President Donald Trump is canceling rallies, some Democrats are supporting the Republican candidate for Michigan Senate, and polling finds Democrats are starting to pull ahead in crucial battleground races.
Here’s what you might have missed on the campaign trail Thursday.
Trump rallies canceled in key states
Two Trump rallies planned for this weekend in Republican states that have become surprise battlegrounds have been canceled.
The president was scheduled to appear in Kansas and Iowa, but he will now instead hold “telerallies,” which are essentially phone calls to groups of Republican activists, in nearly 20 states, Republican officials said.
“With Republicans in a strong position in Kansas and Iowa, previously planned in-person rallies in those states will no longer take place as scheduled,” the Republican National Committee said in a statement to Post White House reporter Natalie Allison.
But public polls show tight races in both states — significantly closer than the Senate race in Florida, where Trump plans to hold a rally on Friday, in Daytona Beach. In Kansas, incumbent GOP Sen. Roger Marshall is locked in a close race with Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton and is trailing in some polls. A CNN poll Thursday called the race too close to call.
The race in Iowa is also close, with Rep. Ashley Hinson (R) and state Rep. Josh Turek (D) battling for an open seat.
Several campaigns were pressing for Trump to hold rallies in their states in the final stretch, three people familiar with the president’s plans told Allison, so the president’s team opted to schedule the telerallies. (All three spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss planning publicly.)
Democratic infighting in Michigan
The fiancé of Democratic Rep. Haley Stevens made waves Wednesday when he said he would vote for Republican Mike Rogers, a former U.S. representative, instead of the party’s candidate, Abdul El-Sayed, in Michigan’s hotly contested Senate race. But Stevens, who narrowly lost the Democratic Senate primary to El-Sayed, said she’s not budging in her support of her party’s nominee.
The division in their relationship reflects a broader Democratic divide in the state.
Washington Post reporters Erin Cox and Liz Goodwin report that the defection by Stevens fiancé, Jason Turkish, follows several others by high-profile Jewish Democrats in Michigan who say they won’t vote for El-Sayed over his criticism of Israel and what some in Michigan’s Jewish community describe as an unsatisfactory response to antisemitism. El-Sayed has said he loves the Jewish people and that his criticism of Israel should not be conflated with criticizing Jews.
The schism is unwelcome for the party in the final days before the election in which El-Sayed is running in a tight race against Rogers.
Alaska keeps heating up
Alaska’s governor, Mike Dunleavy (R), has waded into the growing controversy embroiling the state’s Senate race. Post politics reporter Matthew Choi reports that Dunleavy said he is ordering an investigation into whether the Senate campaign of Democratic candidate Mary Peltola should face criminal charges or civil action over accusations that it helped recruit a spoiler candidate in the state’s highly competitive race.
Members of Peltola’s campaign have been accused of helping Democrats recruit alternative candidates for the Alaska ballot, including one, Dan J. Sullivan Jr., who shares a similar name with Dan S. Sullivan, the incumbent Republican senator who is Peltola’s main competitor.
“Alaskans have a fundamental right to vote for the candidate they actually intend to support,” Dunleavy wrote on X. “Deliberately tricking voters into casting their ballots for someone else strikes at the integrity of our elections.”
Peltola’s campaign has denied it was involved with Dan J. Sullivan Jr.’s campaign.
The principals take the stage
Both parties continued trotting out their biggest stars Thursday in the frenzy before voters head to the polls.
Trump was in South Carolina on Thursday afternoon, holding a rally in support of Darline Graham, the sister of late Sen. Lindsey Graham who was appointed this summer to fill her brother’s remaining months in office. She is now running against Democrat Annie Andrews to serve a full term.
Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance campaigned with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the crucial battleground of the state’s Senate race, where Paxton faces steep competition from Democrat James Talarico. Vance praised Paxton’s record of taking legal action against Big Tech and suing the Biden administration, and he decried Talarico as a candidate who was “handpicked” by Democratic donors in D.C.
And former vice president Kamala Harris has been campaigning throughout the day for Sen. Jon Ossoff in Georgia as he seeks reelection.
Post politics reporter Praveena Somasundaram was at Clark Atlanta University, where Harris said Ossoff “has the courage to point out what we all know to be the most callous, corrupt and incompetent presidential administration this country has ever seen.”
How the polls are stacking up
‘Tis the season for obsessing over the polls. Washington Post polling director Scott Clement has you covered with the biggest things you need to know about how polling is shaping this election season.
A few highlights:
- Prices and the economy are top of mind for voters, but Trump has lost his credibility on the economy.
- Democratic Senate candidates are popular, even as the Democratic Party remains unpopular.
- Trump’s approval ratings are dropping among Hispanic and young voters who previously supported him.
Meanwhile, new polls from CNN on Thursday found that two Democratic candidates in hot races are edging out their opponents: El-Sayed had a lead in Michigan, and Talarico had a narrow edge in Texas. The polls found no clear leader in Maine or Kansas.
Amy Acton opens up about her childhood
The Post’s chief political correspondent Karen Tumulty spoke with Democratic Ohio gubernatorial candidate Amy Acton about a dark chapter of her life that has been dredged up by a controversial campaign ad.
Republican contender Vivek Ramaswamy recently ran an ad featuring Acton’s estranged mother, who called her daughter a liar. The ad has faced widespread criticism; Acton and her brother were removed from their mother’s care as children after a grand jury indicted their stepfather on a charge of raping Acton. Thursday, the Ramaswamy campaign said it was no longer airing the ad.
“I’m very good at solving problems and anticipating things, and I think that’s a strength that came out of a hard thing,” Acton told Tumulty.
One more helping of cheesecake
Who could have predicted the Cheesecake Factory would be the subject of so much presidential back-and-forth this election season?
After former president Barack Obama made a joke about Trump’s White House renovations evoking a Cheesecake Factory owned by Saddam Hussein, and Trump took offense, Obama mocked the president for focusing on a chain restaurant instead of issues voters care about. Trump’s X account for his political operation has now delivered yet another salvo.
“We will never apologize for defending the Cheesecake Factory — a GREAT American institution!” it posted on X. The post is accompanied by an apparently AI-generated photo of Trump smashing cheesecake in Obama’s face outside the restaurant.
Other nuggets you may have missed
- How voters’ prejudice could be influencing Ramaswamy’s run for Ohio governor
- Millions are still voting by mail, even as Trump disparages it.
- Here’s what you need to know about voting in the midterms.
- Who is Hasan Piker, and how has he become such a big name this election cycle?
The post Trump swaps rallies for phone calls in the final days of the election appeared first on Washington Post.
