Trumps

By the end of the year, the U.S. will stop providing Israel with billions of dollars in annual assistance, President Donald Trump proclaimed Tuesday morning. The announcement was delivered as both Washington and Jerusalem are mulling plans for a new wave of attacks on Iran and amid increasing American voter antipathy toward the Israel in the wake of the Gaza war and America’s involvement in the war with Iran.

While Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu has openly discussed weaning his country off direct U.S. assistance in favor of more cooperation on weapons development, the Trump announcement still caught many there by surprise. It also raises a lot of questions about Congressional authorization and the impact on future sales of advanced arms from U.S. manufacturers, many of which are planned, that still have to be answered.

“As far as paying Israel, Bibi Netanyahu and I have made a deal that – we give Israel $4 billion a year – and we made a deal months ago that we’re stopping,” Trump told Fox & Friends Tuesday morning during his message to American voters going to the polls for the midterm election. “And they’re fine with it because you know they have become a very successful country. They don’t need it, and we won’t be paying anymore to Israel, so it’s just a wasted thing because we’ve already agreed that by the end of this year we won’t be paying Israel.”

“Now we’ll help Israel if they need it,” the American leader added. “You know they’ve been a great ally, and we’ve been the greatest of all allies to many many countries.”

Trump did not elaborate on what specific expenditures he was referring to, and we’ve reached out to the White House for more details. However, the president was almost certainly talking about the ongoing decade-long Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Israel.

The MoU calls for providing $3.8 billion in annual aid and it is drawing to a close. Set to run through 2028, the vast majority of that funding is for Foreign Military Financing (FMF) to purchase weaponry mostly from American manufacturers.

“In 2016, the U.S. and Israeli governments signed their third 10-year Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on military aid, covering [Fiscal Year] 2019 to [Fiscal Year] 2028,” according to a 2025 Congressional Research Service (CRS) report. “Under the terms of the MOU, the United States pledged to provide—subject to congressional appropriation—$38 billion in military aid ($33 billion in Foreign Military Financing (FMF) grants plus $5 billion in missile defense appropriations) to Israel.”

The MoU is merely a promise and not legally binding. Congress has to approve any funding requests.

A New Deal

Washington and Jerusalem began negotiating a new MoU in June, according to the Israeli Defense Ministry (MoD).

“The new framework, reflecting the strategic vision of Israel’s Prime Minister and Minister of Defense, is designed to strengthen the IDF’s qualitative military edge through expanded joint investment in research, development, and co-production, deepen the U.S.-Israel partnership demonstrated during Operation Roaring Lion, and gradually transition from aid to a completely reciprocal partnership,” MoD explained.

Netanyahu has been warning Israel for months that it would have to face reduced assistance from the U.S.

“If you think we will continue receiving what I secured twice — tens of billions of dollars in American aid for the defense budget — you’d better prepare yourselves and get used to the idea that this will not continue,” he told Israeli media last month, according to Bloomberg News. “That is because America has changed, not because Israel has changed. It will end. It is only a matter of time.”

Netanyahu added that Israel has two more years with Trump, but must prepare for a less favorable Washington after he leaves power.

In January, the Israeli leader said he wanted to reduce Israel’s reliance on American aid. He told The Economist that he was not seeking the full renewal of the MoU, which has to be renegotiated by 2028. 

“I want to taper off the military aid within the next 10 years,” Netanyahu told the publication. Asked if he meant “to taper it off to zero,” Netanyahu said “yes.”

“We want to be as independent as possible,” the Israeli leader proffered. Referring to his meeting with the the American president in Florida in late December, Netanyahu added: “In my visit to President Trump, I said we very deeply appreciate the military aid that America has given us over the years, but here too we’ve come of age, and we’ve developed incredible capacities.”

For Israel, the MoU “now matters less for the money it provides than for what it signifies: a gauge of the depth and durability of U.S. support,” the Crisis Group think tank argued in August. “To be sure, FMF has enabled Israel to build up its military power without fully bearing the cost, and phasing out this assistance would impose real burdens. Israel would have to pay for critical U.S. weapons from its own budget.”

However, with its annual GDP now exceeding $700 billion and defense spending above $40 billion, “Israel has found increasing difficulty in arguing that it requires an additional $3.3 billion each year for military purchases,” Crisis Group posited. “Netanyahu has asked the finance ministry to allocate billions of dollars in additional funding for the defense budget over the next decade, a large portion of which would be earmarked to procure U.S. fighter jets, on the assumption that Israel will no longer receive the funds necessary for these purchases from Washington.”

Since the attack by Hamas, U.S. money from the MoU has made up a smaller percentage of the Israeli MoD’s overall budget as the country has increased its own defense spending. Those funds have also been bolstered by several large tranches of U.S. supplemental aid to procure bombs and other weapons.

“For most of the last 15 years, the $3.3 billion Israel receives annually in FMF made up roughly 20% of Israel’s defense budget, which was itself 5-6% of Israel’s GDP in the same period,” the Israel Policy Forum (IPF) explained in May. “Both Israeli defense spending and the share coming from U.S. aid slowly declined amid major economic growth throughout the 2010s, and then spiked in 2023 following the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel and ensuing wars.” 

IPF stated that after the Hamas incursion, “Israel sharply increased defense spending (both within the regular budget framework and in extraordinary expenditures) to 8-9% of GDP, and the U.S. gave Israel several large supplemental security assistance packages between late 2023 and early 2026 in addition to the MOU-directed security aid.”

“The net result, taking into account both much higher Israeli spending and large amounts of American aid, is that in 2024 U.S. assistance briefly accounted for more than one third of Israel’s defense budget,” IPF noted. “In 2025 this figure dropped to close to 10%, with Israel spending an estimated NIS 168 billion ($52 billion) on defense in that year.”

Until recently, “Israel had been given a partial exemption” on the requirement that FMF funds be allocated for American products,” the Crisis Group noted. This allowed Israel to “invest a portion of the money in its own defense industry, Crisis Group explained. “This carveout, in turn, has made Israeli firms more competitive in the arms export market.”

Heavy Reliance On American Hardware

Israel, which has received more than $175 billion in U.S. aid since its creation in 1948, relies heavily on American weaponry. The Israeli Air Force (IAF) tactical aviation fleet consists of U.S.-built F-15s, F-16s, F-35s and AH-64 Apache attack helicopters, among other U.S. types. Israel also made deals for a number of other platforms including KC-46A aerial refueling tankers and CH-53K heavy-lift helicopters and it uses large amounts of American precision munitions. Meanwhile, Israeli missile defense systems like Iron Dome and Arrow 3 have been developed with significant assistance from the U.S.

A top Israeli MoD official told The Times of Israel (ToI) last month that his country wants to flip the switch to add value to the American defense industry by using its experience developing weapons as it fights seemingly constant wars. The continual threats from regional actors and terror groups allow Israel to serve as a testing ground for U.S. defense technologies, Aviram Hasson, director of the Defense Ministry’s mission to the US and Canada, explained.

“Hasson pointed to engineering breakthroughs and intellectual property emerging through development of Israel’s active-defense systems, saying every US government request for technology arising from the long-range anti-ballistic missile Arrow 3 program has been fulfilled,” the publication noted.

“It is clear on both sides of the ocean that this cooperation is a strategic need of both powers, not only of Israel,” Hasson told ToI.

U.S. Has Paid Far More Than $4B A Year For Israel’s Defense

Beyond direct financial aid, the U.S. has expended a great deal of resources defending Israel over the past several years. This has included defending against multiple Iranian missile barrages on Israel on top of participating directly in two wars. In addition, there were the constant drone and missile battles in the Red Sea with the Houthis, who began attacking shipping there in response to Israel’s war in Gaza. Part of the U.S. operation against the Houthis was also providing a layer of protection against long-range missile and drone launches at Israel by the rebel group.

During the course of all these events, the U.S. deployed a very large number of its available warships, aircraft, and air defenses, as well as thousands of personnel, to the Middle East at great expense, both in dollars and the toll on troops and equipment.

Just this year alone, 23 U.S. troops have died and nearly 900 have been injured since the launch of Epic Fury in February. Dozens of aircraft have been destroyed and U.S. bases in the region have been partially destroyed and will take billions to repair.

The U.S. has also fired off a large amount of its own munitions defending Israel from attacks by Iran and its proxies. This has contributed heavily to shortfalls in America’s own stockpiles.

All told, the U.S. has spent nearly $50 billion just on the most current conflict with Iran, far exceeding the $4 billion Israel gets per year in annual direct aid. Then there is the opportunity cost of the massive wear and tear on the force and the U.S. military’s overall capacity to fight in the near and medium term due to all these engagements.

All that being said, it can be argued that the U.S. had major interests in participating in these conflicts beyond just the defense of Israel. It is rarely just that simple. The Iran nuclear program, for instance, has impacts much farther than the Middle East and Israel. Still, the U.S. has poured unprecedented resources into Israel’s defense and these investments far eclipse the $4B being discussed today.

Surprise In Israel

Many Israeli government officials were caught completely off guard by the Trump announcement, according to Politico.

“Officials in the Finance Ministry say they were surprised by U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement that military aid to Israel would cease by the end of the year, ” the publication reported.

“No formal document was submitted from the Prime Minister’s Office regarding the end of aid,” Politico added. “The ministry was aware of the intention to end it, but was surprised by the intention to do so immediately.”

Officials in the Defense Ministry and the military were also reportedly surprised by the announcement, according to the Post.

“We did not expect this announcement, certainly not today,” a senior defense official told Israeli media.

“There is ongoing dialogue with the Americans, and we can say that we were surprised. We will study the implications of the decision, which has yet to reach professional officials,” the official is quoted as saying.

As for Netanyahu, he has yet to weigh in on Trump’s statement. However, one of his main rivals in the closely fought Israeli parliamentary election that could unseat him has commented.

“The fact that Israel’s defense establishment is learning of a shift in our strategic relationship through the media, at the same time as the Israeli public, shows just how dangerous Benjamin Netanyahu’s conduct is,” Gadi Eisenkot said in a statement. “He can no longer be trusted and must be replaced.”

In his comments to Fox & Friends, Trump conceded that the midterm election played a role in his decision.

The annual assistance to Israel is a “bad talking point” for Democrats, including Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed, the president proclaimed.

“The left uses the $4 billion payment … as a signal of unfairness. And we can’t allow that to happen,” Trump stated. “I don’t like that. … It’s almost too easy to target

There are many unknowns surrounding Trump’s statement about diminishing U.S. support for Israel.

The MoU, if that is what he is talking about, still has two years left, and almost $8 billion worth of anticipated funding, the vast majority earmarked for procurement of U.S. arms. 

As we noted at the top of this piece, the MoU itself isn’t legally binding but the aid is authorized by law and appropriated by Congress each year. Ending it early would mean Congress either not appropriating the money or changing the law.

Will Congress agree to cut the deal off by December? What about the U.S. defense industry? It is unclear at the moment how, or if, this move would affect American defense contractors selling arms to Israel. These companies depend in large measure on predictability and taking this agreement off the table two years early could be problematic.

It is not exactly clear at this point which U.S. arms makers will be hit the hardest by Trump’s announcement. There are billions of dollars in contracts for the future procurement of aircraft, munitions and other equipment to companies like Boeing for F-15Is and KC-46As, Lockheed Martin for F-35Is and AM General for Joint Light Tactical Vehicles. While Israel has bumped up its defense budget, it is not really known at this point how it will cover these costs without that lost U.S. aid.

Contact the author: howard@twz.com

At least one AeroVironment LOCUST laser counter-drone system is part of the array of anti-air defenses that have popped up around President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, in recent weeks. Versions of LOCUST have been seeing steadily increasing use within the U.S. military in recent years, including deployments now along the border with Mexico. Though there has been much progress in the development of practical laser directed-energy weapons in recent years, the technology has continued to face hurdles to more widespread adoption.

The LOCUST system at Mar-a-Lago, which is mounted on a 4×4 Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), is seen in two pictures that Getty’s Andrew Harnik took on October 31. When exactly the laser-directed energy weapon was deployed is unclear. Laser Wars was the first to spot the system in one of Harnik’s pictures and confirm its deployment.

Harnik’s main focus was a pair of Humvee-based AN/TWQ-1 Avenger short-range air defense systems on a floating platform in Lake Worth Lagoon near the edge of the estate, which were first deployed there just over two weeks ago. Additional Avengers have also been positioned around Donald J. Trump International Airport, which is situated some three miles to the west. The U.S. military has also set up elements of Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System Fly-Away Kits, including Ku-band radar, electronic support measures (ESM), jammers, and 360-degree infrared search and track systems nearby. TWZ covered the presence of the Avengers and the Fly-Away Kits in a report last Friday.

This heightened security comes amid signs that a new round of major hostilities with Iran could be on the horizon, as well as the run-up to tomorrow’s mid-term elections. The regime in Tehran has threatened Trump’s life on several occasions over the years. The President has already been the subject of several domestic assassination attempts and threats.

“At the request of the U.S. Secret Service (USSS) and under NORAD [the U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command] and USNORTHCOM [U.S. Northern Command] authorities, NORAD and USNORTHCOM recently deployed ground-based air defense [GBAD] assets and Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System capabilities in and around Mar-a-Lago, Florida,” the commands told us in a statement last week. “These assets add a complementary layer of technology to enhance protection. Due to operational security, we are unable to provide additional details. For further detail, we refer you to the USSS.”

“The U.S. Secret Service is operating in a heightened threat environment, and we continuously adapt our protective operations to incorporate cutting-edge tools, technology, and methods to safeguard our protectees,” the Secret Service also told us in a prior statement. “At the request of the U.S. Secret Service, NORAD and U.S. Northern Command are providing Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System capabilities in support of our protective operations.”

The U.S. Army began receiving the JLTV-based versions of LOCUST, along with examples mounted on the smaller 4×4 Infantry Squad Vehicle (ISV) last year through a program called the Army Multi-Purpose High Energy Laser (AMP-HEL). This followed the delivery of palletized LOCUST systems under a rapid prototyping effort called the Palletized-High Energy Laser (P-HEL) in the early 2020s. The Army is now acquiring LOCUST X3 systems under its Enduring-High Energy Laser (E-HEL) program. LOCUST has become something of a star more broadly within the directed energy space across the U.S. military. The U.S. Marine Corps and the U.S. Navy have also been exploring the use of versions of LOCUST in ground-based and shipboard contexts.

To date, all versions of LOCUST consist of a turret with the laser beam projector, as well as built-in electro-optical and infrared video cameras for target acquisition and tracking. The complete system also includes power generation and cooling components. LOCUST variants can also be cued using offboard sensors, including small-form-factor high-frequency radars and passive radio frequency signal detection systems on host vehicles or located off-platform nearby, like what the Fly-Away Kit provides.

The stated power rating for LOCUST varies from version to version, with the latest X3 being a 30-kilowatt type. Though the system is categorized as a high-energy laser, this is at the lower end of the power spectrum for weapons of this type, and it is explicitly geared toward the countering small drones mission set. Layering LOCUST in with other hard- and soft-kill counter-drone and air defense systems in a potentially high-threat area, as we are seeing now at Mar-a-Lago, makes good sense.

As mentioned, Mar-a-Lago is not the first time a LOCUST has been deployed in a real-world context. In 2022, the Army confirmed the operational deployment of two P-HEL systems to unspecified foreign locales. Earlier this year, JLTV- and ISV-based AMP-HELs have appeared along the border with Mexico. One of the systems was part of the chain of events that led to the shutdown of airspace around El Paso, Texas, in February. That incident, in turn, prompted the Pentagon to craft a new agreement with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regarding the use of laser directed energy weapons within the United States.

As TWZ has written in the past:

“In general, laser directed energy weapons offer the promise of functionally unlimited magazine depth, as long as there is sufficient power and cooling capacity. They also present a drastically lower cost-per-intercept proposition compared to traditional anti-air interceptors. This is all advantageous for engaging drones, particularly smaller and cheaper designs that can still present very significant threats. The dangers posed by uncrewed aerial systems are only set to grow as networked swarming and automated targeting capabilities, enabled by advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning, become more accessible. Defenders already face real risks of just being overwhelmed by attacks involving volumes of drones.”

…

“At the same time, a laser like LOCUST can only engage a single target at once. Lower-powered lasers need to dwell on their targets for a longer period of time in order to cause significant damage by burning a hole in them, as well. This limits the number of targets a single system can engage in a given window of time.”

“In addition, the power of any laser beam drops as it propagates through the atmosphere further and further away from its source. Weather and other environmental factors like smoke and dust can also distort the beam and reduce its power. All of this only adds to the aforementioned dwell time. Adaptive optics, and just more power overall, can help produce useful effects at greater distances, but laser weapons continue to have short ranges, typically measured in handfuls of miles, as a general rule.”

“The Army, as well as other branches of the U.S. military, have repeatedly acknowledged challenges in fielding laser directed energy weapon systems. Sensitivity to vibration, humidity, dust, and sand, as well as fragile optics and cooling demands, have all created further complications for operating and sustaining these systems in real-world environments. “

Army officials just recently touted the benefits of laser directed energy weapons like LOCUST, while also acknowledging again that there is still work to be done at the Association of the U.S. Army’s (AUSA) main annual convention last month.

“Lasers are real. We can do it. We can go out. We can shoot things,” Kirk Williams, Chief Engineer at the Army’s Directed Energy Project Office, another one of the panelists, said. “But what we got to do now is make these systems reliable enough so that the soldiers have the faith in them when they need them, and that’s really the main point that we’re trying to go after right now.”

“We’re getting to the point where the systems are reliable enough, but we still have to make them maintainable and repairable because this is an Army system,” he continued. “It’s going to be on a battlefield. Things are going to break. We can break things in very creative ways, right? So if it’s not reliable, or if it’s not maintainable, if it’s not repairable, that’s a problem.”

At least one LOCUST system is now participating in a very high-profile mission to help protect President Trump.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

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

The battle for control of elections

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

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

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

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

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

Congress as a constitutional check

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

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

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

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

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

The test after election day

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Courts cannot defend democracy alone

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

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

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

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

A verdict beyond the ballots

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

WASHINGTON — After spending a month asking voters to treat the midterms as a vote on him, President Trump closed his monthlong campaign sprint on Monday sounding like a man bracing for defeat.

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

Still, Trump said he hopes Americans are “ready to do the right thing” and insisted that Republicans could hold on to Congress if voters who buoyed his 2024 victory turn out again. He urged voters to do so, calling this election “the most important midterm, I believe, in our lifetime.” The alternative, he warned, will be a “radical agenda” in Washington as he finishes his last two years in office.

“With your vote, we will decide if these extremists will be given power or not,” Trump said, claiming that the Democratic Party has “nominated the most extreme and dangerous slate of candidates in American history.”

The message capped a dizzying campaign push in which Trump made himself the focus of the midterms as he held dozens of rallies in mostly Republican states. In those rallies, he promised $5,000 checks and brighter days ahead to Americans who vote to keep Republicans in control of Congress. But heading into Tuesday, most polls are predicting a Democratic wave amid a voter backlash to Trump’s handling of the economy and a war in Iran.

Democrats are heavily favored to retake power of the House and are leading in all the key states that would be the likeliest to decide which party will control of the Senate, according to a New York Times/Siena University poll released Sunday. But polling can be flawed, as evidenced by forecasts that underestimated Trump’s support in the 2016 and 2020 elections.

Trump’s approval rating is near historic lows this time around, the poll found. A separate NBC News poll released Sunday found nearly two-thirds of voters are seeking a change from the direction Trump is leading the country.

This year, early voting has already seen strong turnout, outpacing the last midterm election cycle, a trend that could mean bad news for Republicans. If a Democratic surge materializes, party leaders have vowed to use their potential congressional powers to investigate Trump and his family’s business dealings, with a focus on alleged corruption and economic harm to the American people.

Trump told Fox News on Sunday that if Democrats win control of both chambers he will “become Mr. Veto” and “make deals” with them, but hopes he won’t have to “worry about that.”

On the eve of the election, Trump’s message once again seemed to acknowledged that possibility, but his focus was largely focused on the numerous beautification projects his administration is leading in the nation’s capital.

President Trump holds up an image of algae in the Reflecting Pool as he delivers remarks Monday.

(Andrew Harnik / Getty Images)

His final pitch to voters was made in front of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, a landmark his administration has spent months trying, and at times failing, to repair. For the first 20 minutes, he did not mention the election at all. Instead, he flipped through photos of the damaged pool, describing in detail how crews resurfaced and re-caulked its granite, and worked to address the “tremendous algae” that covered the pool.

“Look, it is not an easy thing. The algae is brutal. It forms easily and I don’t think you’ll see too much,” Trump said as he showed a picture of the algae layered over the water. “The green, that’s not grass, that’s algae. It took over the entire pool.”

The renovation has not gone as promised. When he took on the project in April, he said contractors he knew would refinish the pool within weeks for about $1.5 million. The work wrapped up behind schedule at more than 10 times that cost, after algae blooms and a peeling blue liner forced crews to drain it again in July. Trump blamed vandals for the issues, but federal prosecutors in Washington attributed the problems to shoddy workmanship.

Trump spent time listing numerous other renovation projects around the capital, arguing that the construction work shows how his presidency is delivering for the American people.

“Our country is strong, respected and prosperous once more and our capital is cleaner and safer and more spectacular than ever,” Trump said.

His focus on renovation projects drew the attention of Democrats, who argued his message was out of touch with what American voters want from leaders now.

“This is just [what] the median voter wants to hear — an update on various capital improvement projects in the District of Columbia,” Ashley Schapitl, a former Biden Treasury official, posted on X.

It was not the first time Democrats had poked fun at the president’s for being too focused on construction projects. At a rally last week, former President Obama said Trump “should be on HGTV,” ridiculing his ballroom project and the changes he has made to the Rose Garden and the Oval Office.

“He has the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory,” Obama said. “There’s just gold everywhere.”

Trump has bristled at such criticism, insisting that renovations relax him and that he gets them done quickly.

His message on Monday struck a similarly dismissive tone as in other campaign events. Even as voters say they are struggling with the cost of living, Trump has insisted the economy is “booming” and brushed off higher gas prices as a “very small price to pay” for the war in Iran.

The contrast was on display over the weekend at a glitzy Halloween party at Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private club in Florida. As hundreds gathered in the club’s ballroom, eating Alaskan king crab and caviar, Trump showed off the crowd to reporters.

“Look at all my rich members,” Trump told reporters. “They spent all day getting ready. Look at these guys.”

WASHINGTON — Over the past decade, President Trump has steadily expanded executive power, pushing the limits of his authority and evading traditional constraints. But a Democratic takeover of Congress on Tuesday could set up one final constitutional test for the Trump era, challenging the legislative branch to reclaim its role as a check on an increasingly powerful White House.

A blue wave could give Democrats control of both chambers of Congress, handing them not only investigative and subpoena powers in the House, but also, through the Senate, the authority to confirm presidential appointments, pursue impeachments trials, and control legislation and federal spending.

That would historically be enough to bring a president to heel. Yet the Trump administration’s broad assertion of executive privilege and politicization of the Justice Department could make oversight from a Democratic Congress sluggish — if not impossible — over Trump’s final two years.

The Office of Legal Counsel has claimed that even Trump’s communications with private advisors could be shielded by privilege. Independent watchdogs across the federal government, which have traditionally supported congressional oversight, have been systematically removed. And a Justice Department that historically pursued congressional criminal referrals regardless of their political implications is poised to ignore them under current leadership.

A combative administration will pose a challenge to Democratic congressional leaders, who may face internal party calls to pursue a third impeachment of the president over any number of scandals, and will likely shape debate over the coming presidential campaign season.

“Our system of checks and balances and the requirements of super majorities makes it difficult for the legislature to hold the executive fully accountable,” said Alan Dershowitz, a professor emeritus at Harvard and a lawyer to Trump during his first Senate impeachment trial.

“This is a good thing,” he added, “leaving ultimate accountability to the voters, who are the ultimate check in a democracy.”

Norm Eisen, who served as chief ethics lawyer for President Obama and counsel for the House Judiciary Committee during Trump’s first impeachment trial, acknowledged the Trump administration is likely to aggressively resist Democratic probes.

“To be sure, those in the government may resist,” Eisen said, “but the incredible scale of corruption over the past 20 months has also implicated a wide variety of those in the private sector. They will cooperate because the consequences for not doing so are too great.”

Democratic control will also challenge the expansive vision of presidential power that Trump and his closest aides have successfully advanced since the 2024 campaign.

Project 2025 — a conservative effort pioneered by Trump allies that ultimately joined the administration — embraced a sweeping theory of unitary power, under which the president would exercise near-total control over the executive branch, including the Justice Department.

A conservative Supreme Court, featuring three Trump appointees, has endorsed key elements of that theory, affirming broad presidential authority to remove executive officials and granting presidents absolute immunity for exercising their core constitutional powers, along with presumptive immunity for other official acts.

Practical limits on the oversight powers of a Democratic Congress already has some leaders thinking of other, coercive means of using congressional power to exact accountability.

A cabinet fleeing for the campaign trail, or for the safety of the private sector, may create a series of openings that will be difficult for Trump to fill with a Democratic majority in the Senate, said Andrew Rudalevige, a professor of government at Bowdoin College and author of “The New Imperial Presidency.”

“Trump doesn’t have a huge legislative agenda, but there are some things he wants,” Rudalevige said. “Those can be held up. And relatedly, Democrats could embrace the power of the purse, since the budget is the one bill that needs to pass.”

Already, several Democratic House members are debating whether to demand the resignation of Pete Hegseth, Trump’s embattled defense secretary, as a condition of further appropriations funding for the department in its pursuit of war with Iran, the Hill first reported last month.

Democrats may find it difficult to hold the administration accountable for past actions, much of which are already being litigated in federal courts, said Peter Kastor, history department chair at Washington University in St. Louis. The larger question, he said, is how the two parties could govern together — particularly if Trump defies congressional authority, such as by impounding funds appropriated by lawmakers.

“I think it will be extremely difficult for Democrats to take any action to punish the administration for its actions until now, much as Democrats may want this,” Kastor said, suggesting the greatest wild card may lie not in Democratic strategy, but in the actions of a Republican minority.

“The big question is not whether they will desert Trump,” he added, “but rather what role they would see for themselves as a minority caught in the middle of a grand political battle.”

In an interview with the New York Post, Trump suggested he is expecting a wave, stating he will “become Mr. Veto” if Democrats sweep control.

But a president who long viewed concession as weakness may now have to pivot.

“At some point, we’ll probably make deals,” he added.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Darline’s unlikely path to Republican Senate candidate

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

South Carolina’s independents

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

An increasingly close Senate race

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

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

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

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

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

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

MARANA, Ariz. — Michael Falk was heading into the Pima County branch library to drop off his ballot when he stopped to discuss Tuesday’s midterm election.

Pima County, in south-central Arizona, is home to one of the most competitive congressional races in the country. Falk, a 66-year-old retiree and political independent, was casting his vote for the Democrat, JoAnna Mendoza, even though he hardly knows a thing about her.

But Falk knows — and loathes — a good deal about President Trump.

“From the very beginning, when he stepped on the political stage, he made it quite clear to the people who were silenced for a long time, the bigots of the United States, he gave them a voice, and he told those people, ‘It’s OK for you to think the way that you do.’

“And then that just took off like wildfire,” Falk said, sweeping his arm like a moving wall of flame, “and that’s why we have all these laws that are against brown people and illegal people.”

Gregory Corron confessed he’s not too familiar with Mendoza’s opponent, the Republican incumbent Juan Ciscomani.

But Corron, a 67-year-old computer programmer, voted for Trump three times and believes the president is moving the country in the right direction.

Gregory Corron likes the way things have gone under Trump and wants him to continue unimpeded by a Democrat-run Congress.

(Cassidy Araiza / For The Times)

“I think, for instance, exposing fraud is a big thing. Technology is taking off. I’m totally excited about that,” said Corron, who was killing time at a strip mall in Oro Valley while the tires on his Lexus were being replaced. “I think the economy is strong. The stock market is doing well. Employment is doing well.”

For that reason, Corron cast his ballot for Ciscomani, fearful of what might happen if Democrats take control of Congress. “The reforms that Trump started,” Corron said, “need to continue.”

Mendoza and Ciscomani have assaulted the voters of southern Arizona for months, overwhelming their senses and curdling the airwaves with a ceaseless barrage of acrid advertising. Together, the two rivals and their allies have spent tens of millions of dollars on the contest, which both parties have made a top priority.

And yet, to a large degree, Mendoza and Ciscomani are mere stand-ins, their candidacies serving as little more than proxies for the president and his opposition.

Laura Lentner, another Oro Valley resident, allowed as how Ciscomani has done some good things. He is not, the Democrat said, a bad man.

“But his continued support of Trump negates it all for me,” said the 73-year-old retired dental hygienist. It’s about time, Lentner suggested, Republican lawmakers stand up and “stop being afraid of [Trump] and his constituents.”

Arizona’s 6th Congressional District is anchored in eastern Tucson and its suburbs, sprawling north toward Phoenix, east to New Mexico and south all the way to the U.S.-Mexico border. The arid landscape is creased with rugged mountain ranges, cleaved by scenic canyons and filled with vast stretches of open space interrupted by midsize cities and small towns that spring like oases from the desert floor.

In recent years, the terrain has been some of the hardest-fought political turf in the nation.

Joe Biden carried the district in 2020 by less than a percentage point. Four years later, Trump flipped it by the same tiny margin.

Ciscomani, bidding for a third term, has won two nail-biters. He’s facing a fresh opponent in Mendoza, a Marine veteran and former congressional staffer.

The district has a significant Latino population — Ciscomani and Mendoza are Mexican American — and a sizable number of seniors, veterans and military personnel. Mendoza has leaned into her Navy and Marine Corps service. “Battle Tested. Ready To Lead,” her billboards declare, including one near the Ft. Huachuca Army base. (His signs tout “Veterans For Ciscomani.”)

Mendoza has attacked the incumbent as a “spineless” tool of Trump, putting the president front and center in her avalanche of advertising. Ciscomani’s incessant ads tout his bipartisanship — he hails from the establishment wing of the Republican Party — and portray Mendoza as a tool of the unhinged left.

In that way their campaigns distill the push-pull of this midterm election, which, like every one before, amounts to a referendum on the occupant of the Oval Office.

For Trump supporters, that means explaining away vexations like inflation and the war with Iran, twin anchors dragging down the president and fellow Republicans.

Higher costs, Trump voters said, are a hangover from Biden’s time in office, a needed sacrifice or an inconvenience that will pass. Echoing the president, they said the record-breaking cost of gas was a trade-off — and a good one — to keep Iran from building a nuclear weapon.

“I wish gas prices were lower,” said Susan Summers, a Republican who stopped to chat while grocery shopping in Vail. The old railroad town has become a destination for retirees like Summers, 74, a former administrator at Cal State San Bernardino, and for commuters who don’t mind the roughly 25-mile drive to Tucson.

But, Summers went on, she’s willing to accept higher gas prices “because I think it was important to stop a fanatical regime from acquiring nuclear weapons that would actually threaten us in the longer range. Once there is some kind of resolution … prices will come down somewhat and it will make life easier for a lot of people.”

Merilyn Prentice, 78, is another refugee from the state next door. She moved to Benson (population 5,500) from Southern California after a career in nursing. She praised Trump for demonstrating a resolve that other presidents lacked.

“They’re terrorist supporters, and we have terrorist cells in this country,” Prentice said of Iran. “No one wants to talk about that. None of the other presidents wanted to touch it.”

An early voting center and ballot drop-off location at the public library in Marana, Ariz.

(Cassidy Araiza / For The Times)

If backers of the president often seemed defensive — justifying, rationalizing, urging patience — Trump critics were seething.

In Sierra Vista, Ann Nichols, 72 and a Democratic-leaning independent, could scarcely get the words out fast enough as she cataloged her outrage.

“Let’s not forget how the tariffs have wrecked the economy,” she said, “how the war that [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu tricked Trump into declaring on Iran has wrecked the economy, driven up gas prices, and the rampant corruption in the government, and how the Environmental Protection Agency might as well be known as the Environmental Pollution Agency, and the attempt to wreck the Education Department, and we’ve got a twit who knows nothing about medicine in charge of medicine.”

Nichols paused to adjust her N95 mask. She spent decades as a medical librarian at the Ft. Huachuca Army base.

Her vote for Mendoza, Nichols said, was a vote to leash Trump and start undoing some of the damage he’s inflicted over the last two years.

For all that passion, however, it would be wrong to assume a blue wave — should one come Tuesday — means there’s great regard or overflowing affection for Democrats.

Clayton Surratt, 63, a retired actor and screenwriter, was passing out boxes of groceries — veggies, protein, a loaf of bread — at the food bank in Vail when he paused to share his unhappiness with both Trump and the Democratic Party.

“I think our current government thrives and lives on cruelty,” he said as a steady stream of cars pulled up for delivery. “It upsets me to see our world, our leaders, acting in ways that we would punish an 8-year-old at school if they behave that way.”

At the same time, Surratt said, he’s not sure what Democrats stand for, beyond opposition to Trump.

Adam Thompson, a Democratic-leaning independent, was blunter still. “I don’t like either party,” he said. The 39-year-old lives in Tanque Verde and travels throughout south-central Arizona, delivering soda and snack foods to major retailers. He’s particularly upset these days with Trump.

Why, Thompson asked, are so much time and resources being devoted to matters overseas?

“We need to take care of the people here,” Thompson said. “The war in Iran, the war in the Middle East is not helping me put food on my table. I work my ass off. But at the end of the day, I have to pay that price because … we’re so busy fighting wars for other people.”

The big question is how many discouraged Trump voters sit the election out. Their level of apathy and absenteeism will spell the difference between a good and a great night for Democrats.

Alex Lagerberg, a 35-year-old tattoo artist and libertarian, is a three-time Trump voter. He was initially attracted by his seeming authenticity and background as a New York real estate developer. “He was a good option because he was not a politician,” Lagerberg said outside a mercado in Casa Grande. But, he continued, it turns out that Trump’s supposed entrepreneurial prowess wasn’t all Lagerberg thought it was, or that Trump purported it to be.

“Treating the country like a business was a good thing for a little bit, but it really hasn’t helped,” Lagerberg said. “We haven’t seen much change.”

He’s not particularly motivated to vote, Lagerberg said, or decide between Ciscomani and Mendoza, especially with the two heaving so much mud at each other.

Alex Lagerberg is disappointed in Trump and not very motivated to vote on Tuesday.

(Cassidy Araiza / For The Times)

Rick, who declined to give his last name because he doesn’t want to be hassled for his opinion, has made up his mind. He’s done voting — forever.

The 67-year-old retired government worker, a right-leaning libertarian, soured on politics and politicians long ago. “Democrat, Republican,” he said, “it’s all the same thing.”

He voted for Trump in 2024, giving the political system one last shot. And now? Trump promised “no new wars. What do we have?” Rick asked. “New wars. Taxes are still too high. And Medicare? Medicare sucks.” So no, he said, he’s not bothering with the election.

As he left Vail’s thrift shop, steamed about Trump, Mendoza, Ciscomani and the whole lot, Rick clutched his purchase, a compilation of Ray Price’s greatest hits. One song by the country singer seemed to sum up Rick’s attitude: “You Done Me Wrong.”

He’s not alone.

A new court filing has cast further doubt on the accuracy of a list of “likely non-citizen” voters that the administration of United States President Donald Trump sent to the state of California ahead of the midterm elections.

On Saturday, the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA), an advocacy group, submitted an analysis to the court conducted by two data scientists from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

It found that more than four in every 10 names on the list were not on California’s voter rolls.

It also found that thousands of potentially eligible US citizens were incorrectly identified as ineligible to vote.

The Trump administration’s list, delivered to California in early October, had suggested that as many as 20,930 “likely non-citizens” were registered on the state’s voter rolls.

That list has formed the basis of a lawsuit, filed on October 15, that calls on California to sequester any ballots sent to those “likely non-citizens”, preventing them from being tallied as part of voting results.

The lawsuit is unfolding in the final days before Tuesday’s pivotal midterm elections, which will decide which party controls the US Congress, as well as key state and local offices.

Trump has expressed fear that, if his Republican Party loses its majorities in the two chambers of Congress, he could be impeached.

The Republican leader also has a track record of spreading false information about elections, including that his defeat in the 2020 presidential race was the result of a “rigged” vote.

He has often targeted California in his criticism. The state – the most populous in the country – is considered a longtime left-wing stronghold. It will elect 52 seats to the 435-member House of Representatives in Tuesday’s elections.

Already, Trump has accused California of “cheating” in its June 2 primary elections, after several Republican candidates underperformed, including Los Angeles mayoral hopeful Spencer Pratt.

Under the US Constitution’s Elections Clause, election administration falls solely to the states, though Congress may pass regulations governing voting.

Critics, including California’s Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom, have cited that fact in their rebuttal to Trump’s lawsuit.

All 50 states already prohibit non-citizen voting in federal elections and undertake measures to prevent voter fraud, which is considered exceedingly rare.

Other states that have received similar lists of “likely non-citizen” voters have also found significant errors in the Trump administration’s accounting. Nevada, for example, found that none of the names included on that list were non-citizen voters.

Such errors have raised concerns that eligible citizens would see their votes denied if the Trump administration wins its California lawsuit.

Still, the Trump administration has threatened state officials with prosecution over the potential for non-citizen voting.

It has also vigorously pursued its lawsuit through federal court. On Friday, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco rejected the complaint a second time, determining it unconstitutional.

“We decline the United States’s invitation to contravene the Elections Clause by undermining the Constitution’s plain text,” the court majority wrote in its ruling.

In Saturday’s court filing, the data scientists from UCLA’s Voting Rights Project found that 8,880 names on the list were not listed anywhere in California’s current voter files, a proportion of 42 percent.

Many other names on the list were either confirmed as US citizens or may correspond to US citizens.

“This review proves, at least as a preponderance of the evidence, that demands of election officials under criminal and civil threats, endangers the voting rights of plaintiff CHIRLA’s members and clients,” the filing said.

It was co-signed by the Democratic candidate to succeed Newsom as governor, Xavier Becerra.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

U.S. Army Humvee-based AN/TWQ-1Avenger short-range air defense systems (SHORADS) have been set up near President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, as well as at Donald J. Trump International Airport, about three miles to the west. The Avengers were deployed about two weeks ago amid heightened concerns about the president’s safety.

Iran threatened Trump’s life long before he ordered the joint attack with Israel on the Islamic Republic in February. Airstrikes wiped out much of Iran’s senior leadership structure at the onset of Operation Epic Fury. Now the American leader is mulling over plans to renew attacks on Iran as early as next week. In addition, Trump has been the target of assassination attempts and threats not connected to Iran. There may also be elevated security concerns surrounding the midterm elections.

Officials would not provide any specific reasons for the presence of the SAM systems when we asked.

“At the request of the U.S. Secret Service (USSS) and under NORAD [North American Aerospace Defense Command] and USNORTHCOM [U.S. Northern Command] authorities, NORAD and USNORTHCOM recently deployed ground-based air defense [GBAD] assets and Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System capabilities in and around Mar-a-Lago, Florida,” the commands told us in a statement. “These assets add a complementary layer of technology to enhance protection. Due to operational security, we are unable to provide additional details. For further detail, we refer you to the USSS.”

“The U.S. Secret Service is operating in a heightened threat environment, and we continuously adapt our protective operations to incorporate cutting-edge tools, technology, and methods to safeguard our protectees,” the Secret Service told us. “At the request of the U.S. Secret Service, NORAD and U.S. Northern Command are providing Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System capabilities in support of our protective operations.”

NORAD/NORTHCOM declined to say what kinds of ground-based air defense assets are involved or where they are set up. However, Getty Images photographs show two Avenger systems set up on a floating platform in Lake Worth Lagoon on the Mar-a-Lago shoreline and one on the beach.

There are also at least two Avengers at nearby Trump International Airport.

The command did confirm to us that it sent its Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System Fly-Away Kits to support these operations. These are rapidly deployable systems to react to drone threats or ongoing incursions consisting of passive and active sensor systems, such as electro-optical and infrared cameras, Ku-band radar, and electronic support measures, to help spot, classify and track drones. Electronic warfare systems can also be deployed as part of these fly-away kits.

The Avenger is a turreted system with two launchers, each capable of holding four Stinger heat-seeking surface-to-air missiles. The Stinger missiles they fire have been upgraded to deal with drones. Avengers are meant for point defense of forces on-the-go but have also played a major homeland defense role since 9/11. One is even hard-mounted on a rooftop near the White House for air defense purposes.

The deployment of these systems illustrates just how seriously the U.S. Secret Service is taking the threat of drones. Drone technology, including first-person view types and those equipped with fiber optics, is rapidly proliferating around the world and Iran has been both a user and distributor of these weapons. The Islamic Republic has uses long-range kamikaze drones, which could be a particular threat, especially considering Trump’s estate’s close proximity to the sea, which offers a most likely launch option. It’s also worth noting that traditional aircraft are also a threat and the Stingers are capable of dealing with them too.

These assets are meant to augment the NORAD-enforced temporary flight restrictions (TFRs) over the Mar-a-Lago airspace. There is a standing TFR that runs through Oct. 20, 2027. Additional ones are created when Trump visits the area.

“More than 160 planes and drones have breached the airspace over Palm Beach since the restrictions took effect in October 2025, according to an Aug. 11 FAA filing in federal court” that was first reported that month by the Palm Beach Daily News.

The most recent publicly announced incursion took place Oct. 24.

“A NORAD F-16 fighter aircraft intercepted a general aviation aircraft over Palm Beach, Florida, at approximately 12:20 p.m. EST today after the aircraft entered a NORAD-enforced FAA Temporary Flight Restriction (TFR) area over Mar-a-Lago,” the command stated in a media release at the time. “After the fighter jet executed a standard headbutt maneuver to gain the pilot’s attention, the civilian aircraft established communication and safely exited the restricted airspace in full compliance with flight instructions.”

These combat air patrols (CAPs) are standard for presidential visits. Even when Trump is at Mar-a-Lago for days, there are usually CAPs flying overhead, which are extremely resource-intensive, as we explained in a previous story about one that took place during Trump’s first term.

The deployments of Avengers to Florida mark at least the second time since August that these systems have been used to protect Trump. Avengers were seen on Aug. 9, when Trump was attending the final round of the LIV Golf Bedminster tournament at his New Jersey golf course.

In that situation, NORAD told us that when deployed to assist the Secret Service in protecting POTUS, the Avenger systems are operated by the 263rd Army Air and Missile Defense Command. The command today declined to say if that is the case with the current deployments.

On Aug. 1, the White House shared a video of Trump talking with soldiers at Bedminster. In the background was an Avenger.

Trump, as we noted earlier in this story, has already been the subject of several assassination attempts and threats.

The most notable came on July 13, 2024, at a campaign event in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a man fired a shot at Trump, then the Republican presidential nominee. Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, was killed, and a bloodied Trump was whisked away.

Prior to those attempts, Iran made a golf-related threat against Trump.

An image highly suggestive of a drone targeting the then-former President Trump on a golf course in a “vengeance” strike in retaliation for the death of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani was posted on Twitter by an account for Iran’s then-Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The U.S. military killed Soleimani in a drone strike in Iraq in January 2020, which had already prompted public threats from Iranian officials, including against Trump specifically.

Twitter suspended the @khamenei_site account around 15 hours after the post when the image first appeared on Jan. 21, 2020.

Khamenei himself was killed Feb. 28 during the opening night of Operation Epic Fury.

There has been extreme concern for Trump’s safety following the launch of that operation, with an Iranian revenge hit on the president being more plausible now than ever. This has triggered major changes in safety protocols, some of which have made headline news.

Alarms were raised earlier this month after U.S. intelligence found Iran has “‘substantially increased’ its efforts to target American diplomats and officials in the Middle East and beyond, with lethal plots reaching ‘advanced stages,’” Axios reported, citing an Oct. 23 memo to Secretary of State Marco Rubio the outlet obtained.

The Avengers are the most visible indication of increased efforts to protect Trump amongst threats that are unlikely to recede anytime soon.

Contact the author: howard@twz.com

The war over California’s elections intensified late this week after three Los Angeles County officials were slapped with criminal grand jury subpoenas related to their handling of thousands of state ballots, which the Justice Department has demanded be set aside amid claims they could be cast by noncitizens.

Labor unions and voting rights groups hit back, sending a fresh wave of action into the tempest of federal lawsuits already swirling around the ballot clawback order. The storm surged back through the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday morning and appeared on a path to the U.S. Supreme Court, which would decide whether to hear the case.

Voting by noncitizens is exceedingly rare, law enforcement experts and elections officials say. Yet the Trump administration has doggedly pursued claims to the contrary. Under the subpoenas, L.A. County officials are being ordered to hand over troves of internal documents — emails, text messages and other material — related to their handling of the administration’s demand to sequester 20,000 contested ballots.

The subpoenas also order them to produce any evidence they may have collected “which tends to indicate an alien has voted.”

Prosecutors charge that widespread noncitizen voting disenfranchises Americans by diluting their lawful votes.

Meanwhile, Los Angeles County Registrar of Voters Dean Logan and hundreds of workers who report to him are heading into Tuesday’s election under the cloud of criminal investigation, with department bureaucrats ordered to appear in federal court in Santa Ana on Wednesday morning.

“Threats and intimidation have no place in elections,” Logan said.

Who has been subpoenaed and what do the orders seek?

So far, at least three workers from the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder’s Office have been summoned as part of the probe, though the Associated Press reported that prosecutors in all four of California’s federal districts were sending out similar orders.

The Justice Department already subpoenaed thousands of voter records from state and local officials related to claims that noncitizens were voting en masse in California. Now, prosecutors are seeking virtually any written communication from within local election offices about how they responded to those demands to identify and remove such voters, including lists of employees who were told of the directive.

Courts have questioned the reliability of the Justice Department‘s list of potential noncitize voters.

Additionally, the workers must hand over any communications — including self-deleting texts from apps such as Signal — related to the office’s efforts to block noncitizen voting.

The subpoena also demands any evidence the city might have collected indicating even a single noncitizen has voted in an election, as well as details about anyone who might have “aided and/or abetted” them.

“When California has actual knowledge of noncitizens in their voter rolls, if they help them vote, they are now aiding and abetting a criminal offense,” California Central District First Assistant U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli told Fox News this month.

He doubled down with a post on social media this week, saying his office “will hold accountable anyone who unlawfully participates in our elections and those who aid them.”

Is the Los Angeles County registrar of voters under criminal investigation?

Maybe.

Logan has not been subpoenaed, but the subject of a criminal investigation typically is not subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury because the Constitution’s 5th Amendment protects people from having to testify against themselves.

The Justice Department declined to comment on whether or not Logan might be prosecuted.

“While DOJ maintains that a civil remedy is still available, all agree that noncitizen voting is properly addressed through criminal law,” a spokesperson said.

Instead, the threat of prosecution hangs over virtually any worker who processes ballots the Justice Department might seek to contest.

“They will all go to jail for a long period of time!!!” President Trump posted on social media as the fight ramped up this month.

A lawsuit filed Thursday on behalf of workers by the Service Employees International Union and its partners called the subpoenas part of “a coordinated campaign to intimidate, threaten, and coerce state and local officials and employees who are engaged in the hard and important work of administering the ongoing midterm 2026 election.”

The union’s suit also alleged that thousands of California voters could be disenfranchised if courts don’t block the federal government’s efforts “to coerce them into halting the processing and counting of ballots.”

“Threatening these election workers with criminal prosecution for faithfully executing their responsibilities in accordance with federal and state law is plainly illegal and, unless enjoined, risks disenfranchising tens of thousands of lawfully registered voters,” the suit said.

Elected officials also rushed to condemn the move.

“The Trump Administration’s escalating attacks on our hardworking elections officials in California are unacceptable,” California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta wrote on social media.

Can the subpoenas be blocked?

That depends.

An expected order from the Supreme Court could neuter much of the Justice Department’s demand, as the bulk of what officials have been asked to hand over relates to the 20,000 contested ballots whose fate will be decided in Washington, D.C.

The union suit also asks the court to shield election officials from prosecution for counting ballots, which effectively could block the underlying criminal investigation.

Will my vote be counted?

State and local officials have vowed to run the election as usual. The courts have so far supported their effort, with a panel of 9th Circuit judges writing Friday that they “decline the United States’ invitation to contravene the Elections Clause by undermining the Constitution’s plain text.”

The judges — two Trump appointees and one nominated to the bench by President Biden — ruled 2-1 in favor of California.

“If the United States believes different procedures are necessary for vote-by-mail ballots, we believe it should take that suggestion to Congress, not the courts,” the panel held.

That decision, handed down just before noon Friday, all but ensures the issue will reach the Supreme Court and be decided there before polls close Tuesday.

But with hundreds of thousands of ballots already returned and hundreds of thousands more moving through the mail over the weekend, the legal fight still could cause delays. And a ruling for the Justice Department from the Supreme Court could snarl the process further.

“Major concerns remain that granting the United States’ requested relief might result in immense hardship to Defendants and harm the public interest by risking the disenfranchisement of eligible voters and putting the entire tabulation process in jeopardy,” the 9th Circuit panel wrote.

Just in time for next week’s midterms, Brooklyn-based artist Phil Buehler has unveiled another one of his series of public art installations critiquing modern politics on a stretch of chain link fence between a coffee shop and a bar in Bushwick. The 50-foot-long, 10-foot-high piece, “Wall of Crazy,” features 1,516 of President Trump’s social media posts — selected from more than 70,000 — and arranged chronologically, with color-coded statement categories aligning with the American Psychiatric Assn.‘s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition.

These include: social-emotional incongruity (“Happy Thanksgiving to all including the racist and incompetent Attorney General of New York State”); divine favor/ magical thinking (an AI photo of Trump seated beside Jesus Christ in court); catastrophizing (“This miscarriage of justice will destroy America if they don’t change their absolutely insane decision”); contradictions and reversals (a 2019 post calling Atty. Gen. Bill Barr “fair and reasonable” vs. a 2023 post calling him “dumb, weak, slow moving, lethargic, gutless and lazy”); hostility, humiliation and threats (calling Tucker Carlson a “very low IQ individual. He could barely get out of college and maybe he didn’t.”); grandiosity (“I am far healthier than Clinton, Bush, Obama, Biden, but especially, Kamala”); extraordinary and implausible claims (“The U.S.A. is locked and loaded and ready to go against the Islamic Republic of Iran at levels of military strength and power not seen since World War II”); persecution and victimhood (“Only 25 percent want the president impeached, which is pretty low considering the volume of fake news coverage, but pretty high considering the fact that I did nothing wrong”); and conspiracy thinking (“Wayne County (Detroit) Michigan is one of the most corrupt voting areas in the United States, if not the world”).

In a recent phone interview, Buehler said he made the wall over a period of months beginning in July, using his day-job background in market research and data analysis and statistics to search for patterns in large amounts of data in order to distill it down to something simple. Buehler’s first foray into making a wall of public art came in 2020 with the “Wall of Lies,” which documented more than 20,000 false or misleading claims made by Trump.

A detail shot of the “Wall of Crazy” by Brooklyn-based artist Phil Buehler, featuring 1,516 of Donald Trump’s social media posts.

(Photo from Phil Buehler)

At that time, he said, he was struck by the massive volume of falsehoods. “I wanted to dramatize that in a way that brought the sheer scale of it to life,” he said, noting that the same objective holds true for the “Wall of Crazy.” People have known that Trump tells lies since the 2020 presidential election, Buehler said, adding that it’s a story that is continuously told and has simply become part of the daily news cycle that people move on from.

“Making something into a public artwork brings it back into that cycle because I think it comes into people’s heads in a different way,” Buehler said. Plus, because it’s sandwiched between a coffee shop and a bar, it gets both the thinking morning crowd and the more raucous and celebratory evening crowd. The piece, which is being presented by the independent community radio station Radio Free Brooklyn, has been up for about two days, but will be officially unveiled during a modest neighborhood ceremony today at noon EDT.

“The scale of it is important,” Buehler said. “By attracting your eye and attention and then allowing you to walk up to it and read … Trump’s posts.”

In photos Buehler shared, people are doing just that. Some pass by quickly, others stay immersed for quite some time.

The “Wall of Crazy” is the fifth such collaboration between Buehler and Radio Free Brooklyn. After the “Wall of Lies” came the “Wall of Liars and Deniers” (2022), “featuring 381 Republican election-denying candidates”; then the “Wall of Shame” (2025), “documenting 1,575 January 6 defendants pardoned by Trump”; and “Wall of Tears” (2026), “memorializing 18,457 children documented killed in Gaza.”

The “Wall of Lies” was extensively vandalized by Proud Boy protesters, but the others have been mostly left alone, Buehler said.

“The Wall of Crazy shows how Buehler and Radio Free Brooklyn use public art to spotlight our political climate. Calling out the inflammatory, incoherent, divisive and obscene rhetoric under this administration is critical to democracy,” said Orie Givens, president of the Radio Free Brooklyn Board, in a news release. “Like earlier walls, it captures our political culture and urges action before Election Day: voters can change the country’s direction. And it shows why we must support free media — especially independent outlets — that expose this administration’s actions and impact nationwide.”

I’m Arts editor Jessica Gelt, wishing us all a peaceful and sane midterm election and a Happy Halloween. This is your arts and culture news for the week.

The week ahead: A curated calendar

FRIDAY

Singer Lila Downs.

(Berenice Bautista / AP Photo)

Lila Downs
The singer blends Mexican tradition with jazz, cumbia, folk and contemporary rhythms in a celebration of Día de Muertos, featuring Ballet Folklórico de Los Ángeles and songs from Downs’ new album “Cambias mi Mundo.”
8 p.m. Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. laphil.com

Hercules vs. Vampires
LA Opera presents a musical reimagining of Mario Bava’s 1961 cult film “Hercules in the Haunted World,” starring Reg Park and Christopher Lee, with an original score by Patrick Morganelli, conducted by Blair Salter.
8 p.m. Friday-Saturday. United Theater on Broadway, 929 S Broadway, downtown L.A. laopera.org

Kiki Smith
“Untethered Journey,” the artist’s first solo show in L.A. in 30 years, includes historical and recent works.
Opening reception, 6-8 p.m. Friday; exhibit continues through Jan. 23. Jeffrey Deitch, 925 N. Orange Drive. deitch.com

SATURDAY

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Organist Brett Valliant performs the score live with John S. Robertson’s 1920 silent horror film starring John Barrymore.
3 p.m. Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. laphil.com

Día de los Muertos
Forest Lawn celebrates the Mexican holiday at four of its locations, with marigolds, handcrafted Catrina and alebrijes (spirit guide) artworks and brightly colored community ofrendas (altars), plus folklorico dance and mariachi music performances, arts & crafts, face painting, food and refreshments. A free family-friendly event.
Noon-3 p.m. Sunday. Forest Lawn Covina Hills, 21300 Via Verde Drive, Covina, Forest Lawn Cypress, 4471 Lincoln Ave., and Forest Lawn Glendale, 1712 S. Glendale Ave.; 5-8 p.m. Monday. Forest Lawn Cathedral City, 69855 E. Ramon Road. forestlawn.com

Harriet Sansom Harris in “Werewolf by Night.”

(Marvel Studios)

Werewolf by Night & Headless
Michael Giacchino hosts an evening featuring the premiere of “Headless,” a musical by the Academy Award-winning composer and collaborators Elyssa Samsel and Kate Anderson, based on “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” followed by a live-to-picture screening of his 2022 film “Werewolf by Night,” with Sarah Hicks conducting the Los Angeles Philharmonic.
8 p.m. Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. laphil.com

SUNDAY

Building Bridges: The Master Chorale in Concert With the National Chorus of Korea
Two world-class choral organizations team up for a cross-cultural program uniting more than 100 singers.
7 p.m. Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. lamasterchorale.org

Family Fest: Día de los Muertos
A free event featuring activities, festive music, dance and foods.
11 a.m.-2 p.m. The Wallis, 9390 N. Santa Monica Blvd, Beverly Hills. thewallis.org

TUESDAY

Singer Lyle Lovett.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

Lyle Lovett and His Small Large Band
The four-time Grammy-winning Texan performs his greatest hits.
8 p.m. Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts, 18000 Park Plaza Drive. ccpa.cerritos.gov

WEDNESDAY

Daniel Passer direct “The Farce Awakens: Ferdeau x 2” at Odyssey Theatre Ensemble.

(Odyssey Theatre Ensemble)

The Farce Awakens: Feydeau x 2
Cirque du Soleil clown Daniel Passer directs “Going to Pot” and “Stark Naked,” two one-acts by Georges Feydeau.
Through Jan. 17, 2027. Odyssey Theatre, 2055 South Sepulveda Blvd. odysseytheatre.com

The Laugh Track
Playwright Wendy MacLeod’s comedy goes behind the scenes of “I Love Lucy,” the groundbreaking 1950s sitcom starring Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. Directed by Brian Shnipper.
Through Nov. 22. International City Theatre, 330 E. Seaside Way, Long Beach. ictlongbeach.org

The SoCal scene

The Endeavour shuttle is on display in launch position at the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center in Exposition Park.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

ICYMI: The best of this week’s L.A. Times arts coverage.

The Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center opens next month, and the Arts team put together a great package including an architecture review of the new $450-million addition to the California Science Center; an Endeavour shuttle walk-through with an astronaut; a list of noteworthy artifacts in the museum; a list of exciting interactive experiences; and a fun fast-facts sheet.

In theater news, critic Charles McNulty gave a mixed review to the Latino Theatre Company production of playwright Luis Alfaro’s “Speaking in Tongues,” at the Los Angeles Theatre Center; and issued an indictment of Center Theatre Group’s decision to stage a non-Equity touring production of “The Music Man.” McNulty reserved words of praise for an Antaeus Theatre Company revival of George Bernard Shaw’s “Heartbreak House.”

Artist Barry McGee poses for a portrait at Jeffrey Deitch gallery.

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

San Francisco artist Barry McGee is back in L.A. after February’s wild takeover of a 99 Cents Only Store. This time he’s staging a show called “Another Round” at Jeffrey Deitch gallery on Santa Monica Boulevard.

The Times’ Features section ran a piece of commentary about the lack of a true native plant habitat at the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, calling it a “missed opportunity.”

Culture news

Branden Jacobs-Jenkins poses in the press room with the award for best revival of a play for “Appropriate” during the 77th Tony Awards.

(Evan Agostini / Invision / AP)

London’s Royal Court Theatre announced that playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ 2025 Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning “Purpose,” directed by Phylicia Rashad, will launch its new season in January, marking the hugely successful Broadway show’s first staging outside of the U.S. (“Purpose” opens at Geffen Playhouse next month.)

— Jessica Gelt

And last but not least

The desert just keeps on giving — including an upcoming “sandlocked yacht club” in Joshua Tree.

US District Judge Richard Stearns sided with 25 states and the District of Columbia which sued the administration.

A federal judge has ruled against enforcing a new rule by the administration of US President Donald Trump that would require chronically ill people on Medicaid, a public health insurance programme for low-income individuals, to prove themselves “medically frail” to qualify for work exemptions.

US District Judge Richard Stearns blocked the rule on Thursday, siding with 25 states and the District of Columbia, which had sued the Trump administration in June over the change, arguing that it unlawfully limits exemptions for people with serious medical conditions.

The law says the definition of medically frail must include people who are blind or disabled, have substance use disorders or disabling mental disorders, have certain disabilities that significantly impair daily activities, or have serious or complex medical conditions.

‘Significantly impair’ abilities

But the administration’s rule went further, requiring people in those categories to show that their conditions also “significantly impair” their ability to comply with the law’s work requirements.

The plaintiffs argued that the stricter rule would prevent eligible Americans from accessing the care they need, and that it oversteps the law’s text.

“The states have met their burden of showing irreparable harm for which monetary damages would provide inadequate compensation – they face the burden of costly and intensive alterations to their eligibility verification systems,” Stearns said in his 16-page ruling.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the agency that adopted the rule, declined to comment.

Medicaid is a public health insurance programme for low-income people, funded by state and federal governments.

Two restrictions upheld

Starting January 1, 2027, Medicaid expansion enrollees aged 19 to 64 must show that they work or do community service at least 80 hours a month, or are in school at least half the time. There are exceptions for those considered medically frail or in addiction treatment programmes, among others.

Notably, while the ruling will make it easier for some Medicaid recipients with qualifying medical conditions to obtain an exemption from the new work requirements, Stearns’s decision does not strike down the work requirements as unlawful.

Stearns serves in the District of Massachusetts and was appointed by President Bill Clinton.

His ruling upheld two other federal restrictions on how states can verify medical frailty that the states and the District of Columbia had also contested.

WASHINGTON — A federal judge agreed Monday to extend an order blocking the Trump administration’s renovation plans for a century-old public golf course in the nation’s capital.

U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes issued a preliminary injunction that temporarily bars the government from removing or damaging any additional trees on the East Potomac Golf Course. The administration must give 10 days’ notice in writing before making any “irreparable modification” to any “forms or features” of the course while the lawsuit is active.

“The Court earlier stated, ‘I am not the Lorax. I do not speak for the trees.’ The Court still does not speak for the trees. It speaks only for the rule of law,” Reyes wrote.

Reyes expressed astonishment that the government has asked her to “not to believe the sitting President” and disregard Trump’s statements about his plans for the golf course renovations.

“This started as a case about golf. That good walk spoiled. But it has become much more,” Reyes wrote. “It now forces the Court to reconcile assertions by President Donald J. Trump with the sworn testimony of multiple government employees and the argument of senior Department of Justice attorneys.”

On Oct. 18, Trump announced plans on social media to close the golf course for 15 months, starting Nov. 15, and redevelop the 106-year-old park and course despite a court challenge by the D.C. Preservation League and two golfers. A day later, Trump posted that the work would start immediately.

Reyes, who was nominated to the bench by Democratic President Biden, previously ordered the administration to suspend work on the project until at least Oct. 26.

Trump was asked about the case late Monday night as he arrived back at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland following a rally in Mississippi and indicated that work on the golf course will proceed as planned.

“It has the go-ahead. The judge feels that she would like to approve it as it goes along. And I didn’t know she was an architectural critic of golf courses,” Trump said sarcastically.

He added of the judge: “She knows nothing about that, so we’ll appeal that” while also calling his planned overhaul a “beautiful project for Washington, D.C.”

Trump later in a social media post reiterated a statement he made Oct. 18 that the course would close for 15 months. “We are closing the East Potomac Golf Course Site as scheduled on November 15th in order to renovate and rebuild for Competitive (with other such projects!), Safety, Modernization, and Aesthetic reasons,” he wrote.

The plaintiffs challenging the project, DC Preservation League and two golfers, claim the work is inflicting irreversible damage. At a hearing, the judge excoriated the government after workers cut down at least 400 trees over a holiday weekend with little notice to the plaintiffs.

The course renovation project is part of the Republican president’s aggressive campaign to leave his personal imprint on Washington’s historic landscape. Those plans include construction of a huge ballroom at the White House, a massive arch and the creation of a National Garden of American Heroes in West Potomac Park. DC Preservation League is part of a coalition of organizations, including the Cultural Landscape Foundation and one D.C. resident, who have filed lawsuit challenging those plans.

Reyes rejected the administration’s request for her to recuse herself from the case. The government questioned her impartiality and accused her of engaging in “egregious” behavior from the bench during an emergency hearing in the case.

In Monday’s ruling Reyes stressed that she had hoped the parties could have resolved their dispute without judicial intervention. She noted that she had denied plaintiffs’ previous requests.

“The Court would much prefer not to have to resolve Lorax v. Once‑ler redux. Indeed, for months, the Court declined to intervene,” she wrote.

But she said the government forced her hand by bulldozing hundreds of trees without any notice, doing “what it assured all it would not do.”

Reyes quoted from a golf-related opinion written by the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative icon, in stressing the temporary nature of her own decision.

“Here, golf and government have again clashed,” Reyes wrote. “By issuing this preliminary injunction, the Court does not end the round: it simply marks the ball until the parties can fully and fairly litigate this case.

Democracy Forward President & CEO Skye Perryman, whose organization is co-counsel representing the plaintiffs, called the ruling “a big win that will rightly protect East Potomac Park from further irreparable harm.” She added, in an email, that the move will stop activities “while the case continues, and we are eager to argue the case in court.”

Kunzelman writes for the Associated Press. AP reporters Gary Fields and Will Weissert contributed to this report.

The Democratic candidate for the US Senate has been the subject of Islamophobic attacks from Trump.

Detroit, Michigan – Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed has dismissed United States President Donald Trump’s anti-Muslim attacks against him, saying that they are an attempt to move the attention away from the president’s own record.

At a news conference in Detroit on Monday, El-Sayed said Trump is trying to distract from issues that matter to Americans – including petrol prices and the war on Iran – by accusing the Democratic candidate of being a “jihadist”.

El-Sayed called the attacks “deflections and deceptions based on no evidence”.

“They have nothing to say about solving the problems in your life. They’re not talking about you,” the Democratic candidate said of Republicans.

“They’re not talking about your gas or your groceries … They’re not talking about clean air or clean water. They’re not talking about any of the things that the government is actually supposed to solve. Why? Because Donald Trump has created those problems.”

At a rally in Michigan on Sunday, Trump unleashed repeated baseless claims against El-Sayed, accusing the Democrat of wanting to impose “Sharia law” on the country.

“He would be the only senator that will have to go through a metal detector before he’s allowed to go into the Senate,” Trump said. “I want him to have a metal detector.”

El-Sayed laughed off the suggestion that he may personally be a physical threat to Congress. “He knows I got those Wolverine claws,” he said, a reference to the sports teams of his alma mater, the University of Michigan.

The progressive Democrat and former public health official is locked in a close race with former Republican Congressman Mike Rogers, a contest that could decide the Senate majority for the next two years.

Rogers has made unfounded allegations linking El-Sayed to the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas and Hezbollah a central point of his campaign.

On Monday, El-Sayed said most Americans reject such attacks.

“There are always a few small people who want to make America small like that. You see them; they’re very loud, and they bark,” El-Sayed said.

“The vast majority of folks in this state believe in a big America. They’re open-minded. They’re big-hearted. And the story of America is those who believe in big America, overcoming the deception, the distraction, the sad attempts of the small-minded to make us small.”

He added that “Michiganders are a lot bigger than that”.

El-Sayed also addressed Trump’s statements mocking his name and misrepresenting it as “Mohamed”.

“My name and my faith are not the reason you can’t afford your gas – not the reason you can’t afford your groceries, not the reason you can’t pay your rent, your mortgage, not the reason you can’t see a doctor,” he said.

My fellow Californians, let us begin with an intelligence test.

Our great state has been voting since early October. Folks have been mailing in their ballots, dropping them off at collection sites and even showing up at in-person centers.

So raise your hand if you know — or even just assume — elections officials have been doing something with those ballots as they arrive, other than just throwing them in a pile.

Congratulations, hand-raisers. You are now officially smarter than the entire U.S. Department of Justice. Or at least more honest.

On Sunday, the lawyers for the DOJ managed to get a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit to convene a rare emergency hearing because, OMG, people are actually voting and California is processing ballots!

Who could have possibly known?

Even though it’s literally law that counties count ballots in a timely manner; even though it’s happened in every other election; even though the daily tallies of how many ballots are received are posted online by the secretary of State; even though there are live camera feeds of ballots being processed in Los Angeles — somehow the U.S. government didn’t know this normal election procedure was happening, it claimed.

It wasn’t until late Friday, when DOJ lawyers read a filing by California DOJ lawyers laying out that L.A. is, like, actually opening mail-in ballots, that the U.S. DOJ realized that ballots are being opened. About 600,000 so far in L.A.

That seemed “absurd on its face,” argued California Deputy Solicitor Gen. Samuel P. Siegel.

Armed with this previously unknowable information, Trump’s lawyers were begging the appeals court to take their flimsy, constitutionally questionable case away from the judge who had already promised to rule on their requests on Tuesday and immediately give them an injunction to further their election conspiracy claims.

Most folks are aware of the background of this drama, but here’s the quick recap.

President Trump for years has falsely but incessantly claimed that Democrats are colluding with undocumented people to help them sneak into the country in exchange for illegally voting in mass numbers for Democrats. This is not happening, but the president is obsessed with this conspiracy, so much so that he is weaponizing the Department of Justice to attack states, California in particular, in a bid to prove his delusions correct, and perhaps as a bonus, undermine democracy.

A few months ago, the DOJ came to the state of California and claimed it had a list of 190,000 people it believed were illegally registered to vote. That list has since dropped to 20,000. But with all the investigative power of the government hard at work on this, only 28 people in California have been indicted by the feds during this no-holds-barred effort, and it looks as though not all of those cases will hold up.

Undeterred, Trump lawyers tried to get a California judge to order the state (and Los Angeles) to set aside ballots that it claims to have doubts about. They asked the judge in that case for a temporary restraining order forcing L.A. County to do that, and the judge agreed to rule on that request early next week, in an already-expedited fashion.

But then the Trump lawyers learned about all that ballot processing and demanded the judge instead rule by Saturday afternoon — though the reasoning here seems iffy. When the federal judge assigned to the case didn’t rule by Saturday, an absurd ask that didn’t even allow enough time for lawyers to file briefs, the feds ran to the 9th Circuit, claiming that failing to rule on Saturday was a de facto denial of their request.

Basically, it seems the Trump lawyers were arguing two things. First, that once ballots are counted, they can’t be uncounted, and if there are illegal ballots, that hurts all voters. Sure, OK.

But again, there is no evidence this is happening in any widespread fashion, and the lists of potential vote scofflaws compiled by the government have been shown to be error-ridden. They may also involve the use of a mysterious non-government “third party” to gather the information that not even the Trump lawyers could identify Sunday.

DOJ lawyers also claimed they had just learned that once a ballot is taken out of the envelope, there was no way to reconnect that ballot to the voter who cast it — because our votes are anonymous. Therefore, the 20,000 ballots had to be grabbed before they were separated from the documents inside.

The lawyers did not explain why they needed to know how a person voted to confirm they illegally voted. The envelopes are retained by county elections officials, but apparently the Trump lawyers feel it’s critical to tie them to particular votes.

But here’s the thing — there are simply not enough illegal voters to sway a Los Angeles election, or a California one for that matter. We have a system to ferrets out problematic ballots right now, and a separate criminal system that can hold illegal voters accountable. Two weeks before an election isn’t a time to demand ballots be withheld — unless you’re trying to undermine trust.

The appellate judges did not seem impressed by the federal laywers’ arguments, questioning more than once if the 9th Circuit even had jurisdiction since states are in charge of elections, not the federal government. There was even some reading of the 10th Amendment. You know, the one the don’t-tread-on-me types love that reads: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States.”

We should expect a ruling sooner rather than later, but the real question remains, why the emergency? The DOJ is involved in another voting lawsuit in Washington, D.C., where the plaintiffs, led by the UCLA Voting Rights Project, have asked for a restraining order of their own stopping the government from creating national lists of who it thinks should vote, and using janky, secretive information gathering to do it.

It’s also true that the original case was reassigned from a Trump-appointed judge to one appointed by Bill Clinton. There has been speculation the switch may have been viewed unfavorably by the feds, though the Clinton-appointed judge, David O. Carter, was given the case because of his experience in the subject matter.

The D.C. restraining order could be decided in the next few days. I’m not saying the cases are related, or that the judge should or does matter, but the Trump DOJ’s argument in California is basically that its list of 20,000 is really solid, reliable information.

If the D.C. federal judge rules first that the government information gathering is potentially both an overreach and sloppy, it makes it that much harder for another judge, or the appellate court for that matter, to rule that the list is so critical that they must step in.

So maybe there is an emergency.

Just not the one the government is claiming.

Judge questions the Trump administration’s efforts to exert greater influence over elections process ahead of upcoming midterm vote.

A United States appeals court has expressed doubt over the Department of Justice’s lawsuit against California, which seeks to force the state to throw out mail-in ballots it has deemed likely to go to non-citizens.

Circuit Judge Mark Bennett said on Sunday that the three-judge panel would issue a decision as soon as possible, following a rare weekend oral argument.

But Bennett, an appointee of Republican President Donald Trump, voiced concern that the lawsuit would not hold up to scrutiny.

He pointed to the Elections Clause in the US Constitution, which allows states — not the federal government — to administer elections.

“It seems to me that you want us to issue an injunction that is entirely inconsistent with the law that the California legislature has adopted pursuant to the Elections Clause,” Bennett told Justice Department lawyer Matthew Donnelly. “How can we do that?”

The case is part of a larger effort under the right-wing Trump administration to crack down on alleged non-citizen voting ahead of the crucial November 3 midterm elections.

On October 15, less than three weeks before the midterm races, the Justice Department issued a complaint targeting California, a left-wing stronghold.

It asked the federal court system to set aside thousands of mail-in ballots that the government says were sent to “likely non-citizens”.

The lawsuit indicates the Trump administration sent California officials a list of 20,000 names it believes are not eligible to vote, based on citizenship.

Trump has often pushed the discredited claim that the Democratic Party is benefiting from widespread voting by non-citizens.

California has long been one of the targets for his election misinformation.

Earlier this year, Trump denounced the state’s primaries after right-wing candidates like Los Angeles mayoral hopeful Spencer Pratt felt short of his expectations.

“There’s BIG cheating by the Dumocrats in California,” he wrote on social media at the time.

He then announced that the state would be under investigation from the US attorney’s office.

Trump’s efforts have caused alarm, with critics accusing him of seeking to dampen voter turnout through intimidation and confusion.

The midterms will decide which party controls the US Congress, as well as key state and local positions.

Polls, however, predict steep odds for Republican candidates, given Trump’s souring approval ratings and dissatisfaction with issues like the cost of living and the US-Israeli war against Iran.

Voting rights advocates have warned that the Trump administration has not publicly revealed how it has compiled its list of non-citizen voters, and whistleblower reports have cast doubt on the accuracy of such lists.

In response to the October 15 lawsuit, California has countered that it has strong safeguards to prevent non-citizens from voting.

It also said that the Justice Department’s claims are based on dubious data.

“This is a sad, desperate attempt by Trump to use his politicized Justice Department to try to suppress California voters just three weeks before Election Day,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said in a statement earlier this month.

“We will continue to carry out free and fair elections in the Golden State — and call out this authoritarian as he tries every play in the dictator’s playbook.”