Delusional. Stupid. Moronic. What else????

‘I don’t have any’: Trump brushes aside concerns over AI’s existential risks

The president is instead focusing on American tech maintaining its lead over China.

By Casey He

President Donald Trump downplayed concerns about the catastrophic risks of artificial intelligence raised this week by some AI researchers, saying late Thursday he was focused instead on the U.S. losing its edge in the tech arms race.

Asked whether he has concerns about existential risks posed by AI, the president said, “No, I don’t have any.

“I have concerns that if we don’t win AI, we’re going to be put in a very bad position,” Trump told reporters late Thursday as he left Dallas. “We are leading China right now by a pretty good period.”

Trump was wading into a debate over AI’s catastrophic risks ignited by a viral social media post from a former Anthropic and OpenAI researcher. The post cautioned that the leading AI companies have been “gambling with our lives” and that some researchers working on the technology “believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade.”

The post and the discourse it stirred up — along with recent alarming incidents where AI agents have gone rogue to launch hacking attacks — have prompted fresh calls from bipartisan lawmakers to rein in the fast-evolving technology.

The president’s remarks notably contrasted with those of some of his fellow Republicans.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who chairs the Commerce Committee, said this week that the AI risks are “deeply concerning” in an interview with POLITICO’s “The Conversation” with Dasha Burns, while also stressing the U.S. cannot fall behind China.

He said his committee may hold a markup this month on AI legislation, including a bill he is working on with Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) to address AI uses that create biological and nuclear threats.

Meanwhile, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) called on Congress to convene a special session on AI to address its effects in a social media post.

For his part, Trump has been staunchly supportive of the American AI industry, which has been driving economic growth and lifting up the stock market. The president also broke with some Republican elected officials and voters calling for a slowdown in data center construction over energy and land-use concerns.

“The only reason that communities throughout the U.S.A. should not want Data Centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor,” Trump said on social media last month. “If we kill the Golden Goose, you will only have yourselves to blame. China could not be happier with this anti Data Center movement.”

The orange turd doesn't give a fuck.........

Capitol agenda: Trump tells Republicans to vote or ‘go to hell’

President Donald Trump spent the last two days in Dallas trying every which way to persuade his GOP base to turn out for the midterms and reelect a Republican Congress.

By Mia McCarthy and Calen Razor

He’s promising to pay you $5,000. He’s asking you to swear an oath. He’s telling you you’ll “go to hell” if you don’t vote Nov. 3.

President Donald Trump spent the last two days in Dallas trying every which way to persuade his GOP base to turn out for the midterms and reelect a Republican Congress.

We’ll know in 53 days if it worked.

Republicans who attended the party’s midterm convention said they hope it drives Americans to the polls this November. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer said in an interview he’s confident the GOP holds the House majority but acknowledged it’ll come down to Republican voter turnout.

“Do we have some headwinds? Absolutely. Is this the greatest environment we’ve ever run in? No,” Emmer said. “If our people show up, we’ll do just fine. If they sit back at home, we’re going to have some bumps that we got to deal with.”

Trump began the convention by surprising even senior Republicans with a pledge to distribute $5,000 checks to Americans if they reelect a GOP House and Senate majority. Republicans are now left grappling with the practicality of the proposal and whether to make promises to voters on the campaign trail.

Then the president ended evening No. 2 leading the crowd in swearing an oath that they would bring their family and friends to the polls to vote for Republicans in November.

“You know what happens if you don’t vote? You go to hell,” Trump told Dallas’ American Airlines Center. “Go out and vote, go out and vote!”

Republicans’ messaging heavily focused on painting Democrats as a socialist party the country can not afford to elect into power. It was reminiscent of Democrats’ message going into the 2024 election warning Americans they couldn’t afford to elect Trump again, rather than leaning into specific policy agendas.

Obviously, that didn’t prove to be a winning strategy — and Republicans are hoping they don’t make the same mistake.

“That’s a good question,” Rep. Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania said at the convention when asked if he’s worried the party is too focused on its opponents. But he was confident GOP policies on taxes, regulations and education that were enacted in the past two-years are drastically different from what Democrats are proposing.

“We’ll see, but I do think you got to do all the above,” Rep. Jim Jordan responded to the same question. “We did what we said we would do.”

GOP’s anti-trans attacks

Democrats revamp their midterm playbook for GOP’s anti-trans attacks

Democratic strategists say the party needs a fresh approach amid a new wave of anti-trans messaging from Republicans.

Calen Razor

A fresh wave of Republican anti-transgender messaging is driving Democratic operatives to coach candidates on how to avoid falling into the political traps of prior elections.

Their advice: don’t ignore the conversation, state your position clearly and move on to issues voters care about.

“Silence is deadly on these issues and that’s the playbook we tried in 2024,” said Lanae Erickson, senior vice president at center-left think tank Third Way.

“Democrats have to be super clear that we want fair rules in sports made by sports associations and parents to be in charge of their kids’ health care,” Erickson said.

“Nip the issue in the bud and then turn things back to the main issue of costs and things that impact voters’ lives more,” she said.

Republicans offered a preview this week of familiar election messaging they hope will animate their base in November: Democrats support transgender athletes in women’s sports and gender-affirming care for children.

Those messages in 2024 appeared to galvanize voters, with Republicans spending over $110 million in ads on the issues, and then-candidate Donald Trump spending more on ads criticizing supporting transgender rights than on any other subject in the final lead-up to the election.

The majority of speeches by top Republicans at the GOP’s midterm convention in Dallas highlighted the issue, including by Vice President JD Vance, Speaker Mike Johnson, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chair Tim Scott, National Republican Congressional Committee Chair Richard Hudson, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, Housing Secretary Scott Turner and Trump.

“It’s one of our great soundbites of all time,” Trump said Wednesday as he described anti-trans attacks as best deployed against Democrats in the final days of the election. “I’m doing it much too early.”

America PAC, Elon Musk’s super PAC, also invested in a round of new digital ads this week airing across states with key Senate races, including Texas and Iowa, criticizing Democrats’ past support for trans rights.

Ross Hemminger, president of Log Cabin Republicans, a prominent Republican lesbian, gay and bisexual group, who attended the convention, called the GOP approach “a winning message” that will motivate “people who don’t always come out to vote in every election.”

Matt Angle, a veteran Democratic strategist based in Texas, said he’d encourage candidates to model their response to anti-trans attacks on James Talarico, the state’s Democratic nominee for the Senate. Many Republican speeches this week focused on Talarico’s past comments on gender.

“James should continue to respond the way he has, very disciplined,” Angle said. He pointed to a Wednesday FOX News interview where Talarico said he “will oppose trans athletes playing in girls’ sports if it risks safety or fairness.”

“Republicans are trying their best to change the subject and divert attention away from a profound failure, but it’s not shaking James’ focus on gas prices and what it costs to make a living,” Angle said.

Bill to curb data center costs

House eyes Tuesday vote on bill to curb data center costs

Several more vulnerable House Republicans are now supporting the legislation.

By Kelsey Brugger and Nico Portuondo

House GOP leaders have picked Tuesday as the day to vote on legislation intended to shield Americans from the potential costs associated with the data center boom, according to two people granted anonymity to share private scheduling plans.

The upcoming floor action comes after a healthy number of vulnerable Republicans signed onto the measure in recent days, a sign that fears about the issue’s political volatility ahead of the midterms are continuing to grow as voters complain about rising energy prices as a result of data center proliferation.

The bipartisan Ratepayer Protection Act, which aims to compel tech companies to pay for the infrastructure associated with data center development, passed unanimously out of the House Energy and Commerce Committee this summer. Senior Republicans, however, said last week they were still weighing whether to bring the bill to the floor before the House recesses until after the November elections.

The decision to proceed this coming week signals that pressure has been building on leaders to act, underscored by the at least five House GOP front-liners who have signed on as co-sponsors since Sept. 1: Reps. Bill Huizenga and Tom Barrett of Michigan, David Valadao of California, Jen Kiggans of Virginia and Mónica de la Cruz of Texas.

Valadao, in an interview a week before he signed on as a co-sponsor, called such measures “fine” but balked at the idea that House Democratic leaders were trying to politicize data centers right before an election.

“Obviously it has to be addressed — making sure that we’re protecting our natural resources like water in my district,” he said. “Obviously, with California and their regulatory process, they’ve made energy more expensive than anywhere else in the country. So those are major concerns that need to be addressed, and I think those pieces of legislation will make sense.”

But, he added, allowing Democrats “to turn this into a political issue, I would say, is pretty irresponsible.”

The total number of co-sponsors on the bill, championed by Reps. Gabe Evans (R-Colo.) and Kathy Castor (D-Fla.), is up to 42 Democrats and Republicans combined.

The Tuesday vote will take place under an expedited procedure that requires a two-thirds majority of those present and voting to secure passage.

Russia sanctions bill

House sets vote on Russia sanctions bill

The Senate-passed measure will face obstacles in the House, where many Democrats worry the bill would hand the White House too much tariff authority.

Giselle Ruhiyyih Ewing

House lawmakers are set to vote on the sweeping Russia sanctions bill that senators overwhelmingly voted to approve in August, but now faces a tough test in the House where Democrats fear the bill will give President Donald Trump too much tariff power.

The Senate-passed and White House-backed measure is finally getting consideration from the House, after GOP leaders omitted it from their agenda when lawmakers returned from August recess. Many House Democrats — including Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries — have voiced opposition for fear that it would give Trump expansive and risky new tariff authorities.

House GOP enthusiasm for the measure has also been tepid, after a boost following the sudden death of its champion, Sen. Lindsey Graham, wore off.

The House Rules Committee scheduled a meeting to consider the bill Monday afternoon.

Advocates of the legislation argue the bill would give Trump the tools he needs to pressure Russian leader Vladimir Putin to end the war on Ukraine. The bill would issue mandatory sanctions on Russian leadership and its energy sector — as well as collaborators in Moscow’s defense industry and so-called shadow fleet.

But it would also give Trump the ability to hit top buyers of Russian oil with 100% tariffs, a move that Democrats say is dangerous given the White House’s eagerness to slap tariffs on U.S. friends and foes alike.

“Donald Trump already has ample authority to impose sanctions on the companies, individuals, and vessels propping up a Russian war machine that continues its deadly attacks on Ukraine,” Reps. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) and Richard Neal (D-Mass.) wrote in a joint statement with Democratic Rep. Don Beyer of Virginia and Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) earlier this month. “Congress does not need to greenlight new tariff authority for the President to impose those sanctions on Russia today.”

“The White House is pushing Johnson to jam this through because Trump is desperate for new tariff power, not because he needs new tools against Russia,” Meeks added in a statement on Friday.

Backers of the bill were quick to encourage its passage after the vote was announced on Friday.

“Great news that the House will vote on the much-needed Russia sanctions bill,” Senate Foreign Relations ranking member Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) wrote on social media. “Ukrainian civilians continue to be killed by Putin’s war machine, and this bill hits the Kremlin’s coffers hard. Now is the time to pass it and force Putin to the negotiating table.”

The measure passed in an 86-11 vote in the Senate in August.

“Russia ought to be sanctioned to smithereens,” said a European official, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive legislation. “The bill is not perfect but it would grant the administration additional leverage over Russia and send a vital message of political and symbolic support to Ukraine.”

Narrative looks different.

America Grew Up Believing the Good Guys Always Win

Our history is filled with stories of enemies who underestimated us and good guys who ultimately prevailed. Twenty-five years after 9/11, that narrative looks different.

By John F. Harris

Most Americans learning history at a young age grow up believing three things:

First, that America is on the side of the good guys.

Second, that the bad guys often perceive all the arguing and disarray and indulgence that is interwoven with freedom as a form of weakness — and thereby dangerously underestimate American power and resolve.

And third, that the good guys always win in the end.

Yes, yes, of course — as one gets older and understands the path more deeply, it is clear how much the American story is filled with contradiction, complexity, contingency. Most honest people acknowledge that there have been plenty of occasions when American power was not on the side of the good guys, when this power did not achieve its aims, and that in a large and diverse planet the American perspective is not always going to prevail.

Yet on a day — a quarter-century after the 9/11 attacks — when many people are reflecting on one of the most searing imprints on the American experience, it is worth acknowledging how much of the narrative we grew up believing in grade school and high school is grounded in genuine history.

Ken Burns’s documentary, The American Revolution, released last year ahead of our 250th birthday, was a riveting reminder of how tenuous the country’s founding was. Even afterward, many European elites did not expect democratic self-governance to last — especially in a country riven by slavery — and at key junctures leading up to and culminating in the Civil War it looked likely the skeptics would be right. Marx thought capitalist societies would be destroyed by internal contradictions, and it took the modern social state — and Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States — to prove him wrong. In the 20th century, leaders of totalitarian states from Germany to Japan to the Soviet Union thought the United States was too complacent, too disengaged from the world, too enthralled with material comforts and middle-brow consumer culture to fight and win a global clash of civilizations.

In each instance, however, after a lumbering and uneven start, the good guys won in the end. Adversaries fatally misunderstood American character.

How does this foundational American narrative hold up in the case of the violent pivot history took 25 years ago today?

If 9/11 is the modern equivalent of Pearl Harbor, we are now living through the equivalent of 1966. By then, World War II was emphatically in the past, securely enshrined as a triumph of free societies generally and U.S. power specifically. The once-young men and women keeping the country running were still in early middle-age — raising families, working on the factory floor, tending to suburban lawns, growing increasingly worried about Vietnam, watching Bonanza, selling insurance, mixing too many cocktails after afternoon golf. The “Greatest Generation” iconography crafted by President Ronald Reagan and Tom Brokaw would not come for another couple of decades.

I suspect I am joined by many people — those of us, that is, who were at least in early adulthood in 2001 — in perceiving that 9/11 still feels profoundly immediate, not something in the distant past, and that it does not yet conform to a comforting American narrative. This is not because there is a scintilla of ambiguity of who the good guys were, or are. The murkiness flows from what constitutes a “win” and even more from ambiguity about what counts as “in the end.”

By the most literal accounting, the United States fought back and won. Osama bin Laden has been dead for 15 years, after an effort that spanned both the Bush and Obama administrations and was a testament to U.S. intelligence and military prowess. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the 9/11 mastermind, has been in U.S. custody since early 2003, currently at Guantanamo Bay.

Pulling the lens back one increment makes the situation a bit more blurry. Despite 20 years of war and about 6,500 U.S. military and contractor deaths, the Taliban is again in power in Afghanistan. There remains considerable journalistic and scholarly debate about what bin Laden’s strategic motivations were on 9/11. Some believe he expected the provocation would lead the United States to overextend itself militarily in the Middle East, arguably what happened, while others thought he wrongly calculated the United States would simply retreat in disgust. Bin Laden believed the United States was the “far enemy.” He certainly did not achieve his aims for the “near enemy” — the collapse of what he believed were corrupt, illegitimate Western-collaborating Middle East political regimes in favor of a new Islamic caliphate across the region.

At the same time, he surely would take satisfaction at much of what has happened in the United States and around the world in the past 25 years: the fraying and possible dissolution of the NATO alliance; the rise of authoritarianism, with popular support, in many parts of the world; a deep erosion among many Americans in support for the Israeli government; another Middle East war underway, in Iran; an American political culture that is more remorselessly divided than it has been in generations and a populace with shaken confidence about the future. Pew Research Center surveys this year found 69% of Americans are dissatisfied with the direction of the country and 59% believe the United States’ “best years are behind us.”

The 9/11 attacks and the decade that followed — which includes the Iraq War and the 2008 financial meltdown — are probably not the primary causal factor behind most of these downbeat trends, but they are at least adjacent to many of them.

Pulling back the lens further still, the reason 9/11 still feels like a contemporary event with a deeply unsettled aftermath is that it is part of a larger historical chapter that is far from over.

One leader who knows that is President Donald Trump. Whatever else one thinks about him, he is at bottom a transactional man: With the right combination of savvy and strength, he believes, a deal is always possible. He came into his second term saying, and seemingly believing, that a deal ending the Russia-Ukraine war could under his ministrations be achieved within days. Yet the war grinds on implacably. In office, he has raised the possibilities of grand bargains settling the Gaza conflict (by turning the area into a great real estate and resort destination). He has talked up his ability to make a deal with North Korea’s regime over its nuclear ambitions. It is impossible to count the number of times he has announced a breakthrough, or being on the brink of one, with Iran. By any measure, Iran has been militarily decimated — and may continue to be — but to Trump’s surprise, its surviving leaders keep fighting.

What the United States learned (or more precisely re-learned) Sept. 11, 2001, is that we live on a violent planet where many people have worldviews in which they aren’t seeking deals or arrangements as these are understood in conventional Western terms. Osama bin Laden is dead, but his radical spirit — in diverse incarnations — still animates the age.

In this sense, the historical epoch that began on 9/11 is much more akin to the Cold War than World War II. In both those cases the good guys — believing in democracy, pluralism, rule of law, individual dignity, basic decency — won in the end. Surely, they will once again. But it may take a while yet.

Court deals first blow

Court deals first blow to Trump’s coal rescue campaign

The ruling casts a pall on the administration's orders requiring six coal plants across the country to stay online past their retirement dates.

By Niina H. Farah

A federal appeals court on Friday rejected an Energy Department emergency order that kept a Michigan coal plant running months past its planned retirement date, delivering a stinging first blow to the Trump administration’s efforts to hand U.S. coal a lifeline.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit found that Energy Secretary Chris Wright failed to show that federal intervention over state authority was warranted when he ordered a Michigan utility to keep operating the J.H. Campbell power plant in May 2025 — days before it was scheduled to shut down permanently.

“Our reading of the text, structure, and history leaves us unpersuaded by DOE’s sweeping conception of its ‘emergency’ authority,” said Judge Cornelia Pillard, writing the opinion for the court.

“The Department’s position would empower it to pick its preferred power sources in Michigan — or, presumably, any other state — and order them to operate without regard to the multiple procedural and substantive constraints built into state reliability planning processes,” said Pillard, an Obama appointee.

Chief Judge Sri Srinivasan and Judge Robert Wilkins, also Obama appointees, joined the decision.

The ruling is a big win for Michigan and Illinois, along with a coalition of environmental groups that challenged the emergency order. The ruling also lays the groundwork for how other courts could respond to a string of similar orders — including three others challenged before the D.C. Circuit — challenging emergency orders requiring six coal plants across the country to remain online.

Michael Lenoff, an Earthjustice attorney representing the environmental challengers in the Campbell plant case, said the decision was a rebuke of the Trump administration’s “abuse of emergency powers.”

“DOE needs to stay in its lane and use its emergency powers only in actual emergencies,” Lenoff said in a statement following the ruling.

“Preventing the market-driven retirements of coal plants to advance a coal-friendly agenda is not a proper use of emergency powers,” he said. “We will continue to challenge unlawful orders if DOE persists in issuing them.”

The Trump administration could choose to appeal the ruling. The Justice Department declined to comment on the decision.

Wright’s order invoked a provision of the Federal Power Act that gives the DOE secretary authority to keep plants operating under emergency circumstances, such as wartime power shocks or natural disasters.

The Trump administration repeatedly extended the initial 90-day order to keep the Campbell plant running.

The D.C. Circuit found that the section of the law was “best read to apply where the Department identifies a risk of substantial harm from inadequate electricity supply that calls for immediate action by DOE in particular, as opposed to by the states.”

DOE’s move to extend the life of the Campbell plant was a gift for Michigan Republicans from the get-go. Since then, the issue has emerged as a flash point in some races across the state, with Democrats criticizing DOE’s involvement.

The D.C. Circuit’s decision just gave those Democrats a win by bolstering their position.

Consumers Energy, the owner of the Campbell plant, said it was reviewing the court’s ruling.

“While that happens, we are continuing to comply with the current 90-day Department of Energy order that keeps the Campbell plant operating,” the utility said in an emailed statement. “Ultimately, we will follow the law and work to ensure that everyone who benefits from power from the Campbell plant across the Midwest pays their fair share.”

Dangerous, radical and frankly weird

‘Dangerous, radical and frankly weird’: How Republicans used their Dallas convention to frame up the midterms

In an election that is likely to be decided over the cost of living, Republicans are doing everything they can to paint their Democratic opponents as radicals.

By Andrew Howard and Aaron Pellish

Republicans made their midterm convention all about red meat for their base. Their message on affordability, the issue voters are hungriest to hear about, was just a side dish.

On stage at the Republican National Committee’s midterm convention, in private meetings just off-site in hotels around Dallas and in TV ads airing in between live coverage of the unusual spectacle, the party’s main focus was painting Democrats as too extreme.

But poll after poll shows that the cost of living is voters’ top concern by a wide margin. And while Republican leaders touted the Trump administration’s tax cuts and other economic policies in their speeches, few spent much time making an affirmative case for alleviating those concerns.

Instead, Republicans have sought to tie Democratic candidates in competitive races to the progressive figures leading the farthest edge of the party’s left flank, while framing their candidates as defenders against a “radical” party.

“If they win, the greatest legislative body in history will, for the first time ever, be controlled by a communist caucus,” President Donald Trump told the crowd Wednesday, his first of two headline speeches.

“This is about common sense versus crazy,” North Carolina GOP Senate nominee Michael Whatley said in an interview, using the same phrase as numerous other Republican leaders, including National Republican Congressional Committee Chair Richard Hudson (R-N.C.),Speaker Mike Johnson and Vice President JD Vance.

“These people are sick,” House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) said of Democrats from the podium.

“This midterm, we face the most dangerous, radical and frankly weird Democrat candidates in American history,” said Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

All received raucous praise from attendees at the American Airlines Center, which was littered with MAGA hats and anti-communism merch. One attendee sported a shirt that read “AMERICA. NO COMMIES!”

Republicans know they desperately need to turn out the low-propensity base voters that returned Trump to office in 2024 to avoid a Democratic deluge this fall. The president’s direct plea asking voters to treat the midterms as if he’s on the ballot during his Wednesday speech typifies the approach, said a GOP strategist backing Republican congressional candidates, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly.

“That is him trying to turn out low-propensity Trump voters,” the person said. “To me, that’s what this convention is for.”

Battleground Republicans have been emphasizing the affordability a bit more in TV ads in their districts — but even then, that effort pales in comparison to the number of attack ads they’re lobbing against Democrats. Since Aug. 1, Republican candidates, committees and aligned PACs have spent $267.8 million on TV ads in competitive House and Senate races, per ad tracking firm AdImpact. Of those, $130 million were characterized by AdImpact as being tonally negative, while $91.2 million mentioned taxes or taxation — the most common theme of Republicans’ economic messaging in ads as well as onstage in Dallas.

As both sides continue to move resources into redder territory, turning out the GOP base with dire warnings about Democrats becomes more important. In those states, the GOP may be able to stanch the bleeding simply by mobilizing their own voters in droves rather than persuading disaffected independents.

At a private luncheon featuring GOP Senate leaders, battleground senators and candidates hosted by the Senate Leadership Fund on Wednesday, the conversation included tight races in Iowa and Texas, both of which Trump won by double digits in 2024. On Thursday, the Trump-aligned super PAC MAGA Inc. announced that Vance would head to Kansas, where GOP Sen. Roger Marshall is facing a surprisingly competitive reelection bid.

One convention attendee from the state was overheard by a POLITICO reporter bemoaning Marshall’s situation — in a state where the GOP hasn’t lost a Senate race in more than 90 years — on the hotel shuttle after Trump’s speech Wednesday.

Several top Republicans have tried to deflect by blaming Democrats in those closed-door meetings.

In a Thursday donor meeting hosted by SLF, Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) sought to ease donors’ concerns about the escalating tariffs with Canada and the war in Iran hurting Republicans in battleground states, including in normally red Alaska, by leaning into the fears of Democrats gaining control of Congress, according to two people in the room, who were granted anonymity to discuss the private meeting. And at a private meeting in Dallas with delegates from battleground states on Thursday, Vance urged Republicans to lean into the contrast with Democrats.

“We’ve got to nationalize this election, we’ve got to talk about all the crazy things Democrats are doing,” Vance said, according to audio obtained by POLITICO.

The cohesive theme from the stage and elsewhere in Dallas was the culmination of months of planning from GOP operatives, who have been forecasting that November’s midterms will be won or lost over whether Americans believe that Democrats are radical and ready to kill the American dream. SLF President Alex Latcham told POLITICO in July: “This needs to be an election about fear.”

A senior House GOP operative, granted anonymity to discuss internal party strategy, said the party needs to make the midterms “a choice, not a referendum.”

“Republicans would be well served to paint that choice in as clear terms as possible,” the operative said.

But it’s unclear whether voters in less-friendly territory than a heavily scripted convention full of MAGA hats will buy that argument in November — even in the deep red states and districts where Republicans are suddenly playing defense.

“The right strategy is not just to attack the other side and attack those policy proposals,” said Bill Riggs, spokesperson for Americans for Prosperity Action, the Koch-backed GOP-aligned super PAC. “You need to do that, but it’s not going to be enough. You also have to be providing a credible alternative to voters that they trust. Driving that contrast is where we’re continuing to advocate.”

Some speakers touted the Republican tax cuts passed last year and other Trump economic policies as their response to voters’ concerns about the economy. One of the few forward-looking suggestions for alleviating voters’ economic hardships came from the president himself, who pledged to issue a $5,000 dividend to every adult American if Republicans retain control of Congress.

That drew private eyerolls from some Republicans who said the proposal directly clashes with their effort to paint the midterms as a choice between commonsense Republicans and socialist Democrats. “We’re supposed to be fighting socialism,” said one House Republican granted anonymity to speak candidly. “This seems a lot like socialism.”

History hasn’t been kind to parties that rely mostly on a contrast over a forward-looking message, ask for patience during tough economic times or blame the other party for their woes.

In 2024, Democrats constantly warned of the threat of Trump’s return to power and stressed that inflation was coming down — only to be pummeled at the ballot box by voters who were fed up with the economy. The same was true in 2010 for Democrats.

Iowa Republican House candidate Joe Mitchell, like many other Republicans in Dallas, laid the current economic conditions at the feet of Democrats — and namely former President Joe Biden.

“Voters in Iowa aren’t dumb,” Mitchell said on the sidelines of the convention. “They understand the cost of living went up exponentially under Joe Biden and the Democrats.”

“I know what a stack of bills looks like on the kitchen table,” Rep. Monica De La Cruz (R-Texas) said during her speech. “And for four years, Joe Biden and his party made that stack taller.”

Some Republicans openly acknowledged from the stage in Dallas that their pitch to voters needs to extend beyond serving as a bulwark against Democrats.

“It’s not enough just to defend,” said Mike Bouchard, who’s running in the battleground Michigan 10th District. “We must advance, and to do that, we must have real solutions.”

$108 per barrel... Winning!

Global oil hits $108 per barrel while bond yields surge

By John Towfighi, Matt Egan

Oil prices surged Thursday, with Brent crude hitting $108 per barrel for the first time since May, as traders brace for a more prolonged supply shock caused by the Iran war.

Oil prices have climbed back above the $100 per barrel mark this week as fighting in the Straight of Hormuz and Red Sea has intensified. The US and Iran have traded strikes, while the Iran-backed Houthis have attacked Saudi Arabia and ignited tensions in the Bab al-Mandab Strait.

Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, rose as much as 7.1% and hit $108 per barrel before settling at $107.63, up 6.34% on the day. It was Brent’s highest settle level since May 19 and its biggest one-day jump in six weeks.

US crude rose as much as 7.3% and hit $103 per barrel for the first time since May before pulling back slightly and settling at $102.48, up 6.69% on the day. It was US crude’s highest settle level since May 19 and its biggest one-day jump in two months.

Resurgent conflict has stoked concerns of further disruptions to global oil supplies and the flow of crude through the Strait of Hormuz.

“The step up in attacks in the Strait of Hormuz and by the Houthis against Saudi Arabia suggests that Iran and its proxies are trying to regain the initiative in the war,” Jason Tuvey, deputy chief emerging markets economist at Capital Economics, said in a note.

“This could set back the recovery in oil output in the Gulf and raises the risk that global energy prices rise even further in the coming weeks,” Tuvey said.

Oil surge at odds with Trump’s vision

For the first time since the war started, S&P Global Energy said Thursday it does not expect Middle East oil production to return to pre-war levels by the end of next year. The firm no longer assumes a definitive end to the war nor a return to normal in the Strait of Hormuz by the end of 2027.

S&P now expects oil prices to stay high – in the $80 to $100 a barrel range – through next year.

By contrast, President Donald Trump on Wednesday night promised a speedy return of cheap energy.

“Prices right after this very important election on November 3rd will be plummeting,” Trump said. “The war will be over very shortly after the election.”

Jim Burkhard, global head of crude oil research at S&P Global Energy, said the market is “not returning to calm.”

“It is adjusting to the new normal defined by unresolved conflict and persistent Maritime risk,” Burkhard said in the report.

Bond market turmoil

The rise in oil prices has added to nerves about inflation and central bank rate hikes, sending ripples through bonds and stocks.

The bond market sell-off intensified on Thursday, with the key 10-year Treasury yield surging 11 basis points to 4.95%, its highest level since October 2023.

Bond yields have surged despite the Treasury Department on Wednesday announcing it would buy back up to $6 billion bonds on Thursday, a move that could ease pressure on yields.

Some investors weren’t satisfied with the scale of the announcement, while others contend that government buybacks aren’t enough to change the trajectory of bond yields, which have surged this year on concerns about higher energy prices and central bank rate hikes.

“Treasury is figuratively shooting a BB gun at an elephant,” Mike O’Rourke, chief market strategist at JonesTrading, said in a note.

The surge in oil prices and bond yields Thursday morning came as new data showed headline wholesale inflation picked up in August. Traders are pricing in a 70% chance that the Federal Reserve raises interest rates at its policy meeting next week, up from a 61% chance on Wednesday and a 49% chance one week ago, according to CME FedWatch.

Stocks were lower Thursday, with the major US indexes dropping for the fourth day in a row. The S&P 500 fell 0.6%, extending a recent bout of weakness.

The S&P 500 is down more than 2.5% since its last record high on August 13. As corporate earnings season winds down, investors are turning their focus to the Iran war, rising bond yields and assessing the outlook for the Federal Reserve.

Pressure on consumers

The stress from the war with Iran is showing up in markets beyond just crude oil. Diesel prices, essential for the fuel powering trucking and shipping, have surged this year to record highs. The national average diesel price hit a record $5.98 a gallon on Thursday, according to AAA data.

The spike in refined oil products is more concerning than crude oil surging, said Claudio Galimberti, chief economist at Rystad Energy. Businesses, industry and consumers use refined products, so the trends in the price of diesel matter more than just what’s going on with Brent crude, Galimberti said.

“When it comes to crude, the situation is actually less dangerous than it is in the oil products, specifically diesel,” Galimberti told CNN.

Meanwhile, the recent jump in bond yields is driving borrowing costs higher across the economy. Mortgage rates, which tend to track the 10-year yield, are at their highest levels in 15 months.

The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate was 6.76% this week, according to Freddie Mac. The rate is significantly higher than it was a year ago when it stood at 6.35%

The European Central Bank raised its main interest rate by a quarter of a percentage point to 2.5% Thursday, the second increase this year as the energy shock precipitated by the Iran war drives prices higher.

“The conflict in the Middle East continues to generate inflation pressures, and inflation is set to remain well above target for an extended period,” the ECB said in a statement.

Here we go, more destruction of what is left of america.....

Trump admin pushes sweeping overhaul of census that could exclude millions, reshape Congress and slash federal funding

By Piper Hudspeth Blackburn

The Trump administration on Wednesday proposed sweeping changes to the US census that could leave millions out of the count, dramatically altering the allocation of congressional seats and billions in federal funds.

The proposed regulation posted in the Federal Register would add a citizenship question to the 2030 census and exclude immigrants who are not legal permanent residents from the nationwide population survey, leaving out undocumented individuals, asylum seekers and refugees.

The proposal — similar to an unsuccessful effort from President Donald Trump’s first term — marks a dramatic shift from longstanding census practices which have historically counted all residents regardless of immigration status.

Critics and civil rights groups have long warned that Trump’s attempt to add a citizenship question would result in minorities being undercounted by scaring off even legal residents or naturalized citizens from completing the decennial questionnaire, which is also used to determine funding for an array of government programs.

It could take months for the proposed changes to become official, and they are likely to face legal challenges. The public has 30 days to submit comments in response.

The rules, which are not final, come just over a year after Trump directed the Department of Commerce to begin work on a new census that excludes undocumented immigrants and adds the citizenship question back to the census. The regulatory effort also arrives months after the administration installed a group of partisan analysts from the Trump-aligned America First Policy Institute inside the Census Bureau, CNN reported in August. The agency has traditionally been led by career statisticians and operated independently of the White House.

The US Constitution requires a national census every ten years in order to determine how many seats each state gets in the House of Representatives. The 14th Amendment requires a count of “the whole number of persons in each State.”

The administration is also seeking to not include questions about race, ethnicity or sexual orientation, claiming that the survey “should be colorblind and should not be distorted in any way by questions about immaterial personal characteristics.”

Trump has been trying to rewrite the census rules since his first term, when he attempted to reinsert the citizenship question which had been included in most census counts from 1820 to 1950. He has argued it was necessary to better comply with federal voting rights law.

The president’s move led to a lawsuit from a coalition of 18 attorneys general, six cities and the bipartisan US Conference of Mayors and was ultimately blocked by the Supreme Court.

After the high court’s ruling, Trump eventually backed away from the effort and went on to ask federal agencies to provide records that could determine a head count of citizens instead.