Congress
State of Congress: House looks to California (and Trump)
The breakdown of the Senate is all but set. And a handful of races in California — and President-elect Donald Trump’s personnel decisions — seem likely to determine how much wiggle room Republicans will have in their probable House majority.
Arizona Senate: Almost a week after the election, the Associated Press called the open Senate race for Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego over GOP nominee Kari Lake. His lead at the time of the call stands at about 72,000 votes. It’s a crucial win for Democrats, who will now have a minority conference of 47 seats in the Senate.
Pennsylvania Senate: Incumbent Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) chipped away at GOP Sen.-elect David McCormick’s lead, but the Democrat still trails by 35,000 votes after more ballots came in on Monday. The Casey campaign isn’t conceding until the counting wraps, but he faces long odds to erase McCormick’s advantage. The AP called the race for the Republican several days ago. “Ruben Gallego and David McCormick have been invited to attend orientation,” a spokesperson for Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Tuesday morning.
Battle for the House: Republicans have secured 214 called seats by the Associated Press — and currently lead in races that would give them 222 seats. Some of those may not hold, though. Here’s an overview of some of the most competitive seats:
- California 27th: Incumbent Rep. Mike Garcia (R-Calif.) said in a statement Monday night that he had conceded to Democrat George Whitesides, ensuring a flip of a GOP-held seat. Ballot drops have consistently broken in the Democrat’s favor as the process continues.
- California 47th: Democrat Dave Min expanded his lead over GOP nominee Scott Baugh to more than 3,200 votes — or more than one percentage point — for this open seat. An estimated 82 percent of votes have now been counted.
- California 13th: Democrat Adam Gray continues to chip into Rep. John Duarte’s (R) lead in this contest, which appears likely to come down to the wire. The incumbent currently leads by just under 3,000 votes with 62 percent of ballots counted.
- California 45th: A set of ballots dropped on Monday from Orange County broke heavily for Democrat Derek Tran, dropping Rep. Michelle Steel’s (R) lead to 3,908 votes. There are an estimated 16 percent of ballots still outstanding in the contest, so this one is likely to be a nail biter.
- California 41st: Longtime incumbent Rep. Ken Calvert (R) declared victory on Monday as his lead over Democrat Will Rollins stood at more than 7,500 votes. Rollins isn’t conceding yet, though it seems he’d need everything to break his way to overcome Calvert’s lead.
- California 22nd: Incumbent Rep. David Valadao’s (R) lead stands at just under 10,000 votes with an estimated 77 percent of ballots counted in this contest against Democrat Rudy Salas.
- Arizona 6th: Rep. Juan Ciscomani’s (R-Ariz.) lead swelled to nearly 5,000 votes over Democrat Kirsten Engel as more votes are tallied in this swing Arizona district. The AP has not formally called the contest, but this looks like a sure GOP hold.
- Alaska at-large: Observers are still waiting for ballots from rural Alaska to be tallied, but incumbent Rep. Mary Peltola (D) faces long odds to make up a 10,000 vote gap with GOP challenger Nick Begich. One thing to watch: If Begich doesn’t get to 50 percent, the state’s ranked-choice voting system kicks in.
One other thing to watch: Maine officials will run the state’s ranked-choice voting procedures Tuesday at 1 p.m. (watch on YouTube, if you’re into that). Incumbent Rep. Jared Golden (D) leads his GOP challenger Austin Theriault by more than 2,000 votes but came up short of an outright majority, triggering the ranked-choice voting system.
Things could get interesting fast for the GOP majority: Two House Republicans — Reps. Elise Stefanik (N.Y.) and Michael Waltz (Fla.) — have already been tapped by Trump for senior roles, opening up special elections for their seats. Waltz’s role doesn’t even require Senate confirmation, so he’ll vacate his seat immediately.
Called races by the AP Monday afternoon: Rep.-elect Cleo Fields (D-La.); Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.)
James Talarico is planning to counterprogram President Donald Trump’s GOP midterms convention in Dallas with a focus on affordability.
The idea from the Texas Democratic Senate candidate and seminarian: host a statewide “Love Thy Neighbor” food drive to offer a contrast with Republicans coming to town and highlight the high cost of groceries, according to plans shared first with Blue Light News.
“Next week, billionaire mega-donors and their puppet politicians will gather at a convention in Dallas to clink champagne glasses and toast their own corruption. They’re paying $20,000 for entry to a Billionaire Ball celebrating corrupt tariffs, billionaire tax breaks, and a new forever war that are all driving grocery costs through the roof,” Talarico said in a statement to Blue Light News. “We’ll be doing something different. We’re bringing Republicans, Democrats, and Independents together to collect groceries for our neighbors who have been screwed over by corrupt politicians.”
The campaign said it will “mobilize volunteers to collect, sort, and donate groceries for middle class Texans struggling with the high price of groceries.” The event will last from Sunday, Sept. 6 through Wednesday, Sept. 9 — the same day the GOP convention kicks off.
Talarico is also expected to field media interviews in a large warehouse near the convention.
“Texans across the political spectrum will come together to build community, show up for their neighbors, and take power back for working people,” the campaign said in a statement.
A recent poll conducted by Texas Public Opinion Research poll released last week showed Talarico leading ,his opponent Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, 48 percent to 42 percent.
Trump this week said he would campaign for Paxton soon.
Congress
‘I don’t think anyone is really comfortable’: Democrat leading on AI raises alarms at Trump, Zuckerberg call
A House Democrat trying to lead her party on artificial intelligence policy sent a warning shot Friday to tech CEOs trying to undermine efforts to regulate the fast-growing technology.
In an interview, Rep. Lori Trahan raised alarm bells over a POLITICO report detailing attempts by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg to personally discourage President Donald Trump from moving ahead with plans to establish an independent AI regulator modeled after the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, or FINRA.
“I don’t think anyone is really comfortable when they see tech executives who are sitting on the stage at the president’s inauguration, and have had to pay millions of dollars to this fund and that fund, calling the shots,” said the Massachusetts Democrat.
Allowing Zuckerberg to call the shots on the proposed AI commission would be tantamount to “a complete abdication of Congress,” Trahan continued. She also suggested would use her perch on the House Energy and Commerce Committee to work with other Democrats to haul in industry executives like Zuckerberg to testify, should Democrats win back the House majority in the midterms.
“Congress’ job is to do oversight and to have those hearings,” she said. “And I think we would learn a lot from those hearings so that we can put pen to paper on thoughtful proposals. So yes, there have been a number of people, myself included, who have called for those hearings, and I think we’re going to continue to do that.”
Trahan is poised to be a major player in the coming weeks and months when it comes to AI, especially if Democrats prevail in the November elections and are forced to solidify a position on the subject; the party is currently all over the map.
Unlike other Democrats who have retreated to their corners to work on partisan proposals, Trahan has gone out on a limb by crossing the aisle to broker a deal on a bipartisan AI safety bill with Rep. Jay Obernolte (R-Calif.) — a package that was originally met with disdain by members of both parties.
She announced this week she would opt out of a run for a place in House Democratic leadership after being widely expected to make a play in the next Congress — in part, she said, to continue working on AI issues.
But Trahan’s comments Friday illustrate the deep distrust among Democrats, herself included, over the GOP approach to AI regulation — from Republicans waffling on whether they support the proliferation of data centers to Trump’s recent call with Zuckerberg.
Her calls are consistent with left-leaning members like Rep. Greg Casar, a Texas Democrat and chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, who has been at the forefront of the most aggressive proposals to crack down on top tech companies.
“The CEOs of Anthropic and OpenAI say that cutting edge AI could be as dangerous as nuclear weapons,” Casar said Thursday on X in response to the Blue Light News report. “But Trump is conspiring with billionaires for this technology to be regulated like … Hollywood movies.”
Trahan said Friday that “reasonable people can disagree on what regulatory construct we come up with” governing development and use of AI.
But, she added, “what I don’t think the American people agree with is that Mark Zuckerberg and President Trump are going to figure that out on a phone call.”
House Democrats’ top election leader has a message for states ahead of the midterms: count faster.
“We are, I think, nicely trying to encourage people to do their balloting as quickly as possible, and that means hiring additional staff so that it doesn’t call into question results,” Rep. Joe Morelle of New York, the top Democrat on the House Administration Committee, said in a Thursday interview with Blue Light News.
The advice is just one part of Morelle’s efforts to secure the midterm elections. He said Democrats have wargamed over 150 scenarios of how the Trump administration could attempt to interfere or complicate the November elections and its certification. He is encouraging states to have a “degree of urgency” when counting ballots to stave off Republican-led conspiracy theories about the reasons for delays.
Morelle said he is leaning on states to staff up on election officials to facilitate speedy ballot counting while emphasizing the process should still be “done properly,” “fairly” and that “we don’t want people with cast ballots not to have their ballots counted.” He is going to Los Angeles next week to deliver that message and meet with election security experts and election administrators — though he did not specify whom he is meeting with or where.
“We are trying to gently encourage people to staff up,” he said. Morelle added that if Democrats take the House majority, they’d “push for more resources for local and state administrators so they can hire additional capacity.”
Morelle has other big plans in the majority, including cracking down on dark money in politics, protecting voting rights and most notably, working on a bipartisan voter identification bill.
Asked whether he could accept some form of voter identification as part of a larger bipartisan elections package, Morelle said, “I’m personally not opposed to some form of voter ID,” adding that he has opposed multiple Republican-led proposals to tighten up identification requirements.
“I don’t know where my colleagues on the Democrat side will be, but I think voters think, ‘Okay, you show your ID for just tons of things. Is it really that much of a burden?’” he said. “And if it is, we’ll get state issued IDs or federally issued IDs to people who can’t afford it. So I do think that there’s hope for a bipartisan way forward, and I’ll be anxious to work with colleagues to do it.”
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