Politics

Republican Mike Rogers backs Michigan data center moratorium

Published

8 hours ago

August 20, 2026

Republican Mike Rogers expressed support Thursday for a “pause” on data center construction as he runs against a progressive Democrat for Michigan’s open Senate seat.

Michigan is one of the top Senate battlegrounds this cycle, with Democrats hoping to hold on to the seat being vacated by retiring Sen. Gary Peters.

Asked during a news conference about his “policy on data centers,” Rogers said, “I think we need to take a pause, probably, and make sure that we’re answering all the questions that people have.”

Rogers specified to the Detroit News that he supports a one-year moratorium on data centers in Michigan — a proposal state policymakers would approve — not a national ban.

“While I don’t support a federal ban, Michigan needs stronger guardrails to protect community control, prevent utility price hikes, protect our water and stop pay-to-play schemes,” Rogers told the News.

“That is why I am calling for a one-year moratorium on new data centers until we establish a fair, transparent approval process that puts local communities first.”

The position is a massive shift for the former congressman and separates him from most of the Republican Party and even many Democrats. Rogers’ campaign did not immediately respond to Blue Light News’s requests for comment or clarification.

Rogers’ opponent, Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, has called for strict new standards to prevent data center impacts on the electric grid, water and local communities, but has not called for a large-scale moratorium, as other progressives have.

Data centers have become a pivotal issue in numerous midterm campaign as voters grow increasingly weary of the facilities and blame them for electricity costs and other impacts. The Data Center Coalition has said the facilities alone are not to blame for higher utility rates.

Data centers are also defining another major Senate campaign this year — the Ohio contest between Republican Sen. Jon Husted and former Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, who has accused Husted of being too tight with data centers.

This week, the National Republican Senatorial Committee sent a memo to the technology sector warning that data centers are proving toxic in the midterms, especially in the fight between Husted and Brown.

On Capitol Hill, House lawmakers are moving forward with legislation called the Ratepayer Protection Act, H.R. 9340, to shield Americans from the impact of data centers. Husted is sponsoring the Senate companion, S. 5028.

In the past, Rogers has been generally supportive of the data center build-out. In a July interview with ABC affiliate WXYZ, he said there should be electric grid and environmental rules for data centers, but communities that want them should be able to allow their construction.

“If the people are willing to put up with one of these things in their community, they ought to have direct benefit,” he said. “I think that’s a better way to get the community involved in the decision.”

El-Sayed, who focused a large portion of his primary campaign against Rep. Haley Stevens, seemed skeptical of Rogers’ change. He responded to the news on X with an emoji with its eyebrow raised.

“People really effing hate data centers,” the Democrat said in one campaign event.

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) called for a state data center moratorium during her race for governor. She lost the primary.

Politics

How Jonathan Haidt turned the fight over kids and social media into a political movement

Published

22 minutes ago

August 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

How Jonathan Haidt turned the fight over kids and social media into a political movement

lead image

Politics

#Resistance Democrats are flopping in primaries

Published

20 hours ago

August 20, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

During President Donald Trump’s first term, they were resistance stars. During his second term, they couldn’t survive primaries.

Alexander Vindman’s Senate primary loss in Florida on Tuesday is the latest stumble for Democrats who rose to prominence during the impeachment trials and accountability protests of Trump’s first term. Vindman, a former National Security Council aide who testified during the 2019 House impeachment inquiry, made standing up to Trump and other forms of corruption a centerpiece of his campaign.

His national profile helped haul in big money, but that wasn’t enough to stave off an upset loss to democratic socialist Angie Nixon, whose win showed the shifting politics of the Democratic base.

“Vindman is a hero, but memories fade and the focus of most folks is on the cost of living,” said longtime Democratic strategist David Axelrod. “She made those issues her focus.”

Democratic voters clearly want fighters who will stand up to the president and the GOP. But the string of losses for resistance candidates from the first Trump term illustrates a new era for the restive Democratic base, where vocal opposition to the president through official channels and public remonstrations no longer guarantees success.

The political graveyard of Trump-resistance-fighter campaigns is growing by the week.

Two of the 2021 House impeachment managers, Reps. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) and Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), are among them: DeGette lost her reelection bid to a democratic socialist this summer, while Swalwell dropped out of the California gubernatorial primary after a string of sexual assault allegations. Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.), the lead majority counsel in the first Trump impeachment inquiry, was ousted in his primary. Harry Dunn, a Capitol Police officer honored for his heroics on Jan. 6, 2021, lost a House bid in Maryland — his second unsuccessful run.

Other Democrats who built their profiles on Trump resistance flopped as well.

Tom Steyer, a prominent financier of the Trump resistance movement, failed to advance in the California gubernatorial primary. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), a member of the Oversight and Intelligence committees during the 2021 impeachment, fell short in his Senate bid. Reps. Shri Thanedar (D-Mich.) and Al Green (D-Texas), both of whom led impeachment pushes against Trump, were ousted by younger challengers. And George Conway, a longtime Trump critic and Lincoln Project co-founder, won just six percent of the vote in a House primary in New York City.

“‘#Resistance’ was a very Trump 1.0 mood, and now we are in a different moment of anger,” said Lanae Erickson, senior vice president at center-left think tank Third Way. “They’re mad about the war. They’re mad about costs. They’re mad about the establishment not having delivered anything for them.”

Not all the races were defined by Trump accountability politics. Swalwell dropped his bid after multiple sexual assault allegations, several incumbents lost to DSA challengers in closed primaries, and in Goldman’s case, the debate over Israel was a major factor.

A Democratic operative who worked on one of the resistance races, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said the throughline is that those candidates are “institutionalists” who argued the justice system was going to hold Trump accountable. But voters have lost faith in those institutions after he returned to office, and were sold by other candidates’ messaging that relied more on railing against those very systems.

“The prescription isn’t what they were looking for anymore,” the operative said.

If Democrats retake control of the House, they will have to confront their base’s appetite for holding Trump accountable. Republicans have long warned that Democrats will immediately move to impeach Trump should they regain a House majority in 2027, which Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) — the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee — has signaled openness to.

But some Democrats are more careful. “There are certain sections of people that definitely want Democrats to prioritize impeachment of the president. There are also other segments of people that want Democrats to prioritize bringing down the cost of living,” said Rep. Julie Johnson (D-Texas), who lost a runoff in a newly gerrymandered district. “You can’t just focus on one thing at the exclusion of the other.”

These electoral results, along with a growing list of Trump-endorsed candidates who have lost their primaries, suggest Americans are ready to move past Trump, argued Mike Madrid, who co-founded (and later disaffiliated with) the anti-Trump GOP group Lincoln Project.

“People are just tired of him, broadly. They don’t want to deal with him and the fights and the exhaustion and the never-Trump model, but also the sycophantic MAGA support model either,” Madrid said, pointing to the string of Trump-endorsed candidates who lost primaries on Tuesday, from Florida to Wyoming. “It’s Trump fatigue.’”

Some candidates are taking note — and adjusting accordingly.

David Jolly, the Democratic gubernatorial nominee in Florida and a former GOP House member, left the Republican Party in 2018 over disagreements with Trump. He was an independent after that and a regular BLN talking-head criticizing the president. He registered as a Democrat more than a year ago, before launching his bid for governor.

Despite Trump’s role in his political evolution, Jolly hasn’t made Trump central to his race for governor. “I’m not running the race about Trump. I rarely talk about him. But I am going to tie Byron to Trump’s economy,” Jolly told Blue Light News after winning the nomination on Tuesday night, referring to his Trump-endorsed opponent, GOP Rep. Byron Donalds.

Former Rep. Elaine Luria (D-Va.), who served on the House Jan. 6th Committee, is running for her old seat against Rep. Jen Kiggans (R-Va.). She said in a statement that she was “proud of the work I did in Congress to hold Donald Trump and his Administration accountable,” but quickly pivoted into an attack focused more on pocketbook issues.

Some of the candidates who lost primaries say their resistance bona fides did help — just not enough.

Dunn, the Capitol Police officer, earned the Presidential Citizens Medal from former President Joe Biden for his heroism on Jan. 6, 2021 and became well-known for his outspokenness about that day. He said that had little to do with his primary loss — although he acknowledged that Democratic voters’ top priority this cycle has shifted to affordability concerns.

“While name recognition got me to be a formidable challenger, it didn’t put me across the finish line,” said Dunn, who finished third in a crowded primary in Maryland’s 5th District. “I just think it’s too nuanced to just drill it down to ‘people just don’t care anymore.’” The Democratic nominee, Adrian Boafo, is “strongly about holding Donald Trump accountable,” Dunn added.

Goldman, similarly, lost to former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, who often highlighted how he put his “body on the line” to push back against the administration’s immigration policies.

Steyer, the billionaire who ran for California governor, lost to Xavier Becerra — who campaigned hard on his court fights with the Trump administration as California’s attorney general, but also leaned into unrelated sections of his resume like his time as Biden’s health secretary.

Months before entering the race, Steyer reminded voters of the Need to Impeach campaign he once funded in an ad supporting last year’s Democratic gerrymander in California. But those credentials — which he later stressed on the campaign trail — were too dated and too intangible to push him over the top, according to his former campaign spokesperson Kevin Liao.

“Tom Steyer led an impeachment movement almost 10 years ago now, and I think it’s hard to expect the electorate to hold that long of a memory on anything that happened almost a decade ago,” he said.

Adam Wren, Kimberly Leonard, Riley Rogerson, Blake Jones and Madison Fernandez contributed reporting.

Politics

Michael Cohen won’t say if he’ll use his Trump interview to seek a pardon

Published

1 day ago

August 20, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Michael Cohen and President Donald Trump have apparently patched up their differences in private. Now, they can do it in public.

The president is scheduled to do a phone interview Thursday with Cohen on the New York City radio show that Trump’s former lawyer and “fixer” began hosting last month.

Cohen said in an interview ahead of the broadcast that he and his former boss have met privately three times and reconciled since a bitter and very public falling out during the president’s first term.

“I suggest you listen to the show. You may find it extremely interesting,” he told Blue Light News.

Cohen, who made a stunning conversion from pro-Trump bulldog to fierce critic, said he wasn’t sure if during the interview he and the president would discuss presidential clemency for the conviction that landed him a three-year prison sentence.

He isn’t sure he will even push for clemency from the president.

“We’ll see,” he said. “Will I make that request down the road? I don’t know. Maybe maybe not.”

That the president’s erstwhile attorney is even considering asking Trump for a pardon is somewhat remarkable.

Cohen was the star witness in New York prosecutors’ 2024 hush money case against Trump, which saw the then-candidate become the first ever former president to become a convicted felon when he was found guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records to keep word of an affair with former porn star Stormy Daniels from public view.

Cohen, who testified that he lied and bullied for Trump during his years working for the Trump Organization, later turned on his former boss. He told Blue Light News in an April 2024 interview, for example, that the Jan. 6 Capitol riot was “grotesque” and predicted “there will never be another election again in America” if he was reelected.

Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison in 2018 on charges related to hush money payments to help conceal his boss’ affair with a porn star.

He said he sent pardon applications to former President Joe Biden’s administration and the Trump White House but doesn’t consider clemency, which would enable him to recover his law license, critical to his life at this point.

“I’m turning 60 next week. What am I going to go start practicing law again?” he said. “What has the loss of my law license prevented me from actually doing? Though I do believe I’m deserving of it, that’s a whole nother story.”

Thursday’s interview will mark the culmination of a months-long effort by Cohen to get back in the president’s good graces. He told a New York radio station this summer that they had a text exchange that started their reconciliation.

Teasing the interview, Cohen said people will be “interested to hear two individuals that were friends for a decade and a half who have not publicly spoken in eight years” talk about their long shared past. “What could they talk about?” he said.