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The Republican Party’s expensive “Trump-a-palooza” is doling out some of its tickets for free—though the option doesn’t actually guarantee entry.

The bizarre affair, which will take place on September 9 and 10 in Dallas, does not have a single point of entry or a dedicated Texas delegation; House members have been asked to pay a minimum of $25,000 to get in the door with a guest. But that’s really the bottom of the barrel: Better packages have been priced closer to $100,000.

But wannabe ticket holders in the Lone Star State have found that there are a multitude of options to enter the Texas event, either by invitation or by a regional lottery. Tim Bates, a longtime Collin County Republican precinct chair, told The Dallas Morning News that he wasn’t going to pay $5,000 to enter the event. So when he received an email from the state Republican Party about obtaining a free ticket, he passed the information along to his fellow precinct chairs instead.

“More local people will be able to go to fill the venue,” he told the local daily.

But the ticket comes with a disclaimer: Entry is not guaranteed if the arena reaches capacity.

Most major party conventions are centered on a specific item of business, such as formally nominating a presidential candidate. But this function will offer no such line items. Instead, the event has been billed as a big Republican party, which has left the definition of who’s allowed to attend a lot looser.

It will be the first GOP midterm convention in American history. Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance are both expected to deliver speeches to the conservative assembly, though low party enthusiasm has threatened the optics of the event.

The unprecedented conference was thrown together at the eleventh hour in an attempt to boost Republican candidates ahead of a contentious midterm cycle, but dozens of Republicans have decided to forgo the gathering altogether, fearful that showing face at the event—which offers Trump yet another stage to say or do anything he desires—could blow up in their faces and damage their odds back home.

The whole ordeal could backfire on the president too. In 1978, a Democratic midterm convention that was intended to rally party support ultimately turned the party against President Jimmy Carter, offering a vehicle for then-Senator Ted Kennedy to announce his opposition to the president and his agenda.

“There was a lot of hostility to the president there,” Elaine Kamarck, who attended as a 28-year-old working for the Democratic National Committee, told The Guardian. “The Democrats have sworn ever since never to do anything this stupid again.”

Corey Lewandowski, former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s close adviser and rumored boyfriend, used his position at the department to attempt to make some money for himself.

The Wall Street Journal reports that while Noem was still part of President Trump’s Cabinet, Lewandowski took the opportunity to try and make side deals to personally benefit himself.

For example, Lewandowski approached representatives of Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, proposing that the governments could hire him on the side to help with any issues that the DHS handled concerning the two countries, such as visas. Officials from the two countries thought the idea was unusual, as they already had relationships with other Trump administration officials, and turned down Lewandowski.

Lewandowski’s proposal appears to have been a corrupt effort to sell government services for personal gain. He already was in a powerful position at DHS, overseeing the agency’s billions of dollars in federal contracts. He also had authority over tariff collection, and decision-making power over aspects of border security and immigration enforcement as a “special government employee,” which gave him some ability to engage in personal business.

Lewandowski denied any wrongdoing to the Journal, with one of his representatives denying that he “sought contracts with foreign governments.” The same spokesperson added that Lewandowski “adamantly denies ever demanding any payment or compensation from any potential, former, or current government contractor or seeking or soliciting or entering contracts with foreign governments while volunteering his time with DHS.”

Lewandowski was unpopular in DHS under Noem’s tenure, and appeared to stay on far beyond his allowance as a special government employee, with an extensive portfolio of responsibilities. His relationship with Noem was the worst-kept secret in Washington, and had its own set of possible ethical violations, which have come under scrutiny from Democrats in Congress. These latest revelations will only increase his corrupt reputation, as well as that of his paramour Noem.

This post is updated throughout the day to reflect the latest incidents. It was last updated at 7:01 a.m..

Here’s what’s happening on the roads this morning…

▼︎ new incidents

Road incidents as of 7 a.m. on September 8

• South Highway 1 at Route 129 in Watsonville and Pajaro is facing closures for roadwork. The closure will last until 5:59 a.m. tomorrow.
   
• Alternating lanes are closed on SR-129 at Highway 1 in Watsonville and Pajaro because of roadwork. The closure will last until 5:59 a.m. tomorrow.
   
• There is one-way traffic on SR-129 at Union Street in Watsonville and Pajaro because of roadwork. This closure will last until 5:59 a.m. tomorrow.
   
• Highway 9 at Pool Drive in San Lorenzo Valley has alternating lane closures because of bridge work. This will continue until April 30, 2027, at 6:59 a.m.
   
• A lane is closed on North/South Highway 9 at Watermans Gap Junction in San Lorenzo Valley for tree work. The closure is expected to end at 2:30 p.m. today.
   
• There is one-way traffic on SR-236 at Boulder Brook Drive in San Lorenzo Valley because of utility work. The closure will end at 2:01 p.m. today.
   

Disclosure: Traffic incidents are partially generated by artificial intelligence. We are constantly working to improve the accuracy and quality of our AI-generated content. However, there may still be errors or inaccuracies. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us.

The post Tuesday morning traffic: Highway 1/SR-129 closures in Watsonville for roadwork appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

President Trump has drawn the ire of Iceland after posting a map depicting the country as part of the United States.

Along with Iceland, the image also included Canada, Greenland, Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean draped in the U.S. flag. The Truth Social post, made on Labor Day, was captionless.

The post—paternalistic at best, colonial at worst—raised enough alarm in Iceland to lead the country’s foreign minister, Thorgerdur Gunnarsdottir, to summon U.S. Ambassador Billy Long. Gunnarsdottir later told RUV, Iceland’s national broadcasting service, that “it was made clear at the meeting that the post was completely inappropriate.” Other Icelandic leaders felt similarly, comparing their experience to that of Greenland, which Trump has threatened to annex since he returned to office.

“It is not good to be an enemy of the United States, but it is even worse to be its friend,” alternate city councilor Stefán Pálsson told RUV. “What is shocking about the way Greenland has been treated is not really that the United States behaves like this towards another country, but simply that we are not used to it being done to us.”

“I hope, given how this took over the debate in Greenland, that we do not end up in the same place and that we do not allow Trump to set the agenda for the debate here,” Federation of State and Municipal Employees Chair Sonja Þorbergsdóttir said. “But of course this is disrespectful and this is not how civilized nations should behave towards one another.”

The post was yet another example of Trump’s recklessness eroding the seriousness and legitimacy of U.S soft power.

The following is a lightly edited transcript of the September 8 episode of the Daily Blast podcast. Listen to it here.

Greg Sargent: This is The Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR Network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.

Donald Trump’s tailspinning continues. A striking analysis from CNN shows Trump’s approval is lower right now than many previous presidents’ numbers were just before the midterms. Meanwhile, new leaks are exposing fresh GOP panic about Trump’s unpopularity, and we’re also learning that Trump world itself seems to be bracing for a big loss. All of which raises a question: Are conventional midterm patterns reasserting themselves, even at a time when Trump has upended our politics so dramatically?

We’re really lucky to be talking about it all with veteran political handicapper Charlie Cook, who has a new piece on his Substack on why the GOP is in such a tough position this cycle. Charlie, thanks so much for coming on.

Charlie Cook: Thanks for having me on, Greg.

Sargent: Let’s start with this CNN analysis. Using an average of polls and CNN’s own polls, it finds Trump’s approval right now at 35 percent. By contrast, Biden was at 41 percent before the 2022 midterms, Obama was at 43 percent in 2014 and at 50 percent in 2010, and George W. Bush was at 41 percent in 2006 and 66 percent in 2002, which was just after 9/11. By this metric, Trump’s the lowest of this millennium, Charlie. What do you make of all that?

Cook: Well, my guess is he’s more like 37, 38, 39, 40. But still, your point’s still valid. Midterm election dynamics happen for a reason, and that is, you get two years into a presidency, and people in the president’s party are generally lethargic. They may be satisfied, but obviously sometimes they’re just not terribly motivated. The other side’s on fire, particularly in this era of hyperpartisanship. And the pure independents are really, really fickle, and tend to get buyer’s remorse. So that’s sort of the normal stuff.

You look at what Bill Clinton had done prior to ‘94, what George W. Bush had done prior to 2006, what Barack Obama had done prior to 2010—you could take all that combined and not quite get the level of sort of radioactivity that you see with many of the things that President Trump has done. And so it shouldn’t be surprising.

Sargent: Yes, it’s a whole bunch of structural factors plus Donald Trump, basically. I think that’s the size of it, right?

Cook: Yeah. I mean, you take Iran—after promising no more wars and all that—but fuel, fertilizer, no more wars, you take tariffs, and all this goes to the heart of his base, of, you know, small-town, rural, farm, all of that. Redecorating the White House in Washington, self-aggrandizement, alienating allies, depleting military stockpiles. I mean, it’s just, like, all coming together. But it’s manifesting itself in places that you wouldn’t have expected.

Sargent: So Politico reports that Republicans are really nervous about how badly Trump is dragging them down, and they’re leaking word that they’re in a bind. They can’t get distanced from Trump without risking alienating Trump and MAGA voters, who they already need to be more energized this fall, but they can’t get too close to Trump because he’s too toxic. And a lot of those MAGA voters, as you alluded to, are already very discouraged.

You had a good line in your piece: a critical mass of factors. Men and MAGA—a lot of men, men not wanting to pay big bucks for gas for their big vehicles, rural voters hurt by fertilizer costs, and so forth. It all piles on top of each other. Charlie, I think the basic point here is Republicans can’t count on their base this time, which makes it even harder to talk to the middle. Can you explain all this?

Cook: Yeah. I mean, bases, as I talked about a little while ago, bases are always hard. But to have the people that are generally the most enthusiastic for you uniquely hurt—now, that’s new territory. And previous presidents have sort of given some degree of license to their members, that if you need to put some distance between us, go ahead. And that’s just not Donald Trump’s MO.

But President Trump is basically radioactive with independent voters, with pure independents. And because so few of the congressional districts are in competitive places, and so few of the Senate races were in even states that ought to be competitive at all, that seemed likely to limit the potential damage for Republicans.

But we’re looking at extraordinary numbers, like in Alaska and Iowa and Ohio and Texas. And meanwhile, where Democrats seem to be struggling, it’s largely self-inflicted injuries, like Maine and Michigan. So it’s a fascinating situation to see. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.

Sargent: Right. And just to bear down on your point a little, I think what you were gesturing at is that Trump’s numbers are just absolutely terrible with independents. I don’t think we’ve seen a president do this badly with independents in some time. A

nd the result of that is that where Trump won by double digits in a number of different states, all of a sudden there’s a double whammy facing the Republican candidates in those states, which is: one, the base voters have been uniquely hurt by Trump’s policies, and two, he has a unique level of toxicity with independents. Is that more or less the kind of toxic brew we’re talking about here?

Cook: Yes, I think so. But I mean—and I tend to be a poll snob, and in terms of state-level polling, I sort of disregard most of the garbage that’s out there, or all the garbage that’s out there. But for state-level polling, the stuff that The New York Times is doing is fabulous. The Fox News—you can like Fox, not like Fox, but their polling is very, very good, and with a bipartisan team. As does the AARP, and they’ve released surveys in four of these key states.

So just looking at those, President Trump’s approval ratings are running six to fourteen points below his showing in 2024 in these key states. It averages about 10. That’s a heck of an underperformance that’s there.

And it means, practically—when it translates into candidates, when you look at the matchups, in every case the Democrat’s doing better among Democrats than the Republican is among Republicans. The Democrats are doing far better among independents. Democrats are doing better among women than Republicans are with men.

I mean, sort of category after category, it just kind of mounts up. And it’s creating something that really is kind of unlike anything I’ve seen in the, you know, fifty-odd years I’ve been around this business.

Sargent: Yes, he’s double digits behind his 2024 totals in a number of these really important states. That’s the undertow that Republicans are dealing with. The Washington Post had some amazing reporting on how Republicans now fear, additionally, on top of all this, that Trump’s super PAC, MAGA Inc., is not going to spend much of its $400 million on the congressional races. In fact, Trump is now running ads about his own accomplishments, and running them nationally.

On top of all this, a source leaked to the Post that Trump and his team think their fundraising ability will take a huge hit after the midterms. And that, of course, gives Trump a reason not to spend much of it now on Republicans, who he doesn’t seem to care at all about. Charlie, I mean, I think that means Trump and his team are pretty nervous about losing in the midterms and think that’s a likely outcome, right?

Cook: Well, I mean, I think it’s not a news flash that Donald Trump cares more about himself and his own feelings than he cares about his party. I mean, that just goes without saying. Now, this is where I break with most of my traditional journalistic brethren. I think money is so overrated as an influence.

The system is awash in money. Each side, in competitive races—saturation point, it’s already occurred. I mean, I live in Maine now. It’s been wall to wall for months and months and months. And all money’s not equal—candidate money goes farther, in terms of the lowest unit rate with the FCC that broadcasters can charge, and all that. So the money part—that doesn’t drive my feelings whatsoever.

But what is much more—for anyone who voted for President Trump, they’ve got to wonder, is this what I voted for? This is not what I had in mind in September and October and November of 2024. And this isn’t the cruise they signed up for. And they’re reacting the way somebody might when they’ve been the victim of bait and switch.

Sargent: Yeah, absolutely. I just think it’s pretty interesting that Trump’s own team seems to think he’s going to lose the midterms, which is why they don’t want to spend the money now. They’re worried that they’re going to take a fundraising hit if they lose, and won’t be able to raise as much later.

Cook: Well, I think—I’m originally from the South, and the old saying, trying to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. I think they’re faced with a situation, and now they’re having to rationalize it or explain it. But if he opened the spigot up today, they would be ecstatic about spending the money before sundown, you know? So I think there’s a certain amount of trying to soft-pedal the impact of this.

Sargent: So in your piece, you laid out three scenarios for the GOP. The bad one is a loss of fifteen to twenty-five House seats and a loss of two or three in the Senate, which would allow Republicans to keep one chamber, the upper chamber. The really bad one, as you described it, would cost Republicans twenty-six to thirty-five House seats and four or five seats in the Senate—that would lose them both chambers. And then there’s the horrible one, which costs them even more House seats and six to eight Senate seats.

You said in your piece that the really bad one is the most likely. Why is that?

Cook: Well, first—even the really bad one, if I read what I wrote six months ago, I would have thought I’d been on some kind of mushrooms or something. I mean, it just didn’t seem possible, didn’t seem realistic. But we’re seeing what we’re seeing. And because Republicans are so underperforming in places that should be gimme-putt states—we have to, in districts, kind of sit back and recalibrate, that the normal rules, even for midterm elections, don’t seem to be applying here. It’s just that much more. And I sure as hell never expected to see this situation happen.

Sargent: Well, in two out of three of your scenarios, you have Democrats winning the Senate. Can I ask what makes you conclude that, maybe in a little more detail? And also, how seriously do you take Kansas, where a Democrat is making it unexpectedly competitive, and Nebraska, where an independent is making it a real race?

I tend not to think that those types of things come through. But I will say, if there’s an environment in which you’re going to get surprises, it’s this one. So what’s your overall take on all that?

Cook: No, actually, we’re in the same place. To me—close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. And you’re going to see Democrats do better than they have in generations, but in some of these cases it’s going to still be short of a majority, or short of what they need to win. But they’ll be beating the point spread, no question about it.

But I mean—and I was as skeptical, more skeptical than almost anybody else, about Mary Peltola in Alaska. Because, to me, come on, you know, yeah, you won a special election and one House general election, but you had Sarah Palin and Nick Begich—Mark Begich—one of the Begiches on the ballot about the same time. That was underwhelming. And you look at—you kind of go case after case after case, and you look at Paxton, where, how can a Republican lose?

And actually, there’s one other point here, and that is: think about where it would be if Joe or Jane, generic Republican, were in the White House, or a Democrat was in the White House. Number one, would Thom Tillis be running for reelection in North Carolina? Probably. Which means Roy Cooper probably wouldn’t be running.

Would Brian Kemp, the governor of Georgia, be running for the Senate? Good chance. And would have an excellent chance of beating Jon Ossoff. Would John Cornyn be the Republican nominee in Texas today, and cruise into an easy win? Yes.

And so there’s sort of the electoral impact, and then there’s all the fights he’s picked with sort of more normie Republicans, who say, I don’t need this, I don’t want any part of this—or, in the case of Cornyn, tried to hang on and couldn’t.

So it’s sort of lots of different things coming together in, like, a perfect storm for Republicans. And, you know, Republican consultant types, they’ve got to be beside themselves—that, you know, they’ve seen disasters, but not like this one.

Sargent: So yeah, just to sort of wrap up what you’re saying there, you’re essentially saying that if you didn’t have Donald Trump in the White House, all these little pieces wouldn’t be falling into place, but now they are. And then on top of that, if I understand you correctly, all of a sudden you look at James Talarico in Texas, and it’s actually possible. And you look at Mary Peltola in Alaska, and it’s actually possible. And you look at Sherrod Brown in Ohio, which Trump has turned, let’s face it, into a red state—you look at that and you say, Sherrod Brown is possible.

All of a sudden all the pieces are there, right? That’s the essence of what you’re saying. And it’s all because of Donald Trump, more or less, right?

Cook: Yes. But the—using the word “possible,” I think it kind of underrates a bunch of races that are more or less 50-50, which I find unfathomable. You look at some of these, where—Alaska, the last time a Democrat won presidential was Lyndon Johnson in ‘64. The last Democrat to win a Senate seat was 2008, a governorship in 2002. You look at Iowa. Harkin was the last, in 2014, to hold a Senate seat—hadn’t won a governor’s race since 2006.

You kind of go through, it’s like this—we’re looking at things that hadn’t happened. And I think a lot of it, or most of it, is Trump. But some of it is just Republicans having been in for so long that when people are really, really, really unhappy, it tends to permeate, and it spreads way beyond where you might think.

In the South, we say, yeah, when Mom ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy. Well, these voters aren’t happy at all, and they’re taking it out in ways that we had not seen in a really long time.

Sargent: Well, just to wrap this all up—I started this out by saying that, you know, maybe conventional patterns in midterms are reasserting themselves, which is a bit of a surprise given how Donald Trump has made everything topsy-turvy. But I think maybe, after talking to you, it’s a bit of a different story, which is: you’ve got the conventional patterns in a sense reasserting themselves, in the sense that the out party is hyper-energized and the in party is very discouraged.

But you layer on top of that this Donald Trump factor, which just supercharges everything. He’s actually supercharging the conventional patterns, in the sense—he’s really unpopular, he’s really hated by Democrats, and he’s fucking his own base in every which way. So he’s really making them discouraged. I think that might be the big story.

Cook: Yeah. I mean, my base case for the last year and a half has been that the patterns would reassert themselves—OK?—which would translate into Republicans losing a couple Senate seats, and losing, you know, less than normal because of the map this year, that they’d lose, you know, a dozen, two dozen House races. That was my base case. But we’ve now left far beyond that. I mean, I made fun—in my mind, when I heard people six months ago saying stuff like this—but the data didn’t support it then. And right now, the data does support that Republicans are just underperforming in places that have just been gimme putts, as I said earlier. It’s astonishing what’s happened here.

Sargent: It really is. The Donald Trump factor, folks. Charlie Cook, really, really awesome to talk to you. Thanks so much for coming on with us.

Cook: Thank you, Greg.

A 2017 felony assault conviction would disqualify a Pajaro Valley Unified School District board candidate from running for office in states such as Illinois or Virginia, unless he had received a pardon or other action by the governor. 

But here in California, the candidate, Curt Wilcox, is legally eligible to run for office because state law doesn’t prohibit him. He has decades of encounters with law enforcement in Santa Cruz, Shasta and Monterey counties, including a child endangerment misdemeanor and an arrest after leading Watsonville police on a chase where he crashed into multiple fire department cars in 2021. 

The City of Santa Cruz is set to reject key findings from a critical civil grand jury report that blamed city leaders for not doing enough to prevent pedestrian injuries and deaths.

While the grand jury urged immediate traffic safety upgrades, city officials largely dispute the report’s conclusions — even as state data ranks Santa Cruz County among the 20% most dangerous counties in California for pedestrians killed or injured in traffic collisions.

Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here.

The housing developer Workbench has put forward another controversial proposal for a multi-story housing complex in Santa Cruz. This one is apparently going by the name “Bright Plaza.”

Thousands of patients across the southeastern United States are now being forced to travel more than 250 miles to access abortion care in North Carolina, according to a study recently published by The Journal of the American Medical Association. The study, completed by Dr. Kelsey Loeliger and her colleagues quantified the South’s increasingly desperate abortion landscape, documenting the out-of-state abortion cases in North Carolina in the first year since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision.

Anti-choice lawmakers throughout the southeast have made abortion case inaccessible for tens of thousands of women, and now North Carolina—despite having its own anti-abortion policies—has become something of an “abortion refugee” state, with over 10,000 more people travelling from out-of-state to seek abortion care in the first year since Roe was overturned. Moreover, the study found that the impacts of abortion bans disproportionately impact Black patients, adding to a growing body of research that underlines the racial underpinning of anti-abortion policymaking.

Georgia, South Carolina, and Florida, all have six-week abortion bans—sometimes referred to as “heartbeat” bans—while Tennessee, and Alabama have near-total bans, except to save the life of the pregnant person (and, notably, not in cases of rape or incest).

Since the Dobbs decision, North Carolina has received an average of 53 out-of-state abortion patients per day—a monumental increase from just 16 prior to the decision. The largest increase in travel was for Black patients. “The effects of Dobbs on access have not been evenly distributed: Black patients and other minority patients were the most likely to be unable to obtain care locally, to travel farther, and to face obstacles related to childcare, transportation, and time away from work,” says Loeliger, an obstetrician-gynecologist in South Carolina and a researcher, and notes that she is speaking independently and not on behalf of any institution.

“Abortion is often described as elective, but a range of medical and personal circumstances can lead a patient to seek one even when their situation does not meet the legal criteria for a state’s health exception,” says Loeliger, noting that Black patients are far more likely to experience high-risk pregnancies and complications, including pregnancy-related death (often referred to as a the “Black maternal mortality crisis”). Beyond abortion, cuts to healthcare infrastructure and insurance are posing risks to pregnant people throughout the country; as Loeliger notes, “the number of high-risk pregnancies has been increasing nationwide.” Data on maternal mortality has become harder to come by, as states like Florida have ended their tracking of maternal mortality at the same time as banning abortions.

Despite its swelling number of abortion patients, North Carolina has its own, prominent anti-abortion camp. At the time of the study, the gestational limit for abortion was 20 weeks. It’s now limited to 12 weeks, after both chambers of the North Carolina General Assembly voted to override then-Governor (and current Senate candidate) Roy Cooper’s veto of the ban. The state currently has a twelve-week abortion ban in place, and requires all patients to wait 72-hours in between an initial consultation and an abortion.

Waiting periods are a common tactic in abortion-hostile states, meant to give the patient time to “reflect” on their choice, causing unnecessary financial, professional, and logistical challenges for those seeking reproductive care across state lines. Waiting periods have been proven to have little to no impact on feelings of regret or satisfaction for those seeking abortions, and abortion remains one of the lowest-regret medical procedures.

The Florida Access Network, or FAN, is an organization providing funding and logistical support for Floridians seeking abortion, including supporting hundreds of people in seeking abortions out-of-state, mostly to North Carolina and Virginia. For clients working with FAN, an abortion in North Carolina will cost anywhere from $1000 to $1750, between hotel, meals, travel, and the procedure itself (which costs around $650). Laura Rosado and Lana’e Hernandez, speaking on behalf of FAN, note that these costs do not include any lost wages for the days a patient is unable to work, childcare costs that might be required during the 72-hour waiting period, and other related costs.

In May of this year, North Carolina’s Republican lawmaker for Beaufort, Rep. Keith Kidwell, sponsored House Bill 1232, which would enact a total abortion ban and reclassify abortion as first-degree murder. The bill was initially sponsored by another Republican lawmaker, Rep. Ben Moss of Richmond, but he removed himself from the bill after public outcry, chalking up his withdrawal of support to an issue of “language” and reaffirming that he was “firmly pro-life.”

For Hernandez and Rosado, anti-abortion lawmaking in North Carolina creates a bit of déjà-vu: “Florida was previously under a 15-week abortion ban, and in that time, we were the south’s refuge for abortions,” they note. In May 2024, Florida passed a six-week abortion ban, cutting off care for countless Floridians and neighbors, despite the majority of Floridians being against an abortion ban and self-identified Republican and Democratic women having abortions at the same rate. “Now, with so many harmful abortion bans in the region, states such as North Carolina and Virginia are having to carry the weight of the South when it comes to accessing care.”

For experts like Loeliger, it’s important that lawmakers understand that abortion bans do not reflect the needs of pregnant people, or prevent the need for abortions in the first place. “When patients travel across state lines—sometimes driving 15 hours each way within a 48-hour window, with their children in the car, missing school or work—it reflects a real need that is not being met, or fully understood, in their home state,” she says.

In another part of their study, which has not yet been published, Dr. Loeliger and her colleagues asked women who had travelled out of state what they wished their lawmakers would know. “Respondents described losing trust in government and institutions, and feeling they were not regarded as valued members of society,” she says, reiterating the racialized impact of anti-choice lawmaking. “Several Black women placed their experience in the context of the sexism and racism they encounter routinely and the challenge of raising their existing children safely without sacrificing their own health; they viewed abortion restrictions as adding to those burdens.”

In North Carolina, Julia Walker, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood South Atlantic shares that while “anti-abortion politicians are not going to stop what they’re doing,” reproductive rights organizations like Planned Parenthood “are going to continue to do everything that we can to hold them accountable for the bills they introduce and also to make the public aware.” Across the Southeast, Planned Parenthood South Atlantic has created a Patient Navigation Program to help patients coordinate the increasingly opaque landscape and find care, while abortion funds like FAN exist throughout the South to provide resources for out-of-state care.

Anti-choice lawmaking in North Carolina is a nightmare scenario for Southeastern abortion workers working with women reliant on states like North Carolina for care. “If a more severe ban were to pass in North Carolina, it would be devastating for the Southern landscape,” say Hernandez and Rosado. While they reaffirm that the work of FAN and other Southern abortion funds will do whatever is needed to ensure safe abortion access, the threat of anti-abortion lawmakers looms.

You must be as excited as I am for this week’s GOP midterm convention. I’m being serious—well, kind of. I’m excited because a midterm convention is such a preposterous notion, such a display of desperate, indulgent, Napoleonic vanity, it will undoubtedly make a terrible situation for the Republicans even worse.

Except for the Kool-Aid drinking third of the population, America is sick of Donald Trump. The third of us who’ve always seen him as a fascist were sick of him 10 minutes after he descended that escalator. The middle third, well, their enthusiasm for him has waxed and waned, but in these last couple of months, they finally seem to have realized what a charlatan the man is.

So, this convention, in other words, is exactly what America doesn’t want: Two more prime-time nights of watching Donald Trump whine and moan and tell the country how great his poll numbers are and how “hot” America is. That should work great!

It appears that the idea was Trump’s, not some aide or sycophant. That makes sense. Only Trump is dense enough to think this is a good idea. Much has been made of the fact that they scheduled this without realizing that they’re competing (this Wednesday and Thursday) with the first two nights of the new NFL season, and against marquee matchups both nights. But I prefer to think that one of his saner aides knew this and scheduled it anyway, praying that most Americans would rather watch Sam Darnold and Matthew Stafford than tune in to Trump’s train wreck.

Have you seen that list of speakers? If they’d asked me to come up with a speaking list, I couldn’t have concocted something this self-parodic, this certain to repel middle America. There’s Mr. Measles, aka RFK Jr. He’s almost as unpopular as Trump. There’s Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary who used to brag that America under Trump would see 4, 5, or even 6 percent GDP growth (actual 2025 figure: 2.1 percent, or 25 percent worse than Sleepy Joe’s 2024 number) and who in a just world would be prosecuted for lying to Congress. Todd Blanche, the most corrupt attorney general since, well, Pam Bondi, but a man so shady and unprincipled that he makes Bondi look like Louis Brandeis. And Karoline Leavitt—America wants more of her, right after she quit her job, mouthing her mendacious platitudes like those brainwashed soldiers in The Manchurian Candidate? Don Jr.? Seriously? Don Jr.??

Oh. There’s also Scott Turner. Who’s Scott Turner? Good question. I didn’t know. And I’m not telling you. He’s in the administration. You can Google him, and when you see him, I think you’ll see why they added him to the list.

What a bestiary. And that’s why I’m kind of excited. A president at 35 percent in the polls presiding over $4.15 a gallon gas and thinking he’s doing something neat by trying to change New Mexico’s name (“Oh, hell, no,” blared a headline in the Albuquerque Journal) will now go before the nation for two nights spewing lie after lie about the economy. Pass the popcorn.

Here’s the thing about economic lies. There are many things in the political arena you can shade or obfuscate. You can hide your falsehood in a thicket of complexity. You can play on people’s fears and prejudices. But you start telling people that the skyrocketing cost of everything isn’t happening? They will see right through that. So Trump can lie about, say, what’s going on with Iran, or what he’s allegedly doing behind the scenes vis a vis Russia-Ukraine, or what ICE is getting up to, and some people will believe him. Or if they don’t quite believe him, they have a difficult time proving that he’s lying.

But people know that economic lies are lies because they live the economy every day of their lives. You can’t tell people who just shelled out $8 a pound to grill the kids some burgers on Labor Day that affordability is a Democrat hoax. So, I feel pretty confident in saying not only that Trump won’t get a bounce from this convention. Indeed, if there is a bounce, it will be for the Democrats generally and for James Talarico specifically (the convention will take place in Dallas, the idea being in part to shore up corrupt Ken Paxton’s low-energy Senate campaign).

No, Trump’s only hope in November, as even he may know deep down, is to steal it. The lawsuit to stop the Postal Service from implementing new rules on mail-in voting is working its way toward the Supreme Court and may get there very soon. The Supreme Court is as corrupt as it’s been since the 1850s, but even with that being true, it’s hard to see how five justices will find any justification for the executive branch having any say in how elections are conducted, since the Constitution expressly and clearly says that duty belongs to the states, with Congress playing a secondary role.

So, he should lose at the high court. But that just means he’ll ignore the ruling. We already have a whistleblower who came forward to say that the USPS has violated multiple court orders in attempting to implement Trump’s March 2026 executive order on voting restrictions. ICE still may show up at some polls. The military? Probably not, but Trump would surely try, and Pete Hegseth would do everything he could to please the boss.

Will it make a difference? It might. We shouldn’t kid ourselves. It is one on level terrifying, knowing that there’s no law Trump won’t break, no article of the Constitution he won’t shred, and no lie he won’t tell in order to avoid humiliating defeat.

On the other hand, we still have good cause to be reasonably confident that elections will be conducted for the most part honestly. Election officials, even most Republican ones, tend to take their duties pretty seriously. They did in 2020. They had more motive then to keep him in office, I should think. Now, their desire to cheat for a lame-duck loser should be pretty de minimus.  

In the meantime, let’s sit back and enjoy the show this week and remember how, about 15 months ago, we were actually scared of these buffoons.

It didn’t take long after the primary polls closed on August 18 for Jared Mosko­witz, a moderate Democrat who has represented a South Florida congressional district since 2023, to declare victory—not just over his opponent, union organizer Oliver Larkin, but also the Democratic Socialists of America, which had backed Larkin’s campaign. “Florida is known for hurricanes,” Moskowitz told Politico. “And so the DSA is a disaster area in Florida—and there’s no federal reimbursement coming to help these people.” On X, around the same time, he sent a message to the leftist streamer Hasan Piker, who had campaigned for Larkin: “My condolences.” The following morning, almost as an afterthought, Moskowitz returned to X to thank his family and his voters for their support. “My dad died of cancer 4 years ago,” he wrote. “He would have enjoyed all of this. I miss him.”

Moskowitz is both pugnacious and extremely online, which also means he’s a bit of a troll. And Moskowitz had reason to gloat. The biggest source of the campaign’s bitterness had been perhaps the one issue the two candidates agreed on: Moskowitz himself, a staunchly pro-Israel centrist who at times resembles a Republican. Indeed, Moskowitz has described himself as a “[Ron] DeSantis Democrat”—a nod to his stint as director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management under the state’s term-limited, MAGA-lite governor. (It’s not clear if there are other DeSantis Democrats, or if Moskowitz is a caucus of one.)

Moskowitz and his allies argued that running anyone but a pro-Israel moderate would amount to political suicide in the recently redrawn 25th congressional district, which voted for Donald Trump by nearly 10 points in 2024. Meanwhile, Larkin was campaigning on the idea that someone with Moskowitz’s politics no longer had a place in the Democratic Party. He ultimately lost by nearly 30 points. Cue the Moskowitz gloating.

There was just one problem. The very same night, Angie Nixon, a young, progressive state representative from Jacksonville, won a shocking upset victory over Alex Vindman, a hero of the resistance during Trump’s first term, in the state’s Democratic Senate primary. Vindman had the backing of a number of national Democrats and spent more than $9 million—almost 13 times what his opponent put into the race. Oh, and Nixon had just joined the Democratic Socialists of America months earlier. Florida is known for hurricanes, after all.

Welcome to the wild, chaotic world of Democratic politics in 2026, where every competitive primary result was contradicted by the next.

Primary season can seem endless, but things got really interesting in August, which began with Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive doctor campaigning on a platform of Medicare for All, becoming Michigan’s first Muslim Senate nominee. He narrowly defeated Haley Stevens, the suburban Detroit House member who was backed by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, and who had outspent El-Sayed by roughly the same margin by which Vindman outspent Nixon.

A week later, Francesca Hong, a former chef and progressive member of Wisconsin’s state Assembly, lost to moderate, establishment-backed challenger David Crowley after her commanding polling lead crumbled in the final weeks of the race, thanks in part to a poor defense of past “woke” comments and positions. A week after that race, Florida primary voters headed to the polls—and in Moskowitz and Nixon, moderates and progressives both found reasons to claim victory.

Preelection polling suggests that the party could see its biggest midterm gains in 20 years. If, that is, this uneasy coalition can hang together.

What are we to make of all this? If you’re looking for something analogous to the Tea Party that upended Republican politics in 2010 or to the rise of Trump, who co-opted it six years later, you’ll end up with whiplash. For better or worse, the slow civil war between Democratic moderates and progressives that began 10 years ago is still very much ongoing.

Preelection polling suggests that the party could see its biggest midterm gains in 20 years. If, that is, this uneasy coalition can hang together.

Speaking to a packed Detroit Opera House in mid-July, Bernie Sanders made the case that voting for Abdul El-Sayed in the upcoming Senate primary carried existential importance. The battle between El-Sayed and Stevens—who outspent El-Sayed by about 12 to 1, including roughly $30 million from the pro-Israel American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC—had become “an election of historical significance.” Its outcome, Sanders said, would “show the nation whether AIPAC and other billionaire-funded super PACs can spend tens and tens and tens of millions of dollars to buy a U.S. Senate seat.”

Two weeks later, El-Sayed, who had been favored by double digits in several preprimary polls, squeaked out a victory. The polling miss undercut the significance of El-Sayed’s triumph. Stevens had once said, “Israel comes to me in my dreams”; El-Sayed, meanwhile, ran on ending military aid for the country.

Something is clearly happening within the Democratic electorate, the outlines of which you can see in El-Sayed’s rise. The party’s base has, broadly speaking, grown more progressive, less supportive of Israel, and more suspicious of its leaders, particularly after Trump’s reelection in 2024. Even the Democratic Socialists of America will almost certainly see their ranks in Congress grow from two—Rashida Tlaib and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez—to seven. Indeed, a postelection fixation on El-Sayed’s and Hong’s underperformance compared to polls distracts from the fact that both results represent unprecedented performances for Midwest progressives.

Of course, the real significance of El-Sayed’s victory won’t be clear until November, when voters choose between him and Mike Rogers, the Trump-backed Republican currently leading in many polls. But if a candidate like El-Sayed, a son of Egyptian immigrants, can win in Michigan, it will be vindication for those who have spent the past decade insisting that “Bernie would have won” ever since Hillary Clinton lost Michigan (and most of the Upper Midwest, and the presidency) to Trump in 2016.

El-Sayed is particularly notable, but he is hardly alone. Other primary results gave the party’s progressives much to feel hopeful about. Sam Forstag, a labor union leader and former smoke jumper, won a crowded House primary in Montana with the support of Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez. With the same two endorsements, Randy Villegas, a school board trustee in California’s Central Valley, ran a health care–focused campaign in a district that includes the third-highest percentage of Medicaid beneficiaries in the nation. Melat Kiros, the DSA member who will likely represent Denver in Congress next year, ran on Medicare for All, federal rent control, abolishing ICE, and a moratorium on data centers. She knocked out Diana DeGette, a 30-year incumbent, in a race that may have had more to do with anti-incumbent fervor than policy distinctions: DeGette is also a progressive.

The party’s left wing is performing particularly well with what New York political writer Michael Lange has termed the “Mamdani Coalition,” after the group of voters who propelled New York City’s youthful and proudly socialist mayor to victory last fall: “young people of all races, socialists, progressives, pacifists, tenants, millennials, South Asians, Arabs, Muslims, college-graduates, ‘No Kings’ boomers, the children of immigrants, [and] the cost-burdened (working families, fixed-income seniors, mortgaged homeowners).” It’s a coalition very similar to the one that (broadly) propelled El-Sayed to his primary victory, though it’s also clearly one that has its limits, particularly in rural areas.

Not everything has gone the insurgents’ way in 2026, of course. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a centrist foe of the party’s left flank, easily fended off a progressive challenger for her seat in southwest Washington. Cori Bush’s attempt to win back her Missouri House seat from the AIPAC-backed Wesley Bell fizzled. And then there’s the case of Graham Platner, the oyster farmer and Maine Senate primary winner, who bowed out not long after months of negative reporting culminated in accusations of sexual assault. If Platner’s spectacular litany of scandals—racist and sexist Reddit comments, a Nazi tattoo, allegations of sexual impropriety—can be written off as a fluke, they do nevertheless reflect a broader challenge: selection and vetting of insurgent or relatively inexperienced candidates.

Apart from Platner, the Democratic race that best illustrates this came in Wisconsin, where Hong had built a huge lead in early polls, based in large part on her pledge to institute a moratorium on data center construction in the state if elected. But concerns about her campaign persisted, based partly on Hong’s social media history. She had backed calls to abolish both the police and the Senate in the past, and when asked to explain a 2020 tweet stating that Thanksgiving should be canceled because of its colonialist associations, Hong did not initially disavow it. “Bringing folks around the table to share conversation and build community is always a good thing,” she said in August. “But,” she added, “Thanksgiving is also a time that’s incredibly painful for many people in our communities.” It wasn’t until a follow-up interview that she said, “I don’t want to cancel it. I actually love it.” The damage was done.

It was a silly episode for pretty much everyone involved. But it crystallized concerns about Hong that had been bubbling up for some time among members of the state Democratic establishment. In July, Wisconsin’s incumbent governor, Tony Evers, pushed David Crowley, the Milwaukee County executive, to reenter the race 10 days after suspending his campaign—he was polling fourth at the time—largely to counter Hong. It was a bet that ultimately paid off, thanks in part to all the turkey talk: When the state’s primary voters went to the polls, Crowley narrowly beat Hong, thanks in part to concerns about her electability. But the “safe pick” carries risks of his own, most notably his support for data centers—an issue that had likely hurt him in the primary before he emerged as the establishment’s choice. That issue has mattered a great deal in Wisconsin; right now, Republican nominee Tom Tiffany is arguably running to Crowley’s left on it.

Unsurprisingly, El-Sayed’s narrower-than-expected victory and Hong’s loss were treated as a reckoning by some: “THE FAR LEFT HITS A WALL,” read a Politico headline after the Wisconsin result. It’s true that some primary voters simply panicked and worried that running a progressive (or a socialist, in Hong’s case) was too risky, but should El-Sayed be elected to a Senate seat in a state Trump has won twice, it may signal to voters that such a choice is not so risky, after all. Of course, if El-Sayed loses, party moderates will cite the loss as a reason to avoid taking unnecessary risks and pushing policies like Medicare for All, or defending trans rights, or advocating for a wealth tax on billionaires—all of which are part of the El-Sayed platform.

None of this is to say that “electability”—that amorphous, hard-to-define quality that moderates love to invoke as a reason to back establishment candidates—isn’t still an issue for voters. They may want change, but they also want candidates who are skilled enough at threading the needle between popular positions and popular appeal. Hence, perhaps, El-Sayed’s relative underperformance, and Hong’s surprise defeat.

So, what does a winning candidate look like in 2026? The race in Michigan is particularly important for progressives, who have shown in recent election cycles that they can both win power and wield it effectively in solidly blue cities, suburbs, and college towns. But can they begin to replicate that success in more competitive or purple states—states that will likely decide the next presidential election? A win in Michigan opens up a lane for progressives in other competitive races across the country—including, perhaps, one in a presidential primary.

Of course, an El-Sayed win would also mark arguably the biggest single advance in progressive power since Sanders first launched his quixotic presidential campaign in 2015. It would signal that the party’s left flank was not just gaining momentum but possibly on the verge of attaining real control over the party. The durability of the Democratic coalition has thus far largely been belied by a kind of unspoken arrangement in which progressives slowly accrue power without gaining quite enough to unseat the current establishment. Moskowitz compared his victory in South Florida to a “hurricane.” What would he say if El-Sayed wins in Michigan?

Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here.

Dear Gov. Newsom:

Donald Trump’s tailspinning continues. A CNN analysis finds that Trump has a lower approval rating than any of his predecessors going into midterms in this millennium. That’s worse than Joe Biden in 2022, Barack Obama in 2014 and 2010, and even George W. Bush in 2006. Meanwhile, Trump says he’ll campaign heavily this fall, but humiliatingly, Republicans are leaking to Politico that they don’t want him anywhere near them on the trail. And The Washington Post reports that amid GOP fears of his toxicity, he’s running ads about himself and his super PAC may hoard its funds. Why? Because his team fears its fundraising ability may dry up after the midterms—meaning they anticipate a big loss. We talked to veteran political handicapper Charlie Cook about his new piece digging into the GOP “nightmare,” why Trump’s unpopularity may be historically unique, and why that’s making conventional midterm patterns unusually bad for the GOP. Listen to this episode here.

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for its newsletters.

Year after year Californians watch their health bills increase faster than their wages — for some, to the point where care becomes unaffordable. Four years ago, the state created an office to curb that trend. Now, the California Office of Health Care Affordability is gaining new power to control costs.

Its board last week adopted penalties for hospitals, physician groups and insurers that exceed state spending caps — among the strictest in the country. 

Under the approved framework, violators will pay up to 125% of the amount they spend over the limit. Currently the state caps annual spending growth at 3.5%, dropping to 3% in 2029. Certain hospitals deemed “high cost” face even stricter limits. 

Over the past decade, health spending grew by an average of 6% a year. 

The soonest hospitals can face fines is 2028. In October, the state will release enforcement guidelines.

State officials say the penalties are a last resort. Providers who miss spending targets will first get technical assistance and go through a performance improvement plan; fines apply only if they violate that plan. The framework gives the office discretion to set penalties anywhere from 0% to 125% of the overage, depending on individual circumstances.

“The hope is that by imposing these penalties … we’ll begin to reduce the rate of growth of spending on healthcare to make it more affordable for Californians,” said Stephen Shortell, professor emeritus at the UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health and a member of the office’s advisory committee. 

Hospitals and others protest

Hospital executives are the most vocal critics. That’s because the Office of Health Care Affordability narrowed in on hospitals as “a high-impact area to improve efficiency and affordability.” Hospitals account for about a third of healthcare spending.

But hospitals say some of their spending is out of their hands. Barry Arbuckle, executive chairman at MemorialCare health system and a member of the office’s advisory committee, says hospitals have little control over costs related to labor, seismic related construction, and pharmaceuticals. 

“I’ve got drugs in my children’s hospital that are over $1 million a dose. Those are then passed through as hospital costs. So people think, ‘Oh, the hospital is really expensive.’ But the hospital has nothing to do with that drug cost,” Arbuckle told CalMatters.

Arbuckle ran Long Beach Memorial’s spending data for 2022-23 through the state’s penalty formula. Had the rules been in effect then, he estimated the hospital could have faced a $27 million fine. “That’s just beyond belief,” he said.

Industry groups also object to the amount of discretion the office has, calling the 0%-to-125% penalty range too broad. And they warn the caps could hurt patients. 

“Under the current growth targets, the primary way for hospitals to reduce costs is to reduce services and limit access,” Angus Cochran, chief of community support services at Washington Health, a hospital in Fremont, told board members last week.

Washington Health is one of seven hospitals deemed particularly “high cost” by the Office of Health Care Affordability. These hospitals have stricter annual growth limits – their spending growth is currently capped at 1.8%, dropping to 1.6% by 2029.

The California Hospital Association sued last year to block the spending caps. The association argued that the office “only focused on capping hospital spending, without ensuring its cost targets would not harm patients or the availability of hospital services,” as required by statute. In the lawsuit, hospitals say that health insurers began  negotiating reimbursement rates based on the office’s spending cap rather than the actual cost of care. That suit is still pending in the San Francisco County Superior Court.

Hospitals are also asking for more clarity on how the office will weigh outside cost pressures, including a likely rise in uncompensated care for uninsured patients as federal healthcare cuts take effect. These cuts combined with state changes are projected to nearly double California’s uninsured rate —  a shift that could push more people into emergency rooms.

The California Association of Health Plans, which represents insurers, raised similar concerns in a statement, pointing to recent changes in a tax the state charges private health plans. 

“For this framework to succeed, it must distinguish between spending growth that can be addressed and spending growth driven by broader market and policy realities,” the group said in a statement. “Unfortunately, many critical questions were not answered, leaving great uncertainty and significant work ahead.”

Getting serious about healthcare costs

Board members said the state’s affordability crisis demands urgent action. 

Nearly 60% of Californians report skipping or delaying care because they can’t afford it, and four in 10 carry medical debt. Rising premiums are also pushing more people to drop their health plans altogether.

Eight other states have also adopted health spending benchmarks, but because most don’t enforce them, research shows that they have not made a difference in hospital prices or premiums.

“There has to be a penalty framework that is meaningful,” said Christine Eibner, a senior principal economist at the think tank RAND. “If it’s too small or if it’s not enforced, then it wouldn’t be enough motivation.”

Experts caution that relief will take time. Shortell said many hospitals likely won’t meet the state’s spending limits in the first year, with real progress emerging only when the state and industry adjust to work together.

“This is getting from home plate to first base,” he said. “I would look to three or four years from now to begin to see this having some impact.”

Consumers are hungry for relief. Claudia Garcia, a San Francisco hotel worker and mother of two, has gone on strike over health insurance because she can’t go without it – her son has severe asthma, and needs his inhaler and medication refills.

Garcia belongs to Unite Here, the hotel and restaurant workers’ union. Unions have been a forceful voice for controlling health spending because these costs, they argue, eat into potential wage increases. That’s backed up by UC Berkeley Labor Center research, which shows that when employers spend more on premiums, they spend less on raises.

“We should not have to fight every year just for our healthcare,” Garcia said. She hopes that if the state can control health costs, maybe her union can pivot to fighting for higher pay.

Beth Capell, a lobbyist with the consumer advocacy group Health Access California, said the goal is not to punish struggling providers. 

“It is not our goal to bankrupt a small rural hospital,” Capell told the board last week. “But we are interested in penalties that will help to convince large, wealthy health systems and insurers that the state of California is serious about slowing the growth of healthcare costs.” 

Supported by the California Health Care Foundation (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the care they need, when they need it, at a price they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.

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