Donald Trump

Americans head to the polls on Tuesday in midterm elections that will decide control of Congress and determine how much pressure President Donald Trump faces for the rest of his term.

After two years of unified Republican control, Democrats are fighting to reclaim both the House of Representatives and the Senate, while Republicans work to defend their narrow majorities and protect Trump’s agenda on immigration, the economy and the courts.

These 20 photos capture the pulse of this deeply polarised contest – from crowded polling stations and get-out-the-vote drives to last-minute campaign stops – offering a glimpse of voters at the booths and parents with children in tow across the country, all playing their part in a race set to shape the direction of American politics for years to come.

On November 3, as Americans vote in the midterm elections, the United States faces a defining test of presidential power, constitutional accountability and democratic resilience. The election will determine control of Congress, but its stakes extend far beyond partisan fortunes. At issue is whether constitutional checks and balances can constrain President Donald Trump, whether election officials can withstand political pressure, and whether the government will respect the voters’ verdict when the outcome threatens its interests.

The battle for control of elections

The administration’s efforts to reshape election procedures have encountered substantial judicial resistance. According to an October 20 review by the Brennan Center for Justice, at least 34 federal district court decisions had temporarily or permanently blocked administration initiatives involving election procedures and demands for voter registration records. The rulings included decisions by judges appointed by presidents of both parties, including Trump himself.

These decisions demonstrate that judicial oversight remains an important constitutional safeguard. Yet repeated litigation exposes a vulnerability: courts often intervene only after disputed measures have been introduced, leaving states to challenge policies that can generate uncertainty close to Election Day.

The controversy intensified on October 26, when a federal appeals court declined to order California to set aside ballots from approximately 20,000 registered voters whom the Justice Department alleges may be noncitizens. The court ruled that the lower court had not been given adequate opportunity to consider the government’s request. The underlying dispute remained unresolved.

The administration maintains that its actions protect electoral integrity. But investigating credible allegations of wrongdoing is fundamentally different from restricting eligible voters on the basis of unverified suspicions. Election security requires accurate voter rolls, but it equally requires protecting citizens from erroneous challenges.

Repeated allegations of fraud can undermine confidence even when evidence fails to establish that an election has been compromised. The danger is that routine election administration becomes suspect in the public mind, regardless of the facts.

Congress as a constitutional check

Republicans hold narrow majorities in both chambers of Congress, placing control of the House and potentially the Senate within reach of Democrats.

A Democratic House majority would strengthen the opposition’s ability to investigate administration policies, subpoena officials and scrutinise executive decisions. Immigration enforcement, election procedures, federal spending and the implementation of executive orders could face intensified oversight.

Such scrutiny could expose misconduct where evidence supports it and compel officials to explain decisions otherwise shielded from meaningful examination. Yet investigations do not automatically produce accountability. Subpoenas can trigger prolonged legal battles, and congressional hearings alone cannot force policy changes.

Control of the Senate would give Democrats greater influence over presidential nominations and judicial appointments. Nevertheless, Trump would retain his veto power and substantial executive authority. Even unified Democratic control of Congress would not automatically reverse his agenda.

The deeper question is whether Congress will exercise its constitutional responsibilities independently or allow partisan loyalty to take precedence over institutional accountability. Checks and balances cannot function effectively if one branch declines to challenge another when circumstances demand it.

The test after election day

Perhaps the most consequential confrontation will come after the ballots are cast.

Trump’s response to his 2020 presidential defeat remains a critical precedent. He challenged the result, made unsubstantiated allegations of fraud, and pressured Georgia officials to find enough votes to reverse his loss. On January 6, 2021, a mob attacked the Capitol as Congress met to certify the presidential election.

That history does not establish that similar events will recur in 2026. It does, however, make scrutiny of potential election disputes essential.

The danger may lie not in a single intervention capable of changing the result, but in successive confrontations: challenges to ballot counting, pressure on state officials, demands for investigations and attempts to portray ordinary procedures as evidence of fraud. Even unsuccessful efforts can delay resolution and weaken public confidence.

Candidates have every right to pursue legitimate legal challenges. Courts must consider credible evidence, and election officials must correct documented irregularities. But allegations are not proof, and no president can simply declare an unfavourable result invalid.

An election can also be damaged without a single vote being changed. Intimidation of election workers, unfounded accusations and efforts to discredit established procedures can erode public acceptance of legitimate outcomes.

The distinction between lawful scrutiny and political interference is therefore fundamental. Electoral integrity depends on evidence, consistent procedures and respect for the law – not on whether the outcome favours the governing party.

Courts cannot defend democracy alone

Judicial intervention demonstrates that constitutional safeguards remain operational. Courts can invalidate unlawful executive actions, but they cannot independently administer elections across thousands of jurisdictions or guarantee that political leaders will respect every ruling.

Nor can judicial decisions alone restore public confidence after sustained efforts to discredit electoral institutions. Democracy depends on Congress exercising oversight, election officials counting ballots accurately, courts acting impartially and political leaders respecting lawful outcomes.

The willingness of judges appointed by presidents of both parties to rule against administration initiatives reinforces a fundamental principle: constitutional protections cannot depend on partisan alignment. Their effectiveness rests on whether institutions apply the same rules regardless of who benefits.

The broader danger is institutional erosion. Repeated confrontations can weaken public confidence, discourage election workers and normalise the idea that constitutional constraints are obstacles to political power rather than obligations governing its exercise.

A verdict beyond the ballots

The November 3 midterms will not resolve the struggle over presidential power. If Republicans retain Congress, Trump will continue to benefit from congressional majorities, although judicial and state-level checks will remain. If Democrats gain one or both chambers, the administration will face greater scrutiny, but substantial executive authority will persist.

Neither outcome guarantees effective constitutional government. The decisive issue is whether institutions exercise their lawful responsibilities and whether political leaders accept that presidential power is neither unlimited nor permanent.

American democracy has survived profound crises, but resilience should not be confused with invulnerability. Checks and balances work only when institutions enforce them and political leaders respect their limits.

The midterms are therefore about more than congressional arithmetic. They will test whether votes are counted according to law, disputes are resolved through established procedures and electoral outcomes are respected regardless of partisan consequences.

The ballots will determine who controls Congress. What follows will reveal whether American institutions can still uphold a principle fundamental to democratic government: no president stands above the law, no party owns the electoral process, and no exercise of political power is beyond accountability.

On November 3, Americans will vote to determine the composition of Congress. The aftermath will test something more enduring: whether the constitutional restraints that have sustained American democracy remain binding when their enforcement carries the highest political stakes.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

Houston, Texas – The gospel music from Mount Hebron Missionary Baptist Church spills into the streets of Sunnyside, a predominantly Black neighbourhood in southern Houston.

It is a familiar scene on any given Sunday: hands in the air, immaculate bow ties on starched shirts, fabric flowers adorning perfectly pastel hats. But with the US midterm elections just two days away, the service held a special significance on the front line of a US redistricting battle.

Mt Hebron had long been located in the ninth congressional district, its politically engaged Black voters for two decades helping to elect Democrat Al Green, a flamboyant presence in Congress known for his cane-waving opposition to US President Donald Trump.

But following an appeal from Trump, the Republican state legislature last year conducted rare mid-decade redistricting, redrawing the church and its Black community into the Black-majority 18th district.

Critics call the process “cracking and packing”, diminishing the representation in Congress of minority groups, particularly heavily Democratic Black communities, by consolidating their voting power into fewer districts.

“It’s kind of one and the same when we talk about the voting and the civil rights,” said Pastor Max Miller, who has served at the church for 18 years.

“They are trying to manipulate and monopolise the vote and minimise the people who are in those districts,” said Miller. “We see so much rolling backwards that it looks like they’re trying to take a script from an old song and turn back the hands of time.”

As a result of the redistricting, Green was forced to run in a primary against 18th district incumbent Christian Menefee, another Black Democrat. He lost, and Houston lost one of its Black representatives in Congress.

The ninth district, meanwhile, was redrawn to favour Republicans, one of at least five US congressional seats the party hopes to pick up in the midterm vote.

The machinations have resonated with worshippers at Mt Hebron.

“I don’t like the redistricting at all because Al Green was moved out,” said 97-year-old Alice Jefferson, who had followed the congressman throughout his political career. “He always had good advice for the people.”

Janice Ray, a 61-year-old home health aide and entrepreneur, said state lawmakers were “trying to move people out of the district that they’re familiar with”.

“To me, it was all a bunch of BS,” she said. “There was no reason for it.”

“But we’ll stand firm, regardless of what they try to do,” Ray added. “Because just like it was changed, it can always be changed back.”

‘Voices have been weakened’

The redistricting process has undergone a generational transformation this election season, one that, experts say, has degraded longstanding guardrails protecting minority voting power.

“In political science, we have what we call descriptive representation,” Michael Adams, a professor at Texas Southern University in Houston, told Al Jazeera. “In terms of descriptive representation, minorities and others feel that if they can elect someone who reflects their values, for example, and who may look like them, their voting can be defined as one voice.”

“And certainly with not having an additional Black member of Congress representing Houston, a significant segment of Black voters may feel that their voices have been weakened,” he said.

Texas was only the beginning.

This year Republican and Democratic state legislatures across the country joined the spree: Republicans successfully redistricted in Missouri, North Carolina, Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama, Florida and Ohio; Democrats did so in California, while a court-ordered map in Utah handed Democrats a favourable seat. A Democratic push in Virginia was subsequently invalidated.

Redrawing maps mid-decade, and not waiting for the latest demographic numbers from the US census, was already atypical. But many of the maps drawn this year would have been deemed illegal in previous cycles.

Section 2 of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965, initially passed to counter blatantly racist voting practices in the US, had long prohibited redrawing congressional maps to dilute the electoral power of minority voters.

In April, the conservative-dominated US Supreme Court ruled that anyone challenging such a map must prove “racist intent”. Critics have said the ruling effectively allows for racial gerrymandering, with proving such an intent an unreasonably high bar.

But critics of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act have said drawing maps to protect minority voting power is in itself discriminatory.

Defenders in Texas, meanwhile, have said the redistricting was based on the shifting political makeup of the state, and not racial gerrymandering.

“This plan includes political considerations, public testimony, recognition of population growth and recent changes in voter trends,” State Representative Todd Hunter, a Republican, said shortly after the new map’s passage last year.

“Each of these newly drawn districts now trend Republican in political performance. While there’s no guarantee of electoral success, Republicans will now have an opportunity to potentially win these districts,” he said.

A political test

There are no guarantees that a party’s redistricting plans will actually work.

Following the tit-for-tat map redrawings, Republicans hoped to net at least 13 seats nationally. Polling has suggested their gains may be much more muted.

All told, about 35 million US voters will be casting ballots in newly redistricted seats this election.

“Redistricting can change the political boundaries, but it can’t guarantee how voters will behave,” Brandon Rottinghaus, a professor at the University of Houston, told Al Jazeera.

In Texas, the Republican map was drawn largely based on recent Latino voting trends. The demographic swung heavily for Trump in the state in 2024, despite once being considered a reliable Democratic voting bloc.

Beyond the ninth congressional district in Houston, Republicans hoped to pick up four other districts, most based in South Texas, with an eye on shifting Latino sentiment.

But the political tides have again turned. Trump’s popularity has tanked among Latino voters, fuelled in part by unrest over the economy and the administration’s aggressive deportation campaign.

It remains to be seen how that will reflect at the ballot box when Texas voters pick a senator, governor, members of Congress and a slate of state and local officials.

“These districts are a test of whether political dissatisfaction can overcome an aggressively partisan map,” Rottinghaus said.

‘Trying to mobilise’

With new boundaries come new opportunities.

The ninth district is now considered Republican-favoured, but its large population of low-propensity Latino voters creates a pathway for a Democratic victory, according to Dayana Iza, Texas state director of Mi Familia Vota, a Latino voting organisation that has focused resources on the congressional race.

The state legislature “kept a big portion of Latino voters there, but the reality is that the Latino percentage in that district that votes is very, very low,” Iza told Al Jazeera. “So that then became a district that we are trying to mobilise in terms of turnout.”

On the Saturday ahead of the November 3 vote, Democratic candidate Leticia Gutierrez and State Senator Molly Cook zigzagged through a neighbourhood of single-family homes in eastern Houston.

Any path to victory, Gutierrez assessed, would be based on face time and a chance to connect with disillusioned voters.

“This community here has an average annual income of $63,000 a year. I make a little over that, and it’s difficult,” Gutierrez told Al Jazeera. “At this point, it’s not a left or a right thing anymore. This is an affordability crisis.”

“You’ve heard some of the voters out here say this is the first time someone actually came to my door,” she added. “That means a lot, and so we want to continue to do that.”

Among the residents was Christian Garcia, a 53-year-old who works at a local chemical plant and has not voted since moving to Texas from Puerto Rico in 2014. He said he is focused on his family, saving enough for retirement and eventually leaving some money behind for his adult children.

In the past, Garcia said, he felt voting was “wasting my time”.

“You know, it’s a lot of corruption and things,” said Garcia. “I just don’t believe in anybody anymore.”

Down the block, Esmeralda Gil, a 39-year-old teacher, said she hoped for a Democratic surge.

Gil questioned why taxes, particularly on housing, seemed so high, while so many struggled to access healthcare.

“We need affordable healthcare and affordable housing,” she said.

This comes as leading opposition leader, Maria Corina Machado, returns to Venezuela and hints at criticism of Trump administration.

The United States has urged Venezuela to continue on a phased plan of economic recovery and political reconciliation before embarking on democratic elections.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio discussed the gradual plan during a meeting on the country’s political future with Venezuelan Minister of Foreign Affairs Oliver Blanco on Monday. The meeting comes nearly a year after US forces abducted former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro from Caracas and brought him to the US to face drug trafficking and other charges.

Neither Rubio nor Blanco spoke to the media after the meeting, but in a readout. The State Department said in a readout that Washington had reaffirmed President Donald Trump’s “three-phase plan for Venezuela: stabilization, economic recovery and political reconciliation, and democratic transition”.

Last week, Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado returned to her country, thanking the US president and Rubio for their support. Machado, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who gifted her medal to Trump in 2025, said she had come to organise a movement in preparation for Venezuelan elections.

Rubio “has set out a sequence of events aimed at moving toward a democratic transition that makes clear the holding of presidential elections in 2027”, she said.

Machado is balancing an election campaign with a Trump administration that has sought to extract oil from Venezuela by striking deals with the government of interim President Delcy Rodriguez, who served as Maduro’s vice president and took over after his abduction.

In September, the Trump administration said it had struck a deal with Venezuela that would give Washington a stake in about one-fifth of the country’s oil resources.

The US said it was creating a joint venture with North American Blue Energy Partners (NABEP), owned by Venezuelan businessman Alejandro Betancourt, which is the second-largest private oil operator in Venezuela, behind Chevron.

Under the deal, Caracas is giving the company 100-year rights over 17 oilfields with proven reserves of 65 billion barrels. The Pentagon will have a 35 percent stake in NABEP, and the US will be guaranteed the right to buy 20 percent of its oil output at cost, the Trump administration has said.

Shortly before Machado’s statements on Thursday, Rodriguez assured the nation that elections would be held in Venezuela “with the world as witness”, but did not specify a date.

When asked about a possible meeting with Rodriguez, Machado said she had not received any message from the interim president or from Washington.

In remarks after returning Venezuela, Machado seemed sceptical of the oil agreement with the US.

“This agreement does not reflect the levels of transparency that Venezuelan society wants,” Machado said.

Only 32 percent of voters approve of Trump’s job performance in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll.

Ahead of the United States midterm elections, President Donald Trump’s job approval rating continues to sit near a record low, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll.

Some 32 percent of respondents approved of Trump’s handling of the presidency, 1 percentage point above his rating two weeks ago.

Meanwhile, the Republican Party continues to be unpopular among those polled: When asked whether they would vote for a generic Democrat or Republican candidate, 46 percent of respondents preferred Democrats compared with 38 percent preferring Republicans.

Trump himself is not on the ballot, but he has repeatedly told his supporters to vote as if they are voting for him. If the Republican Party loses control of the US Congress, Trump has warned, Democrats may seek to impeach him for a third time.

Trump’s approval rating has dropped steadily, polls suggest, especially since the launch of the US-Israel war on Iran on February 28. The conflict has driven up petrol and diesel prices and has had secondary effects for US consumers worried about inflation and the economy.

The president embarked on a nearly monthlong campaign blitz ahead of the November 3 midterms in an effort to shore up support for Republican candidates, who are trying to retain control of the US House of Representatives and Senate.

Trump wrapped up his campaigning on Monday afternoon with a rally in Washington, DC, at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. The president has devoted significant attention to the site as part of his attempt to renovate the capital. The job ran months late and cost more than 10 times its original estimate, with a special liner for the pool that Trump touted peeling away soon after it was installed.

“It was a work of art that never worked, but now it will work,” Trump said at the rally. He spent much of his speech on his renovation plans for the city, including a “Triumphal Arch”, which is facing legal challenges.

Trump seemed to acknowledge on Monday that his campaigning might not deliver the results he wants for his party, but said this was the political norm for midterm elections.

“For some reason, the sitting president doesn’t win the midterms,” Trump said. “But we gave this a very strong shot.”

California says the move to block ballots from suspected noncitizens could disenfranchise eligible voters.

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has asked the Supreme Court to stop California from counting mail-in ballots from more than 20,000 voters it claims are not US citizens.

The emergency request, filed on Monday, just one day before the midterm elections, is the latest development in a legal battle between the administration and California, a Democratic stronghold and the most populous US state.

California says the move could disenfranchise thousands of eligible voters.

The Department of Justice wants California to set aside ballots from voters on a list compiled by the Department of Homeland Security until after their citizenship status is confirmed.

But California says the list is unreliable and could include thousands of US citizens.

Voting has been under way since early October, and state officials say it would be nearly impossible to separate the ballots in question.

Last week, a federal judge rejected the administration’s request, raising concerns about the reliability of the data on the list.

“If the executive can discount votes and threaten an ongoing election due to unproven allegations, then our democracy is in danger,” Judge David Carter wrote.

The administration has turned to the Supreme Court after a federal appeals court also rejected the request on Friday.

The dispute comes as Republicans fight to retain control of Congress in Tuesday’s elections.

Trump has repeatedly made false claims about widespread voter fraud, but studies and state audits have shown that ineligible voting, including by noncitizens, is rare.

On Tuesday, Americans head to the polls for the United States midterm elections, held halfway through a president’s four-year term. Voters will choose all 435 members of the US House of Representatives and 35 of the Senate’s 100 seats. The voting will decide which party controls Congress for the next two years.

Although the president’s name won’t appear on the ballot, the vote is widely seen as a verdict on the presidency, and the president’s party almost always pays the price.

In 18 of the 20 midterms held from 1946 to 2022, voters took House seats away from the party in control of the White House. The average loss was 26 seats. Only Bill Clinton’s Democrats in 1998 and George W Bush’s Republicans in 2002 bucked the trend.

Political scientists call this the “presidential penalty”, or the “midterm penalty”. The president’s party tends to lose seats simply because it holds power as voters use the midterms to put a check on the White House.

The House: 18 losses in 20 midterms

The chart below shows how many House seats the president’s party has won or lost in each midterm since 1946 from Harry S Truman to Joe Biden.

Democratic presidents have suffered the biggest midterm defeats since 1946. On average, their party has lost about 29 House seats in a midterm, compared with about 23 under Republican presidents.

The largest loss came in 2010, two years after Barack Obama became the first African American elected president, when Democrats lost 64 House seats and Republicans took control of the chamber. The Democrats under Truman lost 56 seats in 1946, and under Clinton, they lost 54 in 1994, each time losing control of the House.

The worst Republican defeats came under Dwight D Eisenhower when the party lost 50 seats in 1958 and Gerald Ford when it lost 48 in 1974. Donald Trump’s first midterm in 2018 cost Republicans 42 seats and control of the House.

Big losses often cost the president’s party its majority. In seven of the 20 midterms since 1946 (1946, 1954, 1994, 2006, 2010, 2018 and 2022), the House changed hands.

The Senate: 13 losses in 20 midterms

The president’s party has lost Senate seats in 13 of the 20 midterms since 1946 but lost control of the chamber in only six: 1946, 1954, 1986, 1994, 2006 and 2014.

Unlike the House of Representatives, where every seat is up for election every two years, only about a third of the Senate’s 100 seats are contested in each cycle because senators serve six-year terms and their elections are staggered. That means which states are voting can matter as much as the national mood.

Eisenhower’s Republicans suffered the biggest Senate loss in the period, giving up 13 seats in 1958. Truman’s Democrats lost 12 in 1946, and Obama’s Democrats lost nine in 2014, handing control of the chamber to Republicans.

At times, the two chambers have moved in opposite directions. In 1982, Ronald Reagan’s Republicans lost 26 House seats but gained one in the Senate. In 2018, Trump’s Republicans lost the House but added a Senate seat, and in 2022, Biden’s Democrats lost the House while gaining one seat in the Senate.

These split results show that a backlash against the president does not land evenly across Congress. A party can hold its ground on a favourable Senate map while losing competitive House districts.

What does it mean to lose the House or Senate?

Losing seats and losing control are not the same thing. Lyndon Johnson’s Democrats lost 47 House seats in 1966 but kept their majority. Twenty years later, Reagan’s Republicans lost only four House seats but lost the Senate after an eight-seat setback.

Control of the chambers decides who sets the agenda and passes legislation. A bill must pass both chambers before it reaches the president for his approval or veto, so an opposition majority in either can block the president’s plans.

A House majority can also mean a party is able to launch investigations and impeach a president while a Senate majority can reject the president’s nominees, including federal judges, who serve for life.

This year, Democrats need to gain three seats to win the House and four to win the Senate. A 50-50 split in the Senate would leave Republicans in control because Vice President JD Vance may cast tie-breaking votes.

Charleston, South Carolina – Avery Milton thought he was a die-hard supporter of US President Donald Trump. The 28-year-old South Carolina native had voted for Trump in the past three elections and believed in his promise to put America first. But ahead of the midterm elections, the president has left him feeling betrayed.

“He stabbed us in the back during his second term,” Milton told Al Jazeera.

Milton’s disillusionment is not isolated. He said many people close to him share this frustration, particularly younger conservatives around his age who are starting families and entering the workforce. Trump launching a war on Iran, after campaigning on a promise to avoid new wars, was a particular breaking point.

Now, Milton is helping lead a grassroots effort to write in Republican Congressman Ralph Norman for the US Senate, rather than support the party nominee, Senator Darline Graham, who has Trump’s endorsement.

A write-in candidate is someone whose name does not appear on the ballot but can still be chosen by voters who write it in themselves. The option is often used to indicate dissatisfaction with the official candidates, but rarely leads to a victory. One of those rare victories happened in 2010, when Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska won after launching a write-in campaign, having lost her Republican primary that year.

In the 2022 South Carolina Senate race, write-in votes accounted for just 0.1 percent of all votes cast.

Despite the president’s endorsement, Graham has struggled to unite conservatives behind her, potentially giving Democratic challenger Annie Andrews an opening in a state that has not elected a Democrat to the US Senate since 1998.

Darline’s unlikely path to Republican Senate candidate

After the sudden death of Republican US Senator Lindsey Graham on July 11, his younger sister, Darline, was appointed to serve out the remainder of his term.

Her appointment followed a tradition of family members succeeding deceased lawmakers, most commonly their spouses. But she made history as the first sibling appointed to fill a Senate vacancy.

Graham initially described the role as an opportunity to finish her brother’s work during the remaining months of his term. But days later, Trump urged her to run for a full six-year term, posting “RUN, DARLINE, RUN!” on Truth Social and promising his “complete and total endorsement” if she entered the race. Three days later, Graham announced on Fox News that she would run.

For some Republicans, the transition from temporary appointment to a full-term campaign happened too quickly. Milton said he felt the appointment had effectively “installed” a candidate.

Graham went on to defeat Republican Ralph Norman in the state’s August primary elections.

Norman, who represents South Carolina’s fifth congressional district, has repeatedly declined to campaign alongside Graham since losing the primary. He has made clear that his support for Graham is limited.

“You have to earn the vote. She hasn’t done that,” he told The Wall Street Journal. “The campaign has been about trying to prop up a candidate.”

The tensions have been particularly pronounced in Upstate South Carolina, where Norman has considerable support. Milton said Graham has done little to reach voters there during the campaign, aside from private dinners and appearances alongside Trump.

“She [Graham] never tried to reach out to everyday people here Upstate. And that spoke volumes about how this South Carolina GOP establishment feels about the grassroots conservatives. They just really don’t care,” Milton said.

Frustrated by what he saw as a failure to represent grassroots conservatives, Milton helped launch the Write-In Ralph movement, building a website and giving the campaign a public platform.

Milton said he and other supporters wanted a senator who would think independently, rather than simply fall in line with party leadership.

“We don’t necessarily want somebody that’s a rubber stamp for everything,” he said, adding that he wanted someone willing to “think of all the sides of an issue and policy”.

South Carolina’s independents

A sizeable group of South Carolina voters does not identify with either major party.

While the state does not register voters by party, a New York Times/Siena poll conducted in October suggested that 30 percent of likely voters identified as independents. Among those voters, Democratic Senate candidate Andrews led Graham by 20 percentage points.

The findings point to a potential blind spot for Republicans seeking to consolidate support around Trump’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) coalition.

John Connolly, a 77-year-old retiree who lives in South Carolina’s Lowcountry, is one example of a voter whose political allegiances have shifted over time. He sees Graham’s appointment as part of a political culture that rewards loyalty over experience.

“I see her as nothing more than a puppet,” he told Al Jazeera. “To nod her head yes whenever she’s told to.”

Leila Ali, a regional campaign adviser who has spent more than a decade working with grassroots organisations across the US South, said political strategists often underestimate the diversity of the Southern electorate.

“The biggest thing that people get wrong is that they think the Southern vote is this monolith,” she told Al Jazeera.

Ali pointed to South Carolina’s early voting figures as evidence of that engagement. Nearly 950,000 early votes have been cast in the state, according to the state’s Election Commission, setting a new record for early voting in a midterm election.

An increasingly close Senate race

The stakes of this race have become increasingly apparent as the November 3 election approaches.

Despite Trump winning South Carolina by nearly 18 percentage points in 2024, he has made two trips to South Carolina in three months to campaign for Graham – an extraordinary show of presidential attention.

And polling suggests the race is far more competitive than Republicans might have expected. The October New York Times/Siena College poll had Graham and Democratic challenger Annie Andrews tied at 48 percent among likely voters.

For Democrats, this division offers a rare opening in a deep-red state where the party has struggled to compete.

Even with the race tightening, Republicans like Milton are willing to risk a Democratic victory by writing in Ralph Norman on their ballot. And if Graham loses, Milton says the blame should not fall on the write-in effort.

“They’re going to try to point the finger on this Write-in Ralph movement,” he said. “But I just want to make something very clear: that would assume that our votes would have gone to Darline anyway, and that’s just not the case.”

Trump attacks Muslim politicians Abdul El-Sayed and Ilhan Omar in his two last rallies on the campaign trail.

United States President Donald Trump has doubled down on Islamophobic rhetoric and conspiracy theories about the Democratic Party at campaign events in Iowa and Kansas, days before the US votes in crucial midterm elections that will decide who controls Congress during Trump’s last two years as president.

The president repeated his claim that Abdul El-Sayed, a Democratic US Senate hopeful from Michigan, is a “jihadist” at both rallies on Sunday, and joked that if he gets elected, the Senate will have to install metal detectors to scan him before he enters the building.

“We’ll have a hundred senators, and most of them will go directly [into the Senate]… We’re gonna have to get a special metal detector for Abdul,” Trump said, drawing laughter from the crowd.

He also repeated unfounded claims that El-Sayed is a member of the transnational Muslim Brotherhood, branches of which the US has deemed foreign “terrorist” organisations.

At both events, Trump repeatedly urged his supporters to make sure they go out and vote, asking them to “pretend I’m on the ballot”, as he sought to energise Republican voters ahead of what polling suggests could be a bruising election for the party.

The two rallies were cancelled last week but were suddenly rescheduled. They will be Trump’s final travelling events before the election.

Both speeches were interrupted multiple times by hecklers.

In Iowa, the president said he would “love” Democratic Representative Haley Stevens, who lost to Abdul El-Sayed in the primaries, to switch parties, after she endorsed El-Sayed’s Republican opponent, Mike Rogers.

At both rallies, he took aim at US Representative for Minnesota Ilhan Omar, whom Trump claims, without evidence, was previously married to her brother and had children with him.

In Kansas, Trump attacked the Democratic Senate hopeful Adam Hamilton, a church pastor, for his support for trans rights, and called him a “stiff” who reads his sermons from teleprompters.

The US-Israel war on Iran, the cost of living, immigration, perceived media bias against him, and the administration of former President Joe Biden also featured heavily in Trump’s two speeches.

Two critical races

While Iowa and Kansas are represented mostly by Republican lawmakers, polling suggests Democrats could flip both states.

Kansas has five federal congressional seats up for election in the midterms: one Senate seat and all four House seats. The state last elected a Democratic senator in 1932.

In Iowa, the Senate race is too close to call, but polling suggests that two Iowan state representative seats up for grabs are leaning Democrat.

The US will vote in the midterm elections on November 3.

Donning a creepy mask of Democratic rival Xavier Becerra, Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton dashed around a children’s Halloween event dishing out candy and warnings about potential liberal tax policies.

“Vote for Becerra, and your parents will have to pay every mile they drive. Isn’t that great?” Hilton sarcastically said at a Trunk or Treat gathering Saturday in Highland Park. “These children are very pricey because if their parents vote for Becerra, they will be taxed every mile they drive. Yay! Yay! Mileage tax! Mileage tax! Mileage tax!”

Becerra was not spooked when he heard of Hilton’s get-up and put-down.

“I suspect, if he takes off that mask, you’ll see Donald Trump right underneath,” Becerra, a former congressman, state attorney general and member of President Biden’s Cabinet, said at a campaign event in Sacramento on Saturday. “That’s who he really is. Either that or he’s a clown.”

With Tuesday’s election barreling toward them, Becerra and Hilton traded barbs and did their the best to gin up support as they crisscrossed California in what has been a relatively sedate race to succeed Democrat Gavin Newsom, who is wrapping up his final term as governor. Recent polls show Becerra leading Hilton by at least 20 percentage points, which is not a surprise in a state where Democratic voters vastly outnumber Republicans and GOP candidates last won a statewide election two decades ago.

Xavier Becerra, Democratic nominee for governor, speaks during a reception Friday in San Francisco.

(Lea Suzuki / San Francisco Chronicle / Getty Images)

Becerra has spent the waning days of the campaign stumping for Democrats in competitive House races in the Central Valley and Southern California.

Party leaders are trying to capitalize on broad anti-Trump sentiment to juice the state’s liberal electorate and win House seats that were redrawn to favor Democrats, including a Sacramento-area seat currently held by Republican-turned-independent Rep. Kevin Kiley.

“We’re not just gonna take back these seats in California. We’re gonna take back the House and the Senate,” Becerra told costumed and cheering volunteers during a quick Saturday stop in support of Richard Pan, the Democrat challenging Kiley. Trump, Becerra said, wants to “destroy democracy. That’s why we’re getting out to vote.”

The Republican president is a big motivator for Democrats this year. California’s high cost of living was among the top concerns of California voters this election, but that was recently eclipsed by fears about Trump’s policies and their desire for a governor to fight back against his administration.

“Everything the Trump administration has done so far is something I disagree with,” 19-year-old Arthur Galvan said after Becerra spoke at Pan’s campaign headquarters. But the UC Davis sophomore said his top priorities are education and one day being able to afford a home, even in Lincoln, the semi-rural and fast-growing town he grew up in.

“Compared to the rest of the state, housing over there is slightly cheaper. But even still, that’s not attainable,” Galvan said. “I don’t think that there’s many easy ways to go about this but it’s something that we have to look into.”

Asked about his support for a proposed mileage tax — which would require drivers to pay a fee based on the total number of miles driven in a period of time — Becerra said he is considering all options to maintain road funding as more Californians adopt electric vehicles and stop paying the gas tax.

“We need to pay for our roads and our bridges and our highways. We need to pay for mass transit. You can’t do it if you don’t have the money,” he said. “I’m not gonna say exactly how it will be, because that’s work we have to do with the Legislature, and with every community having a chance to speak up.”

Hilton, a former Fox News commentator and political advisor to British Prime Minister David Cameron, has embraced his underdog status. The quick-witted Republican has pinballed from California’s deeply-red northern territories to Democratic strongholds in San Francisco and L.A., generating enough heat to remain in the spotlight but not enough to catch fire. He tailgated with Chargers and Rams fans at SoFi Stadium on Sunday, and had planned to rally voters at a Bakersfield demolition derby the night before, but pulled out when rain was forecast.

He has promised to lower gas prices to $3 per gallon, and on Thursday held a $3-a-gallon fill-up event in the San Joaquin Valley. Hilton also vowed eliminate state taxes on workers’ first $150,000 of income, scuttle the behind-schedule, over-budget high-speed rail project and abolish the DMV.

Though endorsed by Trump, Hilton has framed his campaign around the many ills facing California — including the lack of affordable housing, a persistent and worsening homelessness crisis, entrenched budget deficits and high gas prices — all of which he blames on years of Democratic rule.

At the Halloween event on Saturday, Hilton asked Italia Sandoval’s 3-year-old daughter Milania if she would prefer candy or a potential mileage tax. The toddler, understandably confused, opted for candy. Her mother, 31, jumped in, saying that such a levy would mean less story time, field trips and park and library visits for her family’s home-schooled children and further hamper their dreams of one day buying a home.

“Taxes are killing Californians. I want to buy my own home. Can’t afford it,” said the Huntington Park resident, a registered Republican who become politically engaged after studying theater at Cal State LA.

The daughter of a Mexican immigrant said her husband proposed moving to Idaho because of the cost of living in California, but she balked because their families live here. So they found other methods of cutting their budget.

“I shop at Goodwills, yard sales, Facebook Marketplace, you name it,” Sandoval said. “I even sadly say I pick up clothes off the side of the street sometimes. … It’s taught me to be resourceful in this state. But it’s like, come on.”

Aided by his Halloween mask and cardboard cutouts portraying Becerra as a hand puppet controlled by Newsom, Hilton has turned his opponent into a symbol of California’s high cost of living and “killjoy” rules. During a Friday night rally in Sacramento, the Republican candidate lamented local bans on gas appliances and a statewide prohibition on flavored tobacco products.

“It’s ridiculous. They don’t mind the fentanyl, they give out free drugs to hopeless addicts, but you try getting flavored Zyn in California — no way. That is insane,” he said, drawing cheers mostly from younger audience members. Lawmakers approved the ban in 2020 and voters upheld it two years later.

GOP gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton campaigns at a Trunk or Treat block party Saturday in Highland Park.

(David Butow / For The Times)

Though Becerra is considered unbeatable in blue California in the race, many Hilton fans are clinging to hope that the Republican candidate will overcome the odds.

“We need help. I bought a hybrid and still am like, the gas, it’s killing me,” said Marina Gabel, adding that the paycheck from her school district job is “crumbs.” The Roseville Republican wore a shirt to Hilton’s Sacramento rally that described Newsom as a “California Horror Story” in a nod to the long-running FX anthology series.

In the final days of his campaign Becerra seized on voter anxiety about Trump’s policies, heightened by the administration’s recent efforts to wrest control over state voting processes.

Becerra forcefully argued that Tuesday’s election is a referendum on the president, and accused Hilton of being beholden to a White House that has attacked immigrants, launched an unnecessary war against Iran and created economic havoc by imposing tariffs and other unhinged policies.

“We see that wolf in that sheep’s clothing. We see right through you, Donald Trump,” Becerra said Friday at a social club in San Francisco’s Castro district, one of the nation’s most iconic LGBTQ+ communities. “In California, we say no mas. …. that’s why this election is so important, because we gotta prove that California does not take a knee to Donald Trump.”

Canadian PM Carney announces progress in Canada-US trade deal talks ahead of US midterm elections on November 3.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has announced progress towards a future trade deal with the United States, which could help ease tensions between the two North American neighbours.

The Sunday announcement came just two days before the November 3 US midterm elections, which will determine control of the US Congress.

“Good conversation with US President Donald Trump on the future of Canada-U.S. trade,” Carney posted on X on Sunday.

Ties between Ottawa and Washington have been strained by an escalating trade war, with Canada and the US imposing billions of dollars in tariffs on each other’s goods in recent months.

“Teams from both countries will be working in the coming weeks to deliver that outcome,” Carney said. “This builds on recent constructive discussions on the outlines of a mutually beneficial trade deal.”

In his second term, Trump has upended global trade by imposing tariffs on many of the US’s allies, including Canada – one of the US’s biggest trading partners.

In August, high-level trade talks between Ottawa and Washington broke down, and Trump imposed a 50 percent levy on $20bn of Canadian goods, or 5.5 percent of its exports. Canada responded with equivalent tariffs on US steel, dairy, appliances, farm equipment, pulp and paper, and electronics.

Trump said last week that he expected a new trade agreement with Canada to be reached “pretty soon”, but offered no details.

The trade tensions with Canada have become an issue in the midterm elections, particularly in Michigan and Maine, where Republican candidates have faced pressure over tariffs that have hurt local businesses.

Canada has sought to diversify its trade options and recently welcomed a European Union offer to become an “associate member”.

Carney praised the proposal’s ambition, describing his goal as a “unique alliance” rather than conventional EU membership.

Alina Habba Mildon signed the lucrative contract while working at the Justice Department, before Trump pardoned the bank

US President Donald Trump has criticised one of his former lawyers for signing a contract worth more than $50 million with the family of a Venezuelan banker whom Trump later pardoned.

Alina Habba Mildon reportedly signed the lucrative deal while working as a federal prosecutor and later began working for the banker’s family while still being employed as an adviser to the US Department of Justice.

“I thought it was totally obnoxious and outrageous, and it’s not acceptable,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida on Saturday.

“Not acceptable at all,” he added.

According to The New York Times, Habba Mildon signed a four-year contract in October 2025 with a company owned by the family of Julio Herrera Velutini, a Venezuelan banker who was seeking a presidential pardon.

Herrera was accused of bribing former Puerto Rico Governor Wanda Vazquez Garced in exchange for removing a financial regulator who was investigating his bank. He was facing federal bribery charges in the US before reaching a plea deal with prosecutors in August 2025.

Habba Mildon’s contract with his family’s company guaranteed her more than $50 million over four years, including an annual salary of $10 million and bonuses.

When she signed the deal, Habba Mildon was the acting US attorney for New Jersey, a position Trump had appointed her to after working as his personal lawyer.

She left that position in December after a court ruled she could not legally serve in the role. She then immediately took another job at the Justice Department as a senior adviser to the attorney general.

On January 1 , Habba Mildon officially began working for the banker’s family while still employed by the Justice Department.

Two weeks later, on January 15 , Trump granted Herrera a full presidential pardon.

The arrangement has raised questions about potential conflicts of interest, given Habba Mildon’s government position and her ties to Trump.

The company that hired her, Concord Partners, has no public profile and its business activities remain unclear, according to The New York Times.

Habba Mildon has denied having any role in securing Herrera’s pardon.

Last week, she said she had never been paid to obtain a pardon, had never discussed one with anyone at the White House or the Justice Department and had never worked to secure a pardon for anyone.

Trump was reportedly furious when he learned about the size of her contract.

The New York Times reported that he told aides and allies that Habba Mildon should donate some of the money to his future presidential library or another Trump-related organisation.

He also reportedly told at least one ally that Herrera’s family should stop paying her the remainder of the contract.

Speaking on Saturday, Trump said he told Habba Mildon he did not want her to be paid, describing the situation as “terrible”.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters.

All 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 35 of the Senate’s 100 seats are being contested on Tuesday.

Trump says defeated presidential candidate, who faces investigation in Brazil, can stay in the US ‘as long as he wants’.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio says President Donald Trump’s administration did not help Brazil’s defeated presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro flee the country for the United States after losing a run-off to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Bolsonaro arrived in Miami, Florida, on Wednesday, a day after the US Department of State said Bolsonaro and his family would be granted US visas after his October 25 election loss, which bucked a trend of conservative electoral wins in Latin America.

Bolsonaro is under investigation in Brazil for alleged corruption, money laundering and tax evasion, and before leaving, he had been ordered to surrender his passport because police deemed him a flight risk.

“We didn’t facilitate anything,” Rubio told reporters on Saturday in Atlanta, Georgia, where diplomats from the Group of 20 largest world economies were gathered.

“We had word that he had arrived in the United States. He had previously held a visa, and the president made a decision to allow him to enter the country,” Rubio said.

He added that the US government was not “involved directly in any of the moves that were made”.

Rubio also said he had seen Brazil’s foreign minister, Mauro Vieira, in Atlanta on Friday and Saturday and he expected to see Brazilian officials again in November in France during a foreign ministers meeting.

Separately, Trump, who had previously called Brazil’s election “rigged”, voiced sympathy for Bolsonaro and said he could stay in the US indefinitely.

“I think he got treated very shabbily, very shabbily, so he can stay here as long as he wants,” the president told reporters at his Florida residence on Saturday.

The Reuters news agency reported that Bolsonaro was admitted to the US under humanitarian parole, a status that typically lasts for one year.

Trump’s comments suggested relations between the Western Hemisphere’s two largest democracies may remain strained for some time.

After Bolsonaro’s run-off loss, he fled Brazil to the US via Argentina and Ecuador on a journey that some US media outlets reported was partly arranged with the help of Jason Miller, a White House official.

Bolsonaro has refused to concede the Brazilian election and called the results fraudulent without providing evidence.

Since arriving in the US, he has claimed to be the true “leader” of Brazil and said he left the country because he was a victim of “persecution”.

The District of Columbia (DC) and the state of Virginia have filed a joint lawsuit to halt the construction of a large triumphal arch sought by United States President Donald Trump.

Filed on Saturday, the lawsuit denounces the project as “flagrantly unlawful” and “legally indefensible”.

It calls on the federal court system to bar construction before it starts.

Otherwise, the lawsuit warns, Trump could claim that pausing construction already under way would pose a national security risk, as he has done with other controversial projects in the past.

“This is not the first time that Defendants have rushed to dramatically remake the District too quickly for courts to intervene,” the lawsuit reads. “This Court should not allow this effort to escape judicial scrutiny.”

Saturday’s complaint brings the total number of lawsuits against the arch to three.

Trump has championed the prospect of building a triumphal arch, similar to the Arc de Triomphe built in Paris during Napoleonic times.

Trump’s arch, however, is designed to stand 30 metres (100 feet) taller than the Statue of Liberty. It would tower from the Memorial Circle in Washington, DC, at 76 metres (250ft).

That colossal scale has prompted outrage, particularly from veterans’ groups who fear the arch would block views of Arlington National Cemetery, a hallowed military grave site.

White House officials maintain that ground could be broken as early as next week, on or around November 5.

On Friday, the administration unveiled a 106-page proposal for the arch to be a 12-storey megastructure, featuring a winged bronze statue of Lady Liberty lifting an eternal flame.

The arch would include two mezzanines and an observation deck with panoramic east-west views, as well as programme spaces, offices and a “fire command centre”.

Trump has previously said the arch would double as a military hub with snipers and drone capabilities.

Construction on the arch would also result in significant traffic changes in the area, including rerouting traffic to nearby roads.

In Saturday’s lawsuit, Attorneys General Brian Schwalb of Washington, DC, and Jay Jones of Virginia pointed to the project’s disruptive footprint as a major concern.

“As soon as defendants break ground on this project, they will inflict irreparable harm on both the District and Virginia,” the lawsuit said.

It warns that the anticipated three-year construction project will stymie commuter traffic, slow down emergency vehicles and generate significant pollution, including “stormwater runoff into the Potomac”.

The lawsuit calls on the court to force the Trump administration to get congressional authorisation before any construction can begin.

The new legal challenge comes on the heels of an October 8 filing by Arlington County, which was the first governmental body to mount a legal action against Trump’s planned monument.

In that lawsuit, the county’s governing board argued that the project would cause “significant harm” to its residents and likely require changes to nearby flight paths.

The first complaint came in February, when a group of Vietnam War veterans and an architectural historian launched an effort to stop the arch.

District Judge Tanya Chutkan is overseeing that case, and she is weighing whether to issue a preliminary injunction to temporarily freeze any construction plans while the court hears arguments.

At a hearing on Friday, Chutkan deferred an immediate ruling but signalled that she would be issuing a decision expeditiously.

She previously ordered the administration to give the court 48 hours’ notice before undertaking any activities related to the construction of the arch.

The monument has already received early approval from the US Commission of Fine Arts, whose members were all tapped by Trump.

ATLANTA — Two years after Kamala Harris lost the presidential election to Donald Trump, she still delights Democratic donors and activists with jabs against him, saying the Republican is “callous, corrupt and incompetent” and calling him the “decorator in chief” for his White House renovations and gold adornments.

The former vice president also has plenty to say about what her party, the electorate and the country should do next as she also considers whether to run again.

“This is the moment where we turn that anger into action,” Harris said more than once during a busy schedule in the final stretch of the midterm campaign.

Harris campaigned for candidates across seven states, ending with a recent two-day visit to Georgia. It was, in part, the kind of nostalgic tour seen from Barack Obama and Bill Clinton — two-term presidents whose last campaigns are behind them — and the barnstorming from potential future contenders such as Govs. Gavin Newsom of California and Andy Beshear of Kentucky and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.

As the first Black woman elected to nationwide office, Harris urged fellow Black Americans to “honor the ancestors” with their votes. She also said she has become unapologetically “transactional” by demanding more from politicians.

Harris, a U.S. senator and attorney general from California before joining Joe Biden on the 2020 ticket, also pushed fellow Democrats to govern aggressively and she called for “structural work” that she said was necessary to reinvigorate American democracy: Supreme Court expansion, statehood for the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, and reconsideration of the electoral college.

“I think she’s hitting all the right notes,” said Melinda Johnson, a retired nurse who attended a Fulton County Democratic Party fundraising gala that Harris headlined in Atlanta.

Harris made it to early presidential primary states, including Nevada, New Hampshire and Michigan. She also went to Mississippi, not exactly a hotbed of presidential politics, on behalf of U.S. Senate candidate Scott Colom.

“The South is in play,” she said. “When Democrats invest in the South, we can win in the South.”

In Georgia, Harris delved into civil rights history as she accused the U.S. Supreme Court of “backdoor racism” with its decision to gut the Voting Rights Act and allow Republicans to redraw boundaries for congressional districts that now elect nonwhite lawmakers.

“Ruthlessness” is key, she said at the Democratic dinner in Atlanta. “Not ruthlessness in the sense of cruelty … but in our willingness to use our power to deliver on our commitments.” Democrats, she said, “can no longer let process stand in the way of progress.”

Throughout her stops, Harris nodded implicitly to her loss to Trump.

“You know we’ve been spending the last year and a half, so many of us, going through a range of emotions,” she told students. “Anger, depression, sadness, frustration, a sense of helplessness and powerlessness.”

Warning that Trump could try to meddle in Tuesday’s election, she echoed one of the president’s mantras to encourage people to vote.

“In this case,” she said at Atlanta’s Elizabeth Baptist Church, “we just need to turn out in really large numbers that would be too big to rig.”

Barrow writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — A federal judge said Friday she would open a “formal inquiry” to investigate if attorneys for the Trump administration violated ethical boundaries during a legal dispute about a golf course project — one in a pair of plans that are revealing the breadth of the president’s attempts to mold parts of the District of Columbia to his own vision.

The two cases, unfolding at the same time in the same federal courthouse, also showcase the underlying executive authority claims that lie beneath them — a glimpse into the uses of presidential power under Donald Trump.

U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes’ declaration that the court would appoint a “special master” into whether agency officials, and Justice Department attorneys, had made misrepresentations in the court is a far cry from her relationship with the government until this month. She had rejected numerous motions from the plaintiffs to step in, saying she trusted the government attorneys.

The cases involved are an impending shutdown and reconfiguration of a historic public golf course and the construction of a monumental arch that, at 250 feet, would be 100 feet taller than the Statue of Liberty is from its base to the top of the torch. The two projects are barely three miles apart.

The hearing on the golf course change began as other recent ones have: Reyes questioned Associate Atty. Gen. Stanley Woodward Jr. over how Trump’s desires to turn the golf course, near the National Mall, into a world-class facility have become urgent plans that match his public pronouncements.

Reyes stopped the hearing several times and adjourned to her chambers to check previous transcripts of the trial as she questioned Woodward. Among things she wants examined: Was a National Park Service official told to exclude details in a court declaration? Did witnesses offer misleading testimony about the extent of plans in place for the course’s closure and renovation?

At one point, Reyes read the code of conduct to government attorneys on presenting erroneous or false information during a hearing.

Reyes ordered Friday’s hearing after multiple Truth Social posts by Trump indicated that there were plans for the golf course and construction was expected to begin Nov. 15. Trump said the park would be closed for 15 months while work goes on.

The presidential posts, which began Oct. 18, created a tense dynamic in multiple court hearings afterward when officials from the Interior Department, Justice and Park Service could not confirm the existence of the plans under questioning from Reyes. She eventually asked whom she should trust. The Justice Department filed notice Wednesday night that the plans were real.

“On Friday, October 30, 2026, the National Park Service will submit to the National Capital Planning Commission for review a rendering designed by Tom Fazio for a World Class, championship-level golf course that is capable of hosting major events,” the notice said.

Reyes locked in on the filing and Trump’s multiple Truth Social announcements as she questioned Woodward.

At one point, as they talked about plans that Woodward said came about only this week, he slipped and included tree cutting as part of the preparation for the closure.

Reyes responded immediately: “News flash.” She allowed him to correct himself that the tree cutting, which occurred earlier this month, was not part of the plan to close the East Potomac Park Golf Course.

The golf course lawsuit was one of two cases in court Friday dealing with the Trump administration’s push to expand its executive authority as the president remakes the federal areas of the capital near the National Mall and along the Potomac River.

Three courtrooms away, U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan was to hold a hearing on a motion asking that she call a temporary halt to plans to begin construction as early as Nov. 5 on the memorial arch. The arch is opposed by a small group of veterans and an architectural historian who sued in federal court in Washington, saying Congress must endorse the project.

“The public interest leans heavily against allowing defendants to blaze ahead,” the plaintiffs said in seeking the injunction. “This court should enter a preliminary injunction blocking defendants from beginning construction on Memorial Circle in the hope that they can render the arch a fait accompli before this Court has made a final determination.”

Legal experts who have been watching the numerous cases underway say that what might appear at first glance to be vanity projects are in truth cases that test the limits of presidential power.

Past administrations pursued legal theories that were sometimes legally sound, sometimes not, said David Super, law professor at the Georgetown University Law Center.

“But there was always the assumption that you would try to do things that were legal,” he said. “What we’re seeing here now is that if you think the federal courts can’t stop you,” you can break the law.

That’s ”going to do long-term damage to the country,” Super said.

Fields writes for the Associated Press.