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At the beginning of the week, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced six new additions to their “Red ...
10/09/2026

At the beginning of the week, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced six new additions to their “Red to Blue” list, a signal of support from the party. The average margin of victory for Donald Trump in 2024 in these six seats was more than 16 points. But that’s not what caught my eye; it was the presence on the list of Arkansas’s Second Congressional District, which includes the majority of Little Rock and its suburbs.

My colleague Zachary Groz wrote about the U.S. Senate race in Arkansas, where Sen. Tom Cotton is fending off a challenge from a populist farmer named Hallie Shoffner. But this House seat that popped up on Red to Blue is particularly significant, and for one reason: It’s held by French Hill. He’s the current chair of the House Financial Services Committee. He’s Wall Street’s congressman.

That gives him access to a veritable ocean of cash. Hill has received $1.46 million in PAC donations this cycle, according to the website Open Secrets. Four of the top five industries that have contributed to him directly are commercial banks ($430,000), security brokers and investment firms ($247,000), crypto companies ($174,000), and life insurance companies ($165,000). The other top industry is “retired,” a perennial for old Republicans boosted by other old Republicans. Online trading app Robinhood, insurer MetLife, crypto exchange Coinbase, energy trader Virtu, and the Mortgage Bankers Association are Hill’s biggest donors. Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman and Charles Schwab himself have maxed out. All that was as of the end of June.

Yet it hasn’t been enough to stop the bleeding, as Democrat Chris Jones tries to pull off the upset. There’s been $1.5 million in Republican support for Hill since August, Punchbowl News reported. This includes half a million from an obscure group formed in July called the “Committee for American Leadership,” which has compared Jones to AOC and Bernie Sanders in one attack ad, while another made vague claims of corruption. Defend American Jobs, a D.C.-area conservative PAC, is spending a similar amount boosting Hill.

https://buff.ly/7juU8Uq

Several pro-bank Republicans on the House Financial Services Committee are in trouble. Crypto’s cash may not break through, either.

Thousands of people are preparing to protect the midterm elections and mobilize immediately if President Trump interfere...
10/09/2026

Thousands of people are preparing to protect the midterm elections and mobilize immediately if President Trump interferes with the results. They are drawing lessons from the American civil rights era and from fights against authoritarianism worldwide, attending political education classes, and reassessing exactly how much they will risk, personally, to stand between a government takeover and the will of the voters.

“There’s a deeper, broader, bolder set of efforts afoot to prepare people for much more existential scenarios that could come our way that would call into question the pillars of our democracy itself for what it’s for and who it’s for,” said Jackson Potter, vice president of the Chicago Teachers Union. “People are zeroing in.”

He’s organizing with May Day Strong, which this month hosted more than 750 “solidarity school” training sessions nationwide. The group is now in the midst of a week of direct action to call on corporate executives to use their influence to defend the midterms, which organizers told the Prospect is a key part of training because it gives volunteers ways to practice confronting power ahead of Election Day. https://buff.ly/8XVjFTm

Thousands of people are preparing for November 3 in political education and nonviolent direct action workshops, and reconsidering what they’re willing to risk.

Since the Supreme Court ruled earlier this year in Mullin v. Doe that the Trump administration could end Temporary Prote...
10/09/2026

Since the Supreme Court ruled earlier this year in Mullin v. Doe that the Trump administration could end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for immigrants from countries experiencing humanitarian crises that make it difficult to return home safely, the lives of thousands who had the legal right to live and work in the U.S. have been thrown into upheaval. Hundreds of Haitians have been deported back to a country riddled with violence and political instability, despite the State Department issuing a “Do not travel” advisory for the country. Throughout the Trump administration, Haitian TPS holders have seen a surge in targeting by ICE, which included “probation” in the form of ankle monitors, arrest, detention, and now deportation.

TPS was established in 1990 as a part of the Immigration Act, creating a legal status for nationals from designated countries, with work permits and protection from deportation. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has the discretion to renew the period in which people can stay in the U.S. (up to 18 months), which it can extend indefinitely. As of last March, there were over one million people with TPS status in the U.S., with migrants from Venezuela, Haiti, and El Salvador accounting for the majority.

That last country on the list is unique, because El Salvador during the Trump administration has become a staunch ally. Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele has accepted and imprisoned detainees and agreed to other favors from the administration. And that could be impacting the country’s TPS designation.

Salvadorans have been legally protected from deportation for 25 years. The administration has declined to eliminate that status, amid a complicated geopolitical relationship.

The media’s opinion leaders are always looking for the next big thing in election trends. Data centers and AI have explo...
10/08/2026

The media’s opinion leaders are always looking for the next big thing in election trends. Data centers and AI have exploded as midterm issues, and now they’re being lapped by Flock cameras. Compared to these, focusing on health care sounds practically antiquated. But with $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts and the expiration of Obamacare tax credits leading to spiking insurance premium prices and struggling hospitals, health care costs are in fact a top-tier concern, even if it seems boring to some to report about.

The Republican scheme to delay Medicaid cuts until after the election to avoid this reckoning was always doomed to fail. Health systems must plan for the future, and that future is coming in a matter of months. Hospitals are predictably cutting services or closing in advance, and the Obamacare subsidy cuts have been in place for close to a year. It was obvious this would be an anchor for Republicans, and that is playing out across the country.

In fact, health care may be just the thing to spur what would be one of the biggest upsets in November. Dr. Annie Andrews, a pediatrician and mother of three, is making the U.S. Senate race in South Carolina competitive. https://buff.ly/63l1uEE

An unusually detailed health care policy platform from Dr. Annie Andrews, a pediatrician, attacks Big Insurance, Big Pharma, and big hospital systems for putting profits over care.

It’s been more than a decade since a Democrat has held statewide office in Arkansas. Long gone are the days of two-term ...
10/08/2026

It’s been more than a decade since a Democrat has held statewide office in Arkansas. Long gone are the days of two-term Gov. Mike Beebe sweeping every county in the state in 2010, trouncing his Republican opponent by 30 points despite the GOP enjoying a wave year almost everywhere else.

Distant is the memory of the nearly ten-year stretch at the turn of the 21st century when Arkansans had two sitting Democratic senators repping Bill Clinton’s home turf, before both lost back-to-back re-election efforts by 20 points.

But a recent shock poll has given Arkansas Democrats a glimmer of hope that their long slide could reverse in November. An August survey out of Hendrix College showed Hallie Shoffner, a former rice and soybean farmer from the Arkansas Delta and the Democratic U.S. Senate nominee, leading Republican incumbent Tom Cotton by three points. https://buff.ly/KylEg3P

Farmer and Democrat Hallie Shoffner is taking on Big Ag in a long-shot Senate race against Republican Tom Cotton.

Fourteen years ago this month, one of Jeffrey Epstein’s friends emailed him a tentative itinerary for a quick trip to Ca...
10/08/2026

Fourteen years ago this month, one of Jeffrey Epstein’s friends emailed him a tentative itinerary for a quick trip to Caracas, listing nine “movers and shakers” the pe*****le middleman needed to meet. Third on the list was Alejandro Betancourt, described as a “very very interesting kid” who “is only 34 years old and has over $3bill in contracts with the venezuelan gov’t.”

Today, Betancourt, whose full name is Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt López, runs a company that just made, on its face, the most lopsided financial deal since the Russians sold us Alaska for $7 million: an agreement to spend $100 billion upgrading 17 Venezuelan oil fields, then to sell a fifth of the output of those fields to the United States at cost, for the next hundred years. Until weeks ago, the U.K.-based Betancourt was wanted in Switzerland for his involvement in various schemes to divert billions of dollars from various Venezuelan state-owned enterprises. But The Washington Post and others reported that Swiss authorities withdrew their extradition request from Britain under pressure from U.S. officials. And shortly thereafter, three top prosecutors from the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office jumped ship to work for Betancourt, according to the Financial Times.

Which is to say: The oil deal was a very good one, but only for Betancourt. Venezuela appears to be getting royally screwed, which continues a very old story. https://buff.ly/5F3rHGn

A reviled ‘boligarch’ and his right-wing adversaries are engaged in a low-level war, but the only people who will feel the impact are the Venezuelan people.

A federal judge has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to return Ahmed Soliman to the United States, five month...
10/08/2026

A federal judge has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to return Ahmed Soliman to the United States, five months after he was expelled to Equatorial Guinea, a country where he has no ties, in a decision that could have far-reaching implications for thousands of others subjected to the Trump administration’s third-country removal scheme.

A Trump-apppointed judge ordered Ahmed Soliman must be returned to the United States.

A third-country national recently freed from the African prison he was expelled to by the Trump administration got stuck...
10/07/2026

A third-country national recently freed from the African prison he was expelled to by the Trump administration got stuck in an international airport terminal for nearly 60 hours this week due to problems with his paperwork. The 45-year-old man came to the United States as a child refugee.

Finally out of the prison Trump expelled him to, Phone Chomsavanh’s fight for freedom hit one more snag.

Last month, the U.S. Postal Service was thrust into the headlines again when the Supreme Court temporarily blocked Presi...
10/07/2026

Last month, the U.S. Postal Service was thrust into the headlines again when the Supreme Court temporarily blocked President Trump’s new restrictions on mail-in voting. https://buff.ly/7VkFo7M

Oversight Democrats should expose how Trump’s bastardization of USPS has hurt the American people—and present a more reliable alternative.

The settlement comes as more Americans approve of unions and as organized labor gains new ground in spite of GOP interfe...
10/07/2026

The settlement comes as more Americans approve of unions and as organized labor gains new ground in spite of GOP interference and efforts to privilege billionaires, bosses, and management.

Multiple labor unions sued the Trump administration last September over its attempt to fire thousands of federal workers during the government shutdown.

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