“Senate Majority Leader John Thune plans to run for another term as GOP leader, even if Republicans lose the chamber’s majority,” Axios reports.
“Thune is giving his senators broad leeway and tons of cash to preserve GOP control of the Senate.”
Said Thune: “I do see the Senate as a firewall in a lot of ways.”
“Jet fumes aren’t taking over in the Senate. Some vulnerable Republicans are more eager to stay in Washington next week, a rare twist so close to election time,” Punchbowl News reports.
“There was interest at the closed-door Senate GOP lunch this afternoon in returning and voting on the Ratepayer Protection Act, which has already passed the House. GOP senators in competitive races are anxious to take some votes they believe could help back home — after spending most of the September work period on a college sports bill.”
“There’s particular GOP interest in addressing data centers, an increasingly hot issue on the campaign trail.”
Said Senate Majority Leader John Thune: “I’d say right now, still odds are we plan on being here next week, and I’d say that still looks like the case.”
National Journal: “With 41 days left until the midterm elections, Trump has made 12 campaign stops in 2026, compared to the 17 he had made by this time in the 2018 midterm cycle.”
“There’s evidence to suggest that some battleground Republicans might not want Trump in their districts.”
“A judge on Wednesday dismissed Donald Trump’s lawsuit accusing The Des Moines Register and its former pollster of misrepresenting the state of the 2024 presidential race, rejecting the president’s claim that the newspaper’s poll coverage violated Iowa’s consumer fraud law,” the Associated Press reports.
“Adam Hamilton is asking Kansans to take a leap of faith and do something that hasn’t been done in 94 years: send a Democrat to the U.S. Senate,” CNN reports.
“He’s captured the attention of Republicans, becoming the latest headache in their quest to maintain their Senate majority.”
Oliver Darcy: “On Tuesday, after Donald Trump banned Politico from the White House alongside CNN and MS NOW, the White House press office dispatched a letter to the Rosslyn-based news organization attempting to justify the president’s actions…”
“The White House singled out six stories published by Politico, including a June 2026 article that cited a ‘senior administration official’ who put the odds of the U.S. striking a deal with Iran to end the war at between 80 and 85 percent. That senior administration official was none other than Vice President JD Vance.”
“Indeed, Vance not only briefed Politico on the state of the Iran deal talks, but spoke to a group of reporters from several news organizations. In exchange for the information, those outlets agreed to grant Vance anonymity.”
“A federal judge on Wednesday signaled he is skeptical of President Trump’s ban on CNN, MS NOW and Politico from White House grounds, saying in a hearing that the outlets were not given due process before their access was cut off,” CBS News reports.
Deadline: Judge says he’ll rule “as soon as I can” on Trump’s ban on CNN, Politico and MS NOW.
“Republican Senate candidates in Georgia and North Carolina are struggling to create enough distance from Donald Trump to boost their prospects in the November midterm elections, as polls show rising voter frustration over the president’s inability to lower the cost-of-living,” Bloomberg reports.
“While an increasing number of Republicans across the country, including in several tight Senate races, are moving to distance themselves from the president less than six weeks before Election Day, that’s not an option all vulnerable GOP candidates can take.”
“North Carolina’s Michael Whatley and Georgia Representative Mike Collins are high on that list, with polls showing the two candidates consistently trailing their Democratic rivals. Yet they don’t have much of a choice but to align themself with the president because they are known essentially for one thing: their ties to Trump.”
The Guardian: Republican jitters grow as unpopular Trump fuels midterm “bloodbath” fears.
A new Echelon Insights poll finds Democrats leading Republicans on the generic congressional ballot, 51% to 43%.
“Sen. Susan Collins is vehemently denying a ProPublica report out earlier this week that says the FBI targeted her in a corruption probe,” ABC News reports.
Said Collins: “The Biden Justice Department found that there was no wrongdoing by any one of my campaign staff, my office, or me. This is absolutely outrageous. It’s clearly a political hit job.”
Fox News: Susan Collins tears into bribery allegations as new claims emerge during critical Senate battle.
Eli McKown-Dawson: “They have massive amounts of outside spending, but their candidates are consistently being outraised by Democrats.”
“Two Democratic senators are attempting to force a vote Thursday on a bill requiring artificial intelligence firms to submit their new models for government approval,” the Washington Sun reports.
“Sens. Mark Warner of Virginia and Brian Schatz of Hawaii will introduce a bill mandating that frontier companies such as Anthropic and OpenAI have the National Security Agency assess their models prior to release. Currently, the Trump administration has set up only an optional regime for testing the models.”
“Conservative podcasters appear to be losing interest in President Trump. Instead, they are criticizing a Bible-quoting Democrat threatening to flip red Texas, and they can’t stop talking about a murder trial that divided a jury—and the country,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“The Wall Street Journal analyzed nearly 70,000 hours of podcasts to understand the topics that conservative podcasters—some of whom helped propel Donald Trump to victory in 2024—are talking about, and what has fallen out of the conversation. The analysis captures the political mood in key corners before crucial midterm elections in November.”
“In the weeks leading up to President Trump welcoming President Xi Jinping of China to Washington on Wednesday evening, Beijing has been accused of undermining America’s national interests on a number of fronts,” the New York Times reports.
“But as his meeting with Mr. Xi approached, Mr. Trump has repeatedly found ways to give him a pass — portraying him more as a personal friend than as a geopolitical competitor despite significant rivalries on matters of global power, trade, artificial intelligence and more.”
“Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. accepted $4 million in book advances and more than $270,000 in gifts over the past year from close allies who are working to advance his Make America Healthy Again agenda,” the New York Times reports.
“Ethics experts said the financial relationships may violate federal rules barring officials from profiting from their government position, and call into question the secretary’s ability to remain independent and impartial.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
