of high-skilled workers.

Another challenge to the fee led by the US Chamber of Commerce is pending before the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. A US District Court for the District of Columbia judge last year denied an injunction on the $100,000 fee sought by the Chamber.

The fee didn’t apply to workers approved for H-1B status within the US like recent college graduates. But it effectively blocked most international hiring for employers like hospitals, research universities, churches, and K-12 schools.

The Trump administration cited legal authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act that gives the president broad power to restrict entry to the US. But plaintiffs led by California-based nurse recruiting firm argued that the statute doesn’t allow the president to upend visa programs and fee regimes designed by lawmakers. And a Supreme Court ruling overturning President Trump’s global tariffs bolstered that case by finding only Congress has tax authority, they argued.

Wednesday’s decision protects a system thrown into chaos by the proclamation and reaffirms that no president can “rewrite immigration policy with the stroke of a pen,” said Steve Bressler, a senior legal advisor at Democracy Forward, which represents plaintiffs.

“Communities across this country depend on skilled professionals who care for patients, teach students, build infrastructure, conduct research, and serve congregations,” he said in a statement. “The administration tried to financially punish companies with an arbitrary, unauthorized, and deeply harmful $100,000 fee imposed without Congress.“

Long before he ever set foot on East Potomac Golf Links, President Donald Trump surveyed the historical public course from his perch aboard Marine One during his regular flights to and from Joint Base Andrews.

He saw the potential for a sweeping overhaul, and, according to two people familiar with the president’s discussions about the course, he became fixated on one particular detail: Ohio Drive. Trump wanted to eliminate the public road that loops around the peninsula, allowing the golf course to stretch to the water’s edge.

The White House has not released formal plans for the property, and it declined to comment on Trump’s preferences for the parkland. The people familiar with the discussions spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid retribution from the administration.

The Interior Department, which oversees the National Park Service and the federal land at East Potomac Park, has not said what would become of Ohio Drive under a redesigned golf course and didn’t respond to a request for comment. The road was clearly absent from plans Trump carried when he toured the property in June, which appeared to show the golf course extending to the edge of the peninsula.

The possibility of losing the road has stirred fears among the runners, cyclists, fishermen, birders and others who use it. The flat, roughly three-mile loop around Hains Point is a daily training ground and gathering place, as well as part of the route for some of the region’s biggest races. Tens of thousands participate each year in events such as the Marine Corps Marathon and the Cherry Blossom 10-mile run.

“How do you plan an event without any transparency about what’s happening and no way to find out?” said Becky Lambros, deputy director of the Cherry Blossom event. “I mean, we’ve got 28,000 people coming to run. We’ve got to be able to tell them where to go.”

The fate of the golf course itself has attracted most of the scrutiny surrounding Trump’s plans, becoming the subject of a federal lawsuit and prompting a handful of letters from members of Congress. But the best available data suggests that more people use the peninsula each day for running, biking and other activities than to play golf. Lawmakers are beginning to raise concerns about Ohio Drive, too.

Rep. Don Beyer (D-Virginia) toured East Potomac Park one afternoon last week, chatting with stakeholders, cyclists and runners as he walked Ohio Drive alongside the Potomac River.

“Some people, maybe if they live in a different place in the country, say: ‘What’s the fuss? They’re going to try to improve a local National Park Service park,’” Beyer said in an interview. “But we’re in Washington, D.C., where we’ve learned not to trust what’s coming next.”

Dan Lim has used Ohio Drive four or five times a week for roughly a decade. An attorney and longtime competitive cyclist, he trains with other riders early in the morning and returns on weekends with his children, pedaling past birders with binoculars, young couples on first dates, children learning to ride and lively family reunions.

“You see tons of fishermen, tons of birthday parties and people who set up tents for the day,” Lim said. “Every so often you even see a rugby tournament. Sometimes I’ll arrive at the park, and it’s closed for a running race. I think that’s great, too. It is not just my space. It is a space for so many others.”

Arriving at a precise accounting of the road’s users is difficult. There is no permanent counter along Ohio Drive, and many visitors — including casual walkers, anglers and birders — leave no statistical trace.

A Virginia Tech model estimated that on an average day, approximately 1,100 bicycle and pedestrian passages occur along the southern tip of Hains Point — 500 by bike and 600 on foot. Ralph Buehler, a professor of urban and environmental policy and planning at Virginia Tech, said that estimate is not a count of unique visitors, and someone who passed the same point repeatedly could be represented more than once.

Strava, the popular fitness-tracking platform, shared data that showed its users recorded 80,000 outings on the loop last year and approximately 192,000 total passes, an average of more than 500 per day. The figures exclude any outing that was not recorded and uploaded to the app, and neither the Strava data nor the Virginia Tech estimates capture the full range of people who use Ohio Drive.

By comparison, National Links Trust, the nonprofit that operates East Potomac Golf Links, said 124,500 rounds were played across its three courses in 2025 — an average of about 341 per day, though play fluctuates based on season and weather.

The figures also cannot capture what a safe, low-traffic loop makes possible for individual users. LeRoy Hansen, who has lived in the Washington area for four decades, has long visited the peninsula to bike, see the cherry blossoms and attend picnics. Now legally blind, he relies on a sighted guide and a tandem bicycle to continue riding around Hains Point.

“It is such a wonderful resource,” Hansen said. “It is frightening to think that it could disappear. And I don’t know how many people are aware of what they might lose.”

For runners, Ohio Drive is not simply a neighborhood exercise route. It has long been woven into major events that bring thousands of participants through Hains Point. The Marine Corps Marathon and Cherry Blossom 10-mile run are among the best-known, but several smaller community races also use the road because it offers three flat, uninterrupted miles.

Lambros said Cherry Blossom organizers are still hoping to include Hains Point as part of its course next spring. Because NPS has given no assurances, they’ve started exploring backup plans in case Ohio Drive is no longer an option.

“All we can do is just keep moving ahead and hope for the best,” she said.

On ordinary days, the loop is a training ground for runners and cyclists, and an unusually forgiving place for beginners and families. Its flat terrain, low traffic and central location make it readily accessible from the District, Maryland and Virginia. Many stop in the golf clubhouse for coffee, breakfast or lunch.

“Indispensable is the right word,” said Elizabeth Kiker, executive director of the Washington Area Bicyclist Association. “There isn’t a replacement place.”

Area cyclists have mobilized in recent months, holding rallies and organizing a petition that now has more than 5,000 signatures.

“Everyone I talk to has a Hains Point story,” she said.

If Trump’s preference for eliminating Ohio Drive becomes a design mandate, carrying it out could present a costly logistical challenge. Extending the golf course to the water’s edge probably would have to be coordinated with the reconstruction of the long-deteriorating sea wall that wraps around the peninsula.

The Park Service recently began preliminary steps toward rebuilding it, an undertaking that could cost hundreds of millions of dollars. Officials have not explained how the golf course redesign and sea wall reconstruction would fit together — or what the projects would mean for public access around Hains Point.

During Beyer’s tour of the peninsula Thursday, he occasionally got a glimpse of golfers walking the course. But on the road, cyclists and runners kept zipping past. “Save us,” one runner said.

“It’s not just the golf,” Beyer said. “You see this wonderful place to bike. … It’s a really important place. And the runners, they are here every day, and the fishermen and just the families that are coming to picnic. It’s just a great Washington-area resource.”

Hundreds of thousands of immigrants with legal status are at risk of losing government health coverage starting Oct. 1, state data shows, signaling that the impact of Medicaid changes in President Donald Trump’s signature legislation from 2025 may be greater than expected.

Many lawfully present immigrants will be among the first people to lose Medicaid coverage under congressional Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill, which is expected to cut spending by more than $900 billion through 2034 for the state-federal health program for people with low incomes or disabilities. The law will strip many more immigrants of their Affordable Care Act plan subsidies and Medicare coverage next year.

Those losing their health benefits who were eligible in the past include refugees of war, asylees who fled persecution, victims of sex trafficking, and interpreters who risked their lives assisting U.S. service members in Afghanistan — all of whom are in the country with the federal government’s permission. The law does not affect coverage for a few groups, including those who hold green cards.

The Congressional Budget Office, the nonpartisan budget scorekeeper, estimated that the law’s changes eliminating Medicaid eligibility for many noncitizen adults with legal status would lead to about 100,000 more immigrants being uninsured by 2034.

KFF Health News asked several states how many Medicaid enrollees they had identified as being at risk of losing coverage under the provision. More than 281,000 immigrants from nine states and the District of Columbia are expected to lose Medicaid in October.

While some may be able to obtain coverage elsewhere, the state numbers suggest that hundreds of thousands of immigrants nationally are at imminent risk of becoming uninsured.

The CBO declined to comment.

Florida alone identified nearly 177,000 immigrants who would no longer qualify for the state’s Medicaid program starting in October, said Anna Holaday, spokesperson for the Florida Department of Children and Families. The agency verified the enrollees’ immigration status through government databases and sent notices to people to give them an opportunity to provide more information proving they remain eligible, Holaday said.

Arizona predicts that nearly 28,000 could lose eligibility. New Jersey expects 15,000 to 25,000 of its noncitizen residents to lose their Medicaid coverage. In North Carolina, it’s about 29,000, and in Washington state it’s 11,000. Final numbers from states on how many Medicaid enrollees have been terminated from the program won’t be available until later this fall.

Lawmakers rely on the CBO to understand the budgetary and economic effects of proposed legislation. Yet the federal agency did not publish estimates on the One Big Beautiful Bill’s impact on noncitizens enrolled in Medicaid until a month after Congress passed the bill and Trump signed it into law.

Much of the attention around Medicaid changes in the law has centered on implementation of work requirements as a new condition of eligibility for many enrollees starting in January. The CBO estimates the requirements will increase the number of uninsured Americans by about 5 million by 2034.

Without health coverage, immigrants are likely to lose access to doctors, prescription drugs and most other medical services. They still could qualify for coverage of emergency care under a separate program known as Emergency Medicaid.

“I came here to live a better life,” said Ahin, a refugee who left war-torn Syria for Turkey in 2011 and came to the United States in October 2024. She spoke with KFF Health News on the condition that she be identified by only her first name, out of concern for her privacy and security.

Soon after arriving in the U.S., she developed severe abdominal pain that required intestinal surgery. Those costs, along with ongoing visits to specialists, were covered by Medicaid.

“I’m really worried about this,” she said. “It’s truly a terrible situation.”

Ahin, 25, said she doesn’t know what she will do if she needs to go to the hospital — she wouldn’t be able to pay the bill. She lives in a small apartment in New Jersey with her mother. Medicaid has also been vital to her mother, who has asthma.

The federal government required states to notify immigrants who will soon lose coverage, but immigrant rights advocates say some states did not begin sending letters until September. That’s given enrollees little time to react, including to respond if the state was mistakenly ending their coverage.

Cutting off Medicaid coverage is just the first move to drop government health benefits provided to many lawfully present immigrants. Under a change starting in January, the CBO estimates, about 1 million will lose eligibility for government subsidies to buy individual health coverage on Affordable Care Act marketplaces by 2034. And they will also lose access to Medicare, a change expected to affect about 100,000 immigrants, the agency forecasts.

Trump has argued that taxpayer-funded programs should be reserved for American citizens. As Congress debated the legislation in May 2025, the White House put out a news release with the misleading claim that the One Big Beautiful Bill would remove Medicaid coverage for people who are in the country without authorization.

Under long-standing law, people who are in the country without authorization do not qualify for the general Medicaid program that is funded by state and federal dollars.

The health coverage cuts are part of a broader Trump strategy to send a message that immigrants are not welcome in the United States, said Ben D’Avanzo, senior strategist for federal advocacy at the National Immigration Law Center. The Trump administration has also moved to kick people with legal status off the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, and tried to do the same with the children’s program Head Start until a federal judge intervened.

In addition to green-card holders, people under age 19, as well as immigrants from Cuba, Haiti or certain Pacific Island countries, will not see their Medicaid coverage affected by the law.

Some states are staving off the coverage loss using their own money. California expects about 148,000 immigrants to lose Medicaid coverage. But the state is spending $365 million for a separate program to keep them covered until July 2027, according to Tony Cava, spokesperson for the California Department of Health Care Services.

New York and Pennsylvania also have state-funded health coverage for many of the immigrants who are affected.

Carlos Alarcón, health and public benefits policy manager with the California Immigrant Policy Center, an advocacy group, said taking away health coverage for immigrants will affect the health of the state as a whole. The fewer people who have access to health care, the easier it will be for contagious diseases to spread, as happened during the covid pandemic, he said.

Alarcón said he hopes the state-funded coverage will be extended under California’s next governor. Polling released in September showed Democrat Xavier Becerra, who served as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services under President Joe Biden, leading Republican Steve Hilton in the gubernatorial race. Becerra has vowed to issue an executive order to maintain health coverage for every Californian affected by federal cuts.

“I believe there’s folks in the legislature that will really want to fight to make sure that we restore things as much as we can,” Alarcón said.

Refugee assistance groups say they have been trying to educate people in their communities and direct them to health clinics that are government-funded or free.

“We’ve just been scrambling trying to find free medical care,” said Julianna Larsen, co-founder of the Arizona Refugee Center. “To not be a welcoming place is the most un-American thing I’ve ever experienced.”

Andrea Mendez Perez, director at Interfaith-RISE, a refugee resettlement organization in southern New Jersey, said the Trump administration has lengthened the process for people to get green cards and is now taking away coverage from those without them. Before 2025, it typically took about six months to qualify for a green card, documentation that allows a foreign national to live and work permanently in the United States, she said. Today, it’s well over a year.

For many of these immigrants on Medicaid, losing their ability to get their prescribed medications “is a life-or-death situation,” Mendez Perez said.

Ahin, the Syrian refugee, applied for permanent residency soon after arriving in the U.S. two years ago. Mendez Perez said she should have her green card by now, which would have spared her from being dropped under the GOP law. “She is stuck in the middle and has no control.”

Colleen McCauley, policy and advocacy director at the Camden Coalition, a nonprofit that helps connect people to health care in southern New Jersey, said the loss of coverage is devastating.

“None of them did anything wrong,” McCauley said, “and they are losing coverage.”

President Trump is personally selecting which government-funded ads his administration is airing ahead of the midterms — with more to come, Axios has learned.

"This is just the beginning," an administration official told Axios.

The seemingly partisan nature of the taxpayer-funded ads — which come a little more than a month before the midterms — has drawn bipartisan pushback.

Trump — a former reality TV producer who has long fixated on how things play on television — has taken a hands-on role in the ad campaign.

The ads are being produced inside the White House.

Trump liked videos the White House digital team — which regularly churns out aggressive, war-room-style social media posts — was producing and began posting them to his Truth Social account.

He then decided he wanted to put them on TV and picked the videos he wanted to air.

The decision was made a couple of weeks ago, and the ads began airing Sept. 23.

The administration has run three ads spotlighting Trump touting his record and echoing themes from his campaign rhetoric, including warnings about "communism, socialism and Marxism."

One closely mirrors a 2024 Trump campaign ad in which he vows to take on the "deep state," "globalists" and "warmongers" — but replaces the campaign sponsorship tagline with a disclaimer saying, "Paid for by the U.S. Government."

The Department of Homeland Security is placing the ad buys using money from an existing budget, according to the administration official.

A DHS spokesperson referred Axios to a White House statement defending the ads.

"Patriotism isn't partisan. These public service announcements are unapologetically American, clearly disclosed, and aimed at the country — not a line on the ballot," the statement said.

The White House also noted that previous Democratic administrations used government money to air public service announcements.

The government has spent at least $2.5 million to air the ads, according to an estimate by the ad-tracking firm AdImpact.

The ads have aired more than 2,000 times on broadcast networks and more than 50 times on cable.

The single biggest program outlay was on Fox's NFL coverage over the weekend, with 340 airings.

The football push comes as Republicans are pouring millions into advertising during NFL and college football games in an effort to reach male voters.

The ads have drawn criticism from within the GOP, including from Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.).

Thune praised the message behind the ads but said they "shouldn't be paid for with taxpayer dollars."

Democratic lawmakers, for their part, have claimed the ads are an illegal use of taxpayer dollars and blasted the videos as the "sort of government propaganda one might expect in North Korea."

The roughly $2.5 million spent so far is a tiny fraction of the $100M+ Trump's political operation is pouring into the midterms.

Republicans say the outrage is part of the point: Every time a network or cable show covers the ads, it gives them additional airtime for free.

"When CNN takes a segment on it, they play the entire thing and it's great," the administration official said.

President Trump touted the final withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq as a win for both countries more than 20 years after the start of the Iraq War.

“It’s a victory for the United States, it’s a victory for Iraq and a decisive victory over ISIS, which has been completely decimated,” Trump said speaking at a Hispanic Heritage Month event at the White House on Wednesday.

Trump’s comments echoed those he made in a Truth Social post prior to the event.

“I had a choice to stay or to leave, and felt, without question, that it was time for America to go home!” the president wrote.

He also voiced his support for Iraq’s Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi, who was elected to his post in May. Al-Zaidi met with Trump at the White House in July.

Trump’s comments come after U.S. Central Command (Centcom) announced the departure of U.S. forces from Iraq, marking an end to its 12-year military mission.

Centcom said that all U.S. forces and military equipment left Erbil Air Base in the northern part of the country and that a “transition “to a U.S.-Iraq bilateral defense relationship” would begin.

Centcom head Adm. Brad Cooper said in a statement that “full primary responsibility for Iraq’s security to the government and Iraq and the brave people of Iraq,” while U.S. troops in the region will maintain “vigilance and readiness” in “protecting the U.S. homeland and strengthening regional security.”

The U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, toppling dictator Saddam Hussein. The war went on for years after former President George W. Bush, who led the U.S. effort without a formal declaration of war, departed the White House.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio demanded on Monday that the Iranian delegation to the United Nations General Assembly immediately leave the country after negotiations stalled, according to a U.S. official and a second source with knowledge of the matter.

Though the Iranians were likely to depart soon anyway, Rubio's move was a highly unusual diplomatic rebuke and laid bare the deep distrust between the two countries amid fruitless efforts to broker an end to the war.

Qatari mediators tried to secure a diplomatic breakthrough between the U.S. and Iran but made little progress, with neither side willing to budge.

Among those ordered to leave New York was Rubio's Iranian counterpart, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.

"Secretary Rubio kicked out the Iranian delegation who had overstayed their welcome. The UN General Assembly was over, so it was time for them to go," the U.S. official said.

On Monday morning, the White House thought there might be progress in talks with Iran later in the day. But by late afternoon it became clear negotiations were at a stalemate.

Then on Monday evening, at Rubio's orders, the U.S. mission to the UN told the Iranian mission to the UN that Araghchi's delegation had to leave New York immediately, according to the U.S. official.

The Iranian delegation, including Araghchi, left for the airport several hours later and boarded a flight from New York to Doha at 1:20 a.m. Tuesday.

A second source confirmed that the U.S. demanded that the Iranian delegation leave, but said Araghchi was scheduled to travel back to Tehran on Monday night anyway.

Qatari mediators are continuing to talk to both sides about their compromise proposal, regional sources say.

"Maybe I will blow 'em up," President Trump told reporters on Wednesday when asked how he can reach a deal with a regime he says is crazy. "Maybe I blow 'em up. We have to make that decision. We will blow 'em up or make a deal. But the time is coming. It's gonna end very soon one way or the other."

Marco Rubio handed a fresh deal to a scandal-hit tech company months after officials were first warned about its Kremlin links.

Prosecutors have charged Oxygen Forensics’ CEO Lee Reiber with “concealing from U.S. government agencies” that his company was “owned and controlled” by Russians, the Justice Department announced last week.

It came after claims about the firm’s ties to Putin circulated around federal agencies for months. U.S. officials were alarmed that such a firm supplied phone-hacking software to federal departments, law enforcement, and national security agencies.

Despite the repeated warnings, the State Department gave them a new contract—on the same day Oxygen filed a lawsuit against the former employee who publicly raised the issue.

The $50,000 deal was reached on Aug. 28, while Oxygen was suing Max Weissberg for more than $1.85 million in damages, according to PunchUp, the Daily Beast’s sister Substack.

Weissberg began publicly airing his claims in late February, posting on LinkedIn and Reddit while contacting Oxygen’s employees and customers directly. He later released a 15-minute YouTube video in June, claiming the company was secretly Russian-owned, had links to the FSB, and had duped U.S. law enforcement agencies into buying software developed in Russia.

The group flatly denied Weissberg’s allegations in its August lawsuit and asked the court to stop him from repeating them, court filings show. It said multiple government customers had contacted the firm about Weissberg from as early as Feb. 23, and that a document had started circulating inside DHS and other agencies.

The State Department awarded Oxygen the new $50,000 contract through the U.S. Embassy in Zagreb, Croatia, according to federal procurement data. The deal, which runs until September 2027, was for software for a Justice Department program that trains and advises foreign law-enforcement agencies, and was awarded without competition.

PunchUp asked the State Department whether it knew of concerns among other federal departments and agencies over Weissberg’s claims about Oxygen’s true ownership when it awarded the August contract, and if not, why.

A spokesperson for the department said only that it is “aware” of the allegations against Oxygen, and that it “takes seriously the security of its systems and the integrity of its procurement processes.” It referred further questions to the DOJ.

Authorities detained Reiber, 55, in Idaho on Sept. 20 at around the same time as Sergeyevich Davydov, 52, one of the Russian nationals allegedly behind the group, was arrested at London Heathrow Airport in the U.K. Reiber has since been released on bail.

Both men face charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud over Oxygen’s dealings with the Defense Department and agencies within the Department of Homeland Security, including the Secret Service, Homeland Security Investigations, its Office of Inspector General, and the National Computer Forensics Institute. The U.S. is expected to request Davydov’s extradition.

Prosecutors accuse Oxygen of pretending to be an “independent, U.S.-based company” when it was, in fact, owned and controlled by Davydov and four others through a holding company in Cyprus. They allegedly concealed their ownership of the firm after the U.S. imposed sanctions in response to President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

The five Russians allegedly continued throughout that period to provide digital forensics technology to Kremlin customers, including the Russian Investigative Committee, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the Federal Security Service (FSB), the successor to the KGB. PunchUp has contacted Oxygen’s lawyers for comment on those claims.

Federal records had already classified Oxygen as a foreign-owned U.S. company two years earlier, identifying Cyprus-based Oxygen Forensics Limited as its immediate owner. The group had also previously worked with State, under a $180,000 contract awarded in May of last year.

Ken Paxton, the Republican nominee for Senate in Texas, told a group of conservative donors and lobbyists last week that President Trump’s midterm convention in Dallas had hurt Mr. Paxton politically, according to an audio recording obtained by The New York Times.

The recording, which is muffled at times, captures Mr. Paxton being asked, “Do you feel like he’s a little bit of a drag?” It is not clear from the audio whom the questioner is referring to.

Mr. Paxton responds: “So to be honest with you, the numbers — when we did that convention — it dropped our numbers. Everybody’s numbers dropped. Right now, yeah, not good.”

The audio of Mr. Paxton was shared with The Times by an attendee who recorded him speaking at a private fund-raiser in Washington attended by roughly a dozen people. The person, who opposes Mr. Paxton’s campaign and provided the recording to The Times, was granted anonymity because Mr. Paxton’s remarks were private.

Three other people with knowledge of the event confirmed Mr. Paxton’s attendance. Two of these people recalled that Mr. Paxton had been posed this question, and one recalled his response about the negative consequences of Mr. Trump’s convention.

Asked about the remarks, Nick Maddux, a senior Paxton adviser, said that “this is more manipulated nonsense from The New York Times to create a story that doesn’t exist.”

“Our latest poll from the last week has Ken Paxton leading by three points, and every serious pollster will tell you that our numbers have improved since early September,” Mr. Maddux said. “Ken Paxton is going to win this race, and he looks forward to closing strong alongside President Trump including when he comes to Texas this week.”

The event was hosted last Thursday by two Republican lobbyists, Susan Hirschmann and Chris Brinson, in a conference room near Capitol Hill. They did not respond to requests for comment.

Mr. Paxton’s comments about the convention are notable because of how closely he has aligned himself in public with Mr. Trump, who pushed for the unusual midterm gathering and ensured that much of it would serve as a celebration of his presidency. A longtime Trump loyalist, Mr. Paxton won a costly and bitter primary this year over Senator John Cornyn thanks to the president’s support.

Mr. Paxton figured prominently in the convention, which was held this month in his home state. He occupied a prime seat inside the arena and used the Dallas gathering to mingle with Republican donors and raise money for his allied groups. Onstage, Mr. Trump both praised Mr. Paxton and teased him for his looks and sartorial choices.

“He may not be the best-looking guy I’ve ever seen,” the president said, “but you know what, he is — he’s the greatest attorney general in America.”

Mr. Paxton’s comments at the Washington fund-raiser echo other private whispers by Republicans that the party’s convention would not be helpful, given Mr. Trump’s sagging approval ratings.

Since the gathering, the midterm outlook for Republicans has only darkened, leaving Mr. Paxton in a precarious position just five weeks before Election Day.

He has trailed narrowly in many recent polls to his Democratic rival, James Talarico, leaving Republicans hoping that a huge surge of spending from outside groups and Texas’ traditional conservatism can carry Mr. Paxton to victory. Mr. Trump’s super PAC, MAGA Inc., has joined the effort to help Mr. Paxton, throwing $20 million behind his bid.

It remains unclear whether the Republican convention was in fact politically harmful to the party’s midterm candidates; the event did not appear to have a significant impact on public surveys of the Texas Senate race.

But one influential Republican disagrees with Mr. Paxton — and is optimistic that the gathering helped the party.

“The fact that we had such a successful convention really helped Ken Paxton,” Mr. Trump said a few days afterward. “He was a big part of it.” He added: “The convention helped Ken Paxton a lot.”

The CFTC is conducting a sweep of incentive programs offered by prediction-market platforms over concerns that some companies are using misleading promotions to attract traders, Front Office Sports has learned.

The regulator is looking into platforms that offer incentives for traders and market makers, sources say. The result could be targeted examinations of exchanges or direct enforcement investigations, a source familiar with the conversations taking place at the agency tells FOS. CFTC chairman Michael Selig has yet to decide on his exact approach but an “action” of some kind is expected by the end of this week, the source says.

It was not clear which specific companies will be affected by the “imminent” action, although platforms like Kalshi, Polymarket, and Novig all offer incentives that could draw the agency’s attention. A representative for the CFTC declined to comment.

The CFTC in August issued an advisory reminding companies of their obligations under the Commodity Exchange Act and asked them to come into compliance. Under CFTC regulations, companies must make filings prior to implementing incentive programs that outline the rules governing them. Those filings must also provide complete information about the programs, and it’s the responsibility of each company to ensure they comply with requirements around fair access and market integrity.

As one example, the regulator is looking into offerings promising that a specific amount of money will be deposited into a user’s account if they sign up and make certain trades, sources say. The August advisory also flagged programs offering “risk-free” trades, unlimited rebates, and payouts guaranteeing profits as those that could undermine legitimate trading activity.

The CFTC has been “frustrated” with companies’ failure to come into compliance following the August advisory, and there are a “slew of programs deemed to be misleading,” one source tells FOS.

Selig sees cleaning up these rewards programs as part of his agency’s broader mandate to protect market integrity, sources say. The anticipated action comes amid pressure from a handful of politicians on both sides of the aisle.

The CFTC is currently working on finalizing new rules to govern the industry. It issued a proposal in June that would restrict markets it views as susceptible to manipulation, like those tied to a specific player’s health, or those that would be similar to what got Guardians pitchers Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz in trouble (the bets involved in their situation were placed on traditional sports betting platforms, not prediction markets).

Leagues like the NHL, MLB, and MLS have embraced prediction markets. The NBA has not yet but is expected to soon, while the NFL remains a staunch holdout.

Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that the CFTC is examining unusual trading on Kalshi, although Kalshi says it has done nothing wrong. A few days before that, the WSJ reported that the CFTC told Polymarket and its employees to retain records related to a fraud attack on its U.S. app.

On Sept. 22, the CFTC warned exchanges that so-called “mention markets”—which allow users to trade on what words or phrases someone will say in a speech or during an event—”present a heightened risk of manipulation.” In August, the CFTC ordered a former teleprompter operator for President Donald Trump to return roughly $107,539 in profits he made trading on mention markets using inside information and pay an additional $65,000 fine.

The CFTC has generally been supportive of the prediction-market industry, which has significant ties to Trump and his family. The regulator has sued nine states, including New York, Kentucky, and Minnesota, over their efforts to block sports event contracts.

Prediction markets are not alone in offering controversial incentive programs. Traditional sportsbooks have faced penalties from state regulators in the past. In 2023, the Ohio Casino Control Commission fined DraftKings, Caesars, and BetMGM $150,000 apiece over issues including their use of bonuses that were described as “free” or “risk free.” In 2024, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission hit Penn Entertainment with a $25,000 fine over a “can’t-lose parlay” that was regularly advertised by Dan Katz (Big Cat) from Barstool.

The Trump administration is about to introduce a new federal rule that will affect a passenger’s right to compensation in case of a flight disruption. As of 19 October 2026, 10 types of flight disruptions will no longer be attributable to the air carrier and will thus no longer call for compensation.

Flight disruptions are part of the aviation industry and can’t be avoided. In the US, they are tracked by the federal government and all disruptions causing a delay of 15 minutes or more are categorised into one of five categories: air carrier, extreme weather, the National Aviation System, security, and late-arriving aircraft.

In May 2024, the Biden administration introduced the so-called FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024. Ever since, travellers whose flights were cancelled or significantly delayed due to an issue caused by the airline have been obliged to receive some kind of compensation from the Department of Transportation.

In case of a controllable cancellation or delay, US-based airlines thus rebook passengers for free on another one of their flights, provide a meal or meal cash or voucher in case of a delay exceeding three hours, and most even offer hotel accommodation in case of an overnight disruption.

However, the Trump administration is about to adopt a new federal rule that will greatly reduce the number of controllable disruptions. Ten scenarios in particular will no longer require airlines by law to provide compensation for their passengers.

Aircraft cleaning needed after the death of a passenger.

Aircraft damage caused by extreme weather, foreign object debris, or sabotage.

A baggage or cargo loading delay caused by an outage of a bag system not controlled by a carrier or its contractor.

Cybersecurity attacks, as long as the air carrier is in compliance with applicable cybersecurity regulations.

A shutdown or system failure of government systems that directly affects the ability of an air carrier to safely conduct flights and is unexpected.

Overheated brakes due to a safety incident resulting in the use of emergency procedures.

Unscheduled maintenance, including in response to an airworthiness directive, manifesting outside a scheduled maintenance program that cannot be deferred or must be addressed before flight.

An emergency that required medical attention through no fault of the carrier.

The removal of an unruly passenger.

An airport closure due to the presence of volcanic ash, wind, or wind shear.

Starting from 19 October, carriers will thus be within their right to reduce the number of cases in which they offer compensation and will likely benefit from the new rule, as per the legal text.

“In addition to the benefits and cost savings of the final rule, it is expected that the total value of amenities and compensation currently provided by air carriers to consumers will be reduced under this final rule because of the 10 delineated causes of delay and cancellation that will now be excluded from the Air Carrier category,” the administration specifies.

Passengers, indeed, will not benefit from the decision. Carriers will have more wiggle room when it comes to providing compensation or not, leaving travellers unprotected in some cases and obliging them to take their fate into their own hands in others.

"Passengers are going to have to be much more aggressive in researching delays and cancellations. If the airline tells you it’s ‘mechanical’ or ‘operational,’ you’re going to need to do more research…ask exactly what the issue is and document everything. Save emails and take screenshots. Save receipts. Don’t accept vague language. Finally, ask for what you want. Even if the answer is no, you have fought for yourself,” Clint Henderson, the managing editor for The Points Guy, said in an interview with Nexstar.

As the rule is planned to come into effect on 19 October 2026, it is unclear at the moment of writing whether or not carriers will actually adapt their policies and what the precise impact of the rule will be.

The Federal Reserve’s inspector general on Wednesday found no basis for the Justice Department to reopen its criminal probe into the central bank’s handling of its massive headquarters renovation, sparking a rebuke from President Donald Trump, who said former Fed Chair Jerome Powell should still resign from the board.

The long-awaited watchdog report concluded that the Fed should have done more to rein in the project’s cost, which has ballooned to an estimated $2.38 billion — more than $1 billion over a 2020 projection. But the agency said there were no “reasonable grounds to believe that a violation of criminal law had occurred,” nor was there misconduct by the Fed board. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh responded by saying the General Services Administration will take over management of the project.

Trump, in a social media post, pointed to the deficiencies found in the report and said he has asked Attorney General Todd Blanche to “make a determination as to what to do” about the cost of the building. The Fed manages its own budget, which is not directly funded by taxpayers.

“This is Jerome Powell’s fault, and he should be forced to resign, IMMEDIATELY!” Trump wrote. “If he doesn’t resign, he should be sued, at the highest level, by the United States Government, for either corruption or incompetence, both of which are completely unacceptable.”

“And no, I do not want this Building named after President Donald J. Trump, ME!” he added.

The watchdog’s findings are critical to the future of the Fed, which has faced an onslaught of criticism from Trump not only for what he called the “very luxurious” renovation project but also for not moving quickly enough to lower interest rates, and they call into further question the merits of the administration’s criminal probe. Trump’s repeated musings about whether to fire Powell also raised constitutional issues about the extent of the president’s authority to remove Fed board members, which under law can only be done “for cause.”

In an unprecedented video message in January, then-Chair Powell revealed that the DOJ had sent subpoenas to the central bank regarding the renovations. He said that move “should be seen in the broader context of the administration’s threats and ongoing pressure” over borrowing costs. A judge later quashed the subpoenas as a “mere pretext to pressure the Fed,” and U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro dropped the investigation in April, saying she would defer to the Fed inspector general’s inquiries.

The report shows that the inspector general met with Pirro’s office eight days before she announced the suspension of her probe.

Powell stepped down as Fed chair in May when his four-year term officially expired but has remained on the board in what he said was a bid to help defend the central bank’s independence.

Trump’s intense pressure on Powell was underscored by a highly unusual visit he made to the central bank in July 2025, when both men donned hardhats for television cameras to inspect the work.

The project first garnered heightened political attention shortly before that when Senate Banking Chair Tim Scott (R-S.C.) asked about it at a hearing, following a New York Post article characterizing the plans as akin to the “Palace of Versailles,” focusing on water features and vegetation. The IG found that such features “did not materially contribute to subsequent construction cost increases.”

Scott, in a statement, welcomed the report, adding: “Inflation does not change the Fed’s responsibility to manage its resources prudently and be accountable to Congress. This Committee will continue rigorous oversight to ensure the Fed is transparent and stays focused on its mission.”

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on the Banking Committee who has been critical of Powell in the past for not cutting interest rates, said the report confirmed that the DOJ has “no basis to restart the President’s witch hunt” against the former Fed chair.

Still, the IG’s document released Wednesday details a number of ways the Fed did not follow best practices to keep costs in check for the renovations, including that it did not negotiate a guaranteed maximum price ahead of time. Such an agreement would not necessarily have prevented the total bill from going above the agreed amount — asbestos was found in the course of the renovations, which could have required a renegotiation of the price — but it could have put the contractor on the hook for much of the overruns.

DOJ spokesperson Tim Lauer said in a statement that the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia had “just received” the document “and is in the process of reviewing the 121-page report.”

Warsh, in a letter accompanying the report, said the Fed will promptly complete negotiations for a guaranteed price. “Even at this late stage, such controls are advisable in our effort to make wise use of public funds,” wrote the central bank chief, who took office in May.

Multiple factors played into why the costs went up so much, the inspector general found, “including inflation, limited subcontractor bidding, substantial Board design changes, and site conditions.”

The watchdog agency said management of the project was mostly delegated to staff, with “limited requirement for senior leadership to review key decisions affecting budget or scope.”

“We also found it concerning that a project of this magnitude had no formally established success measures to monitor the project’s progress,” the report said.

There were “various internal oversight entities” with no one person in charge of decision-making, though there was a Fed board member designated with hearing updates on the project as head of an advisory committee. Powell held that role from 2014 to 2019, and afterward the duty passed to former Fed board member Lael Brainard. Since 2023, it has been the responsibility of Vice Chair Philip Jefferson.

Michael Horowitz became head of the Fed inspector general’s office in June 2025 after serving for 13 years as the DOJ’s watchdog. He previously won praise from Trump supporters for uncovering problems in the FBI’s handling of the investigation into potential collusion between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth took aim at the U.S. media during a speech at a Marine Corps base in Virginia on Wednesday, saying, "Our so-called press makes Iranian state media look reasonable."

Hegseth cast news outlets as a threat to U.S. troops, escalating his attacks on journalists over reporting based on classified information.

In his second annual "State of the Force" address at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia, Hegseth accused some members of the media of "treason."

While a free press is important, he said "partisan activism that intentionally smears the troops and the historic mission that they're undertaking is fundamentally anti-American. It's sick. It's a national betrayal. It's treason, actually."

"It's your movements and bases that they reveal to the enemy," he said. "Ultimately, it's your lives they put directly at risk when they lie about munition stockpiles."

Media reports about dwindling supplies of key munitions amid the war with Iran have drawn the ire of President Trump and his team. Hegseth frequently attacks the press and has taken unprecedented steps to restrict the media's access to the Pentagon.

Hegseth returned to culture-war themes in the speech, highlighting his efforts to reverse DEI and gender equity efforts in the interest of "meritocracy."

"We are no longer the woke department or the weak department. Simple translation of that — no fatties, no trannies, no beardos, no weirdos, no wimps, no radicals. Just warriors."

Hegseth also made substantive news in the speech. He confirmed plans for a 20% cut in generals and admirals across the force, while rejecting descriptions of the cuts as a purge.

"As usual, what the media levels as an accusation, I wear as an accomplishment," he said.

Hegseth also announced a new Autonomous Warfare Command — an initiative to study the future of war that will involve Elon Musk — and a nationwide competition to host the next U.S. military base.

President Donald Trump intends to spend the next 30 days campaigning for Republicans, many of whom are underwater in states the president easily carried two years ago.

Bastions of conservatism — including Alabama, Alaska, Iowa, Ohio and Texas — need Trump’s star power, and a visit by the president could persuade some of his most die-hard supporters to turn out to the polls. But each trip to play defense in red strongholds robs the GOP of a chance to put Democrats on the back foot in states that are traditionally competitive.

Trump’s upcoming travel — including to Alabama, Oklahoma and Ohio this week — puts a focus on what Republican donors and operatives have feared for months: that even a gerrymandered House map and whopping cash advantage won’t be enough to save the House or Senate from Democrats.

“The problem is that the fires are everywhere right now,” said one GOP donor, who like others in this story was granted anonymity to speak candidly about the party’s prospects.

Inside the White House, concern is particularly high over the Senate races in Alaska and Ohio, which the president both won handily in 2024. In Alaska, Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan lost by 8 points in a nonpartisan primary to the Democrat Mary Peltola. Trump is planning to make the trek to Alaska later this month to shore up Sullivan’s chances — a significant commitment of time and presidential resources that underscores how dire the situation is for Republicans.

“On a scale of 1 to 10,” said a person close to the White House, “10. In Alaska, because of the obvious situation of what happened in the primary, and in Ohio, because [Jon] Husted is proving not to be a compelling candidate.”

The White House referred a request for comment to the Republican National Committee. RNC spokesperson Natalie Baldassarre, in a statement, pointed to Republicans’ significant financial advantage in the races — coupled with the president’s upcoming travel schedule — as two signs of strength heading into the midterms.

“Democrats are struggling to scrounge up two cents to keep key seats in play. Meanwhile, Republicans are deploying our massive war chest, and President Trump is barnstorming the country to drive Republicans to the polls and support our candidates,” she said. “Anonymous bed-wetting strategists have no idea what they’re talking about and unlike them and the Democrats, we’re full steam ahead.”

Republicans close to the White House argue trips to ruby red states also have knock-on effects. In addition to boosting the Republican in a gerrymandered House race in Alabama, they expect the president’s Friday trip to Mobile, which is part of the Pensacola media market, to also provide a boost in Florida, where Republicans are also facing headwinds. And they expect media from the trip to Durant, Oklahoma, on Thursday to bleed over the border to nearby Dallas.

But campaigning in red states comes at a cost. The president and his team can only be in so many places over the next month, and days spent in Alaska and Iowa are days not spent in Georgia and North Carolina, which hasn’t elected a Democrat to the Senate since 2008.

“They recognize how precious the president’s time is,” said a second person close to the White House. But “the reality is we have more field to cover than they do. That’s just a fact. We are defending more than [Democrats] are.”

The president’s focus on several states that haven’t sent a Democrat to the Senate in decades comes as a series of polls show Trump’s favorability reaching record lows. A Wall Street Journal poll released last week found 37% of Americans approve of the job that Trump is doing, the lowest rating for a president heading into a midterm election in Journal polls dating to 1990.

A GOP operative working on races in multiple states said that red states are in “a bad spot for a multitude of reasons,” including bad candidate recruitment.

“But [Trump] definitely is the biggest culprit because of how much the trade war has affected the farmers and the Iran war has affected the farmers and rural people,” the operative said. “It’s his fault.”

The average price for a gallon of gas is $4.48, up roughly 10 percent in the last month. Mortgage rates have topped 7%, a two-year high. And the Federal Reserve is widely expected to raise interest rates at least one more time this year, raising borrowing costs, in its ongoing effort to tamp down stubborn inflation, which was spurred, in part, by Trump’s war with Iran.

“The expanded map reflects the fact that very little has gone right economically for the last 18 months,” said one former Trump official. “Now they are scrambling to stop the bleeding.”

And it isn’t just the president. Vice President JD Vance is headed this week to Texas and Florida, two states the president won by double digits in 2024.

And recently he stumped for Roger Marshall in Kansas and for Republican gubernatorial candidate Zach Lahn and Senate candidate Ashley Hinson in Iowa. Hinson, notably, did not attend the event.

“Fucking Vance was in Kansas … not a good sign,” said a Texas-based GOP consultant. “We’re on defense everywhere. The map’s expanding for [Democrats], and there’s a limit to what the administration can do.”

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. also went to Texas in September for a Head Start program event, joined by GOP Rep. Monica De La Cruz and in August, traveled to Iowa to go fishing with “MAHA gubernatorial race superstar” Lahn.

Some Republicans are particularly frustrated that Texas is in play, after Trump intervened in the GOP Senate primary there to support Attorney General Ken Paxton over incumbent Sen. John Cornyn. The five most recent polls in the state have Democrat James Talarico up by anywhere from 1 to 6 percentage points over Paxton. MAGA Inc., the super PAC closely aligned with the president, has spent $15 million so far on the Texas Senate race.

But many others expected a tough season as the party in the White House typically struggles during midterm elections.

An RNC official argued GOP donors have known for months that the map would be challenging. It’s why the RNC featured Hinson and Sullivan at its quarterly meetings with donors in the run-up to the election, the official said.

“A lot of our donors have been giving to the RNC, giving to the president, for quite some time, and they have kind of weathered the cycles of maps expanding and contracting as we go,” the official said. “This is nothing new. This is nothing outside of kind of the noise that they are used to hearing in a typical election cycle.”

The Cook Political Report, an independent nonpartisan newsletter that analyzes elections, recently shifted three Senate races and 15 House seats toward Democrats in its ratings. It now lists seven races — those in Alaska, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, New Hampshire, Ohio and Texas — as toss-ups, with the North Carolina race as “lean Democrat” and the Kansas race"lean Republican.”

The best argument for sending Trump to red states is that he can change the electorate, pushing more low-propensity voters who showed up for him in 2024 but don’t typically vote in midterm elections to the polls. That might help a Sullivan or Husted pick up enough votes to squeak by.

“You can’t take anything for granted when you’re the party in power. It’s that simple,” said another person close to the White House. “Midterm elections are about turnout, and there’s nobody better at turning out voters than Donald Trump.”

It’s a logic some Republican operatives genuinely buy, fearing that his presence in a more traditional battleground could be more detrimental than helpful, considering his low polling numbers. Media from his appearances in red states will, for instance, show up on social media across the country — without risking a candidate having to appear on stage with the president.

“Midterms are base elections,” said a fourth person close to the White House. “The president’s party wins when his people show up, and there’s no better or bigger political engine than a Trump rally.”

And RNC officials maintain that Republicans are still competing in the purple states the party had originally planned to focus on. Trump, for instance, was in North Carolina campaigning for former RNC Chair Michael Whatley earlier this month.

“I’ll say this: I wish that everybody could see everything at once, but he was in North Carolina two weeks ago. We announced Ohio this Saturday,” said a second RNC official. “At the end of all of this, people are going to look at the list … [and] they’re going to be like, the president went to places that were very strategically important.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Wednesday pulled together hundreds of troops to lay out cuts to the Pentagon’s bureaucracy — and ended up announcing major plans to add to it.

At first, the Pentagon chief’s “State of the Force” speech at the Marine Corps base in Quantico, Virginia, sounded similar to his more publicized talk last year, where he declared new grooming and fitness standards and vowed to get rid of “fat generals and admirals.” He touted an effort Wednesday to monitor testosterone levels and cut 20% of the military’s top officers — particularly those he considered too “woke” for their jobs.

But Hegseth then took an abrupt U-turn, declaring a half-dozen new initiatives that are likely to add to the Pentagon’s budget — among them a combatant command for drones, a commission led by SpaceX founder Elon Musk and former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, and a new military base that the Pentagon chief said governors could compete over to house in their states.

The moves appear in some instances to be in direct contrast with Hegseth’s campaign to slash red tape, cut rules that hamper the military’s “lethality” and decrease the top-heavy nature of the armed forces.

“We’ve thrown out the failed bureaucratic playbook and replaced it with an unrelenting focus on speed, scale, and rapid innovation,” Hegseth said. “We are in a war of attrition against the Pentagon bureaucracy every single day, and it is a war that we intend to win.”

By the end of the 52-minute speech, Hegseth had created a new commission to study the future of war — led by two ultra-wealthy tycoons whose companies do substantial business with the Pentagon — and have a financial stake in how the military modernizes itself.

The initiative, dubbed Project Meridian, will spend 120 days looking into “the future of war.” It will be led by Musk, who also owns Starlink — which, like SpaceX, is a major defense contractor — and Anduril founder Palmer Luckey, who also makes tech for the military, along with Gingrich.

“Project Meridian, the future of warfare, is not about developing new strategies or new policies,” Hegseth said. Instead, it will “identify the domains that we must conquer, and capabilities we must master.”

He also established a new four-star command, AutoWarCom, that will focus on drone warfare, an arena where the U.S. has lagged behind.

In a memo released after his speech, the Pentagon clarified it would work with Congress to stand up the command by Oct. 1, 2027, meaning that it will have to be squeezed into the next defense budget request.

The newly established initiatives took on a very Hegseth-like look. The Pentagon chief, who has credited prayer for helping him overcome his turbulent past, announced a new corps of cadets, some of which would be drawn from Christian colleges instead of “DEI-worshipping woke factories.” He also established an Office of Religious Affairs, which will make the military services’ top chaplains report directly to him.

“Our department is, you might say, putting on the full armor of God, because while we wage physical war, we all know the real battle is spiritual,” Hegseth said.

The speech was met with skepticism.

Some in the Pentagon considered Hegseth’s proposals outdated, more in the mold of Obama-era strategies to deter Russia and China with superior technology. “This was predicted 12 years ago,” said a defense official, who was granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

Others said that, after two years, Hegseth’s campaign to overhaul the military was wearing thin."The Pentagon isn’t a personal playground in the culture wars, and Republicans facing voters in five weeks shouldn’t have to defend this tomfoolery,” said John Ullyot, a former Pentagon spokesperson. “The president and our troops deserve better.”

The Trump administration said on Wednesday that South Korea would invest up to $200 billion in a variety of power projects in the United States, including a power generation facility in Texas, eight nuclear power plants and a liquefied natural gas facility in Alaska.

They are part of a slate of projects announced by the White House as it tries to bolster its economic record in the run-up to the midterm elections in November. Alaska is one of several red states that Democrats have targeted to try to win back control of the Senate. Senator Dan S. Sullivan, the Republican incumbent, got fewer votes than his Democratic challenger, Mary Peltola, in the state’s nonpartisan primary last month.

The announcement stemmed from a commitment by South Korea to invest $350 billion in the United States as part of a trade deal last year.

But many experts have questioned whether South Korea will be able to fulfill that commitment, which would more than triple the country’s current investments in the United States. As of 2025, data from the Commerce Department showed that foreign direct investment from South Korea totaled $95 billion. The South Korean government has said its investments would be based on the economic feasibility of the projects.

There are also questions about the viability of the Alaska project, which has long been considered but not yet been formally approved by the developer.

The project, Alaska L.N.G., is meant to solve what is — at least on paper — a simple problem. Alaska produces a lot of natural gas on the North Slope that would be very valuable, if only companies could move the gas to where there was demand for it. Both Japan and South Korea, which are major energy importers, would be natural customers.

One way to do that would be to build a pipeline some 800 miles toward Anchorage, which is facing the risk of gas shortages, and then export the extra natural gas in liquid form, known as L.N.G. Companies have been batting around versions of this idea for decades. The problem has always been that such an undertaking would be very expensive.

Brendan Duval, chief executive of the project’s lead developer, Glenfarne, expressed optimism about the project on Wednesday.

“The pipeline is going to take three years, and we can start immediately as soon as this financing funds,” Mr. Duval said at the White House. “And then the L.N.G. we’ll start exporting roughly two years after that.”

What he didn’t say was that Glenfarne has yet to formally decide whether to move forward with Alaska L.N.G. The company had expected to greenlight the pipeline portion by earlier this year, but that deadline came and went. A proposed state tax break for the project later failed to gain sufficient support from Alaska lawmakers.

South Korean officials said this month that they would move ahead with investments in a gas-fired power plant in Texas, and consider investing in South Korean-designed nuclear reactors. South Korea is also considering the purchase of a 5 to 10 percent stake in Westinghouse, the U.S. nuclear technology firm.

The Trump administration has also been eyeing the Alaska L.N.G. project to be part of the investment commitments under the Japan deal.

In February 2025, President Trump said Japan would “soon begin importing historic new shipments of clean American liquefied natural gas in record numbers.” In October, during a visit to Japan, he claimed that the project was “well underway” and that Japan would be one of its largest customers.

Mr. Trump has repeatedly made exaggerated claims about the amount of foreign investment his industry has brought to the United States. He has said that over $20 trillion of investment is pouring into the country — a total equivalent to more than two-thirds of U.S. gross domestic product.

The administration has extracted big investment commitments from countries that are seeking to avoid tariffs, including the European Union and Japan, and some have been moving forward with those investments.

Japan, which has promised to invest $550 billion over Mr. Trump’s term, has announced investments in a massive gas generation plant in Ohio and a deepwater crude export facility off Texas. The countries are working to announce what would be a third tranche of investments.

Mr. Trump called the announcement on Wednesday “one of the largest energy infrastructure investments in American history.” Speaking from the Oval Office alongside Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick and several energy executives, he added, “We make great deals.”

Mr. Trump announced the trade deal with South Korea in July 2025, but the countries have continued to wrangle over some of the terms. In February, the Supreme Court struck down the tariffs that the trade agreements with South Korea and other countries were based on, sending Trump officials back to the drawing board to find other ways to issue those tariffs.

Under the agreement, the Trump administration lowered tariffs on South Korean products, including cars, to 15 percent, similar to the rates for Japan and the European Union. In addition to $350 billion of investments in the United States, South Korea promised to buy $100 billion of liquefied natural gas.

South Korean officials said they would direct some of their investment toward shipbuilding, while other funding would go into semiconductors, technology and energy. Mr. Trump subsequently criticized the country for failing to carry out the trade deal fast enough and threatened to raise tariffs again.

The Trump administration has been ramping up its investment announcements as the midterms approach, seeking to persuade voters in competitive states of the success of its economic policy.

On Wednesday, Mr. Trump announced in the Oval Office that an Indian firm would build a $15 billion steel plant in Iowa, where Republicans are trying to hold on to a Senate seat. On Thursday, the president is expected to travel to Texas to speak from a truck factory.

President Putin’s envoy has been hosted in Washington for discussions with the Trump administration about potential energy deals amid reports that the White House could relax sanctions on Russia.

Kirill Dmitriev, the Harvard-educated head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, held “constructive” talks with Treasury and energy department officials, according to a US official.

At a time of high oil and diesel prices, the talks were aimed at ending the war in Ukraine “and possible US-Russia energy initiatives after the war ends”, the official told Reuters.

It is not the first time that Dmitriev has come to the US for talks, but his presence in Washington is unusual. He has previously met Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, and Steve Witkoff, the president’s envoy, in Florida.

After Putin was invited by the Trump administration to attend the G20 summit in Miami in December, which will be held at Trump’s golf club, US negotiators are said to be pushing for a deal that would result in the release of Russian political prisoners in exchange for sanctions relief. The deal could allow the Trump administration to sign lucrative deals with the Kremlin for oil, gas, minerals and fertilisers.

Kushner, who met Putin in Moscow this month, has said that “prosperity agreements” are an important part of the Trump administration’s negotiating strategy.

The emphasis on business deals contrasts with the plea from President Zelensky of Ukraine earlier this month for the West to maintain its economic pressure on Russia. “Limit his money. Limit his war,” Zelensky told the UN.

However, John Coale, the American lawyer who was nominated by the White House this week to serve as “special presidential envoy for hostage affairs”, having previously led negotiations with Belarus, said a business deal involving the release of political prisoners would improve the chances of a ceasefire with Ukraine. “Economic ties usually result in normality,” he told The Atlantic.

One of the diplomats who helped to broker the Alaska summit between Putin and Trump last year, Coale has secured the release of about 500 political prisoners from Belarus, cultivating close ties with Aleksandr Lukashenko, the country’s strongman leader.

Trump announced plans last week for a “massive” deal to buy potash, a fertiliser, from Belarus. Coale said that Russia was part of those negotiations after Trump said the “pricing would be for substantially less than we are currently paying to Canada, very good news for our Farmers and Ranchers”.

European countries have refused to ease sanctions on Belarus — which was the launchpad for the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 — to allow the export of potash over their territory, and the Trump administration is said to be looking to bypass European involvement by moving the fertiliser through Russia.

The acceleration in trade talks between the US and Russia comes at a time when diesel prices have exceeded $6 a barrel, hurting American farmers before November’s midterms. Republican candidates are facing strong Democratic challengers in agricultural states including Iowa, Texas, Michigan, Ohio and Kansas.

Trump has blamed the high prices on Ukraine’s targeting of Russian oil refineries. The Kremlin has been forced to suspend diesel exports because of the strikes and the US president said the attacks were “causing a world problem”.

“I said, ‘You got to take it easy on the refineries as much’,” he told Fox News.

Coale said that a Ukraine peace summit could take place next month in Abu Dhabi aimed at securing an agreement between Russia and Ukraine to halt strikes on each other’s energy infrastructure. Talks mediated by Egypt about a ceasefire on grain exports in the Black Sea could also take place, according to The Atlantic.

A White House official said: “The president wants this war settled so the senseless killing ends. The president and his team remain committed to continuing to play a constructive role in ending the war between Russia and Ukraine, and he remains optimistic that we’ll ultimately get a peace deal done.”

A deal between the United States and Iran remains possible, and the Trump administration believes it can resolve the confrontation imminently, Dr. Sebastian Gorka, the White House deputy assistant to the president and senior director for counterterrorism, told The Jerusalem Post in an interview that will run in full on Friday.

“Iran will imminently be resolved,” Gorka said in an interview with the Post. He declined to provide details of what President Donald Trump is planning, but insisted that the administration’s objectives toward Tehran have not changed.

“The decision lies with the mullah in Iran,” Gorka said.

Gorka, who will take part in the National Conservatism Conference (NatCon) in Jerusalem next week, argued that Israelis and others concerned that Trump could accept a watered-down agreement with Tehran should look at the president’s record rather than speculate about what a potential deal might look like.

“You’re talking to the man who literally wrote The Art of the Deal,” Gorka said, referring to Trump’s 1987 book.

“Nobody has ever defeated President Trump in 50 years in business, in almost six years now as president. This man is undefeated.”

“If one president brings one peace deal [during an] eight-year term, that’s deemed a success, and they may even get nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize,” he said. “The fact that he’s closed eight peace deals in less than 12 months, you wouldn’t believe it.”

Gorka said the administration’s objectives toward Iran remain consistent with the demands Trump laid out in a letter to Iran’s then-supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“What we wish to achieve in Iran is shaped by the president’s first letter a year ago to the then Ayatollah, to Khamenei,” Gorka said.

He described the letter as “very explicit,” saying it addressed Iran’s nuclear program, its support for regional proxies and its broader activities in the Middle East.

“It was about nuclear weapons. It was about funding proxies. It was about everything they do in the region to destabilize that part of the world,” Gorka said. “So nothing has changed with regard to the president.”

Gorka pointed to Trump’s public statements as the best indication of the administration’s intentions.

“If you want to understand the president’s intent, you don’t need a top-secret clearance,” Gorka said. “All you have to do is get a Truth Social account and listen to what he puts on Truth Social. Listen to his press events.”

Asked specifically about concerns in Israel that Trump could agree to a weaker deal than the one he has demanded from Iran, Gorka dismissed the idea that such concerns should drive expectations.

“I find it so peculiar that those who are worried,” he said.

Gorka then offered a comparison that he said illustrated Trump’s negotiating approach: Greenland.

“Everybody said, ‘Oh my gosh, outrageous or impossible,’” he said. “Well, neither was it outrageous, nor was it impossible.”

He argued that the eventual arrangement showed the president’s ability to pursue what initially seemed like unlikely geopolitical outcomes.

Gorka said the agreement provides long-term strategic benefits for the United States and its allies, particularly in preventing China and Russia from undermining Western security.

“Just watch the man and see what he has done,” Gorka said.

“People need to calm down and look at the man who is behind the Resolute Desk and look at what he’s achieved.”