GOP

As Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy came under fire for releasing an attack ad featuring his Democratic competitor’s estranged mother, a mysterious news site was running a Facebook ad boosting the controversial video.

The Buckeye Bulletin, which bills itself as an Ohio-based news platform committed to “reliable journalism” and “strong editorial standards,” popped up suddenly this spring and began pumping out a steady stream of pro-Ramaswamy content.

The publication’s articles have no bylines. There is no list of staff. The website does not feature digital advertisements, nor does it prompt readers to subscribe, but there is also no disclosure of who is funding it.

A closer look at the Buckeye Bulletin’s Meta advertising data shows that its Facebook and Instagram accounts are managed by the Lincoln Media Foundation, a nonprofit organization affiliated with the Orange County-based Lincoln Club — the oldest and largest conservative donor organization in California. IRS documents show that the club and foundation are associated organizations and share at least two key executives.

Meta’s advertising data shows that the Lincoln Media Foundation manages the Instagram and Facebook accounts for the Buckeye Bulletin.

(Meta)

The Buckeye Bulletin, Lincoln Club and Lincoln Media Foundation did not respond to requests for comment.

The Bulletin appears to be a partisan site posing as a local news outlet ahead of the midterm elections, a strategy political scientists refer to as “pink-slime” journalism.

This is not the first time a “pink-slime” outlet has been linked to the Lincoln Media Foundation. In 2024 Max Read, director of civic innovation for the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, identified seven such alleged outlets.

With the exception of one Los Angeles-focused site, those outlets all targeted critical states for the 2024 presidential election such as Georgia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Read reported that the media group had spent more than $63,000 on Facebook and Instagram ads, resulting in up to 18 million impressions during the last election cycle.

“[The sites were] very clearly designed to try to influence the information environment ahead of the presidential election,” Read told The Times. “They had all been started early in the year and used advertising on Meta platforms to juice their engagement numbers.”

When asked by The Times to take a look at the Buckeye Bulletin, Read said it appeared to be “pretty much copy and paste the same tactic that they used in 2024, even down to the aesthetics of the Facebook page and Instagram account.”

“It seems like they realized this worked at some level in 2024 and is worth doing again this year,” he said.

Earlier this year, CalMatters identified another outlet tied to the Lincoln Media Foundation called the California Courier, which had been circulating Facebook advertisements criticizing Gov. Gavin Newsom and the statewide redistricting ballot measure Proposition 50.

Since the Buckeye Bulletin’s Facebook and Instagram pages launched in March, the outlet has shared posts touting endorsements of Ramaswamy — a biotech billionaire and former presidential candidate — as well as his platform for addressing Ohio’s healthcare crisis and his stance on religious freedom in schools.

Simultaneously, the outlet’s social media posts have highlighted the refusal of his opponent — Amy Acton, Ohio’s former public health director — to debate, comments on how she “shut down” the state’s economy during the COVID-19 pandemic and a video with a watermark from right-wing political activist Laura Loomer.

This week, the outlet turned attention to Ramaswamy’s controversial campaign ad featuring Acton’s estranged mother, Donna Arthur. In the ad, Arthur calls her daughter a liar and urges voters not to support her.

However, the ad did not acknowledge that Arthur lost custody of her children after their stepfather, Arthur’s husband, was indicted for raping Acton when she was a child — an omission that drew fierce condemnation from Democrats and some Republicans, including Ohio’s Republican Gov. Mike DeWine. Others, including President Trump and Vice President JD Vance, an Ohioan, have defended the ad.

Arthur and her husband fled to Pennsylvania after his 1978 indictment where he died in 2004 without having been brought back to Ohio to face the charge.

Peppered in between political content on the Bulletin’s social media feeds is a smattering of reels related to non-political news, often featuring videos lifted directly from local TV stations. These other posts are used to create a “veneer of genuine local journalism,” Read said.

The language on the Bulletin’s About Us page displays markers of artificial intelligence such as generic mission statements, polished but repetitive phrasing and vague claims about journalistic standards with no details about the publication’s staff.

Of the last 30 posts shared on the Bulletin’s Facebook as of 5 p.m. Friday, 21 were about state or national politics and 10 were about the gubernatorial race. Engagement on the posts dealing with Ramaswamy and Acton is consistently strong for a page with around 5,600 followers.

For example, a Wednesday post on Ohio State Medical Assn.’s PAC endorsing Ramaswamy received more than 770 likes, 260 comments and 150 shares. Another video posted Wednesday with the label “Amy Acton refuses to debate, says mother is lying about her” received more than 4,800 likes, 1,500 comments and 500 shares.

Meanwhile, a non-political Wednesday post on a chemical explosion in Toledo received two likes, no comments and no shares.

The unassuming social media scroller or person who clicked onto the website would have no clue of the Buckeye Bulletin’s apparent connection to a group of wealthy Southern California Republications.

The Lincoln Media Foundation was started by leaders of the historic Lincoln Club, which was founded in 1962 and once counted John Wayne and former President Richard Nixon as members.

Today, the club describes itself as being home to “the most prominent business and thought leaders” in California and says it offers members the opportunity to meet world leaders and “experience their hobbies come to life through a combination of extravagance and leisure.”

The foundation notes that it uses a digital approach to reach communities left out of the national conversation, but its website does not disclose providing funding to any news outlets.

IRS records show that the nonprofit’s financial activities kicked up dramatically in 2024, the latest year for which data are available. The Lincoln Media Foundation reported $3.88 million in revenue in 2024, compared with $738,000 in 2023, $453,000 in 2022 and $415,000 in 2021.

The Buckeye Bulletin’s Facebook and Instagram accounts have spent just over $10,000 boosting posts this year, according to Meta’s ad library.

That’s barely a drop in the bucket in Ohio, where hotly contested races for governor and U.S. Senate have drawn hundreds of millions in spending. But presenting a slanted political view under the guise of local news tends to offer more bang for your buck than traditional advertisements, said Georgia Kernell, an associate professor in the departments of communications and political science at UCLA.

“Voters are so sick of ads; they’re getting tons of clear paid advertisements on the radio, on the television and on their social media feeds now,” she said. “Anything that can kind of look different is going to be more likely to keep their attention.”

Presenting as a traditional news source also increases the likelihood of viewers believing that the information presented is well-researched, she said.

Nik Usher, associate professor of communications at the University of San Diego, said it’s unclear how much influence pink-slime journalism is having on voting behavior, but political strategists are willing to try any new approach to possibly make a difference in tight races.

“This is one strategic effort to throw more spaghetti at the wall, hoping it’ll stick,” Usher said.

Creators of these partisan sites further stand to benefit from the fact that artificial intelligence tools are constantly scraping content from news websites without paywalls.

Researchers at NewsGuard recently found that leading AI chat bots are citing pink-slime websites nearly half the time when users ask questions about candidates and issues in the midterm elections.

Democrats and Republicans have increasingly leveraged pink-slime journalism to influence voters in the past few election cycles.

In 2020, the New York Times identified a network of 1,300 news sites that paid freelance writers to produce biased content for Republican groups and corporate public relations firms. In 2024, the left-leaning Star Spangled Media group used a site called the Morning Mirror to promote down-ballot Democratic candidates, according to research from Columbia Journalism School’s Tow Center for Digital Journalism.

More recently, the evolution of AI has increased the ease with which these websites can be populated with content, eliminating the need to pay writers and automating the production of social media posts.

Usher described pink-slime websites as “explosive bombs for public trust” that take advantage of the gap created by the loss of independent local papers and further diminish expectations for news to be fairly reported.

“Once these sorts of sites are pointed out to the public it further undermines distrust in political institutions, political parties, the news media,” Usher said, “especially when AI is associated with this kind of stuff.”

TOPEKA, Kan. — At 94 years, the Kansas GOP’s streak of one-party dominance in Senate races is the nation’s longest because even in the toughest years, disaffected Republican-leaning voters have reliably drifted back to the party’s fold before Election Day.

But Republicans fear this year could be different, setting the race between Republican Sen. Roger Marshall and Democrat Adam Hamilton on track to be the most expensive in state history.

Hamilton, founder and senior pastor of the nation’s largest United Methodist church, has raised significantly more money than Marshall, who is seeking his second term. Hamilton’s candidacy — and voters’ disapproval of President Trump’s handling of the economy — have upended GOP hopes of seeing Marshall coast to victory as the GOP tries to hold its Senate majority.

Kansas, which Trump carried in three presidential races, is an unlikely Senate battleground. Republicans redirected money from the North Carolina Senate race to help Marshall, and Trump flew to Kansas this week to hold a rally for him, calling Marshall “one of the greatest senators in our country”.

Stalwart GOP voters sensed a serious threat even before Trump announced his rally.

In Topeka, 81-year-old Julie Adamson has been praying about the election, but she’s also knocked on doors for Marshall, about 200 by her count. She said if Hamilton wins and Democrats control the Senate, “We’ll see, ‘impeach, impeach Trump.’”

“And nothing will get done for our country,” she added.

A formidable candidate emerged in a tough year for the GOP

Before entering the race, Hamilton already had a public profile in vote-rich suburbs through building his Kansas City-area Church of the Resurrection into a 25,000 member congregation. Churchgoing Protestants also knew him as the author of several dozen books, and he’s honed his speaking skills through weekly sermons.

Hamilton has positioned himself as a moderate and made rising prices, particularly for fuel, a key issue. During a debate Wednesday, both he and Marshall endorsed barring transgender girls and women from female sports teams. Hamilton called for local officials to make such decisions but suggested Marshall and other Republicans have been bullying transgender people by making the issue prominent in campaigns.

Marshall, a mostly retired doctor, portrays Hamilton as too liberal — radical, even — for a state where less than 26% of the 2 million registered voters are Democrats, while more than 44% are Republicans.

During Wednesday’s debate, Marshall repeatedly said a Hamilton victory would put Democrats in charge of the Senate and that Hamilton would vote with liberal Democrats.

“We need to remind everybody that control the Senate goes through Kansas,” he said.

There are signs that voter enthusiasm is with the Democrats as advance voting has surged across the U.S. compared to the last midterm. In Kansas, it has more than doubled for the same period.

Amanda Chavez Thomson, who is part owner of a small home-restoration business, said she believes change has been needed “for quite some time.”

“I think we finally have a candidate that can give us that energy and that surge that we need from people who may be on the fence or may not have voted in the past,” she said.

Fundraising emerges as a key concern for Republicans

Since the state’s August primary, Republican groups have committed to spending more than $26 million on television and digital advertising to boost Marshall, more than what they spent in his first race in 2020, according to the ad-tracking firm AdImpact. Including Marshall’s campaign, total GOP ad spending would exceed $32 million.

But Hamilton and Democratic groups together have committed to spending more than $38 million, according to AdImpact. Total ad spending — involving more than 40 groups outside the campaigns — would be about $71 million, a record for Kansas.

One of the reasons the GOP is pushing money towards Marshall may be that the incumbent has proven a lackluster fundraiser. Between the state’s August primary and Thursday, Hamilton has collected more than 10,000 contributions from Kansas residents, while raising $8 million from across the U.S., online campaign finance reports show. Marshall has about 200 contributions from Kansans while raising $905,000 total.

“People are crying out, saying, ‘Come on, Roger Marshall, speak up for us,’” Hamilton said during Wednesday night’s debate.

Marshall talking about liberal Democrats and ‘wokeness’

Marshall’s campaign and GOP groups have tried to knock any shine off Hamilton’s public image by attacking how he’s led his church and using snippets of his own sermons to portray him as too “woke.” During Trump’s rally, Marshall called Hamilton “the most radical liberal Democrat to ever get through a Senate primary in the history of Kansas.”

But such attacks aren’t resonating with at least a few disaffected Republicans. Don Hineman, a western Kansas rancher and former GOP state House majority leader, said he’s tired of “woke” being as an insult.

Hineman, who has signed on to the Republicans for Hamilton group, added that no one “was more ‘woke’ than Jesus Christ.”

Democrats have countered with television ads over Marshall’s pursuit of unpaid patient bills from the practice as an obstetrician that he gave up a decade ago. State court records online show that from 1996 through 2016, Marshall or his practice filed at least 700 debt-collection lawsuits, occasionally 10 or more a day.

The New York Times first reported the extent of the litigation. It said that in 81 cases, patients were arrested for missing court dates and quoted two experts who called Marshall’s tactics extreme. During Wednesday’s debate, Marshall said he’s faced a “gross mischaracterization” of his actions.

History and loyalty have been key assets for the Kansas GOP

Democrats can hold out hope for a Hamilton victory because the state has sizable blocs of moderate Republican and independent voters who’ve regularly swung elections to their candidates for governor and who protected abortion rights in a statewide vote in 2022.

Yet Republicans still have two key assets: Kansas’ political history and the loyalty that even unhappy Republican-leaning voters show to the party.

Not only have Democrats lost every Senate race in Kansas since 1932, no Democrat has come within 10 points of winning since 1974. In both 2014 and 2020, races considered tossups in mid-October fizzled, and Marshall’s predecessor, Republican Sen. Pat Roberts, won.

Leroy Towns, a former Roberts chief of staff, said many Republicans in 2014 who considered voting against Roberts “just couldn’t do it.” Towns — who switched parties because of Trump — is backing Hamilton.

Towns believes Hamilton will win, but added, “That Republican pull at the end of an election is really, really strong in this state.”

Hanna and Cappelletti write for the Associated Press. Cappelletti reported from Washington. AP writer Nicholas Ingram in Topeka, Kan., contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — It is a heated debate in the struggling Republican Party: whether to broaden its ideology or follow the advice of Dick Cheney, Rush Limbaugh and others who argue against deviating from core conservative principles.

Now, the GOP has a chance to see whether a moderate can become a model for Republican resurgence, with Florida Gov. Charlie Crist announcing Tuesday that he will run for the U.S. Senate in that politically important state.

Crist, who has bucked the GOP’s conservative wing on voting rights, global warming and other issues, enjoys high approval ratings. But with the governor facing a conservative in the primary, Republican leaders across the country have seized on Florida as a battleground in the larger philosophical war over the party’s future.

Crist won instant endorsements from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Texas Sen. John Cornyn, chairman of the GOP Senate campaign committee. The two see him as the best hope for keeping a Senate seat in GOP hands as the party tries to avoid falling below the crucial number of senators needed to block legislation, an outcome that many political analysts see as likely.

Crist’s main primary challenger, former state House Speaker Marco Rubio, went on the attack Tuesday, releasing a video showing the governor with President Obama and criticizing Crist’s support of the Democrats’ “reckless” economic stimulus spending.

“Our primary will offer Republicans a front-row seat to a debate about the future of the Republican Party here in Florida and across the nation,” Rubio said. “My campaign will offer GOP voters a clear alternative to the direction some want to take our party.”

Rubio, 37, is little-known outside of Miami and is given steep odds of taking down Crist.

The Florida announcement comes as GOP infighting has intensified following moderate Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter’s defection to the Democrats and a spate of recent surveys that show only about one-fifth of American voters consider themselves Republicans.

Last year’s elections almost wiped Republicans off the map in the Northeast and Southwest. The party won only a fraction of Latinos and other minorities that once were seen as building blocks of a new, long-lasting majority.

Several GOP leaders — including Virginia Rep. Eric Cantor, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush — late last month announced the formation of the National Council for a New America to open a policy-focused discussion designed to help rebuild the party.

But the group has been ridiculed by leading conservatives, who complained that the rollout touched on economic and national security issues but not on social concerns such as abortion, gay marriage and guns.

Former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee wrote a derisive column on the Fox News website poking fun at the GOP leaders for needing a “listening tour” to understand the American psyche. In it, he accused the council of treating “values voters as if they were embarrassing distant cousins who are allowed to come to the family gatherings a couple of times a year, but aren’t expected to be seen beyond that.”

Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, chided the group for kicking off its campaign “devoid of the values that once caused voters to identify with the party.”

In a television interview over the weekend, former Vice President Cheney said he would “go with Rush Limbaugh” as a true Republican over former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, a moderate who last year endorsed Obama’s candidacy.

Limbaugh, the conservative talk show host, also has been critical of Republicans who do not adhere to core conservatism, saying recently that when Specter left the party he should have taken 2008 presidential nominee John McCain with him.

Complicating the GOP’s challenge in presenting itself as a unified party is the presence of the powerful pro-business Club for Growth, which helped push Specter out of the GOP and has been harshly critical of Crist.

Republican strategists said Tuesday that the party needed to be more concerned about picking candidates who could win than with limiting itself to pure conservatives, particularly with the GOP at risk of losing Senate seats in Ohio, Missouri, Kentucky and New Hampshire.

Already, the Specter defection has put the party’s Senate roster right at the crucial number of 40 — and if Democrat Al Franken is declared the winner of last year’s Minnesota Senate race, then the majority party (with the help of two independents) will have the 60 votes needed to override Republican filibuster attempts.

Grover Norquist, who as head of Americans for Tax Reform is a key leader of the conservative movement, said he had a pragmatic desire to elect “the most Reaganite Republican that can win in any given district or state.” That means, he said, that he supports electing moderates in Maine but not necessarily in Texas — and that in Florida, where Obama won last year, Crist may well be the best candidate.

Cornyn, a conservative, signaled months ago that he would take a pragmatic view on the question of ideological purity versus winning elections. Addressing a conservative conference in February, Cornyn said he would recruit moderate candidates if they matched the politics of their states, and that “a circular firing squad is no solution” to the party’s problems.

The Texas senator described Rubio, a Cuban American, as having a “very bright future,” but added that Crist was the “best candidate in 2010.”

Crist, 52, is expected to present himself as an answer to the Republican Party’s image troubles — a nonideological figure with a can-do, friendly demeanor.

He rose to prominence as a tough-on-crime Florida state lawmaker by supporting chain gangs for prisoners. As attorney general and governor, he aggressively courted Latino and black voters. Early in his term, he pushed a rule to speed the restoration of voting rights for ex-felons — a deeply unpopular move with many Republican politicians.

In February, after Obama’s stimulus plan was rejected by every House Republican and all but three Republican senators, Crist irked conservatives by joining the Democratic president at a campaign-style rally in hard-hit Fort Myers, Fla., to extol the need for the bill.

Tom Slade, a former chairman of the Florida GOP, said popularity always trumps ideology, and he predicted Crist easily would win the Republican nomination.

That, he added, that might be good for the party as a whole.

“There are not enough blue-eyed, white, blond guys and girls who go to church three times on Sunday and once on Wednesday to make up a majority for the Republican Party almost anywhere,” Slade said. “If we don’t broaden the party, there won’t be much of a party left.”

—

peter.wallsten@latimes.com

ROSEVILLE, Calif. — San Diego County Republican Carl DeMaio had a warning for conservatives at a get-out-the-vote rally this month in Placer County.

“You are doomed,” DeMaio said, crooning the phrase like a foghorn. The audience chuckled.

“Doomed” is DeMaio’s description for races that lack a conservative candidate. Skip voting in those, he told the crowd, briskly walking them through the Nov. 3 ballot.

Rep. Carl DeMaio speaks to attendees during a “Beer, BBQ & Ballots” event for Proposition 39 at the Nevada County Fairgrounds.

(Fred Greaves / For The Times)

Microphone in hand, the freshman state legislator paced the floor, threw up his hands and scowled as he declared California a “communist state,” the progressive Bay Area “the gates of hell” and Hillary Clinton “the wicked witch.”

Urging volunteers to door-knock at Republican households, he instructed them to ignore Democratic homes entirely.

“I don’t need to remind them there’s an election going on,” he said, prompting more laughs.

DeMaio, 52, is emerging as a prominent voice for California Republicans, promising a path back to power and delighting audiences with his sharp takedowns of Democrats. His vehicle this election is Proposition 39 — he is coauthor of the ballot measure — which would require Californians to provide ID when voting, an initiative backed by millions of dollars from conservatives and condemned by the state’s Democratic leaders and voting rights experts.

A woman grabs a “Yes on 39” lawn sign at the Nevada County Fairgrounds.

(Fred Greaves / For The Times)

On his YouTube channel, he regularly skewers Gov. Gavin Newsom, the Sacramento “swamp” and the media with shows titled, “Thinking of California? 3 Reasons Not to!” and “Socialism on the CA Ballot in 2026!”

His advocacy group, Reform California, supports conservative candidates and helps raise money. Backed by volunteers, the group is usurping the California Republican Party’s influence, according to both his critics and allies.

DeMaio appears undaunted by his quest.

Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly 2 to 1 in California, control the state Legislature and hold every statewide elected position. In Los Angeles, a democratic socialist running for mayor leads in some polls.

“Republicans are tired of what’s going on in the state of California, and they’re looking for somebody to lead them out of the minority,” said Corey Gustafson, former chair of the San Diego County Republican Party. “Many people think Carl is the answer to that.”

An alternative GOP machine

In an interview at Reform California’s Escondido office, DeMaio said his goal is to restore political balance in the state by electing more Republicans.

“I’m trying to get my party to pull its head out of its ass, be more effective at campaigning, and get its ideas across,” DeMaio said, ticking off values he believes the Republican Party should champion: socially moderate positions, environmental stewardship and challenging big corporations.

Though the GOP has a poor track record on those issues, DeMaio says: “I’m just simply tapping into something that already exists, that just needs leadership.”

Fairgoers listen to Rep. Carl DeMaio in Nevada County.

(Fred Greaves / For The Times)

Nearby, scores of volunteers sat at long tables, stuffing voter guides — approved and printed by DeMaio’s team — into envelopes. It is an immense undertaking, with every guide tailored to the voter’s local election. Volunteers hand-write the voter’s name and address on the envelope to give it a personal touch.

Matt Rexroad, a political consultant who ran an independent expenditure against DeMaio in his 2024 Assembly race, said that he doesn’t like DeMaio’s “combative side” but praised his effectiveness.

“He’s hardworking and he’s everywhere,” Rexroad said. “What the California Republican Party and the various central committees should be doing? He is basically running and setting up a system that’s totally outside of that which answers to him.”

Ahead of the June primary, the state Republican Party sent a cease-and-desist letter to DeMaio challenging his use of its trademarked elephant emblem and the phrase “Official Republican Voter Guide” on Reform California campaign materials.

Republican candidates endorsed by DeMaio ultimately beat out the party establishment-backed candidates in two significant races in the primary.

Matt Shupe, a spokesperson for the state Republican Party, said that Reform California is benefiting from the strong “foundation” that the party built. “We’re stronger when we work together, and we look forward to doing just that,” Shupe said.

Clashes with business and labor

DeMaio grew up in Orange County, attended a Jesuit school in Maryland and graduated from Georgetown University.

His mother died of breast cancer when he was a teenager, essentially leaving him an orphan because his father was not in the picture, according to DeMaio.

He frequently speaks about his childhood adversity. He recalled visiting his mother in the hospital during her illness, describing how she hid her leg under a blanket and joked that doctors had mistakenly amputated it. “She had a great sense of humor,” he said. “I try to also, no matter what, to keep a sense of humor.”

After college, he founded a think tank dedicated to reforming government. He co-wrote a 2003 report with suggestions for closing California’s massive budget deficit after the dot-com bubble left the state reeling.

Former state Sen. Jim Brulte said the Senate Republican Caucus spent several days reading through DeMaio’s recommendations and ultimately adopted several. DeMaio is “wicked smart,” said Brulte, also the former state GOP party leader.

Former San Diego mayoral candidate Carl DeMaio announces a recall effort against San Diego Mayor Bob Filner in 2013 in San Diego.

(Denis Poroy / Associated Press)

Elected to the San Diego City Council in 2008, he cast himself as a fiscal watchdog, challenging labor unions and businesses’ influence.

He lost a bid for San Diego mayor in 2012, and two tries for Congress, and also twice pursued a voter ID ballot measure before aborting the efforts.

In 2018, he led the successful recall effort against state Sen. Josh Newman over the Fullerton politician’s support of a gas tax, part of what DeMaio called a “gazelle strategy” to target seemingly vulnerable Democrats.

In DeMaio’s winning 2024 state Assembly race, he heavily featured former Gov. Pete Wilson and his signature push for border control. “Gov. Pete Wilson was right,” DeMaio’s ad proclaimed, before blaming both major parties for “doing nothing” on illegal immigration for decades.

The first openly gay Republican Assembly member, he represents a suburban and rural district in northern and eastern San Diego County that covers Santee, Poway and the unincorporated communities of Julian, Ramona and Borrego Springs.

He is running for reelection on Nov. 3 against Democrat Gerald Boursiquot, an IT contractor.

Friction in Sacramento

On his first day in office, DeMaio introduced bills to require voter ID at the polls, repeal California’s “sanctuary state” law, and bar elected officials from trading stocks, among others. All died in the Democratic-controlled Legislature.

His relationship with some Democrats worsened this year after he fueled outrage over a bill introduced by a Democratic Assembly member to make confidential the addresses of those providing legal and humanitarian aid to immigrants.

DeMaio dubbed it the “Stop Nick Shirley Act,” in reference to the conservative influencer, and said it would prevent activists from doing their jobs. MAGA loyalists flocked to Sacramento in solidarity.

The Democrats “can’t stand him,” said Roger Niello, a Republican state senator from Fair Oaks. “And I think he takes wonderful pleasure in that.”

Assemblymember Josh Lowenthal, a Democrat from Long Beach, called DeMaio’s views and tactics “repugnant” but said he has a friendship with the politician.

“When the camera is on, he’s antagonistic, bombastic and has the capacity to start a nuclear war,” Lowenthal said. “In private, he’s affable, thoughtful and willing to exchange ideas with anyone.”

Campaign Chair Carl DeMaio speaks during a rally at the Santa Clarita Activities Center in 2021 for
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s ouster.

(Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

Now wrapping up his first term in Sacramento, DeMaio said he dislikes living part time in the state capital and avoids its political culture of nightly fundraisers. Instead, he said, he goes to bed early so he can wake up and record his daily show.

“I’m actually an introvert,” he said. “People don’t believe that. When I am not doing politics, I just want to be home with my cats, my partner and just try to disconnect from the world.”

The voter ID push

DeMaio’s Proposition 39 campaign bus pulled up to Folsom last week, part of a 71-stop tour ahead of the election.

“A lot of people, especially in the Trump era, really like someone who’s loud and fighting for them,” said Sadie Foster, a 34-year-old from Sacramento who volunteered serving potato salad at the event. “Even on the Democrat side, you see that.”

DeMaio, speaking to a large crowd, called his voter ID initiative the “most exciting thing on the ballot to get our base to turn out.”

If passed, Proposition 39 would require voters to present identification at the polls or write a government-approved PIN on the back of mail-in ballot envelopes. It would also require county officials to update voter rolls by removing individuals who have moved or passed away.

Opponents, including prominent Democrats and many voting experts, argue that the measure would make voting harder and disproportionately disenfranchise low-income citizens, rural residents and communities of color. They also point to data consistently indicating that voter fraud, including by noncitizens, is exceedingly rare.

President Trump, who remains widely unpopular in California, also supports stricter voter ID laws. Unlike Trump, DeMaio actively encourages mail-in voting.

A spot for the initiative features a woman asking rhetorically, “Can you dislike Donald Trump and still vote YES on Prop. 39 for voter ID? Yes, you can!”

In an interview, DeMaio linked the proposition to what he described as his longtime interest in election integrity. At the same time, no voter wants to see “an ineligible person casting a vote,” he said.

At an online strategy meeting with volunteers last month, DeMaio instructed them to target “low-propensity, lazy Republicans.”

One volunteer suggested tying their campaign to Trump’s offer to pay voters a $5,000 dividend if Republicans keep control of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

“Please,” said DeMaio, sounding frustrated. “Stay on message. Do not get distracted by shiny objects. Because those shiny objects, according to the data, won’t help us win.”

President Trump has pushed Congress to pass a proof-of-citizenship law, signed an executive order seeking a national voter ID requirement and tried to limit mail voting through U.S. Postal Service changes.

None of those moves succeeded in time to affect this year’s midterm elections. It’s a different matter in the states.

More than three dozen voting laws passed in Republican-controlled states are taking effect for the first time this year, many of them containing elements of Trump’s stalled proposals. They include changes to what IDs are acceptable to register for the first time and requirements to show proof of citizenship, an issue the Republican president has tried but failed to get through Congress.

“Trump’s attacks on our elections are deeply damaging, but they are not happening in isolation,” said Sophia Lin Lakin, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Voting Rights Project. ”Across the country, states are also advancing restrictions that make it harder for eligible voters to cast a ballot.”

Republican lawmakers who support the tighter voting laws, especially around voter ID, describe them as common sense changes that help build trust in elections.

Trump and other Republicans have been pushing for more restrictive rules since the president’s false claims of widespread fraud in his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden. Trump’s false claims have resonated with Republican voters, a majority of whom believe Biden was not legitimately elected despite all evidence to the contrary. Trump lost dozens of court challenges, his own attorney general found no evidence of widespread fraud, and reviews, audits and recounts in the battleground states where he contested his loss all affirmed Biden’s victory.

Among the changes confronting voters as early voting gets underway: Students in New Hampshire can no longer use student IDs; Utah voters returning mail ballots must include more information on the envelope; and some voters in Mississippi might need birth certificates or passports to verify their identities.

Changes to voter ID requirements are challenged

New Hampshire state Rep. Donald McFarlane said he sponsored the bill to eliminate student IDs as acceptable for voting because colleges don’t have the same controls when issuing those cards as government agencies.

“The change removes a special exception and applies the same government-issued ID standard to all voters,” he said, adding that his bill had bipartisan support.

Students, he said, can still get state IDs free of charge.

The new requirements have not gone unchallenged.

In South Dakota, the ACLU has filed a lawsuit seeking to halt a new law that includes requiring voters registering for the first time to present the most common forms of ID — driver’s licenses, Tribal IDs and non-driver state IDs. They must be presented in person at places that accept registration.

“Proof of citizenship in itself is not terrible,” said Kathryn Johnson, president of the League of Women Voters of South Dakota.

Her concern is the requirement to present the IDs in person.

“We’re kind of a remote state, so sometimes it takes a drive, and you have to coordinate, you have to take off work, and all of these kinds of things,” she said.

Some Democrats also have expressed support for voter ID during recent debates. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said he was open to the idea as long as it wasn’t based on “conspiracy theories.” When legislatures change their state’s voting laws, they typically give election offices and voters time to adjust. Trump wanted federal voter ID and proof-of-citizenship legislation to take effect immediately, forcing election officials and voters to comply in the middle of the midterms.

Ohio seeks to scrub voter rolls

Ohio has a proof of citizenship requirement in effect for the first time this year for those registering to vote or updating their voter registration information at a Bureau of Motor Vehicles location. The state also eliminated its four-day grace period for mail ballots, which now must be received at local election offices by Election Day.

Yet the biggest concern for voting rights groups is an ongoing purge of the state’s voter rolls. The databases used to check citizenship against voter registration lists can be outdated, said Freda Levenson, legal director of the ACLU of Ohio, which has sued to overturn the law.

“Vast numbers of perfectly eligible voters are vulnerable to being disenfranchised,” she said.

Republican state Sen. Theresa Gavarone, one of the primary sponsors of the bill, challenged the ACLU’s legal action and said the problem it addresses is a real one.

“In the past two years, hundreds of noncitizens have been removed from Ohio’s voter rolls,” she said in an email. “Every single vote cast by a noncitizen disenfranchises a lawful Ohio voter.”

Voters have mixed views on the changes

Outside an early voting center in Wayne County, Ohio, retired steel worker Dan Walter, an independent voter, said he opposes requiring documentary proof of citizenship to vote.

“It’s to keep people from voting, it sounds to me like,” he said.

His wife, Jody, a retired aerospace executive and a Democrat, said she felt the same way about Ohio’s new requirement for registering to vote.

“A driver’s license doesn’t prove citizenship, and that’s all they ask for now,” she said. “It’s going to be an obstacle for so many people.”

Genia Fortune had a different view. A nurse, the Millersburg resident described herself as an independent and said she voted for President Barack Obama, a Democrat, and later for Trump. She believes Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen and sees requiring documentary proof of citizenship as a necessary precaution.

“I just feel like you need to be a citizen and show proof of ID,” she said.

Voting and election laws have become a regular target for legislatures

The Trump administration has pushed multiple strategies to influence this year’s midterm elections, most of them stymied by Congress or the courts.

Chris Diaz, director of legislative tracking at the Voting Rights Lab, said the group has seen several versions of the Republican president’s proposals passed by his allies in the states.

A recently released report by the group highlighted some of the key areas drawing Republican lawmakers’ attention, including mail balloting, voter ID and the hunt for noncitizens on voter rolls.

Noncitizen voting has been a focus of the Trump administration despite it being a rare problem. The U.S. Department of Justice recently announced it had brought charges in roughly 90 cases for various types of election misconduct, including 50 against people who are alleged to have voted as noncitizens. The U.S. had 227 million registered voters for the 2024 presidential election.

The Brennan Center for Justice has identified nearly 40 laws in 21 states taking effect this election season that will make it harder for eligible voters to register, stay on the rolls or cast ballots.

The report from the center, part of the New York University School of Law, found that many of the new laws target subsets of voters.

“What I want voters to take away from this is that elections are still run by the states and there are still people in many states who are trying to make it harder for you to vote,” said Sean Morales-Doyle, senior director of the center’s Voting Rights and Elections Program. “But that’s all the more reason to go make a plan to vote and participate.”

Fields and Smyth write for the Associated Press. Fields reported from Washington and Smyth reported from Wooster and Millersburg, Ohio.

PORT HURON, Mich. — Abdul El-Sayed, holding a microphone and wearing his signature V-neck black T-shirt, slowly shook his head as a woman at his town hall described how she burned through her savings after undergoing emergency brain surgery.

“I’m really sorry for your experience, and I hope that you’re on the mend,” said El-Sayed, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Michigan, after outlining proposals for guaranteed healthcare and paid leave.

Later that night, while talking to reporters in the basement below the theater, his tone was far different. El-Sayed called his Republican opponent, Mike Rogers, a “coward” and said President Trump was “afraid” to visit the state, and he dismissed as “dumb” a question about whether Iran or Israel posed a greater threat to the United States.

The exchanges captured two sides of a candidate who is the central figure in one of the nation’s most consequential Senate races. El-Sayed would be the country’s first Muslim senator, and he’s crisscrossing the state to counter a Republican effort, fueled by tens of millions of dollars, to portray him as a dangerous radical. But he has also embraced his confrontational side by mocking and taunting Trump and Rogers.

“If they want to make me the main character in the midterms, I’m not shying away from it,” El-Sayed said in an interview. “Run against me. See how well that works out for you.”

El-Sayed’s resolute confidence rubbed some Democrats the wrong way during a divisive primary against Rep. Haley Stevens. The former public health official has shown little interest in toning it down, defending his progressive agenda and adversarial approach toward Republicans, emboldening supporters who believe he’s the right candidate for an angry electorate that has lost faith in the political establishment.

But his doubters fear he’ll cost Democrats control of the Senate by failing to unite his party’s disparate factions ahead of November.

“If you want their votes, you have to make nice with those people, and he’s not really doing that,” said Michigan political strategist Adrian Hemond, who supported Stevens. “Maybe he doesn’t have to. The entire theory of this candidacy has been he can remake what the electorate looks like.”

A Republican target

Even though Michigan backed Trump twice in his three presidential campaigns, no Republican has won a Senate race in the state since 1994.

The political landscape is no friendlier this year. Trump started an unpopular war with Iran, leading to higher gas prices and related inflation. Rogers has opted for a low-key campaign with fewer public events than El-Sayed as he tries to make the race all about his Democratic opponent.

As of Saturday, Republicans had outspent Democrats by $78 million to $63 million in the Michigan Senate race, according to AdImpact, which tracks political advertising. Around $40 million in Republican spending has gone toward negative advertisements, compared with around $20 million from Democrats.

The ads portray El-Sayed as “dangerously radical” and “too extreme,” highlighting his past calls to defund the police and relax immigration enforcement. Others tie him to Hasan Piker, a popular online streamer with whom El-Sayed has appeared and who has drawn criticism for past comments, including saying that “America deserved 9/11.”

On Friday, Rogers appeared alongside Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, who told reporters that El-Sayed “sleeps in a Bin Laden jersey.” Rogers laughed.

Vice President JD Vance has called El-Sayed “evil.” In one social media post, Trump shared a photo of himself with First Lady Melania Trump alongside a photo of El-Sayed and his wife, who wears a hijab, with the caption: “Two VERY DIFFERENT America’s.”

Late Wednesday, Trump referred to El-Sayed as “Mohammed” and said he “goes back to the days of the Jihad.”

El-Sayed has hardly backed down. At the campaign stop in Port Huron, he taunted Trump and invited him to visit Michigan, suggesting Rogers and other Republicans were afraid the president would hurt their chances.

“Donald, if you’re watching, don’t wuss out, man,” El-Sayed said.

And he responded to Kennedy’s attack by suggesting the Republican is in the Ku Klux Klan.

“That’s rich coming from someone who wears his bed sheets out at night,” El-Sayed posted on social media.

A personal touch with voters

Before the Port Huron town hall, El-Sayed worked his way down a line of people who couldn’t fit inside the theater, shaking hands, taking photos and stopping for conversations.

Jeff Petrucella and his wife, Alice, traveled from Macomb County to see El-Sayed. They described themselves as politically “middle of the road” and said they had voted Republican in the past.

“I’m pretty done with the Republicans right now,” Jeff said.

Alice said she was “looking for a change that is better for my granddaughters,” pointing to El-Sayed’s support for Medicare for All. Nor was she put off by his more confrontational appearances on Fox News.

“I think he expresses himself well. You can tell he’s a well-spoken, educated man,” she said.

Pat Kreiner was among those who waited nearly an hour to see El-Sayed. Her children had persuaded her to support him in the Democratic primary.

“My son said to me, ‘I have been living with this trickle-down economy since the day I was born,’” Kreiner said. “‘It doesn’t work for me.’”

Kreiner also expressed anger about Trump’s trade war with Canada, just across the river from Port Huron.

“We are heartsick about our neighbors,” she said. “They used to come over a lot. We don’t see them now.”

Visiting smaller towns such as Port Huron has become central to El-Sayed’s campaign, with his team recently saying he’s held more than 500 events in over 100 cities across the state.

“Go everywhere. Talk to everyone. That’s what we do,” El-Sayed said in an interview.

The personal approach has not erased all the skepticism surrounding El-Sayed, including within his party.

His criticism of Israel and association with Piker have raised concerns among some Jewish Democrats. El-Sayed has held a series of private gatherings with undecided Jewish voters as he works to win their support.

He has also sought to strengthen his standing with Black voters. In the Democratic primary, Stevens drew more support in Wayne County, home to Detroit and its large Black population.

Ahead of Thursday’s debate, El-Sayed attended two events with Black leaders before stopping at a Black barbershop, where he moved from chair to chair talking with customers. He stopped at one point to speak with a pregnant woman, congratulating her and asking when her baby was due.

“November 8th? Make sure you vote early, huh?” the candidate joked.

A race about more than just Michigan

While El-Sayed has spent much of his campaign trying to win over Michigan voters, his candidacy has taken on significance far beyond the state. Republicans have made him a symbol of what they say is an increasingly radical Democratic Party, while progressives see his campaign as a chance to prove their politics can win in a closely divided state.

At a New York City fundraiser on Oct. 5, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez cast his campaign as a test for progressives nationwide.

“If Abdul can win in Michigan, anybody can win anywhere,” said the New York Democrat, a potential presidential candidate.

Ocasio-Cortez plans to campaign with El-Sayed in Michigan this week, followed by former President Obama on Oct. 24.

The national stakes have also drawn renewed opposition. United Democracy Project, a super PAC affiliated with the pro-Israel group AIPAC, disclosed an initial $94,000 expenditure against El-Sayed on Friday, after spending nearly $30 million to oppose him in the Democratic primary.

And El-Sayed, while maintaining that the election should focus on Michigan voters and their economic struggles, has also embraced the larger implications of his candidacy.

“I am grateful for your support,” he told the audience at the New York fundraiser, according to remarks obtained by the Associated Press. He said he had two goals: “pick up a U.S. Senate seat” and “change the nature of our politics for the better.”

Cappelletti writes for the Associated Press.

At the Republican Party’s midterm convention, President Trump said he would make his crusade against transgender rights a major campaign issue ahead of the Nov. 3 election — calling the message that “men should not be playing in women’s sports” one of his party’s “great sound bites of all time.”

During a recent campaign trip, Gov. Gavin Newsom, a longtime LGBTQ+ advocate and likely Democratic contender for president in 2028, stood by his remark last year that allowing transgender athletes to compete in girls’ sports is “deeply unfair,” saying, “I haven’t been able to figure out how to make it fair from my perspective.”

For the second election cycle in a row, the rights of transgender people have taken center stage politically, despite their accounting for only about 1% of the U.S. population and many voters identifying other issues as far more important — splitting Republicans and Democrats, but also Democrats among themselves and putting the party on the defensive.

Transgender athlete AB Hernandez, third from right, sits with other athletes at the CIF State Track Championship finals in Clovis on May 30, 2026.

(Tomas Ovalle / For The Times)

The politics are part of a much broader, international battle playing out in education, sports and the law, from local California classrooms and high school sports to the Olympic stage and the U.S. Supreme Court. Polling for years has shown most Americans oppose discrimination against transgender people, but also that a majority — including a substantial portion of Democrats — oppose transgender athletes participating in girls’ sports and children receiving gender-affirming care such as surgery or puberty blockers.

Republicans are pushing a well-funded message that transgender rights should be dismantled across the board, in healthcare, education, sports, the military and public spaces such as restrooms. Conservative mega-donors such as Elon Musk have spent millions amplifying that message in competitive races from Alaska to Ohio to Texas.

And to some degree, those tactics have worked. While many Democrats have ardently defended transgender rights, particularly in California, others in the party have sided with Republicans or softened their support.

Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico appears with Jeffrey Epstein abuse survivors in Dallas on Sept. 10.

(Anja Schlein / Dallas Morning News )

James Talarico, the Democratic U.S. Senate candidate in Texas, backpedaled from past votes by saying young transgender athletes shouldn’t be allowed to play “if it risks safety or fairness,” while others including Rob Sand, a candidate for Iowa governor, and Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) have said they shouldn’t play.

Such messaging has dismayed transgender people and their families, as well as LGBTQ+ rights groups who have been trying to refine Democratic messaging on trans issues since Vice President Kamala Harris — another longtime LGBTQ+ advocate from California — responded to Trump’s anti-trans attacks in 2024 with a message some considered muddled.

Imara Jones, a transgender journalist and founder of TransLash Media, a platform built to spotlight trans people’s own experiences, said the party’s conflicting messaging “underscores the degree to which the Republicans have actually successfully weaponized trans issues.”

“You’re seeing a really sharp political calculus among Democrats,” Jones said, with those “in tight races, where they need to have Republican votes,” bending one way, and others who “want to make a statement about principle” and defending LGBTQ+ rights moving in the other.

Many Democrats in California say they believe the issue is a moral one and that Democrats only hurt themselves by ceding ground on human rights.

A volunteer for Toni Atkins, the former president pro tempore of the California State Senate, is silhouetted holding a Pride flag at the Harvey Milk Coachella Valley Diversity Breakfast, at the Palm Springs Convention Center in Palm Springs Thursday, May 8, 2025.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

“The solution is not to be ambiguous, but to be firm that we support basic human rights and the basic humanity of trans people,” said state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), a leader on pro-LGBTQ+ legislation running to replace retiring Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco). “Then go on to talk about the big issues facing our country, like this illegal war, like the fact that Congress has done nothing to regulate AI, like the explosive cost of energy and child care and housing.”

A national conversation

Trump has signed executive orders to bar transgender athletes from competing in girls’ sports, prohibit federal funding for gender-affirming care for youth, oust transgender service members from the military and deny recognition of transgender and nonbinary identities on critical documents such as passports.

The Justice Department has sued California and other states over their trans-inclusive sports policies, and successfully threatened large hospitals into ending gender-affirming care programs. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services barred federal Medicaid spending on gender-affirming medication or surgeries for minors.

Martin Makary, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, speaks at Health and Human Services headquarters in Washington on Dec. 18, 2025.

(Stefani Reynolds / Bloomberg)

Trump campaigned on such policies, and he and other Republicans clearly see them as helpful in the midterms. In his convention speech, Trump said he’s been surprised more Democrats haven’t abandoned transgender rights given polling showing a majority of Americans oppose transgender athletes in girls’ sports.

“They say it’s an 80/20 issue,” Trump said, in an apparent reference to a January 2025 New York Times/Ipsos poll that found 79% of respondents believed transgender athletes should not be allowed to compete in women’s sports. More recent polls have shown a smaller majority opposed.

The debate has prompted new bans on transgender athletes in college sports and in the Olympics and divided some of the most well-known professional women athletes in the world. It has also put transgender kids in California and elsewhere under an intense microscope — and on the receiving end of harassment from protesters who show up with loudspeakers to local track meets.

Demonstrators at a Rainbow Families Action march in Emeryville, Calif., on Dec. 8, 2025.

(Jessica Christian / San Francisco Chronicle )

Arne Johnson, a Bay Area father of a transgender child who helps run the advocacy group Rainbow Families Action, said being targeted by Republicans is scary, but watching Democrats “find ways to be more flexible about the rights of human beings” has been profoundly disappointing.

But he said he’s also been encouraged by some more recent polling showing Americans moving back toward the middle on transgender rights, which he believes is in part due to people being deluged with anti-trans ads getting frustrated that the political conversation isn’t focused on issues they care more about, like affordability and healthcare.

Ramiro Sarmiento, a spokesperson for the Human Rights Campaign, which has tracked at least $50 million in anti-trans political ads this cycle, agreed, saying, “MAGA wants to talk about trans kids because they’re losing the conversation voters actually care about.”

Conservative groups reject that framing. Many deny tht transgender people exist, while others say they are working to protect cisgender children or defend religious beliefs. They have also scoffed at Democrats who have changed their positions in the lead-up to the election, with the conservative American Principles Project accusing Talarico of only pretending to shift away from his “gender radicalism” on sports in order to win votes.

Allison Schuster, a White House spokesperson, said the Biden administration “spent four years pushing a radical agenda” of gender-affirming care for children, while Trump “pledged to restore common sense” and has since “delivered by consistently taking strong action to protect children from these dangerous, life-altering medical practices.”

The fight in California

In California, transgender athletes competing in youth sports has been raised as an issue in the governor’s race, where Republican hopeful Steve Hilton has rallied against their inclusion, and featured prominently in the races for the next state attorney general and the next state superintendent of public schools.

Transgender athlete AB Hernandez competes for Jurupa Valley High School at the 2025 CIF state track and field championships.

(Tomas Ovalle / For The Times)

Several Democrats running for Congress in the state have been criticized for their records on transgender rights, including San Diego City Councilmember Marni von Wilpert, who is seeking the redistricted congressional seat of departing Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Bonsall), as well as Reps. Adam Gray (D-Merced) and Derek Tran (D-Orange).

Christian Martinez, a National Republican Congressional Committee spokesperson, has accused Von Wilpert of having a “perverted agenda [that] pushes hormone treatments on kids,” and Gray of being “for they/them, not for Californians.”

Marni von Wilpert, a Democratic candidate for California’s 48th Congressional District, canvasses in a neighborhood Friday, May 29, 2026, in San Marcos, Calif.

(Gregory Bull / Associated Press)

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta’s office is fighting on multiple fronts to protect gender-affirming care and successfully rebuffed a Justice Department lawsuit over the state’s transgender sports policies. But pressure is coming not only from the Trump administration.

The California Interscholastic Federation, which oversees high school athletics, also revised its rules to ensure that transgender athletes in individual sports do not displace cisgender ones from rankings or medal podiums. And after local California teachers sued, the U.S. Supreme Court in March ruled against a controversial California student privacy law that precluded teachers from revealing a child’s interest in presenting in gender nonconforming ways in school to their parents if the child requested confidentiality, finding that the policy infringed on parents’ rights and the free exercise of religion.

Meanwhile, state lawmakers just passed at least a dozen measures aimed at bolstering LGBTQ+ rights, including by restoring an LGBTQ+ youth suicide and crisis hotline; helping discharged LGBTQ+ service members find housing and jobs; requiring California gender-affirming healthcare providers who are subpoenaed to inform Bonta’s office if they intend to respond; improving access to HIV prevention care and enhancing LGBTQ+ data privacy.

Newsom signed all those measures into law — his office said California “will not stand” for Trump’s “all-out assault on the LGBTQ community” — but vetoed a bill that would have barred future governors from allowing the extradition of abortion or gender-affirming care providers in California to states where such care is illegal, citing concerns about reduced executive discretion.

The 2026-27 state budget appropriated $66 million for gender-affirming care, including up to $30 million for underinsured patients in the Uncompensated Care Program, $26 million to assist organizations that provide such care and $10 million to cover care for poor children who lost it under the new Medicaid rules. Wiener called the latter a “short-term solution” that will protect kids while the state figures out a more permanent billing pathway under Medi-Cal.

A.W., a Bay Area mother of a transgender teenager who requested anonymity because she fears being targeted by the Trump administration, said her child’s gender-affirming care — a lifeline for him in recent years — was disrupted by the Medicaid rule change, and the state’s temporary fix was too little, too late.

A.W. said families like hers “shouldn’t have to make medical decisions based on politicians in Washington,” particularly for care so critical to her son and other kids. “If he had not had access to gender-affirming care, I don’t know where we would be,” she said. “It scares me to think about it.”

Times staff writer Dakota Smith contributed to this report.

CHICAGO — Dennis Hastert, the nation’s longest-serving Republican House speaker, who helped turn much of President George W. Bush’s agenda into law before his own political legacy was forever fouled by allegations that he molested high school athletes when he was a wrestling coach, died over the weekend, a coroner said Monday. He was 84.

Hastert, who was speaker from 1999 until 2007, died of natural causes at his home, according to Kendall County Coroner Jacquie Purcell.

When he was sentenced in 2016 to more than a year behind bars, the former history teacher became one of the highest-ranking American politicians ever ordered to prison.

In the late 1990s, Hastert was a little-known Illinois lawmaker with a reputation for congeniality that had helped him ascend the ranks of congressional leaders. When Newt Gingrich lost support because of ethics violations and the GOP’s poor showing in an election, Republicans elected Hastert to succeed him. In his first weeks on the job, he presided over the House while the Senate conducted Bill Clinton’s impeachment trial.

After the GOP reclaimed the White House, Hastert took much of what Bush proposed and steered it to passage, including massive tax cuts and a measure that amounted to a huge expansion of prescription drug benefits — the biggest change in Medicare in decades.

His legacy was suddenly thrown into doubt in 2015, when he was accused of evading banking regulations as part of a plan to pay hush money to conceal unspecified “prior misconduct.” Nearly a year later, prosecutors filed papers that described what media reports had suggested for months: Hastert’s misconduct involved the sexual abuse of teenage boys on his wrestling team in the small town of Yorkville, west of Chicago.

During a 16-year coaching career, he led his team to a state championship and was named national coach of the year in 1976. But behind the accolades, prosecutors said, Hastert sexually abused at least four team members from 1965 to 1981.

The person Hastert was paying, identified in court papers only as Individual A, said the abuse occurred in a motel room when he was 14 on the way home from wrestling camp. Hastert allegedly touched other wrestlers in a locker room after saying he would give them massages. Two wrestlers said Hastert performed sex acts on them.

Prosecutors also described a recliner where Hastert often sat in the locker room with a direct view of the stalls where the boys showered.

Hastert agreed to plead guilty to evading banking laws. In all, he paid more than $1.7 million out of $3.5 million that he had promised to Individual A, sometimes in lump sums of $100,000 cash.

At the sentencing hearing where he received 15 months behind bars, the visibly angry judge called Hastert a “serial child molester.” A former wrestler struggled with his emotions as he told the court about his “dark secret” from adolescence.

In his own statement, Hastert said he was “deeply ashamed” and admitted that he “mistreated” some of his athletes. But he never referred directly to sexual abuse.

The public knew nothing about Hastert’s past when Republicans lost seats in the 1998 midterm elections. Hastert confronted Gingrich about dissatisfaction in the GOP ranks, saying it was unlikely Gingrich could hold his post, Hastert wrote in “Speaker: Lessons from 40 Years in Coaching and Politics.”

“Well, I’ll make them support me,” he quoted Gingrich saying of the GOP rebels. Told that was unlikely, Gingrich asked Hastert what to do.

“Do what you have to do,” he replied. The next day, Gingrich stepped down as speaker and left the House.

Hastert’s path to the speaker’s office was cleared when Louisiana Rep. Bob Livingston, who was considered a lock to replace Gingrich as speaker, resigned after acknowledging several extramarital affairs.

In January 1999, Hastert broke with tradition by delivering his acceptance speech from the House floor and by allowing Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, a Missouri Democrat, to briefly preside over the day’s proceedings.

“Solutions to problems cannot be found in a pool of bitterness,” Hastert said in his speech. “They can be found in an environment in which we trust one another’s word, where we generate heat and passion, but where we recognize that each member is equally important to our overall mission of improving the life of the American people.”

Hastert was aware of the personal pitfalls of holding the powerful position.

“You know, in this business, especially in a job like this, you can get your head someplace where it shouldn’t be,” Hastert said in a 1999 interview with The Associated Press. “But you come back home, and you’re home. You’re back where you’ve always been, and your feet are back on the ground.”

He was generally viewed as a friendly, even-tempered lawmaker. His wrestling experience followed him to Washington, with GOP colleagues often calling him “coach.”

Hastert said he lacked the appetite for higher office.

As the recount of the 2000 presidential election dragged on, Hastert’s aides briefed him on the possibility that he might become acting president in the event of an Electoral College deadlock.

“I really didn’t want to be president, temporary or otherwise,” he wrote in his book. But he decided that he would not pass the office to the constitutional officer next in line if an Electoral College deadlock extended beyond Inauguration Day. In the end, the Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling ended the recount, and Bush moved into the White House.

Hastert’s journey to Congress from his boyhood farm appeared to be the result of fate and luck.

In 1980, he finished third in an Illinois House primary. But the incumbent became fatally ill, and GOP leaders chose Hastert to take his place on the November ballot, where he won in a traditional GOP stronghold.

Hastert became a congressional candidate in 1986, when local Republican leaders put him on the primary ballot, replacing freshman Rep. John Grotberg, who was battling cancer. Hastert went on to beat the Democrat with 52 percent of the vote, his smallest margin of victory in a congressional race.

In Washington, Hastert served quietly in House leadership, working closely with Gingrich and then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay after Republicans took control in 1995. Several years later, DeLay was the force driving Clinton’s impeachment and was simply too toxic to seek the speaker’s chair.

Hastert’s tenure was marked by a shift of power from committee chairmen to GOP leaders, fealty to the Bush administration and an explosion of congressional pet projects known as earmarks. Democrats fumed that he weakened the ethics process that ensnared DeLay, who left Congress under a cloud of criminal charges in 2006.

Hastert became wealthy largely through a complex web of transactions that coincided with one of his own highway earmarks increasing the value of land he had purchased in his district.

He was forced to step down as speaker in 2007, when Democrats gained control of the House, and he resigned his seat later that year. In 2008, he joined the Washington lobbying firm of Dickstein Shapiro as a senior adviser, specializing in government law and strategy.

Born in Aurora, Illinois, Hastert earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from Wheaton College in 1964 and a master’s in education from Northern Illinois University in 1967.

In 2007, Wheaton named its newly created public policy center the J. Dennis Hastert Center for Economics, Government and Public Policy. After Hastert’s indictment, the school removed his name in 2015. Other organizations abandoned associations with Hastert, and his portrait was removed from a hallway outside the House chamber.

Hastert lived his entire life in Chicago’s suburbs, primarily in the Yorkville area. While growing up, he helped his father with the family feed business.

Survivors include his wife, Jean, and two adult sons.

Tarm and McCann write for the Associated Press. Tarm and McCann are former Associated Press reporters.

There are few people, if any, who’ve tracked U.S. elections for longer or in greater depth than Charlie Cook.

Ever since 1984, when he started his eponymous political newsletter, Cook and his stellar crew of nonpartisan analysts have plumbed many thousands of races — for president, Congress, governor — following the money, sussing out the candidates, watching their ads and assaying the campaign landscape at a granular level.

Cook calls this midterm election the strangest he’s ever seen.

What appeared to be a fairly normal election for a president halfway through his term — a probable setback, as unhappy voters register their discontent — has the potential, Cook said, to turn into a disaster for Republicans. Big losses aren’t rare for the party in the White House. Democrats picked up 41 House seats in President Trump’s last midterm election, in 2018.

What’s unusual, Cook suggested, is the prospect of big Democratic gains when Republicans started out this election season with so many advantages. (And that was before the GOP set off on a gerrymandering jag at Trump’s behest.)

Roughly two-thirds of the Senate seats up in November are in states Trump carried in 2024. Five of the seven toss-up races are in states Trump won, several by double digits.

On the House side, Republicans maintain control by an exceedingly narrow margin, meaning there aren’t a lot of low-hanging districts for Democrats to aim for. As Cook rightly noted, “A party cannot lose a seat they don’t have.”

But Trump’s deteriorating approval rating, an unpopular war, persistent inflation and the president’s egotistical indulgences have jeopardized a number of GOP-held seats that normally would be automatic wins, including contests in such Republican strongholds as Alaska, Florida, Iowa, Ohio and even Texas.

“I’m not a meteorologist, but it’s kind of like three competing weather fronts collided,” Cook said. “One was Iran and gasoline, diesel prices going sky high … Then there’s trade, tariffs, overall non-energy cost of living, tariff impact on farmers. And then the third is kind of the catch-all and it’s everything from ballrooms, reflecting pools, arches, vaccines, Medicaid cuts.”

We’ll get to predictions in a moment. (Patience, dear reader.)

First, let’s hear from Nathan Gonzales, another longtime election handicapper. He’s been tracking political contests nationwide for more than 25 years and edits and publishes Inside Elections — formerly the Rothenberg Political Report — another nonpartisan field guide to campaigns. Like Cook, he traffics in clear-eyed, dispassionate analysis, not partisan wish-casting or political spin.

Gonzales, too, sees a bad moon rising for Republicans.

A detail of the exhibit in the Epstein Files Bookmobile during a campaign stop for Democratic House candidate Bob Brooks at the United Steelworkers of America office in Bethlehem, Pa. Brooks is challenging Republican incumbent Ryan Mackenzie (R-Pa.) in Pennsylvania’s highly competitive 7th Congressional District in the upcoming midterm election.

(Alex Wong / Getty Images)

Trump’s performance — his approval rating is flirting with record lows — “has inspired Democrats, turned off independents and created a group of apathetic Republicans,” Gonzales said, “and those are the ingredients for a good or great Democratic year.”

He noted Democrats don’t need a big wave to seize control of the House. A pickup of just three seats would flip the House, marking the seventh straight midterm election in which one chamber or the other changed partisan hands.

(For the record, there is no authoritative definition of a wave election, though it’s generally agreed the term applies to an election in which one party or the other gains a large and lopsided number of House and Senate seats.)

It’s beginning to feel a lot like 2006, Gonzales said.

“We had an unpopular Republican president, a war in the Middle East that drove up gas prices. Some members on Capitol Hill that were behaving badly,” Gonzales recalled. “I remember talking to Republicans after the fact and they admitted that, while they thought they had great research on Democratic candidates and they had a fundraising advantage, voters just didn’t care. Voters weren’t in the mood to listen to what they were saying about Democrats because they were so frustrated with what was going on with the status quo and the direction of the country.”

In that election, at the midpoint of President George W. Bush’s second term, Democrats gained six seats to take control of the Senate and netted 31 in the House, allowing the installation of Nancy Pelosi as the first female speaker in history. “A thumpin’,” Bush called it.

So, 2026.

Gonzales and his team of experts believe the House is most likely gone for Republicans, forecasting a Democratic gain of seven to 15 seats, unless the bottom falls out for the GOP and their losses climb much higher.

In the Senate, where Democrats need to pick up four seats to take control, Gonzales sees the chamber teetering on a knife’s edge, forecasting a Democratic gain of three to five seats.

“It’s too late to fundamentally change the trajectory of this election,” Gonzales said. “But if Republicans can boost Republican turnout, it might be enough to save the Senate.”

For his part, Cook agrees that Mike Johnson may be nearing the end of his speakership. The best-case scenario for the GOP would be keeping its losses to 25 House seats or less, Cook said, which is right around the average for midterm elections going back well over half a century.

“It starts getting into eyebrow-raising territory if it gets north of 35,” Cook said, “because that shouldn’t be possible with the few competitive districts we have now.”

As for the Senate, he suggested the best Republicans can hope for is a net loss of two seats, keeping the GOP barely in control. (A loss of three would mean a 50-50 split, leaving Vice President JD Vance poised to be the tiebreaker on close votes — and wouldn’t he love having to drop off the 2028 campaign trail to be on hand, just in case.)

Of course, there’s still an election to be held, votes to be cast and ballots to be counted.

Blue wave, tsunami or a pale sapphire puddle?

We’ll know in a little more than four weeks.