Just dropped · Trial Balloon · Ep. 193
The Magnificent Seven
“Flávio Bolsonaro and President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva were statistically tied in a poll released on the eve of Brazil’s runoff election,” Bloomberg reports.
“Bolsonaro had 50.5% support to Lula’s 49.5%, according to the BTG Pactual/Nexus poll, a gap within the 2 percentage-point margin of error and little changed from Monday when the right-wing challenger led by less than a point.”
“Democratic groups and voting-rights advocates are seeking to join a federal lawsuit to stop the Justice Department’s effort to prevent Alaska from certifying its U.S. Senate election results if Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan loses,” CNBC reports.
“Together, the groups argue that the executive branch lacks legal authority to intervene in state-run elections and is attempting an unprecedented override of state election administration with early voting already underway.”
Rick Hasen calls the Justice Department lawsuit the “weakest election law complaint ever.”
Hasen has more in Slate: “With just days to go before November’s midterms, the Department of Justice ended this week by launching its most desperate and unprofessional assaults on the American election system yet.”
Washington Post: “Republicans are going all in on AI-generated ads. Democrats, meanwhile, are shunning them and trying to turn the tables on the GOP, suggesting the ad campaigns are emblematic of a party that doesn’t care about the truth and can’t be trusted.”
“U.S. intelligence suggests Iranian preparations to attack Americans throughout the Middle East have reached ‘advanced stages,’ prompting a sudden exodus of personnel from embassies and military bases throughout the region,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets across France on Saturday for a second consecutive weekend of protests against the cost of living—with clashes erupting between police and masked groups in Paris and other cities,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“The demonstrations come despite a massive security deployment aimed at preventing a repeat of last week’s rioting and looting.”
“Chad Mizelle, an attorney representing Jared Kushner, demanded that Vanity Fair take down a recently published book excerpt alleging that President Donald Trump’s son-in-law had access to secret foreign bank accounts during his first term,” The Wrap reports.
“The Justice Department is sharply intensifying efforts to intervene in the midterm elections, goaded by a president unfettered by even the limited restraints of his first term,” the New York Times reports.
“The next several weeks represent a critical moment for federal law enforcement, a test of whether a department repurposed by President Trump as an instrument of unmediated executive power will be effectively mobilized as a guarantor of his political power.”
“In recent weeks, the department has taken several new steps, including an extraordinary effort to invalidate any potential Democratic victory in the Alaska Senate race, that reflect Mr. Trump’s growing agitation as his party faces the possibility of losing control of Congress precipitated by his sagging popularity.”
“Washington has always viewed Silicon Valley as culturally strange. But the current crop of AI leaders is becoming a monumental political liability,” Axios reports.
“Even pro-AI government officials and lawmakers wish AI founders would do what every other major industry chief does — shut up and just build their products … safely.”
“By centering the conversation around digital sentience and global catastrophe, AI leaders are turning an already complicated regulatory debate into an impossible moral panic.”
Wall Street Journal: “The MAHA-MAGA marriage is tenuous—and one reason is the frailty of Kennedy’s political apparatus. Most of the donors who gave last cycle to boost Kennedy and later his alliance with Trump are missing in the midterms.”
“Allied MAHA super PACs and nonprofits have spent far less than the $100 million promised, dropping only about $4 million in support of candidates since January 2025, according to federal election filings and news releases.”
“I think Congress made a mistake not protesting turning the Rose Garden into what looks like the entrance to Liberace’s bathroom.”
— Former President Bill Clinton, quoted by The Wrap.
“President Donald Trump pushed back Saturday morning against reports he was considering replacing the White House press briefing room with an indoor swimming pool but said he was considering moving media ‘to a less obnoxious location,'” NewsNation reports.
Said Trump, on Truth Social: “There is a Fake News report out there that I am going to remove the White House Press Room and bring back the old Swimming Pool, which lies directly underneath. Although I may move the Fake News to a less obnoxious location, the old swimming pool will never be brought back.”
He added: “I NEVER even thought to do such a stupid thing!”
“President Donald Trump insisted his job approval is somehow actually 60% as polling has shown he’s one of the least popular presidents going into the midterms,” Mediaite reports.
Said Trump: “I don’t believe I could be beaten by anybody.”
The Polling Dashboard shows Trump’s approval at just 35%.
Politico: “Transunion, a consumer credit reporting agency, found in a 2024 study that 22- to 24-year-olds in Gen Z had higher average credit-card balances, higher average auto-loan balances and higher average personal-loan balances than millennials of the same age a decade earlier, even when adjusted for inflation. Gen Z borrowers also had higher delinquency rates than their millennial counterparts.”
“This gap — between the promise that hard work will bring stability and the costs young adults say they can’t get ahead of — is key to understanding the politics of Gen Z, a voter group that helped President Donald Trump win in 2024, but whose longtime loyalties have yet to be won by either party.”
“Secretary of State Marco Rubio called on Cubans seeking ‘positive change’ to work with the CIA, the latest ploy in the growing efforts from the Trump administration to remove Cuba’s communist regime from power,” CBS News reports.
“Boy, they are scraping the bottom of the barrel. It feels like a real desperation play to me, because it has got zero basis in the law.”
— Republican election law expert Ben Ginsberg, quoted by Politico, on the Trump administration’s effort to invalidate Alaska’s election results.
