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President Trump’s push to redraw the nation’s U.S. House districts received mixed results Tuesday as South Carolina senators defied his desires, but Missouri’s top court upheld a new map that could help Republicans win an additional seat in the November midterm elections.

Rather than waning, a national redistricting battle that began 10 months ago has intensified — inflamed by a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling that weakened the federal Voting Rights Act and provided grounds for states to try to eliminate voting districts with large minority populations.

Republican lawmakers in Louisiana are wrestling with how politically aggressive to be when redrawing House districts after the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated a majority-Black district as an illegal racial gerrymander.

The ripples of the Louisiana ruling already have led to new U.S. House districts in Tennessee and have extended to Alabama, where Republican Gov. Kay Ivey announced an Aug. 11 special primary for four of the state’s seven congressional districts. That came after the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday overturned an order mandating use of a map with two largely Black districts. The state plans to switch to a map passed in 2023 that has only one majority-Black district.

Republicans think they could gain as many as 14 seats from new House maps enacted so far in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Florida and Tennessee. Democrats, meanwhile, think they could gain six seats from new maps in California and Utah. The Virginia Supreme Court last week struck down a redistricting effort that could have yielded four more winnable seats for Democrats.

Missouri map splits Kansas City district

Missouri was the second Republican state, after Texas, to redraw its congressional districts at Trump’s urging last year. Since then, numerous other states have joined the redistricting battle.

During arguments earlier Tuesday, attorneys for voters challenging Missouri’s new map focused on changes to a Kansas City-based district long represented by Democratic U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, who previously was the city’s mayor, the first Black person to hold the post.

The new map takes a compact urban district that covered 20 miles and two counties and stretches it 200 miles over 15 counties, distorting it “into a sprawling behemoth that cuts clear across the state to unite territories that share nothing in common,” said Abha Khanna, an attorney who has represented Democrats in voting and redistricting cases across the country.

A lower court ruled in March that the map as a whole satisfied the compactness requirement, even though the Kansas City district is less compact. No Missouri court has ever struck down a congressional map for not being compact, said attorney John Gore, who defended the districts on behalf of the Republican Party.

A second case heard by the high court centered on whether the new map took effect in December, as asserted by Republican Atty. Gen. Catherine Hanaway and Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins, or whether it should have been suspended when referendum signatures were submitted.

To suspend the map before validating the signatures would let activists temporarily undercut laws by submitting boxes of fraudulent signatures, Missouri Solicitor Gen. Lou Capozzi argued.

But to not immediately suspend the map “would dilute the referendum right, if not destroy it altogether,” said attorney Jonathan Hawley, arguing for voters who sued.

Republican officials contend the new districts can be suspended only after Hoskins determines the petition meets constitutional requirements and has enough valid signatures. Hoskins has until Aug. 4, the day of Missouri’s primary elections, to make that determination. The Supreme Court upheld the decision of a state judge in March who agreed with Republicans’ position.

Louisiana hearing leads to death threats

Louisiana state Sen. Jay Morris, a Republican who drafted redistricting bills that would eliminate one or both of the state’s majority-Black districts, told lawmakers Monday that he received death threats after Friday’s contentious hearing in which he told members of the public to “shut up.”

Morris acknowledged the outburst but denied the Louisiana Democratic Party’s assertion — blasted across social media and in a news release — that he also used the derogatory term “boy” toward its executive director, Dadrius Lanus, who is Black.

State Sen. Gary Carter, one of three Black Democrats serving alongside six white Republicans on the Senate committee overseeing redistricting, told the Associated Press on Tuesday that he had withdrawn from the committee “to help restore the decorum and focus that this moment demands” after shouting at Republicans during Friday’s hearing. Carter publicly apologized Monday to Morris and his Senate colleagues for having “lost my temper” and for any remarks that were taken as “personal attacks.”

Carter is the nephew of U.S. Rep. Troy Carter, a Democrat who represents New Orleans and is at risk of losing his seat in the redistricting process. Gary Carter is being replaced on the committee with state Sen. Royce Duplessis, a Democrat representing New Orleans.

South Carolina weighs political risks of redistricting

The Republican push for South Carolina to join the national redistricting battle by redrawing its U.S. House map fizzled Tuesday as an initial vote in the state Senate fell short.

Trump had urged South Carolina to redraw its congressional districts ahead of the November elections in an attempt to help Republicans win another seat in the closely divided chamber. The state House had voted in favor of letting lawmakers return after the regular session ends this week to consider redistricting, and had proposed a new map that could eliminate the state’s only Democratic-held seat.

But the Senate had to give permission to take up redistricting, too.

The 29-17 vote failed, with just two votes short of the two-thirds needed. Five Republicans joined all the Democrats in the chamber to reject the proposal.

Trump said Monday on social media that he was closely watching the redistricting vote, urging South Carolina senators to “be bold and courageous” and to delay the House primaries so new districts can be drawn.

Although Republicans have a supermajority in the chamber, some GOP senators weren’t sure the proposed map would guarantee the party could unseat longtime Democratic U.S. Rep. James E. Clyburn. They also said it could push enough Democrats into other districts to backfire, resulting in a 5-2 or even a 4-3 Republican split.

Republican Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey acknowledged the pressure from Trump, but said he doesn’t like being asked to bend to someone’s will instead of doing what’s best for his state.

“I got too much Southern in my blood,” Massey said. “I’ve got too much resistance in my heritage.”

Lieb, Collins, Brook and Chandler write for the Associated Press. Brook reported from Baton Rouge, La.; Chandler from Montgomery, Ala.; Collins from Columbia; and Lieb from Jefferson City, Mo.

WASHINGTON — The head of the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Marty Makary, is resigning after a rocky tenure that drew months of complaints from health industry executives, anti-abortion activists, vaping lobbyists and other allies of President Trump.

He steps down after just over a year leading the powerful health regulatory agency, according to a White House official who was not authorized to speak before an announcement expected Tuesday and requested anonymity.

Kyle Diamantas, the agency’s chief for foods, will take over as acting commissioner, the official said. Diamantas is an attorney with personal ties to Donald Trump Jr.

A surgeon and health researcher, Makary came to prominence among Republicans as an outspoken critic of COVID-19 health measures during the pandemic when he frequently appeared on Fox News.

But he struggled to manage the FDA’s bureaucracy and failed to win the confidence of its staff after mass layoffs, leadership changes and a series of controversies in which the agency’s scientific principles appeared to be overridden by political interests, including those of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The FDA commissioner, as the leader of an agency that regulates billions of dollars in consumer goods and medicines, is often required to juggle competing priorities that straddle science and politics.

Makary faced a unique challenge in balancing calls by Trump and other Republicans to cut red tape at the FDA, while also tending to Kennedy’s interest in scrutinizing the safety of vaccines, drugs and food additives.

Virtually all of the FDA’s senior career officials resigned, retired or were forced out in the first year of the second-term Trump administration, leading to a steady stream of leaks and negative stories in the media cataloging low morale, dysfunction and frustration among staff.

Makary’s handpicked deputy, Dr. Vinay Prasad, was pushed out of the agency twice in less than a year for running afoul of specialty drugmakers and groups for patients with rare diseases. Makary appeared poised to weather the controversy, despite an ongoing pressure campaign calling on Trump to fire him.

Recent months brought fresh criticisms from other interest groups that the White House considers key to Republican chances in November elections.

Anti-abortion groups have criticized Makary for allegedly slow-walking an internal review of the abortion pill mifepristone, which has been on the market for 25 years but remains a target for conservative activists.

Vaping executives told Trump that Makary was blocking approval of their products, including new flavored e-cigarettes seen as crucial to the industry’s survival.

Last week, the agency abruptly changed course on vaping: authorizing the first fruit-flavored products and issuing guidelines that loosened marketing for major manufacturers. But it wasn’t enough to keep Makary in the job.

A permanent replacement for FDA commissioner will need to be nominated by Trump and confirmed by a majority vote in the Senate.

Faster drug reviews are overshadowed

As a former regular on Fox News, Makary was aggressive about promoting his accomplishments on cable television and podcasts and in online opinion pieces.

More than a half-dozen initiatives from Makary aimed to speed up or streamline FDA drug reviews, including dropping certain study requirements, incorporating artificial intelligence into drug evaluations and offering expedited reviews to medicines that support “national interests.”

But pharmaceutical executives rely on the predictability and consistency of FDA decisions, even more than speedy reviews. Makary’s efforts on drug reviews were overshadowed by internal conflicts and upheavals that created headaches for drugmakers, investors and patients.

A number of specialty drugmakers studying therapies for rare or hard-to-treat diseases said they received rejection letters or requests to run additional studies for drugs that previously had been given the go-ahead by FDA staff. Those drugs were primarily overseen by Prasad, who stepped down for a second time from his role as FDA’s vaccine and biotech chief in April.

Vaccine moves denounced

Prasad repeatedly overruled vaccine staffers to restrict eligibility for new COVID shots. In February, Prasad initially refused to even consider Moderna’s mRNA shot for flu. The FDA was forced to reverse itself after Moderna pledged to formally challenge the decision and called for intervention by the White House.

Some of Makary and Prasad’s most controversial vaccine proposals never came to fruition, despite stoking confusion and anxiety within the FDA and beyond.

In an internal memo in November, Prasad claimed — without publishing evidence — that the FDA had linked COVID shots to the deaths of 10 children. Prasad used that to justify a planned wholesale overhaul of the agency’s approach to approving and updating vaccines.

A dozen former FDA commissioners issued a scathing denunciation of the plan, warning that it would “undermine the public interest” and decimate vaccine development. The FDA has not released its analysis of the deaths or its plan for the vaccine overhaul.

FDA’s drug center had a revolving door

In the FDA’s drug center, which is the agency’s largest division, Makary oversaw a revolving door of leadership changes. Six people served as director over the course of one year.

Makary’s initial pick for the job, Dr. George Tidmarsh, was forced to resign after allegations that he used his FDA position to pursue a personal vendetta against a former business partner.

His replacement, longtime FDA cancer specialist Dr. Rick Pazdur, announced he would retire after just three weeks on the job, after clashing with Makary on multiple issues involving drug reviews.

With Makary’s departure, the fate of many fledgling initiatives is uncertain.

Most of the programs Makary introduced have not gone through federal rulemaking required to enshrine them in U.S. regulations and could easily be overturned by his successors.

Democrats in Congress have questioned the legality of some of those efforts, including a program that offers drugmakers expedited reviews for innovative medicines.

Perrone and Kim write for the Associated Press.

BEIJING — President Trump’s first visit to China in nine years is a high-stakes trip reflecting the rivalry and mutual dependence of two superpowers hoping to avoid a collision course — even if Trump cast it more as a meeting between close friends and business partners.

Speaking to reporters before departing Washington on Tuesday, Trump downplayed tensions between the two countries, including on trade, calling Chinese President Xi Jinping a “wonderful guy” and a friend and saying the working relationship between the two countries is “very good.”

Trump acknowledged China’s might — saying that the Asian nation and the United States are clearly the world’s two superpowers — and that the focus of the meeting “more than anything else will be trade.”

“We’re gonna have a great relationship for many, many decades to come,” Trump said. “My relationship with President Xi is a fantastic one. We’ve always gotten along, and we’re doing very well with China, and working with China’s been very good — so we look forward to it.”

Trump also downplayed the importance of the meeting for the war in Iran. He said Xi might be able to help the United States reach a deal to end the war, but that he doesn’t need it, “because we have Iran very much under control.”

The state visit marks the first by an American president to China since Trump’s trip here in 2017, only months into his first term. President Biden never came, becoming the first to not do so since diplomatic ties were normalized, an absence that underscored simmering distrust and animosity between Washington and Beijing that has only worsened since.

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In the capital, security forces sealed off an area around the Temple of Heaven roughly the size of 400 football fields ahead of the U.S. president’s visit, anticipating a stop at the monument to imperial China and Confucian thought.

On his previous trip, Trump received the rare honor of a state banquet inside the Forbidden City. This time he is expected to dine at the Great Hall of the People, an imposing structure off Tiananmen Square that hosts high-level gatherings of the Chinese Communist Party.

Trump’s positive spin on Tuesday aside, his agenda for meetings beginning Thursday with Xi highlights the vast array of American interests that depend on — and often clash with — Beijing’s policies.

After launching a trade war against China at the beginning of his second term, Trump now comes hat in hand requesting an extension of a tariff truce, fearful Xi might follow through on his threats to halt the export of rare earth minerals to the United States that are vital to the manufacturing of American goods, including everyday consumer equipment and advanced defense technologies.

His visit comes as a ceasefire in the war with Iran, brokered with help from Beijing, is on “massive life support,” according to the president. Trump is expected to appeal to Xi for assistance in getting Tehran to restore free and open passage through the Strait of Hormuz.

And in a dramatic reversal, the Trump administration has begun discussions with the Chinese about establishing a channel of communication on artificial intelligence, alarmed that recent technological leaps could pose global risks.

All of these requests are expected to come at a cost.

President Trump departs the White House on May 12, 2026, for his second state visit to China.

(Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images)

In earlier remarks before the trip, Trump said he expected U.S. arms sale to Taiwan — including one already approved by Congress — to become a chip in the negotiations.

“I’m going to have that discussion with President Xi,” Trump said. “President Xi would like us not to, and I’ll have that discussion. That’s one of the many things I’ll be talking about.”

The notion that U.S. support for Taiwan is a negotiable matter is sure to rattle America’s allies throughout the region, from Japan to the Philippines, which are reliant on U.S. security guarantees amid China’s Indo-Pacific military aggression.

Despite geopolitical tensions, both sides are expected to announce business and investment agreements, underscoring how deeply intertwined the world’s two largest economies remain.

China plans on making a significant purchase of Boeing aircraft, and the president has brought 17 American corporate leaders with him on the trip to discuss additional opportunities, including Apple’s Tim Cook, BlackRock’s Larry Fink, Meta’s Dina Powell McCormick and Tesla’s Elon Musk.

The two leaders are expected to have other opportunities to talk in person throughout the coming year, including potential meetings at the Group of 20 summit in Florida, the APEC summit in Shenzhen, China, and a state visit in Washington that Trump said he will host for Xi at some point in the coming months.

Trump on Tuesday said Xi’s visit will be “toward the end of the year” and “exciting.” He also lamented that the ballroom he is building on the White House grounds — on the site of the historic East Wing he demolished — won’t be ready in time.

Jennifer Hong, senior director at the Institute for Indo-Pacific Security, said her concern is that the state visit becomes part of a “tyranny of calendaring,” where the Chinese agree to schedule more high-level meetings sought by Trump that put off vital U.S. decision-making.

“I do think this trip is necessary for the U.S. government — I think that there are things that are on hold because he doesn’t want to rock the boat,” Hong said, noting the Trump administration’s delay in arms sales to Taiwan, despite the packages already having received congressional approval.

“I’m just worried this will be a stringing along of promises, or maybe some reprieve for a year or so,” she added, “as we continue to handicap ourselves on national security matters for the sake of more meetings.”

Trump on Tuesday repeatedly dismissed China’s potential help in resolving the war in Iran, which has driven up prices domestically and around the world as oil shipments through the strategic Strait of Hormuz have been badly disrupted and U.S. efforts to fully reopen the channel have so far been unsuccessful.

“I don’t think we need any help with Iran, to be honest with you,” Trump said. “They’re defeated militarily.”

Trump also said the financial pain many Americans are feeling from the war, including at the gas pump, simply isn’t a factor — “not even a little bit,” he said — in his ongoing negotiations with Iran.

“The only thing that matters when I’m talking about Iran [is that] they can’t have a nuclear weapon,” he said. “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody.”

WASHINGTON — President Trump’s plan to put weapons in space — pitched as a “Golden Dome for America” missile defense program — is estimated to cost $1.2 trillion over a 20 year period, according to a new analysis from the Congressional Budget Office, a far heftier sum than the initial $175 billion price tag he gave last year.

The nonpartisan CBO report, published Tuesday, is described as an analysis that reflects “one illustrative approach rather than an estimate of a specific Administration proposal.”

The futuristic system was ordered by Trump in an executive order during his first week in office. He said then that he expected the system to be “fully operational before the end of my term,” which wraps up in January 2029.

“Over the past 40 years, rather than lessening, the threat from next-generation strategic weapons has become more intense and complex with the development by peer and near-peer adversaries of next-generation delivery systems,” Trump said in his executive order, justifying the need for the missile defense system.

The CBO’s estimates are in part based on a lack of details from the Defense Department about what and how many systems will be deployed, “making it impossible to estimate the long term cost” of the Golden Dome system, the report says.

The concept for the missile system is at least partly inspired by Israel’s multitiered defenses, often collectively referred to as the “Iron Dome,” which played a key role in defending it from rocket and missile fire from Iran and allied militant groups as it prosecutes the war on Iran alongside the U.S.

The U.S. Golden Dome is envisioned to include ground and space-based capabilities able to detect, intercept and stop missiles at all major stages of a potential attack.

Congress has already approved roughly $24 billion for the missile defense initiative through Republicans’ massive tax and spending measure signed into law last summer.

Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-OR, who requested the estimate from the CBO, said in response to the report that the missile defense project is “nothing more than a massive giveaway to defense contractors paid for entirely by working Americans.”

Last May, the president said the Golden Dome would cost $175 billion. The CBO last year estimated that just the space-based components of the Golden Dome could cost as much as $542 billion over the next 20 years.

Hussein writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth faced tough questions Tuesday from Republican and Democratic lawmakers about the Trump administration’s end game for the Iran war, the cost of the conflict and its impact on diminishing U.S. weapons stockpiles.

For his part, the Pentagon chief softened his tone from hearings before Congress nearly two weeks ago, notably avoiding the same pointed criticism of lawmakers in his opening remarks as he outlined the Trump administration’s efforts to ramp up production of weapons and other military capabilities.

Even so, Hegseth insisted that the military has plenty of missile defense systems and other munitions for the Iran war or future conflicts as both Republicans and Democrats hammered him with those concerns.

“I take issue with the characterization that munitions are depleted in a public forum,” Hegseth said. “That’s not true.”

The cost of the Iran war has risen to about $29 billion, the vast bulk of which — $24 billion — is related to replacing and repairing munitions but also includes operational costs to keep forces deployed, Pentagon comptroller Jay Hurst said. That’s up from $25 billion that he told lawmakers nearly two weeks ago.

The powerful House and Senate Appropriations subcommittees that oversee defense spending are holding back-to-back hearings to review the Trump administration’s 2027 military budget proposal, which calls for a historic allocation of $1.5 trillion. The discussions in the House quickly veered into the handling of a war that appears locked in a stalemate as higher fuel prices pose political problems for Republicans in the midterm congressional elections.

Hegseth and Caine face bipartisan pushback on munitions stockpiles

Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, told Hegseth that the “question must be answered at the end of this crisis: What have we accomplished and at what cost?”

“This administration has not presented Congress with any kind of clear or coherent strategy week to week, day to day, hour to hour,” DeLauro said. “The rationale shifts, the objectives change. The end game is ill-defined when it is defined at all.”

California Republican Rep. Ken Calvert, the House subcommittee’s chair, also asked about the impact of the Iran war on military funding as well as the U.S. military’s weapons stockpiles.

“Questions persist about whether we are building the depth and reliance required for a high-end conflict,” Calvert said.

Minnesota Rep. Betty McCollum, the defense subcommittee’s ranking Democrat, pressed Hegseth on whether the military has a plan to draw down troops in the Middle East if Congress passes so-far-unsuccessful efforts to end the Iran war.

“We have a plan to escalate if necessary,” Hegseth said. “We have a plan to retrograde if necessary. We have a plan to shift assets.”

He said he would not reveal any next steps publicly. Noting repeated questions from lawmakers over the military’s weapons stockpiles, drawn down from the Iran war, Hegseth said the concerns have been “unhelpfully overstated” and that “we have plenty of what we need.”

He said the defense industry has been told to “build more and build faster,” blaming the military industrial base’s inadequate capacity on previous administrations and U.S. aid to Ukraine in its war with Russia.

Trump administration faces pressure from impact of the Iran war

President Trump is facing increasing pressure from the economic shocks of Iran effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz, a vital shipping corridor where 20% of the world’s oil normally flows. The U.S. military in turn has blockaded Iranian ports and the two sides have traded fire, with American forces thwarting attacks on their warships and disabling Tehran-linked oil tankers.

Trump said Monday that the ceasefire is on “massive life support” and criticized Iran for its latest proposal, pointing to his demands that Iran significantly limit its nuclear program.

“I would call it the weakest right now after reading that piece of garbage they sent us,” Trump said.

The Republican president also said he wanted to suspend the federal gas tax to help Americans shoulder surging fuel prices. He has previously said higher costs are worth it to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.

Tuesday’s hearings are giving a mostly new group of lawmakers the chance to grill or applaud Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the planning and execution of the war.

The Senate hearing later Tuesday will include Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, a Republican whose reelection this year is far from guaranteed. She voted with Democrats on an effort to halt the conflict late last month, saying she wants to see a defined strategy for bringing the war to a close.

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, another Republican on the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, has voted against the string of unsuccessful war powers resolutions but spoken of the need for congressional authorization so Americans will know the war’s limits and objectives.

He also will face plenty of friendly Republicans, including the Senate subcommittee’s chair, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and perhaps the Iran war’s biggest booster in Congress, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.

Finley, Toropin and Barrow write for the Associated Press. Barrow reported from Atlanta.

Secret Handshake, the anonymous arts and activism group behind an ongoing series of satirical public sculptures — mostly about President Trump’s alleged ties to convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein — has channeled its black comedy into a new video game about the Iran war called “Operation Epic Furious: Strait to Hell.”

“The game features furious tweet battles against Iranian schoolgirls, low-flow shower heads and other threats to American freedom like DEI and the Pope. And just to save you time, the only way you can lose is by trying to hold Melania’s hand. But it’s the Middle East, so you also can’t win either,” Secret Handshake wrote in an email to The Times.

The group placed three old-school arcade-style games inside the Neoclassical DC War Memorial, which is located near the Reflecting Pool in Ash Woods and resembles a domed, open-air bandstand. The pivot from sculpture to video games was necessitated by current events, said a member of the group.

A plaque beside three video games placed in the DC War Memorial by the satirical arts and activism group Secret Handshake.

(Secret Handshake)

“We didn’t sit down and say, let’s make a video game. The video game was the answer because that’s what was happening to us. It was about watching the actions take place in Iran and some truly, truly horrible things, and how that was being spun into something cool and hip and edgy through the actual administration, through the use of video games,” the man said. “They were literally cutting in ‘Call of Duty’ and ‘Grand Theft Auto’ and others as well into these hype videos for the war, almost as if it was before a concert or a wrestling match.”

The game, which is also available to play online, begins with a shot of the White House. “Another big, beautiful day as the best President ever,” a caption reads. The game moves into the Oval Office where Trump sits at the Resolute Desk under the words, “Uh-oh another one of your executive orders was halted by the courts.” Players can then choose whether to order a Diet Coke or bomb Iran — if you choose to do the latter, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth enters the room and says, “Hey boss! Just saw on Truth Social you declared war on Iran. Hell yeah!”

“Some call it a war, I call it renovating my Middle East ballroom,” Trump says.

“My delts are ready, let’s liberate some oil,” Hegseth yells.

FBI Director Kash Patel is featured in the satirical video game made by Secret Handshake.

(Secret Handshake)

A representative for Secret Handshake says if you choose to order six Diet Cokes something special happens. I tried. You unlock an achievement and are told your health is perfect.

Secret Handshake has been erecting satirical Trump sculptures on the National Mall for more than a year, making headlines in September when the park service toppled one of its pieces, titled “Best Friends Forever,” featuring Trump and Epstein gleefully holding hands. The statue, bruised and battered by its fall, ultimately went back up.

Secret Handshake is meticulous about getting the necessary permits to display its protest art, which is why the pieces have lately remained in their designated spots for up to a week. The “Operation Epic Furious” video games are scheduled to stay up for at least the next few days, the rep said.

The goal is to get people to think, not to mock or glorify violence in any way, the Secret Handshake rep said.

The video game “Operation Epic Furious” by Secret Handshake begins with a choice: Order a Diet Coke or bomb Iran.

(Secret Handshake)

“There is no violence in the game,” the rep said. “The damage that is done is political damage and the weapons are things like gas prices and Catholic guilt.”

It’s also important to the group to be mindful of various political viewpoints.

“I would say that everything we’ve done, we’ve tried to do with respect to the other side and to not make it cruel,” the rep said. “And also we’ve done it with permission.”

Protest art, yes. But the kind that is, hopefully, built to last.

PORTLAND, Ore. — Appealing to voters’ anxieties about the soaring cost of living is central to Democrats’ messaging in their hopes of big wins in this year’s midterm elections. In Oregon, a question on the primary ballot is complicating that strategy.

The Democratic-controlled Legislature raised the state gas tax and a range of fees last fall as a way to pay for road improvements and plug a hole in the state’s transportation budget. Republicans responded with a petition to repeal the increases, leading to a referendum that will land before voters just as the Iran war is causing the price of gas to skyrocket around the United States.

“It is a hell of a time to be raising gas taxes on people,” said Jeanine Holly, filling up her tank on a recent morning in Portland.

The gas tax repeal on the state’s May 19 primary ballot comes amid widespread disruptions in the oil industry from the war with Iran started by Israel and President Trump. Discontent is high among U.S. consumers across the political spectrum, with the price of gas topping $4.50 a gallon nationally on Friday and averaging about 80 cents more per gallon in Oregon.

The referendum will give voters a chance to weigh in on a hot-button issue hitting them directly in the pocketbook at a time when prices remain elevated for everything from housing to groceries. Nationally, Democrats have focused on the affordability concerns similar to those that helped propel Trump to victory in 2024. Some of their candidates have even proposed ways to cut taxes as a way to promote their agenda and counter a traditional GOP strategy.

“It’s difficult to imagine a worse situation for … a gas tax increase than right now in American politics,” said Chris Koski, professor of political science and environmental studies at Portland’s Reed College.

Republicans sense an opportunity

Republicans wasted no time in appealing to voters after the Legislature and Democratic governor signed off on the tax increase, which also included a higher payroll tax for transit projects and a boost in vehicle registration and title fees.

They needed 78,000 voter signatures to qualify the referendum for the ballot. They quickly got 250,000.

“That is a remarkable number,” Republican strategist Rebecca Tweed said.

Republicans in Oregon have countered Democrats’ affordability messaging by portraying the tax and fee increases as further fueling the high cost of living.

“Do Oregonians want to pay more? The answer is no,” said GOP state Sen. Bruce Starr, who helped lead the referendum campaign. “Everything they’re looking at is expensive.”

Under the legislation, Oregon’s gas tax would rise from 40 cents to 46 cents a gallon. That would make it tied with Maryland for the eighth-highest gas tax of any state when factoring in other state taxes and fees, according to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

At the Portland gas station, Michael Burch said he used to spend $70 to fill three-quarters of his pickup truck’s tank, but now pays $80 for just over half a tank.

“I’m sick and tired of taxes,” the 76-year-old retiree said. “Gas is certainly dampening the spirits and the coffers of folks that aren’t as well off.”

Hannah Coe, a 30-year-old student, said she was not sure how she would vote on the primary ballot referendum.

“I think I would be in favor of it if it was going to go to the things that it was saying it was going to go to, such as fixing our roads,” she said. “I also kind of feel like that’s just a grab at trying to get more money from the people who live here.”

Democrats blame the Iran war

Oregon Democrats spent much of last year fighting to pass a transportation funding bill to help raise money for services such as road paving and snow plowing. The debate came amid projections of declining gas tax revenue as more people adopt electric, hybrid and fuel-efficient cars.

They finally passed a narrower version of their plan during a special session called by Gov. Tina Kotek.

She recently acknowledged the challenging timing of the referendum.

“Certainly, the conversation at the ballot this year … is a tough sell right now, because I think everyone is feeling a pinch on their household budgets,” she told reporters.

But she and other Democrats said the root cause of the jump in gas prices is Trump’s decision to go to war with Iran. She suggested the federal government consider reducing the federal 18-cent-a-gallon gas tax if it wants to provide relief at the pump for Americans.

Some Oregonians are receptive to the Democrats’ reason for passing the legislation last year. Kurt Borneman, 68, said he would support the gas tax increase, even though he’s now paying at least $10 more to fill up his tank.

“I realize that money’s tight and roads need to be improved,” he said at the Portland gas station. “I want less government, but I also want nice roads.”

Democratic state Rep. Paul Evans said his party lost the battle over how to frame the gas tax increase to the public. So far, there has been no organized effort from Democrats and their allies to oppose the ballot referendum.

“When anything is reduced to, ‘Do you want a tax or not?’ Most people are going to say no,” he said. “The messaging got away from us, and it became focused upon the price instead of the value.”

Rush writes for the Associated Press.

SAN DIEGO — President Trump nominated Cameron Hamilton on Monday to lead the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a surprising comeback for the former Navy SEAL who was fired from his role as FEMA’s temporary leader last year after he defended its existence.

His nomination comes as the Trump administration has increasingly signaled it is backing away from promises to dismantle FEMA, an agency that has faced withering criticism by the president. The nomination of Hamilton, who argued abolishing FEMA was not in the country’s best interests, is the latest indication of that change.

If confirmed, Hamilton would be the principal advisor to Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin on emergency management and FEMA’s first permanent administrator in Trump’s second term. The agency has gone through three temporary leaders, including Hamilton’s brief tenure from January to May 2025.

He would take over an embattled agency still reeling from Kristi Noem’s turbulent leadership of the Department of Homeland Security, of which FEMA is part. FEMA’s workforce has been worn down by mass staff departures, policies that hamstrung operations and a 75-day-long Homeland Security shutdown that ended April 30.

Hamilton will need to ensure the agency is prepared for summer disaster season, just weeks away, while answering to Trump, who is likely to expect major reforms after a council he appointed recommended sweeping changes on Friday.

“Now is the opportunity to stabilize FEMA,” said Michael Coen, the agency’s chief of staff in the Obama and Biden administrations.

Fired after defending FEMA

Hamilton, who had never been a state or local emergency management director and who had publicly criticized FEMA in the past, was a controversial choice when Trump named him temporary leader in January 2025, just days before the president floated the idea of “getting rid” of FEMA.

His rupture with Homeland Security officials began as he defended a federal role in supporting disaster-affected states, tribes and territories.

“Once the conversation shifted to, ‘Now we’re going to abolish,’ I immediately expressed concern,” he said in September on the “Disaster Tough” podcast with John Scardena, a former FEMA incident management team leader.

Homeland Security officials even subjected him to a polygraph test, accusing him and other officials of leaking details of a private meeting. He passed but said he knew his dismissal was inevitable.

At a May 7, 2025, appearance before a House Appropriations subcommittee, Rep. Rosa DeLauro, a Connecticut Democrat, asked Hamilton if he believed FEMA should be abolished.

“I do not believe it is in the best interest of the American people to eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency,” he replied. The next day, he was fired.

Hamilton will have to rebuild trust

Defending FEMA despite knowing it would probably cost him his job generated respect and trust among people whose job it is to lead communities through crisis, said Scardena, now president of the consultancy Doberman Emergency Management Group, which trains emergency managers.

“He won myself over and I think a lot of people by what he did,” Scardena said.

But multiple current FEMA employees who requested anonymity for fear of retribution for speaking publicly told the Associated Press they had concerns over some of the actions taken under Hamilton.

In 2024, Hamilton shared posts on X promoting misinformation about FEMA spending during Hurricane Helene.

During his temporary leadership, FEMA ceased door-to-door canvassing to reach survivors after disasters, and canceled a multibillion-dollar resilience grant program, since restored by a federal judge. The Department of Government Efficiency gained access to internal FEMA networks containing survivors’ private information. FEMA staff were fired for fulfilling a reimbursement payment to New York City for housing undocumented immigrants as part of FEMA’s Shelter and Services program.

Hamilton has said he believes FEMA needs major reform. He has said that he wants FEMA to move faster, that the agency is saddled with responsibilities he sees as outside its remit, and that some states have become too dependent on the agency. A Trump-appointed council last week urged sweeping changes to FEMA, which would require congressional action.

“I think he’s going to need to rebuild trust across the agency,” said Deanne Criswell, FEMA administrator under former President Biden, adding that she believes Hamilton cares about FEMA and she appreciated his outreach to emergency management directors and former officials during and after his tenure.

Senate confirmation process could raise questions of experience

Hamilton could face pushback in the Senate confirmation process over never having led an emergency management agency, a common stepping stone to becoming administrator of an agency with over 21,000 employees.

Federal law requires the FEMA administrator to have “a demonstrated ability in and knowledge of emergency management and homeland security” and at least five years of “executive leadership and management experience.”

Hamilton trained as a Navy hospital corpsman before spending a decade as a Navy SEAL on SEAL Team Eight. He then became a U.S. State Department emergency management specialist handling overseas crisis response, then directed emergency medical services at the Department of Homeland Security.

Angueira writes for the Associated Press.

Walt Disney Co. has picked up a vocal ally in its fight against the Federal Communications Commission: one of the panel’s three commissioners.

FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez — the panel’s lone Democrat — took a rare step of sending a letter to Disney Chief Executive Officer Josh D’Amaro Monday to describe what she sees as a pressure campaign to weaken not just Disney’s ABC network — but all media outlets that provide critical coverage of President Trump.

“What Disney and ABC are facing is not a series of coincidental regulatory actions but a sustained, coordinated campaign of censorship and control, carried out through the weaponization of the FCC’s authority as a federal regulator,” Gomez wrote.

The FCC’s efforts were all about “pressuring a free and independent press and all media into submission,” Gomez wrote in the four-page missive to D’Amaro — Disney’s recently installed chief executive.

Her outreach comes after the FCC, in a highly unusual move, initiated an early review of the broadcast licenses for ABC stations that Disney owns, including KABC-TV Channel 7 in Los Angeles. Disney owns eight stations and its licenses were not set to expire for another two to five years.

The FCC also demanded that Disney’s Houston television station explain why the ABC daytime show, “The View,” should be entitled to an exemption from providing equal time rules for politicians whose opponent appears on a program.

Disney has said “The View” was granted an exemption — which is widely used among news programs — in 2002. Last Thursday, Disney sent a blistering letter to the FCC, challenging its inquiry on “The View.”

Gomez has been outspoken about the tactics of her colleague — FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, a Trump appointee — and the dangers she said that certain FCC actions represent to 1st Amendment freedoms. Monday’s letter escalated her criticism and gives Disney potent ammunition to use in its legal battle against the FCC.

Disney and the FCC did not immediately comment.

Gomez, a telecommunications attorney, listed four key events, which began when Disney decided to settle a defamation lawsuit brought by Trump one month after he was reelected for a second-term. Some free speech experts felt Disney had a chance to win that case, based on erroneous statements made by ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos.

However, Disney agreed to pay $15 million in late 2024 to make the case go away.

“Whatever the legal calculations behind that decision, its effect was immediate and unmistakable,” Gomez wrote. “It told this administration that pressure works. It told every other company watching that capitulation was an option. And it opened the door to every action that has followed.”

Gomez said the administration’s goal has not been to bring challenges that the FCC would have to defend in court, but rather, to prompt TV networks to self-censor and tone down their news coverage as a way to avoid getting pulled into fights with the president and Carr.

“Most [FCC investigations] are destined never to be brought to any enforcement conclusion that could face judicial review,” Gomez wrote. “That is because the threat is the point.”

TAIPEI, Taiwan — A resolute Secretary of State Marco Rubio took to the White House lectern Tuesday and declared the United States, under President Trump’s leadership, had launched a bold new operation to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, based on the principle that international waterways must remain free.

An hour later, Trump walked it all back, ending the complex military endeavor after less than a day.

It was just the latest evidence to America’s allies that the word of the U.S. government is subject entirely to the president’s whims. And such is the worry fueling concerns in Taipei ahead of Trump’s state visit to China this week.

Privately, senior administration officials have assured Taiwanese leadership ahead of the trip that Trump has no intention of changing long-standing U.S. policy on the island, two sources familiar with the discussions said — a stance of “strategic ambiguity” that has avoided any declarative statements on Taiwanese independence since it was coined by Henry Kissinger 55 years ago.

A White House official was definitive that U.S. policy toward Taiwan “remains the same as the first Trump administration.”

“The U.S. One China policy, as our cross-strait policies are collectively known, is based on the Taiwan Relations Act, the three U.S.-PRC Joint Communiques and the Six Assurances to Taiwan,” the official said. “There is no change to our policy with respect to Taiwan.”

But Chinese officials told The Times that their president, Xi Jinping, intends to raise the matter as a top priority, knowing that only one person — Trump himself — speaks for the administration today.

Whether Xi can leverage the intimacy of a private audience to shift Trump’s stance, potentially linking it to other U.S. objectives, is the source of significant concern here.

Taiwanese officials fear even the most subtle rhetorical change in policy from Trump could imperil a delicate status quo that has held, to its benefit, for decades. They have similarly sought assurances that the administration will follow through on a pending U.S. arms sale worth over $10 billion, which received approval from Taiwan’s legislature on Friday.

“The most serious scenario would be if President Trump were to make an impromptu statement, such as, ‘I oppose Taiwanese independence,’ particularly if he were to link this to trade, the Iran issue, or a summit agreement,” said Chienyu Shih, of the Institute for National Defense and Security Research in Taiwan. “This would constitute a rhetorical concession of substantial significance to Beijing.”

Rubio told reporters at his news conference Tuesday — with a similar confidence he expressed on the Iran file — that China understands Washington’s long-standing position on the island.

“I’m sure Taiwan will be a topic of conversation. It always is. The Chinese understand our position on that topic — we understand theirs,” Rubio said.

“I think both countries understand that it is in neither one of our interests to see anything destabilizing happen in that part of the world,” he added. “We don’t need any destabilizing events to occur with regards to Taiwan, or anywhere in the Indo-Pacific. And that’s to the mutual benefit of both the United States and the Chinese.”

Trump has suggested a willingness to shift U.S. policy on Taiwan before.

During his initial campaign for the presidency in 2016, Trump openly questioned the One China policy, drawing ire from Beijing for suggesting he might endorse Taiwanese independence. He accepted a call from Taiwan’s president after his victory and would later support significant arms sales to Taipei.

And yet, at a 2017 meeting with Xi, Trump vacillated, telling the Chinese leader he could “deal with” the Taiwan issue in “a matter of months,” according to the Wall Street Journal. The Chinese were reportedly so flabbergasted by the comment that they dismissed it as rhetorical flourish.

“There is concern that the conversation between the two leaders could veer into sensitive territory on the topic of Taiwan,” said Brian Hart, deputy director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, “but there are many in the administration who would still appreciate the importance of general continuity in U.S. policy.”

U.S. support for Taiwan’s democratic movement used to be a matter of principle. Today, Washington sees it as a matter of national security. Over 60% of semiconductors are produced in Taiwan, including 90% of the world’s most advanced chips. And it is viewed as the clasp of the first island chain guarding against Chinese maritime expansion.

A robust debate between Taiwan’s Cabinet and the opposition in parliament ended Friday not over whether to accept U.S. defense equipment, but over how much to spend. The Legislative Yuan approved $24 billion in purchases — including a defense package passed by Congress in December and the pending arms sale — falling short of Taipei’s $40-billion proposal.

Anticipation for the president’s state visit is high here in the capital city, where local news is filled with questions over the influence Trump’s war in Iran might have on his appetite for supporting Taiwan.

Chinese defense analysts have seen the war as a sign of U.S. weakness. But Taiwanese defense experts have taken away a different lesson: cheap equipment from a lesser military, such as dumb mines thrown in a strait, may just be enough to paralyze a superpower.

The latest U.S. National Security Strategy, released by the Trump administration in December, emphasized the importance of support for Taiwan and the status quo.

But the Taiwanese took note that the strategy also called for an end to forever wars in the Middle East, offering little preview of the president’s sudden strategic pivot on Iran in February, launching a war few saw coming.

What Trump chooses to say in China “might be difficult to predict,” said Jyh-Shyang Sheu, a scholar of Chinese politics and military capabilities based in Taiwan.

But “in Taipei, we are still focusing on the U.S. policy,” he added, “more focusing on what he does instead of what he says.”

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — For 21 years, Steve Fowler and Sam Wilson have performed together in a band on Memphis’ renowned Beale Street. And for the last decade, the men have been neighbors on a quiet, leafy avenue.

But as of Thursday, they will no longer cast the same ballot despite living across the street from each other.

That’s because Tennessee’s Republican-controlled Legislature redrew the congressional district of Memphis, which has long enjoyed its own Democratic-leaning U.S. House seat. Now, the city is split into three Republican-leaning districts, its majority-Black population sliced up and bound to mostly white, rural and conservative communities along lines that branch away from Fowler and Wilson’s East Memphis neighborhood.

A line runs down the middle of the street, placing Fowler in the 8th Congressional District, which runs hundreds of miles to central Tennessee across a dozen counties. Wilson is zoned for the 9th District, which extends across most of the state’s southern border before curving up to encompass the largely white and affluent Nashville suburbs.

“I think it’s horrible,” said Fowler, who is white. “This isn’t just going to be bad for Black folks in Memphis, but poor whites in these new districts also aren’t going to get services. How are any of these congressmen going to serve all these different counties?”

A national competition

The redraw was sparked by a ruling from the conservative majority of the U.S. Supreme Court that may be a death knell for congressional representation of majority-Black Southern communities such as Memphis.

For 60 years, a provision of the landmark Voting Rights Act required mapmakers to prove they were not discriminating against racial minorities in how they drew districts, often leading to political boundaries that allowed some minority communities to vote for their preferred representative rather than having their vote diluted by white majorities surrounding them.

The rule had the greatest effect in Southern states, where neighboring Black and white communities remain highly polarized in partisan politics.

On April 29, the justices severely weakened that requirement, ruling that the way courts had handled it improperly injected racial matters into redistricting in violation of the Constitution. Republicans across the South immediately leaped at the chance to redraw their maps before the November elections to eliminate as many Democratic-held, majority-minority congressional seats as possible.

Tennessee’s Legislature was the first in a GOP-controlled state to finalize a new map. But it is one of several Southern states — Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina among them — engaged in a broader partisan redistricting competition sweeping the country.

Republicans have long complained that the Voting Rights Act prevented them from doing to Democratic, majority-Black districts what Democrats in states they control do to conservative-leaning, white and rural areas — scatter their voters for partisan gain.

That is what Tennessee Republicans did in their initial congressional map in 2021 to the state’s other large reservoir of Democrats in Nashville, where they did not have to step gingerly because that city is majority white.

“Tennessee is a conservative state and our congressional delegation should reflect that,” said Republican state Sen. John Stevens, who shepherded the bill for a new map that made all nine congressional districts solidly Republican.

The nationwide gerrymandering wars began after President Trump pressured Texas to redraw its map to favor Republicans. Some Democratic states, including California, countered by redrawing their congressional maps for partisan advantage. With the U.S. Supreme Court ruling reining in the Voting Rights Act and the Virginia Supreme Court’s decision to toss out voter-approved maps that favored Democrats in that state, the GOP has gained the upper hand.

A ‘central place’ in pursuit of racial justice

Wilson, the Memphis musician who is Black, was less distraught by the carving up of his neighborhood for partisan purposes. He saw the move as just another trial facing the city after a surge of federal agents sent by Trump to combat crime and amid narratives about Memphis’ safety from neighboring suburbs and Republican state lawmakers.

“It’s a hustling community. We’re going to make ends meet for our families,” Wilson said. “The legacy of Memphis is music and our civil rights history,” he said, adding the two were intertwined. “Hard times mean you’re going to try and find your gift. That’s what we do here; music in Memphis is a way of life.”

The Memphis district predates the Voting Rights Act. For at least a century, well before Congress acted to protect minority voting rights, Tennessee has believed it made sense for its metropolis on the Mississippi River to have its own U.S. House district. But since that law was passed in 1965, anyone who tried to split up the district for partisan gain could be sued and have the maps thrown out. Now, legal experts say that is not much of a risk.

Nonetheless, Democrats and civil rights groups are suing to block the map. The symbolism is especially sharp as the city is home to the National Civil Rights Museum, built around the motel where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968. When the Legislature passed the new maps, Democrats and protesters shouted, “Hands off Memphis!” and waved signs accusing Republicans of bringing back Jim Crow.

“Memphis is not just any city; it holds a central place in the national story of our quest for racial justice in this country and how, over time, we have increasingly achieved civil, voting, and economic rights for all Americans,” said Eric Holder, a former U.S. attorney general who chairs the National Democratic Redistricting Committee. “Black citizens protested, marched and died there for the right to vote.”

A city-state divide

Memphis has faced dual stories in recent years. Billions of dollars in private investment and federal dollars have flooded into the area in recent years, but many local businesses still express concerns about a lagging regional economy.

Residents who spoke with the Associated Press expressed concerns about safety and public services but bristled at stereotypes about rampant crime. The twin stories are often on display in the river city, where pothole-filled streets run from empty storefronts to ornate mansion-filled neighborhoods and leafy college campuses only blocks away.

The city has long had a contentious relationship with the rest of the state, which voted for Trump in 2024 by a roughly 2-1 margin.

The conservative Legislature in Nashville has clashed repeatedly with Memphis and accused its leaders of broad mismanagement. Legislators passed a law blocking many police overhaul efforts in Memphis that were put in place after the death of Tyre Nichols, an unarmed Black man, at the hands of city police officers in 2023. It passed another measure seizing control of Memphis’ airport board and those of other cities across the state, and gave the state attorney general, also a Republican, the power to remove Memphis’ elected district attorney.

“The state Legislature is trying to take it over,” said U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen, the white Democrat who still represents the city in Congress until the new lines kick in after the midterms. “And that’s absurd. It was all partially because it’s a majority Black city.”

Lack of representation seen

Thomas Goodman, a politics and law professor at Rhodes College in Memphis, says the new congressional districts may lead to greater friction over who receives attention — and funding — from lawmakers. Memphis residents will soon share districts with Republican towns with starkly different economies, geographies and demographics. Whoever holds those congressional seats will have an incentive to pay attention to those voters and not to Memphis’ population.

“It would not only deprive Black Tennesseans of proper representation,” Goodman said. “These changes also break up the city of Memphis as an entity into multiple districts, thereby removing a dedicated agent in government who knows the people, who understands their concerns and can speak for them and deliver on behalf of their interests and desires.”

Chris Wiley’s house sits in what was, before last week, a quiet street in Midtown Memphis dotted with duplexes, tidy lawns and sports fields. Now his neighborhood will be carved apart at the intersection of three congressional districts. That is not surprising, he said, because “Tennessee is all about the dollar” rather than residents.

“Memphis is majority Black, so if you mess with that, what’s the point of even voting in Tennessee?” said Wiley, a 29-year-old sports stadium worker who is Black. “Whatever the congressional numbers, whatever that is, we don’t count on the scale as high, anyway.”

Brown writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Nicholas Riccardi in Denver and videojournalist Sophie Bates contributed to this report.

Addressing reporters on a recent flight to Algeria, Pope Leo XIV invoked the Gospel, called himself a peacemaker and pledged to keep speaking out on behalf of the downtrodden.

“Too many people are suffering in the world today,” he said. “Too many innocent people are being killed, and I think someone has to stand up.”

Pontiffs have a tradition of weighing in on global strife, and Leo’s words were in keeping with long-standing church teaching. Appearing in front of reporters in this fashion was also not new: Pope John Paul II began taking questions from journalists on the papal plane in the 1970s.

But the first American pope was in fact wading into an unprecedented political tempest — responding to a series of broadsides from President Trump that drew Leo into debates over the war with Iran, immigration policies and more, all while Catholics in the U.S. and around the world looked on.

Missionaries from Austin, Texas, gather for prayer in St. Peter’s Square on May 11, 2025.

(Marco Di Lauro / Getty Images)

With no permanent peace deal in sight to end the war, two of Trump’s top lieutenants — Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, both Catholics and potential 2028 presidential candidates — have also been pulled into the fray. On Thursday, Rubio met Pope Leo at the Vatican in what he said was a long-planned diplomatic visit. Next month, Vance will release a memoir, “Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith,” detailing his 2019 conversion to Catholicism.

Trump’s invective has not abated, even in the week his chief diplomat met the pontiff. Ahead of Rubio’s visit, Trump repeated his claim that Leo was “just fine” with Iran developing a nuclear weapon. In response, Leo said that his critics should go after him “truthfully,” noting that the Catholic Church has spoken out against all nuclear weapons.

Against the backdrop of this sparring, Rubio sought to downplay the drama after his official visit to the Holy See, which lasted about two hours. On X, he said the meeting with Leo focused on their “shared commitment to promoting peace and human dignity.”

The episode has revealed the unique power Leo holds on the U.S. stage, with his inherent understanding of the country’s politics and an ability to deliver his message in an accent that at times reveals his Chicago roots.

“He’s speaking in English and he’s American,” said Father James Martin, a Jesuit priest and author, most recently of the memoir “Work in Progress.” “People can’t dismiss him as not understanding the United States.”

For weeks, Leo has been asked to respond to a cascade of insults from Trump, including accusations that he is “weak on crime,” that he was chosen as pope because of Trump, and that the leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics should “get his act together.”

In measured tones, Leo has repeatedly said he does not want to fight with the president. He counters that he is merely preaching the Gospel. On that flight in April, the pope told journalists: “I do not look at my role as being political, a politician. I don’t want to get into a debate with him.”

He added: “I will continue to speak out loudly, looking to promote peace, promoting dialogue and multilateral relationships.”

He may not be a politician, but Leo’s preaching, ranging from Iran to immigration and global warming, has touched a nerve with Trump. In the U.S., Catholics often serve as a powerful swing vote and hold a wide range of views on those issues. But even in a time of deep division and political malaise, enthusiasm for the pontiff, born and raised in the Chicago area, is hard to dismiss.

Leo’s ascendancy comes as engagement with the Catholic Church appears to be growing in the United States. Though comprehensive data are hard to come by, parishes are reporting renewed interest.

Mark Gray, a senior research associate at the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University, said there was evidence of an increase in baptisms, a trend that appeared to predate Leo’s election as pope last May.

Some of the new American converts lean more conservative, experts said, part of a broader rise in traditionalism. Amid tensions over whether the church should focus more on traditional issues of morality, such as abortion and marriage, or global concerns like war and migration, Leo has stressed that all are welcome and that he wants the church to function as a big tent.

Making history

U.S. presidents have long sought to court the pope, mindful of the country’s sizable Catholic population and its potential as a swing vote in elections. Woodrow Wilson was the first president to meet with the pope, in 1919, during talks after the end of World War I. Since Dwight Eisenhower made a trip to Rome in 1959, every president has traveled to meet the pope, some more than once.

That includes Trump, who traveled to see Pope Francis in 2017, accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump and his daughter Ivanka Trump. He also attended Francis’ funeral in 2025.

Asked if there was any precedent for Trump’s clash with the pope, Steven Millies, a professor of public theology at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, invoked an English king who changed the course of church history: “Henry VIII invites a comparison,” he said. Henry rejected Catholicism in the 1500s and founded a new church in order to ratify a divorce rejected by the pope.

Though Trump — who is not Catholic — has not suggested any such schism, he certainly appears to have discarded most niceties. The president has not apologized for any of his comments, though he did, after widespread backlash, take down a social media post that appeared to depict him as Christ.

Trump is constitutionally blocked from seeking another term, so picking a fight with Pope Leo may not have lasting political implications for him. But it’s a different story for Vance and Rubio, both of whom may need to appeal to the country’s Catholic voters to further their ambitions.

In the 2024 election, the Catholic vote tilted more decisively to the right, with 55% supporting Trump compared with 43% for Kamala Harris, according to the Pew Research Center. Four years earlier, Catholics were evenly divided, with 50% supporting Joe Biden, a practicing Catholic, and 49% backing Trump.

Rubio noted as he headed to Rome that “obviously we had some stuff that happened” between the White House and the Vatican. Vance, who has frequently expressed his support for the pope but is also known for his often-punchy defense of the president’s positions, drew some derision in April when he was asked at a conference about Trump’s comments and suggested that Leo should “be careful when he talks about matters of theology.”

Pope Leo XIV exchanges gifts with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the pope’s private library at the Vatican on Thursday.

(Vatican Media via Associated Press)

He later modified his tone, posting on X: “Pope Leo preaches the gospel, as he should, and that will inevitably mean he offers his opinions on the moral issues of the day. The President — and the entire administration — work to apply those moral principles in a messy world. He will be in our prayers, and I hope that we’ll be in his.”

Still, the rift could cloud the upcoming release of Vance’s memoir, overshadowing a book meant to burnish a potential 2028 bid with questions about Trump’s antagonism toward the pontiff.

Two Catholics have served as president — Biden and John F. Kennedy. During an era of stronger anti-Catholic sentiment, Kennedy famously gave a speech as a candidate emphasizing the separation of church and state. Biden was more openly devout, attending Mass every weekend and quoting Catholic hymns in his speeches. Vance is the second Catholic vice president, following Biden’s two terms as President Obama’s deputy.

In a statement, White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers said Trump’s social policies were a boon for U.S. Catholics and alluded to electoral politics without mentioning the pope. “President Trump has great respect for the more than one billion Catholics around the world, especially the Catholic Americans who helped power his landslide election victory in 2024,” she said.

The Midwestern pontiff

It’s been a year since the man born Robert Prevost in 1955 stepped out onto the Vatican balcony as pope, a role that predates the United States by nearly 2,000 years. The first American pope’s compatriots quickly seized on his Midwestern upbringing (he’s a White Sox fan) and relatable family dynamics (one of his two brothers supports Trump). In a nod to his Chicago roots, an Iowa-based clothing store, Raygun, began selling a T-shirt bearing the slogan “Da Pope.”

Leo also served for years as Bishop of Chiclayo in Peru, building a global profile that helped propel him to the papacy. It hasn’t stopped Chicagoans from claiming him as one of their own — even showing up at the Vatican with Chicago-style deep-dish pizza.

Known as “Bob” before becoming Pope Leo, the new pontiff chose a name that clearly signaled his intentions as a leader, invoking memories of Leo XIII, an intellectual considered a pioneer of modern Catholic social teaching and an advocate for workers. Millies said the choice signaled that Leo wants to refocus on justice and care for others as well as the rising threats around the globe. Leo has cited artificial intelligence as one of those challenges.

With a more low-key presence than his predecessor, Pope Francis, some observers have labeled Leo as quiet. But as his tug of war with Trump shows, his messages are frequently not subtle. In fact, his reserved style may be a reflection of his Midwestern roots.

Pope Leo XIV presides over the Prayer Vigil for Peace at St. Peter’s Basilica, on April 11.

(Antonio Masiello / Getty Images)

This mild manner comes across in public statements that nonetheless make a lasting impact.

Last fall, Leo questioned Trump’s decision to rename the Department of Defense as the Department of War. “Let us hope it is just a way of speaking,” he said. More recently, he took aim at the president’s preferred method of communication, his social media site Truth Social. Asked about Trump’s vitriol on the platform, Leo said: “It’s ironic — the name of the site itself. Say no more.”

Perhaps no message has been clearer than the pope’s decision on how to spend the Fourth of July this year. For the nation’s 250th birthday, as Trump hosts a giant celebration, the pope will be an ocean away. His plans? Visiting Lampedusa, an Italian island that serves as a stop for migrants traveling to Europe.

Lucey writes for Bloomberg.

Bad Bunny’s halftime show at this year’s Super Bowl was largely embraced as a milestone for Latin music and Puerto Rican culture on America’s most prominent pop-cultural stage.

Not everyone thought so, though.

The Federal Communications Commission has released a massive trove of viewer complaints against the musician, the show’s broadcast partner NBC, and the NFL.

Many of them expressed outrage at the supposed bawdiness of Bad Bunny’s Spanish-language lyrics and dancing on a broadcast watched by children.

“That was the most disgusting inappropriate show. I had to make all of my children go into the next room!” wrote one traumatized Las Vegas viewer. “The none use [sic] of inappropriate language should stand no matter what language it’s in. This is the most disturbing thing I’ve witnessed on live TV in a long time.”

“NFL halftime show showed 2 men in act of intercourse while behind a pickup truck door,” wrote one aghast Ohioan. “The ratings for NFL [sic] made it safe for my children to watch but they witnessed this and became disturbed.”

Another viewer from Charlotte, NC who, to their credit, seemed familiar with Bad Bunny’s catalog, wrote that they “take issue with the vocal performances of ‘Safaera,’ which is a track widely known for explicit sexual references and graphic lyrical content, and ‘Yo Perreo Sola,’ which had choreography featuring overtly sexualized movements, including widespread twerking, grinding, pelvic thrusts and other sexually suggestive conduct.”

Those viewers were likely not sated by the FCC’s February review of the performance, which found that the songs’ lyrics had been appropriately altered for the broadcast.

Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) had called for the FCC to investigate the broadcast.”What Americans witnessed during the Super Bowl halftime show with Bad Bunny was despicable and never should be allowed to be shown on television again,” Fine told the New York Post.

Many of the viewer complaints mirror President Trump’s post-show social media criticism, calling the performance “one of the worst EVER!”

“Nobody understands a word this guy is saying, and the dancing is disgusting, especially for young children that are watching from throughout the U.S.A., and all over the World,” the president wrote at the time.

Just before the Super Bowl, Bad Bunny had won the Grammy for album with “Debí Tirar Más Fotos,” and joined a wave of artists speaking out against violent ICE raids in speeches at the ceremony. The superstar demurred on performing in the continental U.S. for similar fears, instead performing a lengthy Puerto Rican residency.

Walt Disney Co.’s ABC is forcefully resisting Federal Communications Commission efforts to soften the network’s programming, accusing the federal agency of an overreach that violates 1st Amendment freedoms.

Last week, the FCC took the unusual step of calling in the licenses of eight Disney-owned television stations for early review. The move — widely interpreted as an effort to chill the network’s speech — came a day after President Trump demanded that ABC fire late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel over a joke about First Lady Melania Trump.

The FCC separately has taken aim at ABC’s daytime discussion show, “The View,” which delves deeply into politics.

The FCC has questioned whether the show, which prominently features Trump critics Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar, could continue toclaim an exemption to rules that require broadcasters to provide equal time for opponents of political candidates.

In its filing this week with the FCC, Disney’s Houston television station raised the stakes in the dispute over “The View,” calling the commission’s actions “unprecedented” and “beyond the Commission’s authority.” The ABC station’s petition for a declaratory ruling said “The View,” has long qualified as a “bona fide” news interview program with freedom to conduct interviews of legally qualified political candidates.

“The Commission’s actions threaten to upend decades of settled law and practice and chill critical protected speech, both with respect to The View and more broadly,” the Houston station KTRK-TV said in the filing.

The network’s firm stance sets up a clash with the Trump administration, including the president’s hand-picked FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, who has made no secret of his disdain for Kimmel and other ABC programming. Earlier this year, Carr announced that decades-old exemptions from the so-called “equal time rule” for news programs, including “The View,” were no longer valid.

ABC’s strenuous arguments mark a departure for the Disney-owned outlet.

In December 2024, a month after Trump was elected to a second term, the network quickly settled a lawsuit over statements made by news anchor George Stephanopoulos that Trump found offensive. ABC agreed to pay Trump $15 million to end his legal fight — sparking an outcry among free speech advocates, who accused the network of caving on a case it could have won.

“Some may dislike certain—or even most—of the viewpoints expressed on The View or similar shows,” the station said in its filing. “Such dislike, however, cannot justify using regulatory processes to restrict those views. The government does not get to decide ‘what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion.’”

The station noted that, while the FCC has questioned the exemption for “The View,” which dates back to 2002, the FCC hasn’t showed interest in regulating programs on other networks, “including the many voices — conservative and liberal — on broadcast radio.”

“The danger is that the government will simply decide which perspectives to regulate and which to leave undisturbed,” ABC said.

On April 28, Carr called for a review of Disney’s broadcast licenses two years before any of them were set to expire, citing the agency’s year-old inquiry into Disney’s diversity, equity and inclusion policies and whether they violated federal anti-discrimination rules.

MINNEAPOLIS — A man who sprayed vinegar at Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar at a town hall meeting in Minneapolis pleaded guilty to assault Thursday in federal court after reaching a deal with prosecutors.

Anthony Kazmierczak, 55, is awaiting sentencing.

Kazmierczak, dressed in bright orange jail clothing, gave only a fragmentary explanation Thursday of the Jan. 27 assault, which came as the city was already on edge after the fatal shootings of two people by federal agents during a White House crackdown that brought thousands of immigration officers to Minnesota.

After being asked what he remembered of the assault, he told U.S. District Judge Joan N. Ericksen: “It’s fuzzy.”

Kazmierczak, who was in the audience during Omar’s January town hall, leaped up when the representative called for the ouster of then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. He sprayed liquid from a syringe as court documents say he shouted that Noem would not resign and that Omar was “splitting Minnesota apart.”

Security officers tackled Kazmierczak, who told them the liquid was vinegar.

“I didn’t want anybody to think she was in danger,” he said Thursday.

Omar, who was not injured, continued with the town hall after the arrest.

Authorities later determined he’d sprayed her with a mixture of water and apple cider vinegar. He was charged with assaulting a U.S. officer.

Court documents say Kazmierczak, a critic of Omar who has made online posts supportive of President Trump, told a close associate several years ago that “somebody should kill” her.

Omar, a refugee from Somalia, has long been a target of Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric. After she was elected seven years ago, Trump said she should “go back” to her home country. He has described her as “garbage” and said she should be investigated.

Trump has also accused Omar of staging the attack, telling ABC News, “She probably had herself sprayed, knowing her.”

On Thursday, Kazmierczak told Ericksen that he was being treated for Parkinson’s disease, and that he’d been diagnosed with ADHD, or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and a form of post-traumatic stress.

After his arrest, his then-attorney said that he did not have access to the medications he needed for Parkinson’s and other serious conditions.

Minnesota court records show that Kazmierczak, who was convicted of felony auto theft in 1989, has been arrested multiple times for driving under the influence and has had numerous traffic citations. There are also indications he has had significant financial problems, including two bankruptcy filings.

In social media posts, Kazmierczak had criticized former President Biden and referred to Democrats as “angry and liars.” Trump wants the U.S. to be “stronger and more prosperous,” he wrote.

Threats against members of Congress have increased in recent years, peaking in 2021 following the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of Trump supporters before dipping slightly, only to climb again, according to the most recent figures from the U.S. Capitol Police.

Sullivan writes for the Associated Press.

VATICAN CITY — The Vatican raised the “need to work tirelessly in favor of peace” in talks Thursday with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who came to Rome on a fence-mending visit after President Trump’s criticisms of Pope Leo XIV over the Iran war.

Both the Vatican and the U.S. State Department stressed that Rubio’s meetings with Leo and the Vatican’s top diplomat underscored strong bilateral ties. Those relations, though, have been strained over Trump’s repeated broadsides about Leo’s calls for peace and dialogue to end the U.S.-Israeli war.

Rubio, a practicing Catholic, has often been called on to tone down or explain Trump’s harsh rhetoric. He had an audience first with Leo, which was complicated at the last minute by Trump’s latest criticism of the Chicago-born pope. During a 2½-hour visit, Rubio then met with the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, who on the eve of his visit had strongly defended Leo and criticized Trump’s attacks.

“Attacking him like that or criticizing what he does seems a bit strange to me, to say the least,” Parolin said Wednesday.

After the meetings, the U.S. State Department said that Rubio and Parolin discussed “ongoing humanitarian efforts in the Western Hemisphere and efforts to achieve a durable peace in the Middle East. The discussion reflected the enduring partnership between the United States and the Holy See in advancing religious freedom.”

In a separate statement about the audience with Leo, U.S. State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott said that the two discussed the situation in the Middle East and the Western Hemisphere. “The meeting underscored the strong relationship between the United States and the Holy See and their shared commitment to promoting peace and human dignity,” he said.

The Vatican, for its part, said that during Rubio’s meetings with both Leo and Parolin, “the shared commitment to fostering good bilateral relations between the Holy See and the United States of America was reaffirmed.”

It said the two sides exchanged views on the current events “with particular attention to countries marked by war, political tensions, and difficult humanitarian situations, as well as on the need to work tirelessly in favor of peace.”

Rubio also has meetings Friday with Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani. Those meetings might not be much easier for Washington’s top diplomat, given both have strongly defended Leo against Trump’s attacks and have criticized the Iran war as illegal — drawing the president’s ire.

A mission to smooth ties

The tensions began when Trump lashed out at Leo on social media last month, saying the pope was soft on crime and terrorism for comments about the administration’s immigration policies and deportations as well as the Iran war. Leo then said that God doesn’t listen to the prayers of those who wage war.

Later, Trump posted a social media image appearing to liken himself to Jesus Christ, which was deleted after a backlash. He has refused to apologize to Leo and has sought to explain away the post by saying that he thought the image was a representation of him as a doctor.

Rubio said that Trump’s recent criticisms of Leo were rooted in his opposition to Iran potentially obtaining a nuclear weapon, which he said could be used against millions of Catholics and other Christians.

Leo has never said Iran should obtain nuclear weapons and that the Catholic Church “for years has spoken out against all nuclear weapons, so there is no doubt there.”

“The mission of the church is to preach the Gospel, to preach peace. If someone wants to criticize me for announcing the Gospel, let him do it with the truth,” Leo said late Tuesday, after Trump again accused him of being “OK” with Iran having a nuclear weapon.

By Thursday, tensions seemed to have eased.

Rubio gave Leo a small crystal football paperweight. He acknowledged Leo’s known allegiance to the Chicago White Sox, saying “you’re a baseball guy,” but noted that the football had the seal of the State Department on it.

“What to get someone who has everything?” Rubio joked as he gave Leo the paperweight.

Leo, for his part, gave Rubio a pen apparently made of olive wood — “olive being of course the plant of peace,” Leo said — with his coat of arms on it and a picture book of Vatican artworks.

Trump also has criticized Meloni and other NATO allies for a lack of support for the Iran war, recently announcing plans to withdraw thousands of American troops from Germany in the coming months.

Vatican seen as willing to have dialogue

Giampiero Gramaglia, former head of the ANSA news agency and its onetime Washington correspondent, said that he didn’t expect much to come out of Rubio’s visit for Italian or Vatican relations. He, and other Italian commentators, believe Rubio instead was looking to smooth over relations with the pope for his own political ambitions, as well as the upcoming midterm U.S. congressional elections and 2028 presidential race.

“I doubt Rubio has the role of conciliator for Trump,” he told Italy’s Foreign Press Association. “I have the perception that Rubio’s mission is more about himself” and his political ambitions as a prominent Catholic Republican.

The Rev. Antonio Spadaro, undersecretary in the Vatican’s culture office, said that Rubio’s mission wasn’t to “convert” the pope to Trump’s side. Rather, Washington “has come to acknowledge — implicitly but legibly — that (Leo’s) voice carries weight in the world that cannot simply be dismissed.”

“The situation created by President Trump’s remarks required a high-level, direct intervention, conducted in the proper language of diplomacy: a semantic corrective to a narrative of frontal conflict with the church,” he wrote in an essay this week.

Cuba is also on the agenda

Rubio said that topics other than the Iran war were on the agenda for the Vatican visit, including Cuba. The Holy See is particularly concerned about the Trump administration’s threats of potential military action there following its January ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Trump has said frequently that Cuba could be “next,” and even suggested that once the Iran war is over, naval assets deployed in the Middle East could return to the United States by way of Cuba.

Rubio is the son of Cuban immigrants and a longtime Cuba hawk.

“We gave Cuba $6 million of humanitarian aid, but obviously they won’t let us distribute it,” Rubio said. “We distributed it through the church. We’d like to do more.”

Winfield and Lee write for the Associated Press. Lee reported from Washington.

Democrats have a huge opportunity to make a huge difference. But whether they’ll grab it is a huge question.

In 2020, I wrote that voters were “weary, anxious and looking for salve” after President Trump’s first term. I said then that the experienced, reassuring Joe Biden fit the moment. Now I fear that if Democrats nominate a similar presidential candidate in 2028, one who wins yet doesn’t act with alacrity on democracy preservation and helping Americans live better lives, a fed-up electorate will once again turn them out as ineffectual.

Who can or should lead the party at a time like this?

I’m not alone in hoping for a tough and confrontational 2028 nominee, someone who is aggressive, persistent and, when necessary, as ruthless as the forces on the opposite side. This person also must have the energy to undertake the mammoth task of repairing the institutional wreckage of Trumpism. Which suggests Democrats should be checking out younger nominees.

Fortunately, newer generations of leaders are emerging. Those who “get it,” in my view, include Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut.

Obviously any Democrat will be better than anyone from Trump’s team or orbit, including JD Vance, Donald Trump Jr. or Marco Rubio. The issue facing Democrats is whether moderate or policy wonkish people such as former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear or Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro would be the democracy warriors this moment demands. Repairing a crucial interstate bridge with lightning speed is a great thing and, sometimes, so is outreach to Republicans and Fox News. But would they prioritize thinking big and fighting hard for the fundamental changes we need?

Where would centrist former CIA officer Abigail Spanberger, the new Virginia governor, land on this scale? Even after coming around to supporting new House maps that will net four seats for her party? Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, who began his podcast by inviting MAGA guests, championed a referendum on five new Democratic seats in his state and led his party to a redistricting triumph. Where would he land? Would he prioritize outreach to Republicans or the battle to assure a “no kings” future for America? The need for structural changes in our outdated institutions is glaringly obvious. Who will run to repair this country? Who can be trusted to follow through? Because the solutions are out there, staring us in the face:

Checks on presidential pardon power. A larger, term-limited Supreme Court bound to an enforceable ethics code. A national law requiring independent redistricting commissions or, better yet, multi-member districts with proportional representation. A voting rights law that sets minimum standards for mail voting, early voting and voter IDs. Anti-corruption laws that prevent profiteering by presidents and their allies. Explicit limits on presidential construction and alterations to federal properties. A stronger “impoundment” act with sharp teeth to make sure future presidents spend taxpayer money constitutionally, as Congress intends, instead of any way they want. D.C. and Puerto Rico statehood to start rebalancing a Congress and electoral college that have shortchanged urban America since the late 19th century.

It’s a long list, and there’s no guarantee that today’s Supreme Court would allow any of it. But realizing some of these goals will take decades; we can’t be discouraged by temporary impediments such as the current lineup of justices. The work on all of it should start ASAP — next year in the next Congress if Democrats are running one or both chambers. And at some point, we’ll have a different high court.

I can already hear the protests: What about affordability? That’s the best part: Trump has done so many things to make life more expensive that simply reversing them would have immediate impact. Stop the Iran war; reopen the Strait of Hormuz; aim to restore the Obama-era agreement that kept Iran’s nuclear ambitions in check; end the Trump tariffs; stop shrinking labor forces in agriculture, healthcare, construction and other industries by ending detentions and deportations of noncriminals; reverse last year’s tax breaks for elites and restore the money for Medicaid and health insurance premium subsidies; and kill off the Versailles-level Trump ballroom that he now wants to fund with taxpayer dollars (initially $400 million, now $1 billion).

Then Democrats could revisit some of their own affordability priorities, including the expanded child tax credit that significantly reduced child poverty, new ways to put housing within reach of more people and national paid family leave. They could also crack down on military spending that is pointless in the modern era and refocus on cheap and effective equipment such as drones like Ukraine is using to strike inside Russia.

As it happens, a stark indicator of the political tides came as I was writing this. Maine Gov. Janet Mills suddenly dropped out of the Democratic Senate primary race against Graham Platner. It was a lightning bolt, given her establishment support after being recruited by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. But in a way it was inevitable.

Mills is 78. If she had gone on to win the primary and defeat GOP Sen. Susan Collins, she would have been sworn in at age 79. Platner is 41, an oyster farmer and military veteran with a compelling, relatable persona. Though he has a controversial past, Mills’ negative ads did nothing to dent his appeal. Polls showed him winning the primary vote against Mills, sometimes by 2 to 1, and with a consistent general-election edge against Collins as well.

Platner told Jon Stewart last week that the party leadership establishment had largely ignored him. His message to them? “You should be curious, because I’m polling 40 points ahead.” By the next morning, Mills was out, and the establishment — Schumer and New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, chair of the Senate campaign committee — said they’d work with Platner to flip the seat.

The midterm races are sending Democrats clues. They should take them seriously.

Jill Lawrence is a journalist and the author of “The Art of the Political Deal: How Congress Beat the Odds and Broke Through Gridlock.” Bluesky: @jilldlawrence

The Humboldt County Office of Elections made an unnerving discovery Monday: a stack of 596 sealed ballots from the most recent election left at the bottom of a locked voting drop box.

The uncounted ballots would not have affected the outcome of the November statewide special election for Proposition 50, the county office said in a news release Wednesday. However, officials said they’re working hard to have all the votes legally counted.

The office discovered that the ballots were uncounted because of a staff error. When workers checked the drop box, there was a miscommunication about whether it had been fully emptied, the office said.

“That outcome is unacceptable and runs counter to the core of what this office stands for,” Juan Pablo Cervantes, county clerk-recorder and registrar of voters, said in a statement. “While the mistake occurred after an election worker did not follow proper procedures, the responsibility for what happened ultimately sits with me.”

After the ballots were discovered, elections staff confirmed that the sealed ballots had not been tampered with, and they worked with the California secretary of state to determine next steps. Under California law, the ballots should have been counted before the election was certified on Dec. 5 and destroyed six months later.

The Office of Elections said it had altered its protocols to ensure such a mistake does not take place again, implementing a new “lock out, tag out” procedure to ensure each drop box is empty and secured before election results are finalized.

“I promise you that we are taking this seriously,” Cervantes said. “We will strengthen our processes and continue pushing toward the standard our community expects and deserves.”

The discovery comes as California continues to be under a microscope for allegations of voter fraud.

Within minutes of polls opening for California’s special election in November, President Trump took to Truth Social to claim that the Proposition 50 vote — which redrew several congressional districts to favor Democratic candidates — was rigged.

“The Unconstitutional Redistricting Vote in California is a GIANT SCAM in that the entire process, in particular the Voting itself, is RIGGED,” Trump wrote.

When asked later that day to explain Trump’s claims on how the election was allegedly rigged, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said California has “a universal mail-in voting system, which we know is ripe for fraud.” She also accused the state of counting ballots from undocumented immigrants.

Elections officials and Democratic leaders including Gov. Gavin Newsom decried those claims as baseless. “The bottom line is California elections have been validated by the courts,” California Secretary of State Shirley Weber said in a November statement.

More recently, Republican gubernatorial candidate Chad Bianco has drawn scrutiny for using his position as Riverside County sheriff to seize some 650,000 ballots in the county to determine whether they were fraudulently counted. Critics decried the move as another attempt by Republican election deniers to disenfranchise voters.

Humboldt County, which encompasses 4,052 square miles of rural California below the Oregon border, has largely avoided election-related turmoil in recent years. In 2008, however, Humboldt election officials discovered that software they used to tally votes had failed to count 197 ballots from one precinct.

More recently, nearby Shasta County has become a hotbed of election denialism and MAGA politics, with its Board of Supervisors voting in 2023 to end the use of Dominion Voting Systems machines in favor of pursuing a hand-counting system.

Times staff writers Hailey Branson-Potts, Jenny Jarvie and Ana Ceballos contributed to this report.

PORTSMOUTH, Va. — The FBI searched the Virginia state Senate leader’s office on Wednesday as part of a corruption investigation, a person familiar with the matter said. Federal agents also were seen at the senator’s nearby cannabis business.

The search at Virginia Sen. L. Louise Lucas’s district office in Portsmouth comes after the Democrat helped lead the state’s recent redistricting effort.

The FBI said only that it was conducting a court-authorized search warrant in Portsmouth. The person who confirmed the FBI’s search was not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation by name and spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Besides the search at Lucas’ office, agents in FBI T-shirts also went into the nearby Cannabis Outlet, which she opened in 2021. Several entrances to its cannabis store parking lot were blocked by unmarked vehicles with flashing blue lights.

Lucas — a prominent backer of legalizing marijuana — has said the store sells legal hemp and CBD products. It has drawn scrutiny from local media amid allegations that some products were mislabeled.

Virginia has legalized pot possession, but retail sales of recreational marijuana remain illegal in the state.

A message seeking comment was left Wednesday on a cellphone for Lucas, who has been a state senator for 34 years.

State House Speaker Don Scott said he was deeply concerned by the FBI search.

“Right now, there is far more theatrics and speculation than actual information available to the public,” Scott, a Democrat, said in a statement, adding that more facts were needed “before anyone rushes to political conclusions.”

Gov. Abigail Spanberger declined to comment. Some other Virginia Democrats were quick to note that the search comes as the FBI and Justice Department have opened a spate of politically charged investigations into perceived adversaries of President Trump.

The context “must be acknowledged,” U.S. Rep. Bobby Scott said in a social media post.

Last week, the Justice Department charged former FBI Director James Comey with making a threatening Instagram post against Trump, an accusation that Comey — who for nearly a decade has drawn the president’s ire — has denied. A separate mortgage fraud case, ultimately dismissed by a court, targeted Democratic New York Atty. Gen. Letitia James, who had brought a major civil fraud lawsuit against Trump and his business.

The FBI and Justice Department have also provoked concerns among Democrats about ongoing election-related investigations, including the seizure by agents of ballots and other information from Fulton County, Ga.

Lucas has been a vocal leader of Virginia’s redistricting effort, which voters approved last month. A sign urging people to “vote yes” to “stop the MAGA power grab” still hung Wednesday on a fence separating her office’s parking lot from the parking for the cannabis shop.

Amid a national, state-by-state partisan redistricting fight kicked off by Trump’s desire to aid his fellow Republicans, Virginia voters OK’d a Democrat-backed constitutional amendment authorizing new U.S. House districts. The plan could help the party win up to four additional seats.

“We are not going to let anyone tilt the system without a response,” Lucas said after the vote. Trump, meanwhile, denounced the results.

The state Supreme Court let the referendum proceed but has yet to rule whether the effort is legal. The court is considering an appeal of a lower-court judge’s ruling that the amendment is invalid because lawmakers violated procedural requirements.

Voting districts typically are redrawn once a decade, after each census. But Trump last year urged Texas Republicans to redraw House districts to give the GOP an edge in the midterms. California Democrats reciprocated, and redistricting efforts soon cascaded across states.

Lucas, 82, has been a figure in Virginia politics since the 1980s, when she became the first Black woman elected to a City Council seat in her native Portsmouth. She now is the first woman and first African American to serve as the body’s president pro tempore.

Earlier in life, she was the Norfolk Naval Shipyard’s first female shipfitter, according to her biography in the state library. The job entails making, installing and repairing sometimes enormous metal assemblies for vessels.

In recent years, she has been the chief executive of a Portsmouth business that runs residences, day programs and transportation for intellectually disabled adults.

Tucker, Breed and Peltz write for the Associated Press. AP writers Dylan Lovan in Louisville, Ky.; Jake Offenhartz in New York; and Claudia Lauder in Philadelphia contributed to this report.

Karen Bass, Spencer Pratt and Nithya Raman each came into tonight’s mayoral debate with goals for what may be their only time together on stage.

As the incumbent mayor, Bass had to weather blows from her challengers while trying to sell voters on her fitness for another term, despite a disastrous 2025.

As a reality TV star with no political experience, Pratt needed to show that he could offer substance instead of just AI fanboy videos and the name-calling — “Karen Basura” — he has indulged in on social media.

Raman’s task was perhaps the hardest. As a city councilmember whose two previous campaigns were backed by the local Democratic Socialists of America chapter, she needed to convince Pratt-curious voters that she’s more conservative than Bass. Yet for others, she needed to appear liberal enough to peel away support from the mayor and come out as a progressive lioness to excite Democrats in a year where GOP candidates like Pratt have to answer for the disaster that is President Trump’s second term.

Only one of the three failed.

At times, Raman was tongue-tied trying to answer simple questions. Moderators kept telling her she was going over her time. Answering a yes/no question about whether noncitizens should be allowed to vote in city elections, the councilmember went on and on, until the moderator cut her off.

While Raman offered some policy plans, she also played a card straight out of Trump’s arsenal. She claimed that Pratt and Bass were teaming up against her — an unlikely scenario that drew laughs from the audience. She got more and more frustrated, to the point that when Bass was allowed time for a rebuttal, she dejectedly proclaimed, “I haven’t been offered that in a lot of this debate.”

Raman, who had endorsed Bass’ reelection before throwing her hat in at the last minute, came off as inexperienced, touchy and unprepared.

The line of the night was Pratt dismissing Raman as a “random councilmember” — which is how the L.A. political world responded to her entry into the race. She was so upset about Pratt’s remark that she continued to whine about it to a KNBC reporter after the debate.

What’s shocking about Raman’s flop is that she should know how important it is to project well to a television audience, given that her husband is a screenwriter. Her tone was flat, when she needed to be passionate.

No one had to remind Pratt of that. He was parrying tough questions on a big stage for the first time, facing an audience who knew him only as the Angry L.A. White Guy he has reveled in playing.

He mostly succeeded.

At his best, Pratt came off as a boisterous bro with enough charm to call himself “humble” without coming off as obnoxious. He dominated the flow of conversation without coming off as commandeering, even interrupting Raman at times to let Bass speak. At one point, he even said “Sorry” when he had taken up too much time and the moderators cut him off.

He was light on specifics, other than saying he was going to do better than the others and that he would prioritize public safety above all. Instead, he was the one person on stage who used anecdotes to sell himself, citing conversations about abused animals, downtown workers too afraid to eat outside and film producers hiring local gang members to keep their shoots safe.

As a TV personality-turned-influencer, Pratt knows that storytelling is far more effective than drowning the audience in statistics, as Bass and Raman did.

But the bad Pratt flared up at times. He earned a reprimand from KNBC anchor and debate co-moderator Colleen Williams when he called the mayor an “incredible liar.” Affecting high-pitched voices to mock Bass and Raman came off as juvenile and possibly sexist. And when it came to last summer’s federal immigration raids that terrorized Southern California, Pratt appeared flummoxed when Bass pointed out that 70% of those arrested didn’t have criminal records — a use of stats that hit.

Bass was also who she had to be — measured, forceful and raring to defend her record, without coming off as defensive. She wasn’t exactly inspirational, but she didn’t have to be. The city’s powerful labor unions have backed her, along with much of the Democratic establishment.

Raman and Pratt are right in deeming Bass the old guard of a beat-up city — but the old guard didn’t get there without knowing how to win.

WASHINGTON — Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is appearing Wednesday before a House committee investigating sex offender Jeffrey Epstein as lawmakers seek answers for Lutnick’s contact with him in the years after Epstein’s 2008 conviction for soliciting prostitution from an underage girl.

Lutnick, a member of President Trump’s Cabinet, is the latest powerful political figure to appear before the House Oversight Committee. He has previously given contradictory statements about his relationship with Epstein, but he says he has done nothing wrong and welcomes the closed-door interview with lawmakers.

Still, the transcribed interview presented a test of how much scrutiny lawmakers will apply to powerful men who kept company with Epstein even after it was known that he had solicited prostitution from an underage girl. Trump’s Republican administration has tried unsuccessfully for more than a year to move past the issue.

Lutnick is the highest-ranked official in the Trump administration, besides Trump himself, to be named in the case files on Epstein. Trump has consistently denied any knowledge of Epstein’s crimes and has said he ended their relationship years ago.

Several Democrats have called for Lutnick to resign, and a few Republicans, including Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina, have said he should at least testify before the Oversight panel.

Lutnick has downplayed his ties to Epstein, who was once his neighbor in New York City. Under questioning from Democrats during an unrelated hearing earlier this year, he described their contact as a handful of emails and a pair of meetings in 2011 and 2012.

But that admission came after he had previously claimed on a podcast last year that he had decided to “never be in the room” with Epstein following a 2005 tour of Epstein’s home that disturbed Lutnick and his wife.

In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to state sex offense charges in Florida, including soliciting prostitution from an underage girl.

“I did not have any relationship with him. I barely had anything to do with him,” Lutnick told senators in February when he was asked about Epstein during a subcommittee hearing of the Senate Appropriations Committee.

But Lutnick, who was previously the head of brokerage and investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald, actually had an hourlong engagement at Epstein’s home in 2011. His family then visited Epstein’s infamous private island in 2012 for lunch.

The federal release of case files on Epstein also showed that the two had kept in contact through email. Lutnick in 2018 emailed Epstein about a proposed expansion of a museum in their neighborhood that would have blocked the view from their homes. Epstein also gave $50,000 to a 2017 dinner honoring Lutnick, while Lutnick invited Epstein to a 2015 fundraiser for Hillary Clinton. In 2013, they both invested in the same business venture.

The White House has continued to express support for Lutnick, who was one of the biggest boosters of Trump’s sweeping tariffs strategy. He has been close to Trump for years and helped fundraise for his 2020 and 2024 campaigns.

The House Oversight Committee is also scheduled to hear testimony on May 29 from Pam Bondi, who was pushed out from her job as attorney general last month.

Epstein died in a New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.

Groves writes for the Associated Press.

Five months ago, President Trump was stinging from one of the first political defeats of his second term as Republican state senators defied him on redistricting in Indiana. Now he has proved he can still punish wayward party members after he endorsed a slate of challengers who defeated almost every one of those lawmakers he wanted to dislodge.

The results will likely bolster Trump’s confidence heading into upcoming Republican primaries where he wants to help oust more incumbents, including U.S Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana and U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky.

Indiana’s primary also ratchets up the pressure on Republican lawmakers in other states to move aggressively to redraw congressional district boundaries before the November elections. Alabama and Tennessee have already begun special sessions that could limit Black voters’ strength in Democratic-leaning districts, and some of Trump’s allies in South Carolina want to follow suit.

State Sen. Linda Rogers, one of the Indiana lawmakers who voted against redistricting and lost her seat Tuesday, said the outcome “will probably discourage others in other states.”

“If someone is going to ask you to take a tough vote, you may think twice about your conscience and what’s best for your community and instead what’s best for you and your career,” she said.

Redistricting efforts began last year, when Trump saw an opportunity to give Republicans an additional edge, but they were supercharged last week when the U.S. Supreme Court gutted a provision of the Voting Rights Act that influenced how political lines are drawn.

Trump’s success in Indiana, aided by more than $8.3 million in campaign cash in races that usually see very little spending, reaffirmed the president’s continued strength within a Republican Party that he has dominated for a decade, despite his inevitable slide toward lame-duck status and his sagging poll numbers.

“Historic night for Indiana as Republicans stood with me and President Trump to nominate some great America First conservatives,” Gov. Mike Braun, R-Ind., posted on social media. “I look forward to winning big in November and serving Hoosiers with this team in the statehouse!”

Trump backed primary challenges against seven Republican state senators who rejected his redistricting plan in December. Five of the president’s candidates won, and another race remained too close to call.

Trump was relatively restrained on social media about the voting. He shared a series of photos celebrating the victories of candidates he endorsed in Indiana and Ohio, which also held primaries Tuesday. But he otherwise passed on boasting or renewing his attacks on Massie or Cassidy.

Massie has been among the members of Congress who frustrated the president by pressing for release of the Jeffrey Epstein case files. Cassidy was among the Republican senators who voted to convict Trump on 2021 impeachment charges after the Jan. 6 riot.

James Blair, one of Trump’s top political advisers, was more direct, posting an image from the movie “Gladiator” depicting Russell Crowe’s ancient Roman character Maximus exulting after a combat victory.

Rogers, the Indiana state senator, faced almost $670,000 in television advertising against her, funded by political action committees associated with Braun and U.S. Sen. Jim Banks, R-Ind.

She said she did not regret her vote against redistricting.

“It would have been easy for me to hit that ‘yes’ button,” she said. “To hear the number of people who asked me not to, then the number of people who thanked me, would mean I wasn’t representing them.”

Louisiana’s primary, in which Trump has endorsed U.S. Rep. Julie Letlow over Cassidy, is set for May 16. Kentucky, where Trump has endorsed Massie’s challenger, retired Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein, will hold its primary May 19.

Beaumont and Barrow write for the Associated Press.