Monday, November 2, 2026 · Evening Edition

Today

By StaffNews Desk

Good morning. On Sunday afternoon, Rep. Haley Stevens retracted her endorsement of Abdul El-Sayed, the Michigan Democrat who beat her in August's Senate primary, and threw her weight behind Republican Mike Rogers. Scheduled to stand beside El-Sayed at a unity event, she instead spurned him, saying "I don't belong in Abdul's campaign." She bucked influential party members who had pushed her toward El-Sayed; the switch landed 48 hours before Election Day, and Trump promptly called it brave and invited her to join the GOP.

The left read it plainly. By backing Rogers, Stevens showed the party's pro-oligarch faction is willing to destroy its own party to beat El-Sayed, and one analysis called her guilty of the very sin behind her endorsement. Her pretext was a feud over a campaign ad she called anti-Semitic. Bernie Sanders, who backs El-Sayed, said Republican rhetoric about him — including from Trump and Ted Cruz — should appall Americans.

While the base fights over Michigan, the administration is weaponizing elections through the courts. Justice Department attorneys urged sanctions against an immigrant rights group whose analysis found more than 40% of the people on the government's noncitizen-voting list do not appear in the state's voter file. In Alaska, a federal judge dismissed the DOJ's pre-emptive suit — the department's second such effort against a state this month — against a race with two candidates named Dan Sullivan.

On war, Ro Khanna said he would cut off funding: "I would stop the funding. The House and the Senate should stop the funding for any further actions in the Iran War." Trump's advisers had assured him the war would end before the midterms; now he is searching for a fall guy even as Washington and Israel prepare another attack on Iran after Tuesday's vote. And Sen. Chris Murphy, 53, is awake and alert after a stroke, hospitalized at Johns Hopkins after feeling arm numbness at his son's hockey game Saturday.