Republican politicians and conservative leaders are turning up the pressure on Senate GOP leadership to pass the SAVE America Act to strengthen election integrity.
President Donald Trump posted Thursday on Truth Social, imploring senators to move quickly on the measure.
“The Republicans MUST DO, with PASSION, and at the expense of everything else, THE SAVE AMERICA ACT,” Trump wrote. “And not the watered down version. This is a Country Defining fight for the Soul of our Nation!”
Texas Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett’s fiery bid for a U.S. Senate seat was an exercise in self-immolation, according to a new report citing comments from various black Democrats.
The report from Politico said the shaky underpinnings of Crockett’s campaign were evident long before she lost the Democratic primary to state Rep. James Talarico.
The report also noted that Crockett’s defeat exposed fault lines within the Democratic Party shaped by the culture of identity politics.
Right-wing media attack James Talarico for his Christian faith and beliefs: “He’s not a minister, he’s blasphemous” Media Matters for America
from news.google.com
Texas Primary Shock: Democratic Voter Turnout Surpasses Republicans Independent Voter News
from news.google.com
Global oil and gas prices have skyrocketed following the US attack on Iran last weekend. But another key global supply chain is also at risk, one that may directly impact American farmers who have already been squeezed for months by tariff wars. The conflict in the Middle East is choking global supplies of fertilizer right before the crucial spring planting season.
“This literally could not be happening at a worse time,” says Josh Linville, the vice president of fertilizer at financial services company StoneX.
The global fertilizer market focuses on three main macronutrients: phosphates, nitrogen, and potash. All of them are produced in different ways, with different countries leading in exports. Farmers consider a variety of factors, including crop type and soil conditions, when deciding which of these types of fertilizer to apply to their fields.
The U.S. Supreme Court has stopped Progmerican-controlled New York state from disappearing a republican district through gerrymandering before the 2026 election. The decision does not rule out a future evaporation of the sole GOP-held district, but it prevents it from disappearing before the midterm election.
SCOTUS Blocks NY Bid To Redistrict GOP Seat Before Midterms – thefederalist.com
The U.S. Supreme Court shut down a bid by New York courts to redistrict a Republican-controlled congressional seat ahead of the 2026 midterms on Monday.
In its 6-3 ruling, the high court granted an emergency application to temporarily stay (“pause”) a state judge’s efforts to redraw Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis’ congressional district. Malliotakis has represented New York’s 11th Congressional District since 2021 and won reelection by 28 points during the 2024 election.
As described by The Hill, “A state judge had ordered the boundaries be redrawn after ruling the district dilutes black and Latino voting strength in violation of the state constitution.” The Supreme Court’s Monday order “granted Malliotakis’s emergency application to block that ruling as the litigation proceeds, effectively restoring her existing district lines for the midterms.”
The high court noted that the New York court’s ruling “is stayed pending the disposition of the appeal in the New York state courts” and the filing of a petition at SCOTUS asking the justices to take up the case. The Supreme Court’s stay will terminate if it declines to hear the case or if it agrees to take up the case and renders a verdict on the matter.
Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson would have denied Malliotakis’ request for relief.
Associate Justice Samuel Alito authored a concurring opinion in which he expressed agreement with the court’s decision and blasted the New York judge’s directive “that blatantly discriminates on the basis of race.” He noted how the “New York Supreme Court (that State’s trial-level court) ordered the New York Independent Redistricting Commission to draw a new congressional district for the express purpose of ensuring that ‘minority voters’ are able to elect the candidate of their choice.”
“That is unadorned racial discrimination, an inherently ‘odious’ activity that violates the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause except in the ‘most extraordinary case,’” Alito wrote. “Extraordinary circumstances exist only when the challenged state conduct is narrowly tailored to achieve a ‘compelling’ interest, and our precedents have identified only two compelling interests that can justify race-based government action: (1) mitigating prison-specific risks and (2) ‘remediating specific, identified instances of past discrimination that violated the Constitution or a statute.’ … Neither of those interests is present here.”
In her dissent, Sotomayor (joined by Kagan and Jackson) accused the majority of “[i]gnoring every limit on federal courts’ authority” by “tak[ing] the unprecedented step of staying a state trial court’s decision in a redistricting dispute on matters of state law without giving the State’s highest court a chance to act.” Such an action, she claimed, “violates basic principles of jurisdiction, federalism, and equity.”
“By granting these applications, the Court thrusts itself into the middle of every election-law dispute around the country, even as many States redraw their congressional maps ahead of the 2026 election,” Sotomayor wrote. “It also invites parties searching for a sympathetic ear to file emergency applications directly with this Court, without even bothering to ask the state courts first. There is much reason to question whether the majority will exercise its newfound authority wisely, but there is no reason to question this: If you build it, they will come.”
Monday’s ruling is the latest in a series of redistricting-related cases to come before the high court ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. Within the past several months, the justices have effectively greenlit maps passed by Texas and California that bolster their respective ruling party’s chances of winning more seats this fall.
Shawn Fleetwood is a staff writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. His work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics and RealClearHealth. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
from thefederalist.com
Voters are giving President Donald Trump a modest boost on the economy — and Republicans a messaging edge heading into the midterms.
The latest Harvard CAPS / Harris poll shows the GOP has surged 8 points on the generic congressional ballot since January, pulling even at 50-50 after trailing at the start of the year. Among likely voters, Republicans now hold a 4-point edge.
That momentum comes as the February survey found 52% of voters say the economy is better today than it was under President Joe Biden, up 5 points from January. A narrow majority, 51%, now describe the U.S. economy as strong, a 2-point bump from last month and an 8-point jump since November.
Republicans in the Senate are arguing over the SAVE America Act — common-sense legislation that would require voter ID and proof of citizenship in federal elections. Numerous polls demonstrate that such laws are overwhelmingly popular among American voters. But while some RINOs are reportedly blocking legitimate efforts to advance the legislation, voters in deep blue California are taking matters into their own hands to safeguard their elections against fraud.
After a months-long, grassroots-driven campaign, GOP State Assemblymember Carl DeMaio and other proponents submitted signatures for the California Voter ID Initiative on Monday. The proposal, which DeMaio said garnered more than 1.3 million signatures, would amend the state’s constitution to require voter ID “for all future elections in California.”
On Wednesday, ABC and CBS were nauseatingly in awe on their flagship newscasts of far-left Texas State Representative James Talarico — who believes, among other things, God was non-binary and that Mary would support abortion — as possessing “cross-partisan appeal” in a campaign “emphasizing unity” to pull in “moderates” to deliver Texas the first statewide Democrat win since 1994.
CBS sent senior White House and campaign correspondent Ed O’Keefe to Austin, Texas, who reported back on CBS Mornings that Talarico had “put off his seminary studies in order to launch this campaign, believing he can combine support from Democrats, independents in this state and Republicans upset with the President.”
In a second live-shot that aired in some time zones (due to a CBS News Special Report on a Pentagon briefing), O’Keefe boasted of Talarico’s “cross-partisan appeal” with a “Christian progressive approach, that you can be rooted in your faith” and “make a faith-based argument as to why the country needs to change.”
WATCH: Wednesday’s ‘CBS Mornings’ fawns over Texas Democrat James Talarico’s “cross-partisan appeal,” “Christian progressive approach, that you can be rooted in your faith” and “make a faith-based argument as to why the country needs to change” that could “pull support from… pic.twitter.com/yjBXBJ9xwr
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) March 4, 2026
Rep. Al Green (D-TX) is at risk of losing his seat in the U.S. House of Representatives after failing to secure a majority of the vote in the primary race for Texas’s 18th Congressional District.
Green will now face fellow Democrat Rep. Christian Menefee (D-TX) in a runoff election.
Under Texas law, if no candidate wins more than 50% of the vote, the top two candidates advance to a runoff.
According to results reported Wednesday by The Associated Press, Menefee received 46% of the vote, while Green secured 44.2%, forcing the race into a second round.
A Virginia circuit court ruled that a referendum vote enabling Democrats to gerrymander U.S. congressional districts can move ahead, despite leaving open the possibility that the referendum itself could be illegal.
The case involved the City of Lynchburg suing to “pause early voting” or have the court “answer questions about the legality” of the referendum vote, as reported by Cardinal News. If approved by voters, the measure would allow Democrats to redraw the congressional map to gerrymander Virginia’s congressional districts to eliminate four Republican seats, giving Democrats a 10-1 advantage.
As The Federalist reported, Republicans have apparently been relying on untrustworthy courts to stop the referendum, while essentially ignoring a get-out-the-vote effort. They now have two days before early voting starts on March 6, with “Election Day” set for April 21.
In a Monday ruling, Judge Patrick Yeatts of the Lynchburg Circuit Court refused to rule on the substance of a lawsuit aimed at stopping the referendum vote from taking place, leaving the issue in the hands of the Virginia Supreme Court.
Watch Virginia closely. The far-left Gov. Abigail Spanberger is setting out on a path that other Democrats will follow, and that the party will roll out nationally if it wins in 2028. It is a path to authoritarian leftist control and the destruction of our freedoms. Besides the gerrymandered congressional map, she has also allowed for mail-in ballots that will allow enough fraud to keep the Democrats in power forever. Meanwhile she is lightening penalties for violent crime and forbidding local police to cooperate with ICE. This will ensure a terrorized native population and the flooding of Virginia with migrants who will further ensure the left’s total control of the state. And for the left, Virginia is just the beginning.
“5 VIRGINIA CONGRESSMEN: Democrats are rejecting voters to gerrymander our state,” by Rep. Rob Wittman, Fox News, March 2, 2026:
Virginia voters settled the redistricting question in 2020. Nearly two-thirds of Virginians amended our Constitution to create an independent redistricting commission and take map-drawing power away from politicians. The message was unmistakable: stop the gerrymander. Stop letting politicians choose their voters.
Democrats applauded that reform. House of Delegates Speaker Don Scott praised fairness and transparency. Senate President pro tempore L. Louise Lucas declared it would ensure “an equitable, transparent and bipartisan process to ensure our electoral maps are drawn fairly.” Rep. Don Beyer said plainly, “Gerrymandering is cheating. It allows politicians to select their voters, when it should be the other way around.” They were right.
In 2019, Abigail Spanberger said, “Gerrymandering is detrimental to our democracy. Opposing gerrymandering should be a bipartisan priority.” While running for governor, she added, “Short answer is no. I have no plans to redistrict Virginia.”
That was before she took office.
Democratic Moderates Warn Against Leaning Too Far Left for 2028 Election National Today
from news.google.com
Hard-left Democrats have reportedly been pushing for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) to run for president in 2028.
A report from Axios indicates that those Democrats view the young socialist as a replacement for the candidacy of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). Behind the scenes, allies of Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) said that she would have an opportunity to boost her national profile if she runs, potentially polling in the top five of candidates and raising well over $100 million in campaign funds.
“There’s a window of opportunity for a left-wing nominee that may not come again for a generation. Democratic-socialist and liberal victories in New York City and elsewhere — with potentially more this fall — have changed the political playing field,” noted Axios.
A top Department of Homeland Security official vowed during a private call with election officials Wednesday that immigration officers will not be stationed at polling places in November amid Democratic warnings about interference in the midterms by the federal government.
Heather Honey, the department’s deputy assistant secretary for election integrity, dismissed as “disinformation” any fears that officers from Immigration Customs and Enforcement would be deployed to the polls as part of President Donald Trump’s ongoing mass deportation campaign.
“Any suggestion that ICE is going to be present at polling places is simply disinformation,” Honey said, according to four people on the call who were granted anonymity to discuss it. “There will be no ICE presence at polling locations.”
As progressive activists blockade Palantir offices and protest the company’s AI tools used in ICE deportation and surveillance operations, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has continued taking millions from the company’s lobbyists, according to new Federal Election Commission filings.
In January alone, more than a dozen lobbyists with firms representing Palantir bundled a combined $2.9 million for the DCCC, according to a newly filed FEC disclosure. The January haul from Palantir’s lobbying firms represents 38% of the DCCC’s total contributions for the month.
In electoral politics, it is usually the party that is out of power that promises that a victory will end the rule of an unpopular congressional majority or president.
The usual message coming from a minority party during a midterm election is that they should be elected to serve as a check on the president. The message of checks and balances has an inherent appeal to many voters, because the system of checks and balances between the three branches of government is baked into America’s national DNA.
“Anything you can do, I can do better,” the famous duet from the musical “Annie Get Your Gun,” comes to mind as Republicans in blue states watch their red congressional districts disappear because Democrats turned the tables on President Donald Trump’s plan to push mid-decade redistricting to make it easier for the GOP to hold the House majority. Once Republican states decided to employ this strategy, Democrats would have been derelict not to do the same.
House Republicans leaders are beginning to realize that their chances of midterm victory may shrink because this Pandora’s Box was opened. It’s not just that blue states might create more safe seats than red states might. The debate has energized the Democrat base and allowed their big money donors to argue to the public that this is just another “authoritarian” attempt by Trump to rig the system.
High Democratic turnout in Texas’s Senate primary is driving record early voting numbers, giving hope to Democrats in the reliably red state.
Though primary turnout is usually lower in nonpresidential election years, the 2026 primary has drawn unusually close attention, largely due to the race between state Rep. James Talarico and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX). In the first seven days of primary voting, a record 1,259,356 votes were cast — 665,664 for Democrats and 593,692 for Republicans, according to unofficial data from the Texas secretary of state, obtained by the Texas Tribune.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has added 12 candidates to its list of “Red to Blue” races. These candidates represent 8 states, Arizona, Iowa, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin. Four states, Arizona, Iowa, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, have two “Red to Blue” races. An analysis of the Cook Political report puts 14 GOP seats in a toss-up or leans Democrat, compared to only 4 Democrat seats.
House Democrats Pick 12 Candidates to Back in ‘Red to Blue’ Initiative – legalinsurrection.com
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) added 12 candidates to its “Red to Blue” initiative in an attempt to retake the House in 2026…
The candidates are and the incumbent:
…Unfortunately, the Cook Political Report has 14 Republican Congressional seats in its toss-up category. The organization has only four Democratic seats.
Regarding Republican-held seats, the Cook Political Report also put NE-02 as a lean Democrat and UT-01 as a solid Democrat.
However, Democrat-held seats, NC-01 leans Republican, while ME-02 and TX-35 are likely Republican.
NORTHERN VIRGINIA: Rising energy costs are fuelling frustration among American voters ahead of this year’s midterm elections.
In Northern Virginia, data centres – notorious for guzzling massive amounts of electricity and water – are emerging as a flashpoint over power demand and infrastructure strain.
The region on the eastern coast of the United States is widely regarded as the data centre capital of the world, with a large concentration of server farms clustered in counties just outside Washington, DC.
The Supreme Court’s tariff decision left the door wide open for Democrats to hammer President Donald Trump for violating the law. This time, they’re not taking the bait.
Instead, Democratic campaigns are leaning into an argument they have been making for months: Trump’s tariffs are coming out of voters’ pockets. Some Democrats can’t help but hit the tariffs as “unlawful,” but they’re pivoting quickly back to affordability.
In Blow to Mamdani, Left-Leaning Group Breaks With Mayor Over U.S. House Race The New York Times
from news.google.com
California’s Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom is facing allegations of “liberal racism” after remarks he made about black people at a Sunday night event in Atlanta while promoting his new book.
Speaking with Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens, Newsom attempted to relate to the mostly black audience by downplaying his academic credentials.
“I’m not trying to impress you,” Newsom said.
“I’m just trying to impress upon you, ‘I’m like you. I’m not better than you.’
‘This right is fundamental’: Federal judges reject lawmakers’ bid to toss Utah’s new congressional maps The Salt Lake Tribune
from news.google.com
Occasional California Governor Gavin Newsom, who keeps turning up anywhere but California, has continued his highly calculated descent into vulgar and insulting behavior this week. The performance still has the awkwardness of the first week of acting school. It’s like watching a character play a character, many times removed from an identifiable real person. Whatever he’s doing, he’s definitely pretending.
If you’ve missed it, Newsom is back to doing subtext-heavy locker room kneepad jokes like the one he did in Davos, and he’s bragging to audiences that he’s stupid like them, “a 960 SAT guy.” He’s playing a towel-snapper, a mean jock, not above hard words or a fist fight. His relentlessly horrible director of communications got in on the act, responding to questions from a journalist like this:
🚨🚨EXCLUSIVE and BREAKING: What about that @GavinNewsom dyslexia disgnosis – can the gov. provide any paperwork related to his dyslexia diagnosis at any time of his life?
Newsom’s comms team just now tells me to “fuck off.”
Think @GavinNewsom’s comms team is losing it today? pic.twitter.com/oT3GoK5Cxi
— Susan Crabtree (@susancrabtree) February 23, 2026
Judges remove districts, drop other claims in NC redistricting suits Carolina Journal
from news.google.com
If you wanted a textbook example of the Streisand Effect, look no further than the Trump administration’s meddling in the Texas Senate race.
CBS News refused to air late night host Stephen Colbert’s interview with Democratic Texas state Rep. James Talarico, who is currently locked in a competitive Senate primary with Rep. Jasmine Crockett.
Colbert said that CBS’ lawyers feared retribution from the Federal Communications Commission, claiming that the interview could be seen as a violation of the equal-time rule.
Fulton County, Ga., officials say DOJ lied about elections office raid upi.com
from news.google.com
A narrative of a looming “blue wave” just hit a wall — and it came from inside CNN.
During a segment breaking down the 2026 gubernatorial map, CNN data analyst Harry Enten delivered a “wake-up call for Democrats,” pointing to race ratings that currently tilt in Republicans’ favor across the country.
“I think electoral races nationwide should stand as a wake-up call for Democrats,” Enten said. “A wake-up call for Democrats.”
