majority

BANGOR, Maine — Ever the optimist, Speaker Mike Johnson said he believes Republicans will hold on to their U.S. House majority, defying a surge of Democratic momentum in the final stretch of the midterm elections that will determine control of Congress.

It’s the crowds he says he’s seeing as he crosses the country campaigning for GOP candidates. The caliber of recruits and incumbents he calls workhorses, not show horses. And the nearly half a billion he has raised for House Republicans.

He also has faith.

“We run to win, and that’s biblical: You run to win,” he told the Associated Press during a campaign stop in Maine.

“And I believe that we will.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson, right, applauds along with President JD Vance as President Trump delivers his State of the Union address during a joint session of Congress in February in Washington.

(Andrew Harnik / Getty Images)

The speaker of the House is one of the most consequential elected officials in the United States, second in line of succession to the president. While Johnson quipped to Fox News recently that he may return to his hometown of Shreveport, La., to start a lawn care business if Republicans lose power on Nov. 3, he fully expects to buck an American midterm tradition that often sees the president’s party dumped in Congress.

It can be said that Johnson, who has drawn so close to President Trump that he routinely fields 1 a.m. calls — they spoke the night before as Trump rallied in Alaska — walks on the sunny side of the street. That’s despite voter frustration over high prices and the Iran war, and his own challenge of leading one of narrowest House majorities in modern times.

In his three years as speaker, Johnson has pushed past the doubters and naysayers, holding his thread-thin GOP majority together to deliver Trump’s agenda. He notably led passage of the big tax breaks and social service cuts bill. Most days he does not have a single vote to spare.

“So many times everybody had written off, there was no way he was going to be able to pull off a particular vote,” said Republican Rep. Mark Harris of North Carolina, who joined the speaker on the campaign swing. “Yet he always seems to pull out the win in the end.”

In the interview, Johnson did not speak brashly about expanding the House majority on election day, as he has in the past. But on track to visit more than 20 states and 40 congressional districts though November, he said the political mood reminds him of the 2024 election that swept Republicans to control of Congress and the White House.

“It’s not going to be a giant majority,” he said. “But I genuinely believe that we will have a working majority.”

Emboldened by Trump

Johnson first fell into the speaker’s job almost by accident, a desperate choice by his GOP colleagues after a contingent of renegade Republicans ousted his predecessor, then-Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California in 2023.

Johnson had been a lower-level member of House leadership, but distinguished himself before the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol by organizing support for Trump’s false claims of widespread fraud in the election that he lost to Democrat Joe Biden.

In the time since, Johnson has secured proximity to Trump’s power. He joined Trump at a UFC fight in New York and once gifted the president a speaker’s gavel as Trump signed the “One Big Beautiful Bill” into law. It was a symbolic act, but one that critics saw as giving away the authority of a coequal branch of government.

More recently, Johnson abruptly sent lawmakers home early rather than face a vote forced by Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth as lawmakers tried to halt the Iran war, which has not been authorized by Congress.

Over coffee in Bangor, after rallying for House candidate Paul LePage, a former governor, Johnson brushed back criticism that Congress has eroded under his watch as Trump works to amass executive power.

“Absolute nonsense,” Johnson said.

“We did not yield Article 1 authority to the president,” he said, referring to the powers spelled out in the Constitution. “We used our own,” he said, to muscle GOP priorities past Democratic opposition.

Trump agenda at risk

Johnson has focused the election on Democrats he portrays as “communists.” A handful of far-left liberals, backed by the Democratic Socialists of America, are on the ballot.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the House Democratic leader who is in line for the speaker’s gavel if his party sweeps to power, is preparing a first-100 days agenda for when the new Congress convenes in January, if there is a change in control.

What the Republicans will do if they retain power is less defined.

“Lots of plans,” Johnson said, “along the same course of what we’ve been doing — less taxes, less regulation.”

Trump “wants to go big for his legacy,” he said. “We have big things on the horizon that we can do.”

The president has essentially purged the House GOP ranks of those perceived to be disloyal. Among them are Massie, who lost his primary, and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, who retired early after breaking with Trump over release of the Jeffrey Epstein files.

Pressed how he would keep Republicans in line, Johnson said he is preparing to change the House rules if he returns as speaker.

“There’s going to be some changes that are going to make the machinery work smoother,” he said.

Praying for the speaker, and the country

Faith has often been strong among House leaders. Two former speakers, Nancy Pelosi and Newt Gingrich are Catholics, as is John Boehner, who invited Pope Francis to address Congress.

Johnson, a former constitutional lawyer who was first elected alongside Trump in 2016, is expected to win his own reelection next month.

“My faith is a huge component of how I think and how I act and what I do,” said Johnson, who led a public prayer on the National Mall as part of the nation’s 250th anniversary.

He is drinking lots of coffee these days, he said, cutting back on the Celsius, and still has 1,413 unread text messages, a slight dip from the frightful number reported a few months ago by the Wall Street Journal.

One text is from someone praying for him.

Johnson said he is grateful for the outpouring of prayers he receives, for him and the country.

“I pray for God’s will. And I believe God’s will is for us — and not the communists — to be in charge of America,” Johnson said.

“And it does say in the New Testament, you run the race to win,” he said, citing 1 Corinthians 9:24. “This is a biblical admonition. So we will.”

Mascaro writes for the Associated Press.

A majority of US adults say President Trump and his family have inappropriately profited from presidency.

Most US adults believe President Donald Trump has placed his personal financial interests and those of his inner circle ahead of the country’s since returning to the White House in 2025, according to a new nationwide poll.

The poll, conducted by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and released on Tuesday, suggests that public perception of the Republican president leans heavily critical: Over half of surveyed adults view Trump’s second term as self-serving by investing in his own business and commercial pursuits “a lot”. Roughly one quarter believe he focuses on national interests, but only 11 percent feel Trump represents regular Americans. Fifty-five percent of Republicans surveyed said that Trump has prioritised his personal business interests “a lot” or “some”.

Half of the respondents report that Trump has placed zero priority on people “like them”.

As Trump’s family business pulls in record funds from new ventures helped by his policies, the poll results suggest that most US adults think growing his own finances has been the north star of Trump’s presidency, at least to some extent.

Trump’s June financial disclosure revealed massive post-election influxes of foreign and corporate capital into his business empire, stemming primarily from over $1bn in cryptocurrency ventures after he loosened regulation on the industry, as well as from international real estate.

During his first year as president, the Trump Organisation – Trump’s multinational family-owned enterprise dedicated to property development and global brand licensing – made eight real estate deals with authoritarian or one-party foreign states. Some speculate these countries were highly motivated to maintain favourable relations with the US to keep Trump happy on fronts like trade tariffs, military protection and private business dealings.

The administration, meanwhile, has repeatedly dismissed concerns over Trump’s business conflicts of interest, maintaining that he acts solely in the interest of Americans.

In late September, a separate Reuters/Ipsos poll found that Trump’s approval rating has fallen to 32 percent – the lowest of his ⁠political career – as his fellow Republicans soured on his handling of the cost of living crisis amid the deeply unpopular Iran war.

The dip in performance and approval ratings follows a high point in January 2025, when the newly inaugurated president boasted a 47 percent approval rating right after taking office.

According to the AP-NORC poll, which surveyed more than 2,000 US adults in late September, general sentiment around the administration’s ethical conduct is highly polarised, with far more citizens feeling that the president has neither prioritised the country as a whole nor everyday Americans.

Just over 40 percent of respondents believe Trump has “done something illegal” vis-a-vis allegations of personal enrichment while in office, with another 18 percent viewing his financial dealings as “unethical but not illegal”.

Opinions surrounding the lawfulness of the president’s financial practices split sharply along party lines, with Democrats overwhelmingly viewing the actions as illegal, compared with about three in 10 independents and about one in 10 Republicans, who largely see his behaviour as justified.

WASHINGTON — Chuck Schumer has won and lost Senate majorities since becoming Democratic leader a decade ago. But this year’s midterm elections could be his most important yet, with some in the party having said he needs to step down and make way for a new generation.

Schumer, who has directly or indirectly overseen his party’s Senate campaign arm in almost every election cycle over the last 20 years, has regained trust within his caucus, for now, as Democrats are hopeful of making gains in the midterm elections despite a difficult map that favors Republicans.

Allies of the New York Democrat say it’s a significant turnaround from last year, when the party was still reeling from major election losses. A low point came in the spring of 2025, when the party’s base erupted at Schumer for voting to keep President Trump’s government open.

Interviews with more than a dozen Democratic senators in recent weeks indicate that Schumer has recovered his political standing with many in his caucus. If Democrats gain seats in the election, colleagues expect him to easily win enough support in the closed-door leadership election, likely the week after Election Day.

Should they win a majority, a feat once seen as improbable, another term as leader would be nearly assured, many said. Both parties pick their Senate leaders by secret ballot, so no senator has to reveal their vote.

Still, nothing is guaranteed. While no Democrat has stepped up to challenge Schumer, that could quickly change if his party suffers an unexpected level of losses. And several Democratic candidates around the country have said publicly that they won’t vote for Schumer or have remained noncommittal.

Interviewed by The Associated Press earlier this month, Schumer stated unequivocally that he’s running for another term as leader. He said he believes Democrats have won more favor with voters over the last year and have a shot at winning the majority after fighting Trump’s tariffs, forcing more than a dozen votes to end the war in Iran and focusing on affordability, corruption and healthcare.

“I think our caucus is strong, it’s united,” Schumer said. “A year ago, everyone said it was out of reach. Today, we have a broader map, strong candidates, a clear contrast.”

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., said that “Senate seats in some ruby red states seem to be in play” because of candidates Schumer recruited.

Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat who has served with Schumer for almost 30 years, said that “if you had told us in 2025 that we’d be in the home stretch with a really good shot of taking the majority, it would have been like, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’ You can’t argue with results.”

And if Democrats don’t win additional seats? “I’m not thinking about that,” Wyden said.

Some senators won’t commit to supporting Schumer

While Schumer appears to be in a good position at the moment, many Democratic senators won’t say publicly whether they will support him — particularly those in the most progressive wing of the party.

“It’s a little bit too early to speculate on that right now,” said Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent who caucuses with Democrats.

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren said she is focused on November’s elections. “We’ll know a lot more after the midterms,” she said.

Freshman Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan has called for a “new generation” of leaders across the party.

“It’s not a secret that Democrats still haven’t totally found their footing after Trump,” Slotkin said in a recent interview, adding that “we have to see what the results of the election are.”

It’s unclear if anyone else wants the job

Even if there are losses in Senate races, it’s unclear if any other Democrat wants the burden of being leader. Many are instead eyeing runs for the White House in 2028.

Speculation about a challenge to Schumer has centered on Sens. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, Chris Murphy of Connecticut and Brian Schatz of Hawaii, who has already said he’s running for the No. 2 leadership spot to replace retiring Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin.

Asked about Schumer, Van Hollen said he doesn’t want to discuss it yet.

“Look, I think everybody wants to get through this election, and then we’ll go from there,” Van Hollen said in an interview before the Senate left Washington to campaign.

Several Senate candidates around the country have either said they won’t vote for Schumer if they are elected or remained noncommittal, including Troy Jackson in Maine, Adam Hamilton in Kansas and Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan.

At the same time, the Senate Majority PAC, which is closely aligned with Schumer, has put millions of dollars into those campaigns and others. Schumer backed El-Sayed’s primary opponent, but the two met in Washington last month.

El-Sayed said after the meeting that the party is united and “we’re having really productive conversations about what it takes to win.”

Schumer has kept his caucus close

Several of the Democratic senators who insisted on anonymity to share their views agreed that Schumer is likely to win another term as leader. There have been very few discussions about a change, said one, partially because Schumer has stayed close to almost everyone in his caucus, keeping them on speed dial in his famous flip phone. Another senator said that they aren’t aware of Schumer asking for any commitments just yet.

At the same time, some said they would like to see Schumer, who is up for reelection in 2028, announce that this is his last term as leader and commit to helping transition to a successor. A commitment like that could end the conversation, one senator said.

Another senator said that a commitment from Schumer about the future isn’t as important — what will matter is if they win in November.

All of the senators agreed that there are no obvious contenders right now to challenge him, but that could change quickly if Democrats lose Senate seats in November.

Schumer has turned the tables since 2025

Attitudes within the Democratic caucus have improved since last year, when the base revolted against Schumer for the March vote to keep the Republican president’s government open. Progressive groups like MoveOn called for him to step down, arguing that Democrats needed to fight harder against Trump and Republicans.

Schumer regained some favor with Democrats inside and outside the Capitol during a prolonged government shutdown a year ago and as he has repeatedly blocked Trump’s nominees and Republican legislation.

But while the calls to resign or step aside have waned, many are still agitating for change.

“Our priority right now is organizing and making sure we elect a new generation laser-focused on affordability and fighting corruption,” said Joel Payne, a national spokesman for MoveOn.

Referring to the 2025 calls for Schumer to step aside, Payne said the group’s members have “already rendered a judgment on Schumer’s tenure and made clear they’re eager for new leadership that energizes the party base.”

It’s unclear, though, whether calls from the progressive wing of the party will influence the secret ballot vote, in which Schumer needs only a majority to win.

Sen. Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., dismissed the talk about Schumer’s future.

“It’s hard to lose if no one else is challenging you,” he said.

Jalonick writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Steven Sloan, Seung Min Kim and Joey Cappelletti contributed to this report.

JUNEAU, Alaska — In the thick of Alaska’s primary election season this summer, independent Bill Hill took a break from his U.S. House campaign to return home to Bristol Bay.

The world’s biggest sockeye salmon run was beginning, and that meant he needed to get back to work.

“I told my team that I have got to fish,” he said, adding: “Commercial fishing is the way that we pay the bills.”

Hill, 57, grew up in a tiny southwest Alaska village where he said his family had no phone and had to haul water from a nearby lake for cooking and bathing. Today, while he no longer has to fetch water, his lifestyle is not much different. He lives in a remote fishing community of about 430 people that he has called home for nearly half his life.

A retired teacher and school administrator, Hill has positioned himself as a working-class candidate who can relate to Alaskans’ frustrations with high fuel and other costs. He has made affordability and pushing back against billionaires a central theme in his campaign against Republican Nick Begich, who’s seeking a second term in Congress.

“We are pedal to the metal, making sure that every Alaskan knows about this campaign, every Alaskan knows what we stand for and every Alaskan knows that it’s really one of them going to Congress,” Hill told people at a campaign event this week in Juneau, wearing his standard campaign uniform of jeans, a zip-up vest and cap with a fishing company logo. “I need your help getting there.”

The race has become a concern for Republicans as they are trying to hold onto their majority in the U.S. House. Vice President JD Vance held a rally this week for Begich and Dan Sullivan, the U.S. senator who also is in a tight reelection race. President Trump is scheduled to do another in the coming week.

Begich and Republican political action committees have ratcheted up ad spending in the House race since the primary.

Planes, ferries and four-wheelers on the campaign trail

Hill, a first-time candidate who is Alaska Native, faces an incumbent from a prominent family long associated with the state’s politics. Begich’s late grandfather once held the state’s only U.S. House seat. Begich’s uncle Mark was a U.S. senator. Both were Democrats. Nick Begich is a lifelong Republican and has aligned himself with Trump, who has carried Alaska in his White House runs.

Hill’s campaign said he has traveled more than 20,000 miles in the state, including by plane, ferry and all-terrain vehicle, to introduce himself to voters and promote his message.

Begich’s name recognition presents a hurdle for Hill’s campaign, but some Democrats tried to clear a better path for Hill. One suspended his campaign before the August open primary and endorsed Hill. Two other Democrats with virtually no name recognition withdrew after the primary despite being in line to advance.

One candidate registered as a Democrat remains in the top four, Eric Hafner. He has no apparent ties to the state and is incarcerated in New York.

Hafner received 3.8% of the vote, enough to qualify for the ranked vote general election on Nov. 3. His submitted candidate biography appearing in state election materials makes no reference to his stint in federal prison, where he is serving time for making threats against police officers, judges and others.

Hill’s campaign has shared stickers showing Hafner in an orange jumpsuit and calling him a “fake ‘Democrat.’”

“We want to make sure that the Alaskan people are well-informed,” Hill said.

Begich gets support from Trump and the U.S. House speaker

The contest has received national attention, with spending by groups that include the National Republican Congressional Committee and House Majority PAC, which seeks to flip the U.S. House to Democrats.

In early August, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., held a rally for Begich that was closed to reporters. Vance called Begich a “machine” and effective legislator during his rally in Fairbanks, where Vance also gave support to Sullivan, who faces a challenge from Democrat Mary Peltola, a former congresswoman.

Trump has cited Begich’s support of his signature package of tax breaks, social service cuts and immigration enforcement that was passed last year. The president plans to headline a rally Tuesday in Wasilla, hometown of Sarah Palin, the party’s 2008 vice presidential nominee.

Hill said the visits show Republicans are nervous.

“I was not going to get into this race to waste people’s time, to waste people’s money,” he said. “I did my due diligence before jumping in to ensure that there was a path to victory.”

Begich’s campaign did not respond to messages from the Associated Press. On social media, the campaign has highlighted events such as Begich’s visit to the Alaska State Fair and recently has taken swipes at Hill.

Zach Bannon, an NRCC spokesperson, said Begich has delivered “commonsense wins for Alaska,” including support of expanded oil and gas development. He called Hill a “far-left Democrat.”

Hill was endorsed by Democrats but asserts his independence

Hill, who was endorsed by the Alaska Democratic Party, said he is a lifelong independent. He said he will not be beholden to a “party boss” or party line, and he rankled some voters earlier in the campaign by not explicitly saying which party he would caucus with in the House if he were elected.

He has said he is willing to work with anyone on what is best for Alaska. He also has called for bans on congressional stock trading and for limiting the influence of money in elections.

Hill said he wants to help build coalitions, saying he “can be a big part of a small group that makes big changes.”

Democrat Bill Brown came to the Juneau event planning to vote for Hill but wanting to talk with him directly. He said they aligned on numerous issues, including support for the environment, schools and ending “forever” wars.

The retired economics professor said policy is important, but in this political moment he finds himself “most interested in the integrity of the candidate. Bill Hill convinced me on that issue.”

Hill, who is Dena’ina Athabascan, said the top concerns he hears about from Alaskans are the price of fuel and overall cost of living. He said he had to fly home earlier this year and pump fuel oil from the textile manufacturing business he runs with his wife and bring it back to his house in a barrel because the community had run out.

He said fuel prices jumped from about $6.70 per gallon to about $9 per gallon after a barge shipment to his town earlier this year. Prices also have been higher elsewhere, particularly in communities accessible only by air or water. On social media, Hill’s campaign calls out Begich for his support of the Iran war as it posts photos of fuel prices around the state.

Steve Davis, a voter at Hill’s Juneau event this week, called him authentic and a “really good dude.” He said he was drawn to Hill in part because he wants to see Congress reclaim its oversight role. Hill drew applause during the gathering when he said Congress must reassert itself as a separate but equal branch of government.

“We don’t need a unified executive, we don’t need kings,” Davis said. “We need a Congress that actually functions.”

Bohrer writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — With the midterm elections just over three weeks away, the fight for control of the U.S. Senate is intensifying in battleground states, as Democrats push into red regions and Republicans pour money into key contests.

Campaigns are entering a crucial stretch for persuading the independent voters who will probably determine outcomes in swing races. Nearly all of the most competitive Senate races are in states with significant swaths of people unaffiliated with either major party — the “kingmakers” in these high-stakes midterms, said Jeremy Gruber, an independent-voting expert.

“Independent voters are going to be deciding this election in every respect,” said Gruber, senior vice president of Open Primaries, an organization that advocates for states to open primary elections to unaffiliated voters.

The urgency around courting nonaligned voters has been on display at recent debates, in ads flooding the airwaves and in the campaign money pouring into key states. For Republicans, it has become an effort to put distance between themselves and President Trump; for Democrats, it’s often a rhetorical shift toward the center and away from the far left.

In Iowa, Republican Ashley Hinson used a Wednesday night debate to emphasize her willingness to break with Trump. In Kansas, Democrat Adam Hamilton is circulating a video in which he describes himself as both liberal and conservative. In Alaska, a GOP-backed ad blitz launched last week aims to persuade voters that Democrat Mary Peltola isn’t independent-minded.

Mary Peltola, a Democrat running for the U.S. Senate seat in Alaska, addresses supporters at an election watch party on Aug. 18 in Anchorage.

(Mark Thiessen / Associated Press)

Though many unaffiliated voters have made up their minds, those who remain undecided will begin making decisions soon, as mail ballots go out and early voting begins in some states.

“For Republicans who are running behind and are looking at a potentially devastating midterm election performance, what they really need to do is target the independents who lean Republican,” said Karen Kedrowski, an Iowa State University political scientist. “For Democrats in some place like Iowa … what they need to do is make it seem safe [to independents] to vote for a Democratic candidate.”

Unaffiliated constituents have long been key to victory in swing states, particularly where races are traditionally decided by small margins. They have been viewed as particularly persuadable this year, as public dissatisfaction with Trump’s economic policies puts the votes of swing voters who backed him in 2024 up for grabs.

Forecasters predict that Democrats are on track for the House majority and could hold a majority of gubernatorial seats for the first time since 2010. Though Senate control remains a toss-up, Democrats’ chances are viewed by forecasters to have significantly improved since the summer.

A set of New York Times/Siena polls reported last week showed Democratic candidates for the Senate ahead in Texas, Michigan, Alaska and Ohio and neck-and-neck in Kansas and Iowa — all states Trump carried in 2024. Republicans, meanwhile, are feeling increasingly bullish about their chances in Maine, New Hampshire and Minnesota, all states that went blue in the last presidential election.

Republicans hold a significant fundraising advantage, however, and party donors are pouring money into key races, hoping the spending can cut into the Democrats’ edge. By September’s end, GOP advertisers had more than doubled their spending compared with August, outstripping Democrats, according to tracker AdImpact. Among the nine Senate races considered the tightest by forecasters, Republicans have outspent Democrats in all, AdImpact reported.

But on Friday, the Cook Political Report, a leading election forecaster, moved 18 House races in Democrats’ direction, saying that heavy ad spending by Republicans has not begun to move the needle in their favor.

Democrats view themselves as in their “strongest position yet” to win the majority, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), who chairs the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, said in a statement last week.

“In this final stretch of the election, Democrats will continue to vigorously campaign and fight for every vote across the expanded map,” Gillibrand said.

Republicans are confident about their ability to persuade voters in key states, said Bernadette Breslin, a spokesperson for the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

“Republicans will defend the Senate majority across key battlegrounds that have trended reliably red,” Breslin said, “with candidates like Mike Rogers [in Michigan] and Roger Marshall [in Kansas] winning over independents by exposing their Democratic opponents’ radical, unaffordable agendas.”

Along with the decisions of independent and swing voters, the midterm outcomes could also hinge on the level of turnout within each party, analysts say. If a portion of the party faithful stay home in a given place — for instance, disillusioned conservatives in Kansas or frustrated Black Democrats in Michigan — that could swing individual races, analysts said.

The number of independent voters reached a record high this year, with 45% of American adults identifying as political independents in Gallup polling. Equal shares identified as Republicans and Democrats, 27% for each party. The trend is partly driven by majorities of millennial and Gen Z voters choosing to be unaffiliated with either party, according to Gallup research.

Such voters make up a majority in Alaska and between 30% and 40% of all registered voters in Maine, Iowa, New Hampshire, North Carolina and Ohio. They account for about 29% in Kansas and about 16% in Texas and Michigan, according to state data compiled by the Independent Voter Project.

Across recent polls, independent voters have favored Democrats and expressed dissatisfaction with Trump. In a late September poll from Emerson College Polling, 66% of independents said Trump has done worse than expected during his second term in office.

State Rep. James Talarico, Democratic U.S. Senate candidate, listens at a food drive at the Frederick Douglass Human Services and Justice Center on Sept. 9 in Dallas.

(Julia Demaree Nikhinson / Associated Press)

In Texas, Democrat James Talarico led Republican Ken Paxton among independents by 32 points in a September poll by Texas Public Opinion Research. The Democratic candidate in Ohio, Sherrod Brown, led Republican Sen. Jon Husted by 27 points among independents in a CNN poll released Thursday.

In Kansas, where the Senate race has become unexpectedly close amid economic-driven anger with Trump, disapproval of the president’s performance among independents appears to be rubbing off on incumbent Sen. Roger Marshall, the Republican seeking reelection.

Fifty-two percent felt unfavorably toward Marshall and 62% disapproved of Trump’s performance, according to a recent Emerson College/Nexstar poll.

In those battleground red states, that creates a tough fight for both parties, analysts said. With control of the Senate hanging in the balance, candidates are duking it out in fundraising and on the campaign trail to win every last vote.

“Both campaigns are raking in ridiculous amounts of money … and they’re spending every penny because [they] have to,” said Wichita State University political science professor Alexandra Middlewood, referring to the Kansas Senate race. “We see that they’re really going to have to fight it out all the way to the end.”

Debates are another tool for candidates to reach independent voters, said Corwin Smidt, a political science professor at Michigan State University.

Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, left, and Republican Mike Rogers meet in a Michigan Senate debate Thursday night in Grand Rapids.

(Paul Sancya / Pool Photo)

In Michigan, where the Senate candidates sparred in their first debate Thursday evening, Rep. Mike Rogers, the Republican Senate nominee, has distanced himself from Trump twice in recent weeks, first calling for an end to the war in Iran and then releasing an ad last week denouncing the tariffs against Canada. Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, meanwhile, announced a rally with former President Obama, an appeal to mainstream voters.

“They’ve got to try to both win over people who have been paying attention, but also introduce themselves to the ones who haven’t been paying attention,” Smidt said.

Winning unaffiliated voters can require a tightrope walk for candidates who are faced with the dual tasks of appealing to their party base while persuading independent constituents.

In the final stretch of the campaign, candidates seeking independent votes should telegraph a willingness to admit their party’s flaws and an understanding that voters are turned off by partisan rhetoric, said Chad Peace, legal strategist at the Independent Voter Project, which advocates for open primaries.

“They have to communicate to those folks and try to meet them where they’re at,” Peace said. “[Independents] want the campaigns of persuasion, they don’t want to hear you tell me how bad the other candidate is.”

And, Gruber said, they want to be engaged with, not ignored.

“Independent voters,” he said, “are going to be responding to those candidates and parties that actually talk to them.”

San Marino High first-year football coach Dujuawn “DJ” Jones got smart when he took over the program, searching for the best athletes on campus and getting their friends on the football team to lobby for them to come out.

What’s happened this season is pretty extraordinary. Aided by nearly a dozen baseball players, San Marino’s football team is off to a 6-0 start. The quarterback, Parker Wilson, is the starting catcher for the baseball team. There are also wrestlers, basketball players and track athletes on the team.

The joke is whether the majority of players are talking about the Dodgers or the Rams during practices.

“We try to do some of the teachings more like in baseball terms,” Jones said. “We want our kids to play other sports.”

There are lots of baseball players around the Southland having big seasons playing football, from Capistrano Valley quarterback Talon Spencer to Corona del Mar receiver JJ Haley to Hart running back Matix Frithsmith to La Canada quarterback Joe Bell to Palos Verdes running back Christian Weis.

The only question left to ask regarding San Marino is how many of the football players are visiting the batting cage before practice?

“Right now they’re not missing too much,” Jones said.

If only the baseball players playing the sport 365 days a year knew what fun they are missing out on.

This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.

A Black police officer asked whether a monkey was named “Tyrone,” to the laughter of a roomful of Latino and Asian colleagues.

A Latina cop described how to inflict maximum pain: “You hit Black people in the liver — I heard they got weak livers,” she said, according to an LAPD internal affairs report.

The report said their boss, an Asian sergeant, stood by as his employees used terms like “midnight” and “chocolate, chocolate” to describe people’s skin tones.

Those were among the comments that came to light last year after an LAPD whistleblower secretly recorded his colleagues in a unit that screens police recruits.

The scandal, which has seen new developments in recent weeks, is forcing department officials to reckon with a harsh reality: Years of efforts to make the LAPD more diverse have seemingly done little to stamp out prejudice in the ranks.

For much of its history, the LAPD was a white man’s department. Aggressive tactics in communities of color fueled racial uprisings in the 1960s and early 1990s, when the beating of motorist Rodney King led to the discovery of messages similar to those in the recruitment unit tapes, with officers referring to Black men as “Buckwheat” and bragging about “busting heads.”

Under pressure from lawsuits and consent decrees, police leaders pushed to recruit more Black, Latino and Asian officers, seeking to build up trust in minority communities.

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1. Los Angeles Police Department graduates a total of 22 recruits at the Los Angeles Police Academy in Elysian Park on Friday, September 18, 2026. 2. (Christina House/Los Angeles Times)

Latinos now make up more than half of the 8,500-officer department. Black officers constitute less than 9% of the force, coinciding with a decline in the city’s Black population.

The officer who made the recruitment unit recordings, Daniel Flores, is Latino.

He recorded dozens of conversations over a six-month span in 2024, eventually handing them over to the department’s inspector general for investigation.

Last week, Flores filed a new lawsuit against the city, adding to a previous claim that alleged he faced retaliation from his bosses for documenting the offensive comments he heard while on the job.

According to his latest claim, department officials recommended that he be suspended for 22 days without pay. After initially seeking to keep his job with the LAPD, the 13-year department veteran said in the lawsuit that he recently decided to retire rather than endure an increasingly hostile work environment.

Flores also alleged LAPD officials were responsible for pushing a criminal case against him for violating a state eavesdropping law that prohibits recording conversations without consent. Initially alleging 16 felonies, Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman has since reduced the charges to misdemeanors, likely allowing Flores to avoid jail time.

An LAPD spokesperson declined to answer questions about Flores’ case.

“The Department takes these allegations seriously,” Lt. Elpidio Orozco said in a statement. “Because the case and related personnel proceedings remain ongoing, we cannot discuss individual disciplinary actions or make comparisons to unrelated past incidents.”

The department’s defenders maintain that progress has been made toward rooting out bigotry.

Officers are required to undergo psychological screening and training aimed at teasing out unconscious biases. New recruits and seasoned officers alike take field trips to the Museum of Tolerance, where trainers extol the virtues of multiculturalism. The department has sent recruiters to historically Black colleges in the South and the East Coast.

But others, including civil rights attorney Connie Rice, say the latest scandal proves that the LAPD’s problems run deeper than the hateful actions of a few individuals.

The beating of Rodney King in 1991 forced a reckoning for the LAPD.

(George Holliday / Associated Press)

“Racism is like the herpes virus in the body of the LAPD: You can suppress it with a good chief, but as soon as they leave, it breaks out again,” Rice said.

A 2024 study by British researchers examined racial attitudes among members of the department’s vaunted Metropolitan Division.

The researchers found that LAPD officers were “shockingly defensive” when asked about systemic racism, taking a negative view of diversity hiring programs and insisting that left-leaning activists, elected officials and media outlets were stoking public outrage over racial profiling.

“The dismissive reactions … to a question on such an important issue highlight an unhealthy antagonism which prevents any organization from learning or developing its practice,” the researchers concluded. “It is a fundamental barrier that must be overcome.”

While hiring more officers from historically marginalized groups has long been pushed as a way to improve police practices and build trust in minority neighborhoods, studies have not necessarily borne that out, said Daniel Gascon, a sociology and criminology professor at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

“Just because there’s more numbers of a given sort in a department doesn’t mean it’s going to change automatically,” said Gascon, who has studied the LAPD’s relationship with Latino communities.

Since the start of the year, a review of recruit graduation announcements shows the department has hired just seven new Black officers. By contrast, roughly 80% of the 241 officers to graduate from the police academy over the last nine months have been Latino.

The growing Latino presence in the LAPD has been reflected in police use-of-force numbers.

A Times analysis of police shootings since 2016 found that of the roughly 150 people who have been shot dead by the LAPD across the city, at least 94 were Latino men. In 3 out of every 4 of those shootings, at least one of the officers who fired was also Latino, the analysis showed.

LAPD Officer Daniel Flores, left, listens as his attorney Alan Jackson speaks to reporters at the Superior Court building.

(Libor Jany / Los Angeles Times)

Despite the increased diversity, interviews with current and former LAPD members indicate deep divisions are reflected in the way that Black and Latino officers see the department’s racial issues. Most agreed to speak on the condition of anonymity due to fear of retaliation.

Several Black officers told The Times they still experience workplace hostility and racial dog whistles, such as fretting about the lowering of police recruit standards. The comments, they said, came from Black and Latino colleagues alike.

Too often, the Black officers said, Latinos who wear the uniform see themselves only as victims of discrimination, and not perpetrators.

Some Black officers said they avoid conversations about race entirely for fear of upsetting conservative colleagues — who feel emboldened by the divisive rhetoric coming from the White House.

The Latino officers who spoke to The Times said the department has for too long prioritized the promotion of Black members of the force to leadership roles while the representation of Latinos in the highest ranks has slipped.

Others argue that because society tends to lump Latinos of different backgrounds together, workplace discrimination against and within the community is often missed.

Officers from both groups said their race has been used against them when it comes to promotions. But both sides also say racism is a problem in society writ large, and not limited to the LAPD.

In a recent interview with The Times, Mayor Karen Bass said that although she is pleased that the department has increased the number of Latino officers to reflect the city’s demographics, its percentage of Black officers continues to dwindle as older African Americans are on the brink of retirement with very few young Black officers coming onto the job.

Bass, who was a young community organizer in South L.A. when the King beating happened, said it was foolhardy to believe that merely because the LAPD is more diverse, old problems cannot be repeated.

“Just because this happened 30 years ago and there are new policies that were put in place, that’s not enough,” she said in an interview with The Times. “You’ve gotta make sure that those policies are constantly updated.”

Times staff writers Andrea Flores and Richard Winton contributed to this report.

The 7,500-capacity Copper Box was some way short of full, with the upper tier closed and empty seats dotted around the arena.

But Fisher’s “Bosh Army” did their best to fill the gaps with noise, giving the “Romford Bull” a raucous reception.

Alongside his social-media star father “Big John”, Fisher has built a loyal following through an unusually unfiltered glimpse into family life, training camps and the pair’s well-documented enthusiasm for Chinese takeaways.

Fisher started with intent, swinging heavy hooks and reddening Pirotton’s eye in the opening round.

The little-known Belgian was unfazed by the home support or Fisher’s pressure, but his eye was cut by the second.

“I can see, don’t stop the fight,” Pirotton told the referee before a doctor examined him in the fourth.

Allowed to continue, he came out firing, but Fisher responded with a flurry to head and body.

Blood stained Pirotton’s white shorts, yet he rallied in the fifth – his best round – as Fisher began to look tired and static.

Among those in attendance were British fighters Derek Chisora, Conor Benn and Caroline Dubois, alongside WWE stars AJ Styles and LA Knight.

WWE is owned by American sports and entertainment group TKO, which is also behind Zuffa Boxing.

The doctor took another look at Pirotton before the seventh but allowed the bout to continue.

Neither man was offering much by the latter stages until a short right hand from Fisher staggered Pirotton in the 10th.

For a moment, a 13th stoppage victory appeared within reach, but Fisher could not find the finishing burst as Pirotton slipped to his third loss in 15 fights.