“Rick Caruso is on track to spend more than $100 million by Nov. 8 in his bid for Los Angeles mayor, an astounding sum that puts the real estate developer on par with candidate outlays in some of the country’s most closely watched and expensive midterm races,” the Los Angeles Times reports.
Kari Lake Lends MAGA Star Power to Other Republicans
“Arizona Republican Kari Lake hasn’t yet won her campaign for governor. But she is already offering her help to other Republican candidates across the country,” Politico reports.
“Lake is releasing video advertisements bolstering gubernatorial hopefuls Tudor Dixon of Michigan and Doug Mastriano of Pennsylvania — an unusual move for a first-time candidate still in the throes of a competitive race, but one that starkly illustrates Lake’s meteoric rise in the national party.”
GOP Not Punished for Hardline Immigration Stance
Dave Weigel: “For a long time, Republicans thought they had to choose one of two options: Restrict legal immigration… or appeal to non-white voters, who’d be turned off by a hardline immigration position.”
“It is clearer than ever that Republicans don’t have to choose, and some of the candidates who excite the party the most are non-white conservatives who can argue against liberal race and immigration policy while laughing at accusations that they’re ‘racist.’”
Race for Senate Control Remains Tight
For the first time this cycle, the Decision Desk HQ forecast now predicts that Republicans will flip the Senate — though with just a 50.4% likelihood — controlling an average of 51 seats.
The Double-Negative Election
Ron Brownstein: “Are voters more upset with Democrats over the economy, or with Republicans over lingering Trumpism?”
Graham Says Democrat’s Fundraising Isn’t ‘Legit’
While appearing alongside North Carolina Senate candidate Ted Budd on Fox News, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) tried to portray donations to Cheri Beasley, Budd’s Democratic opponent, as suspicious.
Said Graham: “She raised $13 million in the last quarter. Ted raised four. From October 1 to October 19, the last reporting period, she raised 5. Ted raised one-and-a-half. I don’t know where all this money comes from, Sean.”
He added: “I just don’t believe this is legit—on the up and up.”
How Google’s Ad Business Funds Disinformation
“Google is funneling revenue to some of the web’s most prolific purveyors of false information in Europe, Latin America and Africa,” a ProPublica investigation has found.
“The company has publicly committed to fighting disinformation around the world, but a ProPublica analysis, the first ever conducted at this scale, documented how Google’s sprawling automated digital ad operation placed ads from major brands on global websites that spread false claims on such topics as vaccines, COVID-19, climate change and elections.”
Ukraine Attacks Russian Black Sea Fleet
Ukraine has carried out a “massive” drone attack on the Black Sea Fleet in the Crimean port city of Sevastopol, damaging one warship, the BBC reports.
Twitter Roils With Hate Speech as Trolls Test New Limits
“In the wake of Elon Musk buying Twitter Inc., a tide of slurs and racist memes swelled on the platform, sparking concern that the site is entering an era of hateful speech,” Bloomberg reports.
“Twitter has long wrestled with how to enforce content policies fairly on its platform in order to appease the advertisers, users and powerful world leaders that use its service. But as Musk, a self-styled ‘free speech absolutist,’ took over ownership of the company, some conservative officials, partisan extremists and conspiracy peddlers saw reason to celebrate the change.”
Jonathan Last: Please God, let Elon Musk kill Twitter.
Pelosi Attack Shocks Country on Edge
“An America that can already feel like it’s hurtling toward political disintegration has been jolted yet again, this time by the violent attack on the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi less than two weeks before Election Day,” the AP reports.
New York Times: “Members of Congress have watched warily in recent years as threats and harassment against them have crescendoed, privately worrying that the brutal language and deranged misinformation creeping into political discourse would lead to actual violence.”
Axios: “Members of Congress are sounding new alarms about their personal security — and broader concerns about what the drumbeat of threats against prominent political figures means for them and for the country.”
Brazil’s Election Is Tight
The Economist: “Polls underestimated support for Mr Bolsonaro in the first round. All now suggest that the result will be close… However, one of two maxims about Brazilian elections is bound to be upturned. Since the country’s return to democracy in 1985, the candidate who was ahead in the first round of the election has always gone on to win the run-off. But a sitting president has never lost.”
Governor’s Races End with Scrambled, Surprising Map
“Democrats and Republicans raced on Saturday into the final stretch of more than a dozen competitive races for governor, as the G.O.P. moves within striking distance of flipping the top office in a series of blue and battleground states and Democrats show surprising strength in several other contests,” the New York Times reports.
Biden’s Agenda Hangs in the Balance
“For President Biden, the Dreaming-of-F.D.R. phase of his presidency may end in little more than a week. If Republicans capture one or both houses of Congress in midterm elections, as polling suggests, Mr. Biden’s domestic agenda will suddenly transform from a quest for a New Deal 2.0 to trench warfare defending the accomplishments of his first two years in office,” the New York Times reports.
“On a wide array of issues like abortion, taxes, race and judges, Mr. Biden’s opportunities would invariably shrink as he focuses less on advancing the expansive policy goals that have animated his administration and more on preserving the newly constructed economic and social welfare architecture that Republicans have vowed to dismantle.”
“While the president and Democratic leaders have not publicly given up on the possibility of hanging onto Congress in the balloting that concludes on Nov. 8, privately they are pessimistic and bracing for two years of grinding partisan conflict.”
20 Richest Tech Billionaires Have Lost Half a Trillion
“The 20 richest tech billionaires have collectively lost nearly half a trillion dollars this year amid the stock market’s sharp tumble, a loss of wealth that is more than the market values of all but seven companies in the S&P 500,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Paul Pelosi Secretly Called 911 and Spoke in ‘Code’
“The San Francisco Police Department confirmed during a press conference on Friday evening that Paul Pelosi, husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was somehow able to call 911 before being attacked with a hammer, allowing dispatch to respond,” Insider reports.
“Confirmation that Paul Pelosi made a 911 call came after media reports said he had secretly called 911 so that the intruder would not know and spoke in a way that would alert the dispatcher to what was happening without giving himself away.”
GOP Candidate Admits Funneling Money Thru Campaign
“Liam Madden, the Republican nominee in the open race for Vermont’s lone seat in the U.S. House, during a radio interview Thursday morning described in detail a self-funded scheme to inflate his campaign donations during the primary cycle in order to qualify for candidate debates,” VT Digger reports.
“Madden claimed to have ‘drained’ his wife’s business’s bank account and distributed roughly $25,000 amongst family members — including his toddler son, June — who then donated the money to his campaign. Madden said he is now recouping the money by collecting a salary from his campaign.”
Said campaign finance expert Saurav Ghosh: “He just appears to be ignorant of the fact that he’s just confessed on an interview on air to breaking campaign finance laws.”
Bannon Associate Found Guilty
“Federal prosecutors scored the conviction of Steve Bannon associate Timothy Shea on their second try on Friday, as a jury found him guilty on all charges in the We Build the Wall fraud case,” Law & Crime reports.
What If Trump Backers Won’t Certify the 2024 Election?
“It’s a nightmare scenario for American democracy: The officials in charge of certifying an election refuse to do so, setting off a blizzard of litigation and possibly a constitutional crisis,” the New York Times reports.
“And there are worrying signs that the fears of independent scholars, Democrats and a few anti-Trump Republicans could become a reality. We could soon be in legal terra incognita, they said — like the days when medieval cartographers would write ‘Here Be Dragons’ along the unexplored edges of world maps.”