Today’s notice: Latest from across the map. Alaska may actually just have a lot of people named Dan Sullivan. More on Trump’s potential staff pardons. Jamie Raskin has a new Epstein report. Live from New Mexico. And: MAGA’s evangelical coalition is fraying.
THE MAP
Michigan: Trump’s grim closing argument. “I’m here to keep a jihadist Muslim Brotherhood member from becoming a United States senator,” Donald Trump said of Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed at a rally yesterday in Port Huron. He said El-Sayed, if elected, “would be the only senator that will have to go through a metal detector before he’s allowed to go into the Senate.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders responded to Trump at an El-Sayed rally in Grand Rapids: “Mr. President, instead of slandering Abdul and his family, what are you going to do about the health care crisis in America?”
Trending
For his part, El-Sayed offered this: “I get that the president of the United States takes personal offense to my first name, he doesn’t mind as much when it’s a shared name from the Saudis who are funding his son-in-law’s private equity.”
Texas: Latino voter watch. Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico appeared at a Voto Latino-sponsored concert headlined by popular norteño band Los Tigres del Norte in Weslaco last night. The Washington Sun’s Daniella Diaz was there, and noted the importance of the location. Trump won this congressional district in 2024, but Democrats are betting the coalition he built in Texas’ border country has crumbled. Voto Latino told Daniella 8,000 people packed it out last night to hear Talarico and a slew of other Democratic candidates.
South Carolina: Stormin’ Normans. Conservative Warren Norman — the son of Republican Rep. Ralph Norman, who lost in the Senate primary to Sen. Darline Graham — said he is “leaning” toward voting for Democratic Senate nominee Annie Andrews. Ralph Norman has said he will vote for Graham, but that he won’t do any public appearances with her.
Maine: Trump bails out Susan Collins? The Maine Republican claimed credit for the president loosening some Canadian tariffs, a welcome boost for her campaign against Democrat Troy Jackson.
More: Appeals Court Questions Trump Administration’s Bid to Block 20,000 California Ballots
FROM ALASKA
Are there really too many Dans Sullivan? The president attacked one Alaska Republican senator, Lisa Murkowski, this weekend after she condemned the DOJ effort to preemptively invalidate a possible election loss by the state’s other Republican senator, Dan Sullivan. The whole thing is based on the existence of a Dan J. Sullivan on the Senate ballot, which Trump allies call a dirty trick. Democrats deny any involvement.
Our data reporter Andrew Van Dam looked through a lot of records to find Alaska could be a hotbed for guys named Dan Sullivan. The state is 4th in the nation for number of Dans. It has fewer Sullivans than the national average, but then again Sullivans are several times more likely to be named Dan than the rest of us.
In other Alaska news: Democratic nominee Mary Peltola and her family sustained minor injuries after the vehicle they were traveling in was struck by another vehicle Saturday night.
FROM THE WHITE HOUSE
Pardon backlash: “People committing crimes for Trump, or in connection with Trump, take the risk that they will be successfully prosecuted by a future DOJ,” Rep. Ted Lieu (D-California) posted yesterday after The Sun’s Jasmine Wright and Jeff Stein broke the news that the president was considering pardons for lower-level staff. Lieu noted that a blanket pardon has never really been tested by the courts.
Trump doubled down after our reporting, saying it would “be very unfair” for his staff to go through the “corrupt weaponization” that took place under Joe Biden, adding: “I certainly don’t want to see innocent people go through hell and lose all their money.”
New today: House Judiciary Democrats released a report this morning that pulls together years of assault allegations against Trump and his reported connections to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Eight days before the midterms, the report calls for a renewed criminal investigation and further congressional oversight. Much of the information in the report has been out there but it included a new allegation from a Swiss model who claimed the president raped her during a beauty pageant in New York in 1993.
The Sun’s Stephen Neukam reports that the House Oversight Committee, which is leading the congressional Epstein investigation, did not work on the report released from Judiciary Ranking Member Jamie Raskin.
The White House response: “None of these allegations are true. This ‘report’ is nothing more than a desperate attempt by crazed Democrats to distract Americans from the surging Republican momentum driven by President Trump’s historic achievements,” said White House spokesperson Lauren Bis. “The President kicked Jeffrey Epstein out of his club at Mar-a-Lago because he was a creep, and he has been fully exonerated of anything related to Epstein.”
FROM 2028
Meet the New Mexico kingmakers: We were at the inaugural Fourth in the Nation Matanza rally in Albuquerque this weekend — a sort of coming out party for New Mexico’s status as a key player in the Democratic 2028 primary calendar (they’re going fourth, hence the name). The event was hosted by Sen. Ben Ray Luján and featured local pols meeting with two would-be Democratic presidential candidates: Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona (“I’m considering it,” is how he talks about a potential run) and Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland (“I’m kicking the tires”).
We spoke to a lot of local Democratic leaders, and they’re already getting a lot of facetime with these tire-kickers. State House Speaker Javier Martinez told us his phone has been ringing off the hook with calls from people like Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and more. “One of them is actually taking me out for a beer tonight,” he told us Saturday. “That’s the first beer so far.”
More: A Catholic Republican 2028 Nominee Would Make History. Does Anyone Care?
NEW ON THE WASHINGTON SUN
Evangelicals are not feeling the Trump love this time: “When evangelical voters make up a substantial chunk of that base, and they’re not overly enthusiastic, they’re not excited, they’re frustrated, they don’t necessarily feel like they got what they asked for. That tends to affect enthusiasm and participation,” Cole Muzio, a Republican operative who focuses on Christian outreach, told The Sun. Our Ben T.N. Mause and Andrea Padilla have the story of a major fracture in the coalition that made MAGA happen in the first place: traditional evangelicals and Trump.
More: Inside the Trump Administration’s Dismantling of a Health Care Research Office • New Kimberly Guilfoyle Financial Report Illuminates Debts • Work Trucks at East Potomac Park Are Seen With Covered Logos and License Plates
NOT US
- How the Supreme Court Is Shaping the Midterm Elections, by James Romoser and Neil Mehta for The Wall Street Journal
- Trump’s DOJ told a judge how to rule. Then it pulled her from court. By John Woodrow Cox for The Washington Post
- Latinos Are Now America’s Most Important Swing Voters, by Jennifer Medina and Ruth Igielnik for The New York Times
- A Texas Cop Signed on to Help ICE Deport His Neighbors. It Tore the Town Apart. By Francesca D’Annunzio and McKenzie Funk for ProPublica
WEEK AHEAD
Today
Trump hosts a rally in Mississippi.
JD Vance holds a rally in Montana and Kansas.
Kamala Harris hosts a rally in Wisconsin.
Temporary restraining order expires in the East Potomac Golf course case.
Tuesday
Trump hosts rallies in Lubbock and Waco, Texas.
Vance hosts a rally in Michigan.
Gubernatorial debate in Iowa between Republican Zach Lahn and Democrat Rob Sand.
Israel parliamentary elections.
Wednesday
Trump hosts a rally in Chillicothe, Ohio.
Barack Obama campaigns in Georgia with Sen. Jon Ossoff and gubernatorial candidate Keisha Lance Bottoms.
Harris campaigns in Georgia.The Federal Reserve announces a decision on interest rates.
Thursday
Pennsylvania 8th Congressional District debate between Republican Rob Bresnahan Jr. and Democratic challenger Paige Cognetti.
Harris campaigns in Georgia.
Friday
Trump hosts a rally in Daytona Beach, Florida.
Harris speaks at an event in Fulton County, Georgia.
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The newsletter was produced by Thomas Burr and Gaby Morera Di Núbila.
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