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“Vice President JD Vance argued voters should have patience with the pace of economic improvements, saying that despite what he described as progress, there was ‘no way’ the Trump administration would have been able to quickly reverse Biden-era cost of living setbacks,” the Washington Post reports.
Vance said officials “have to be honest with the American people” about what is possible.
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum is traveling to Venezuela today, with plans to meet with acting President Delcy Rodríguez and announce an oil agreement, Bloomberg reports.
President Trump said the Texas Republican Senate candidate that does not get his endorsement should drop out of the race, announcing that he will throw his weight behind the race “soon,” The Hill reports.
The Atlantic reports Trump is expected to endorse Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) over Ken Paxton (R).
Semafor reports Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) will stay neutral in the runoff.
“An email sent to Liberty University School of Law students over the weekend lays out, in refreshingly unvarnished terms, what the administration’s hiring pipeline actually looks like,” Above the Law reports.
From the email: “The two most important requirements are you MUST be aligned politically with President Trump and his administration and you must be willing to work hard. Don’t be scared off by the transcript requirement. GPA is not a strong factor. If you meet those two requirements, you have a shot.”
“Rep. Jasmine Crockett conceded to state Rep. James Talarico in the Texas Democratic Senate primary Wednesday morning, after saying on Tuesday that the election could not be called due to a legal dispute over voting precinct hours in Dallas,” Politico reports.
Said Crockett: “Texas is primed to turn blue and we must remain united because this is bigger than any one person. This is about the future of all 30 million Texans and getting America back on track. With the primary behind us, Democrats must rally around our nominees and win.”
A new Pan Atlantics Poll in Maine finds Graham Platner (D) leading Gov. Janet Mills (D) in the Democratic U.S. Senate primary by 7 points, 46% to 39% with another 11% undecided.
Jonathan Last: “The lesson is that Talarico codes as moderate because he looks like a youth pastor and leads with his faith. But if you were grading him by issue sets, he sits closer to Bernie Sanders than, say, Tim Ryan.”
“And Democratic voters noticed. Talarico ran up huge margins with Hispanic voters and I’m guessing that’s because he spoke to their religious convictions. But he also ran up huge margins in counties that were Bernie-curious in 2016. He gathered a coalition of progressives, Hispanics, and college-educated professionals—which is 3/4ths of the Democratic base. The only group he didn’t win over was African Americans.”
“A Democratic candidate who could hold the Talarico coalition while also adding African Americans would be formidable in 2028.”
Yair Rosenberg: “The shifting explanations for Trump’s war and the alleged imminent threat that prompted it suggest poor planning and internal confusion about the president’s motives.”
“They are also a smoke screen. Fundamentally, a war ordered by the most powerful man in the world, commanding the most advanced military in the world, is the responsibility of the man who ordered it. Trump is a two-term president with agency, and he has long telegraphed and demonstrated his eagerness to use military force around the world—and in particular, in Iran…”
“Trump’s officials and allies have fumbled around to find an ‘imminent threat’ to justify the president’s decision to strike Iran. But the real impetus for such action was Trump’s imperial approach to American power, which was decades in the making.”
Jimmy Kimmel took a moment during his monologue to ask President Trump directly to let him host this year’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, The Wrap reports.
Said Kimmel: “Mr. President, please, let me host this dinner. I’ve never asked you for anything, but can you imagine you, me, the commissioner of the FCC all at a table together? Think of the ratings!”
He added: “I’ll even throw in an award. You like awards! I’ll give you a brand-new award.”
“Officials at a Fresno elementary school filed a police report against City Council candidate Rene Campos, a registered sex offender, for holding a news conference across the street from the school,” the Fresno Bee reports.
“In 2021, Campos, 41, pleaded no contest to a 2018 misdemeanor charge of possession of child pornography and served two years of formal probation.”
“The United States is expected to increase tariffs on global imports to 15 percent this week, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday, as the Trump administration works to replicate some of the punishing duties struck down by the Supreme Court,” the New York Times reports.
That rate is an increase from the 10 percent global tariffs that President Trump imposed last month after a court ruling struck down the administration’s emergency tariffs.
Brynn Tannehill: “The American air campaign against Iran would seem to be a tactical and an operational success. The United States has struck 1,700 targets in Iran and apparently suffered only six fatalities. The Iranian leadership has been disrupted and dozens of senior figures killed, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.”
“But a price must be paid for these short-term successes, and it makes the bigger, strategic picture far less clear. The United States, Israel, and their Gulf allies are using up scarce and costly munitions at an astounding rate. These losses can’t be replenished nearly quickly enough to avoid possible global repercussions, as far more formidable adversaries than Iran—Russia and China—assess the war-fighting capacity that America holds in reserve. If they conclude that the West has burned through too many interceptors to defend itself, Russia might pursue aggressive action against NATO, or China could move against Taiwan.”
“Senate Majority Leader John Thune urged President Donald Trump on Wednesday to deliver a swift endorsement of Texas Sen. John Cornyn to potentially forestall what is widely expected to be an expensive and nasty primary runoff against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton,” Politico reports.
Said Thune: “If Trump endorses early, it saves everybody a lot of money, and… 10 weeks of a spirited campaign on our side that keeps us from spending time focusing on the Democrats… If the president can weigh in it would be enormously helpful.”
Andrew Egger: “Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has been feeling the heat. After one year running point for Donald Trump’s mass-deportation regime—a year marked by personal scandal, inexplicable management decisions, baroque internal feuds, and a management philosophy of theatrical cruelty that titillated the MAGA base while horrifying the rest of the country, culminating in the disastrous occupation of Minneapolis and the deaths of two U.S. citizens—Noem suddenly seemed to realize weeks ago that Republicans might be looking for a scapegoat for their immigration failures, and that she was a strong candidate.”
“Suddenly, she was fleeing the spotlight she’d sought so aggressively all year and looking for others to take the blame.”
“It’s hard to imagine Noem’s appearance yesterday before the Senate Judiciary Committee reassured her.”
Nate Silver: “The most obvious path to victory for Talarico would seem to be Beto-on-Steroids, rebounding among Hispanics and taking advantage of Democratic enthusiasm to post some really big numbers in the cities. Are there any indications of Talarico’s ability to do this from the primary? Maybe.”
“Talarico won the most Hispanic counties in Texas by a combined 22 points. He also won the most urban counties by 14 points, but that’s misleading: it’s because Talarico dominated in Austin, winning Travis County by 52 points. But Crockett actually won Dallas and Harris counties. She also won Black counties, especially in East Texas, by wide margins.”
“So we’ll want to see whether there is any lasting damage to Talarico among Black voters from the primary.”
The House Ethics Committee launched a formal investigation into Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX), establishing a panel to probe allegations that he “engaged in sexual misconduct towards an individual employed in his congressional office” and “discriminated unfairly by dispensing special favors or privileges,” Politico reports.
Kristi Noem claimed to the Senate yesterday that Corey Lewandowski has no role approving contracts at DHS, ProPublica reports.
But internal DHS records and interviews with current and former agency officials contradict her testimony.
Michael Lange: “Ever since Donald Trump returned to power, the Democratic Party, in fervent anticipation of 2028, has anxiously searched for clues as to the mood of its angry, perpetually disappointed base. However, gauging voter sentiment from only a handful of elections — often shaped by hyper-local interests and regional nuances — let alone extrapolating broader implications, is difficult, if not impossible.”
“Nonetheless, in the pre-midterm vacuum, two riveting and high-profile contests have stood out, defined by scores of national attention, record voter turnout, massive campaign spending, expanded electorates, and an incredibly diverse coalition of Democratic voters: the 2025 New York City Mayoral Primary and the 2026 Texas Senate Primary.”
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.
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