Mark Dayton, a prominent Minnesota politician, held a career in public service that spanned five decades.

He is well known for serving two terms the state’s governor, leaving office in 2019. Before that, Dayton’s career included stints as a state agency official, a state auditor and a U.S. senator.

Friday at noon, Dayton sits down with MPR News politics editor Brian Bakst to reflect on his career and discuss his new memoir "Perseverance." In this conversation, Dayton recounts his personal challenges and his time as governor. He also revisits his call to increase taxes on the wealthiest Minnesotans — a campaign promise he fulfilled— and his role in legalizing gay marriage in the state.

Also, election season is underway in Minnesota.

On the ticket is an open governor’s race, an open U.S. Senate seat and much more. Both of the state's major party chairs join the conversation to share their political lay of the land as voting begins.

Guests:

• Mark Dayton served as the 40th governor of Minnesota. He also served as the state’s U.S. senator and Minnesota State Auditor.

• Alex Plechash is the chair of the Minnesota Republican Party.

• Richard Carlbom is the chair of the Minnesota DFL Party.

• Dana Ferguson is a politics correspondent for MPR News.

• Peter Cox is a senior politics reporter for MPR News.

Subscribe to the Politics Friday podcast on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or RSS.

Minnesota’s start to voting Friday begins without a cloud over how ballots sent through the mail are handled, now that the U.S. Supreme Court has turned back potential restrictions.

That brings certainty to an increasing number of jurisdictions in the state that exclusively use mail to get ballots to voters.

In some places, Minnesota voters have been voting by mail for decades. State law allows cities with fewer than 400 registered voters and townships of any size to choose to vote exclusively with mail ballots. There are more than 1,100 precincts in Minnesota where registered voters receive a ballot in the mail automatically.

Jenna Weiss lives in Barclay Township just outside of Pine River, north of Brainerd. Her township is one of 43 Cass County precincts — more than half of its total — that vote exclusively by mail.

“I think it's worked really well,” Weiss said. “It’s convenient in that I get a ballot to my mailbox. I don't have to remember to go to the polling place, which is kind of a benefit."

Weiss said for her rural, remote township, voting by mail makes sense. It can be difficult to find enough volunteers to staff a local polling place. And it's a 45-minute drive to the county seat of Walker.

Weiss said she trusts the mail ballot system, although she has some concerns about the reliability of the U.S. Postal Service as it faces pressure to be more profitable.

"But by and large, I don't really think twice about it,” she said. “I put it in the mail, and I'm pretty confident it's going to get where it needs to go."

Voting by mail has been under scrutiny since President Trump signed an executive order in March. It directed the U.S. Postal Service to use federal citizenship lists in determining which mail ballots it would deliver.

Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon objected to that proposal.

“This would have, for the first time in its 250-year history, put the U.S. Postal Service in the position of being the traffic cop for voter eligibility and literally not delivering mail to people who ended up on the wrong list,” Simon said.

Minnesota and other states sued. They argued the changes would interfere with states' authority to run elections and would leave elections officials with little time to comply.

The Supreme Court sided with the states and blocked the Postal Service's new rules for mail-in voting — at least for the midterms.

That allowed elections officials in Minnesota to carry on with the work of preparing ballots to send to voters.

About 20 small cities and townships in Stearns County use only mail ballots, said elections director Laura Laudenbach. She said voter turnout in those precincts tends to be higher.

“Just because it’s right in front of them. It’s a little easier to send the ballot back,” she said. “They have a little time to do their research as they’re voting.”

If they prefer, those voters have the option of casting their vote in person at the county service center, Laudenbach said. And they can track their ballot online to make sure it arrived and was counted.

Still, in Cass County, elections administrator Pamela Smith said opinions are mixed about mail voting, and some voters have raised concerns.

“Whether those concerns are about politics or about trusting the mail system or just a personal preference, I can't really say for sure,” she said. “But those viewpoints are present."

The Trump administration claims that mail ballots are vulnerable to fraud. But Minnesota elections officials say the system has safeguards to prevent ineligible people from voting or people voting more than once. They are confident that ballots are securely processed.

“I think one of the misconceptions is that people can double vote,” said Roxanne Gerads, Stearns County’s elections supervisor. “The system does a really good job of flagging those."

Still, some officials worry that the Trump administration's attacks on mail ballots are creating distrust in the voting system.

"There's no question about that,” Simon said. “This has introduced a level of confusion and at least short-term doubt by a lot of voters, and maybe that was the goal all along."

Still, regardless of how they cast their ballot, Minnesotans typically want to vote, Simon said.

The state saw record-breaking turnout for its August primary. With many key races on the November ballot, officials are preparing for another busy election.

Elections officials like Jory Danielson, administrative services director for Crow Wing County, urge voters with questions to contact the Secretary of State’s office or their local elections office.

"Elections are run by our friends and neighbors and even family members in the communities of both major political parties,” he said. “The checks and balances and the procedures that are in place are there to protect the voter, and to protect the ballots.”

At about 4 p.m. every day, Mark Lang readies his knuckles as he starts knocking on doors in the neighborhoods of Pine Island.

He’s running for mayor in this community of 4,000 people located just north of Rochester.

Lang is a corporate pilot and first-time candidate who said community concerns over a hyperscale Google data center proposed for Pine Island prompted him to run. Like some of his neighbors, he has questions about the massive development’s environmental impact and its location so close to town.

But the most common refrain Lang hears while going door to door is that many in Pine Island feel as though the project came out of nowhere, saying plans for it seem to have been hashed out in secrecy.

“[Residents] feel betrayed, let down,” Lang said. “Everyone feels that this should have been something put out to a vote, or at least some kind of say in it from the people."

Lang is one of at least three candidates running for local office in Pine Island who are doing so because they oppose the current data center proposal. Google plans on building a massive facility on about 88 acres of land, and the project could eventually expand to more than 400 acres. It’s temporarily on hold after a judge halted construction until a lawsuit over the project's environmental review can be heard.

Data center proposals are roiling communities large and small across Minnesota this election season, unifying people on the left and the right and prompting civic engagement among people who, until recently, paid little attention to local governance.

It’s a backlash happening in a moment of growing unease about the fast-paced development of artificial intelligence and the huge data centers that power AI — with political candidates up and down the ticket taking on the issue, too.

In Minnesota’s 1st Congressional District, for example, Democratic candidate Jake Johnson said recently he supports a data center moratorium in southern Minnesota. Meanwhile, Sen. Grant Hauschild, a DFLer from Hermantown, where Google proposed building another enormous data center, is airing campaign ads touting his support for state restrictions.

Benefits to the community

In Pine Island, data center opponents accuse city officials of being too cozy with big tech, developing Google's proposal in secret and agreeing to a plan that will drain resources and pose health risks.

Amidst the fervor, Pine Island's mayor stepped down earlier this year, citing work obligations. City Council member Brandi Veith Staloch replaced him as interim mayor and is running this fall for a two-year term.

“I think [the data center] is an amazing opportunity for the community,” she said.

Google and its developer have promised the data center will employ 100 people full-time and create around 500 construction jobs while it’s being built. And while the city provided $36 million to Google in tax incentives to locate its facility there, proponents like Veith Staloch say Pine Island can expect $131 million in new property tax revenue because of the project. About $25 million will go to the Pine Island schools to support science and technology education, as well as to modernize classrooms, said Veith Staloch.

“And there's things that aren't even really being advertised that they have helped with,” Veith Staloch said, citing the tech giant’s promise to update the HVAC system in the town’s middle school.

“The newest part was they're going to update the playground equipment for the kids,” she added.

And Veith Staloch said that the city can continue to refine the project to address residents’ concerns as it moves through the permitting process.

"I feel that the way we have it laid out right now, we have enough protections in place and a very good relationship with the project team and Google that we can fluidly change things in the process as we need and still be sure that we are protecting our community and our assets,” Veith Staloch said.

A lack of transparency

As with many communities weighing data center proposals, some senior city staff members signed non-disclosure agreements, limiting what they could say about the project as it was being developed. For months, it wasn’t clear that a data center was even being proposed for the site, and it wasn’t until earlier this year that Pine Island residents learned Google was behind the project.

Veith Staloch insists the city did everything it could to communicate what they could about the project, short of going door-to-door. And she said she takes the transparency concerns seriously. If elected to a full term, Veith Staloch said she plans to hold regular office hours and vows to respond to constituent concerns raised at City Council meetings quickly and in public.

Pine Island business owner Nicole Mills opposes the project and is a member of a group working to stop it. She said a lack of transparency may have benefited the project’s backers.

"If they had said, ‘Hey, here's a generic environmental study on a 400-plus acre development for a huge hyperscale AI data center,’ I bet you a few more people would have turned out [to City Council meetings],” she said. “And now that it's been all approved, every time we open our damn mailbox, we’ve got something from Google telling us how wonderful this is going to be."

First-time candidate Tosca Wohl is running for City Council and echoes concerns about transparency. She said the city’s roll out of the data center project eroded trust in local leadership.

“Prior to the data center situation, I had a positive image of the City Council,” Wohl said. “I just feel like there are some serious issues of transparency and the duty to notify the public.”

Wohl said, data center aside, she’s running in part to ensure that development projects that come before city leaders get the public scrutiny they deserve and that the community’s small businesses are able to thrive.

“If I get elected, I'm in office for four years, and this data center… will resolve one way or another,” she said. “And I'm not campaigning just off the data center. I want to serve this community. I love this town. I love this community.”

MPR News confirmed eight Somali men are being held at Guantanamo Bay. This comes after MPR News correspondent Matt Sepic reported on the situation. He had a brief conversation with Adam Abdullah, who was living legally in the Twin Cities when he was detained in December, at the start of Operation Metro Surge.

After officials moved him to Kentucky and Louisiana, he was told he was being sent to Somalia but instead is being held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

MPR News host Clay Masters spoke with Democratic U.S. Sen. Tina Smith on All Things Considered to about what happened. Sen. Smith said there have been discussions about the use of Guantanamo Bay amid the White House’s immigration crackdown.

“The administration says we send the worst of the worst to Guantanamo,” Smith said. “Yet in the case of Mr. Abdullah, there has been no evidence presented about what he has done, no explanation for why he has been detained. I mean, there is really has been no due process.”

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.

The Federal Reserve raised interest rates for the first time in more than three years Wednesday, in a show of its determination to attack stubborn inflation.

The central bank raised its benchmark interest rate by a quarter percentage point to a range between 3.75 percent and 4 percent. That makes it more costly to borrow money to buy a car, grow a business or carry a balance on a credit card.

"Inflation remains elevated," Fed policymakers said in a statement. "Today's policy action will support a timelier return to the Committee's 2 percent goal."

The U.S. war with Iran has rekindled inflation, pushing oil and gasoline prices higher and driving the price of diesel fuel into record territory. Higher interest rates won't automatically bring lower prices at the pump, but they do signal the central bank's commitment to restoring price stability.

Financial markets had widely expected the rate hike after hawkish comments from Fed chairman Kevin Warsh last month.

"The responsibility for 65 months of sustained, elevated inflation sits squarely with the central bank," Warsh told an audience in Jackson Hole, Wyo. "We must be confident that underlying inflation is moving to our objective, clearly and at sufficient speed. Otherwise, we have work to do."

Still, some economists questioned whether the rate hike would have much effect on price pressures.

"Today's decision reinforces the Fed's commitment to price stability and addresses credibility concerns," said Selma Hepp, chief economist at the real estate data firm Cotality. "The bigger question is whether the Fed risks fighting the wrong inflation battle. A rate hike is unlikely to lower gasoline prices, reduce tariff-related costs, or accelerate homebuilding, but it will further dampen housing demand and delay a broader market recovery."

Gas prices are a big driver of inflation

Annual inflation was clocked at 3.4 percent in August, according to the cost-of-living index released by the Labor Department last week. Prices rose a sharp four-tenths of a percent between July and August, with a surge in gasoline prices accounting for more than a third of the total monthly increase.

The price of diesel fuel has reached an all-time high, averaging $6.31 a gallon on Wednesday, according to AAA. That has the potential to raise the cost of many other goods that have to be transported by truck or train.

Since April, prices have been climbing faster than average wages, so the typical worker's paycheck doesn't stretch as far as it used to.

Forecasts released at the conclusion of Wednesday's meeting show Fed policymakers expect an average of one additional quarter-point rate increase this year and no rate hikes in 2027.

Warsh, who took over as Fed chairman in May, did not offer a forecast. He has generally discouraged such forward guidance, fearing it could tie the Fed's hands and leave policymakers with less maneuvering room.

The bond market is already pushing long-term borrowing costs higher. The yield on 10-year Treasurys topped 5 percent this week. Bondholders are demanding higher returns in response to inflation and the strong demand for capital from both the federal government and private borrowers.

The yield on 10-year Treasurys helps set the rate for many types of borrowing, including mortgages and car loans.

Copyright 2026, NPR

A Tuesday court ruling means David Streever of Rochester, New York no longer has to worry that federal officers may threaten him over a harsh email he sent to the former acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement earlier this year.

Streever filed a lawsuit in July arguing ICE agents had violated his First Amendment rights when they tried to track him down at his home, an airport and a hotel to confront him about the email and serve him with a warning notice that said he may have violated the law.

Streever's email compared ICE's former acting director, Todd Lyons, to a Nazi, called him a "monstrous human being" and predicted he would be tormented by his own conscience. Streever told NPR he sent the email after federal immigration officers fatally shot two observers in Minneapolis in January.

The warning notice agents left at Streever's home said "YOU MAY BE IN VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW" and lists federal laws that make it a crime to threaten federal officials. "Receipt of this Notice will be taken into consideration, should you continue to be involved in any criminal activities described above," reads the bottom of the form.

Streever, who is represented by the nonprofit free speech group, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), argued the federal agents' actions violated the First Amendment and caused him to self-censor his views.

"Mr. Streever's injury is the loss of his freedom to engage in political speech now because the threat of such an investigation or prosecution looms over him like the sword of Damocles, and he is forced to self-censor under that threat," Contreras wrote in his ruling.

He wrote that because it was likely the federal government had already infringed on Streever's First Amendment rights, he was issuing a preliminary injunction while the case continued so that Streever could continue to speak freely.

The court order blocks DHS and ICE from, "taking further steps in reliance on the Warning Notice…and from issuing any substantially similar threats to [Streever] aimed at his protected expression during the course of this matter."

In a statement, Streever said, "I'm deeply relieved that the court affirmed what I knew all along: that I am permitted to speak my conscience in the United States of America, including when I criticize government officials."

He added, "While I wish this ordeal hadn't happened, hopefully this incident will serve as a reminder that the First Amendment protects us all."

DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In court filings, DHS defended its investigation of Streever by citing an increase in threats of violence against public officials. The federal government had argued Streever's case should be dismissed and had said the investigation into Streever was closed in late June, before he filed his lawsuit.

The federal government's filing did not assert that Streever's email was a violent threat that could be prosecuted.

In his ruling, Contreras asked the government to turn over the report that closed its investigation of Streever.

"ICE knowingly pursued an American citizen for criticizing his government — speech that is at the heart of the First Amendment," said FIRE Senior Attorney Adam Steinbaugh. "Ominous letters warning people their speech might land them in prison are meant to coerce people into silence, and that's not how the First Amendment works."

Copyright 2026, NPR

It was meant to be a game changer for the cryptocurrency industry. Instead, a key piece of legislation championed by both crypto executives and President Trump suffered a stinging defeat in the U.S. Senate — and now faces steep hurdles to become law.

The Clarity Act — officially called the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act — has been at the top of the crypto sector's wish list for years. But on Tuesday, the bill failed to clear a key procedural hurdle following entrenched Democratic opposition.

The massive bill — which stretches over 600 pages — would have established the first regulations for the crypto sector in U.S. history.

But opponents saw it as the industry's attempt to encode into law a set of rules they saw as far too lenient on the industry, without enough safeguards.

A version of the bill already passed the House last year, but it has faced a long and torturous road in the Senate as opponents have fought tooth and nail. Now, it faces an uncertain future, as the crypto industry and its backers in the Senate must decide whether to try again at a later date.

Here are 5 key things to know about the Clarity Act — and why opponents are fighting hard to prevent it from ever being passed.

What's in the bill?

Just like with most things dealing with crypto, the details are complicated and a bit geeky. But the measure effectively would have established a clear legislative framework for the crypto sector for the first time in U.S. history.

That would have marked a sea change from today, when crypto regulation can change depending on who controls the White House. Under President Biden, for example, the Securities and Exchange Commission took an aggressive approach toward policing the crypto sector. But that changed radically under Trump, with the agency now led by Paul Atkins, a former adviser to the industry.

"Tens of millions of Americans are investing in products that don't have clear regulatory oversight," said Ryan VanGrack, vice chair of the crypto firm Coinbase, before the vote. "That's an abomination."

"Whether you love crypto or you hate crypto, you should want it regulated," he added. "And this is the best opportunity we have ever had to do just that."

The crypto sector has also grown beyond Bitcoin to include all kinds of cryptocurrencies — such as meme coins. Meanwhile, the technology underpinning Bitcoin and some other cryptocurrencies are also starting to be adopted by the broader financial sector.

The Clarity Act would have formally split oversight of the crypto sector between the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. But — controversially— it would have given the CFTC, a far smaller regulator, the majority of control.

Critics say handing the CFTC the bulk of the reins was the crypto sector's way to avoid heavy regulatory scrutiny. Crypto industry executives denied that's the case, and Trump administration regulators have defended their oversight of the industry.

What was at stake in Tuesday’s vote?

It was effectively a vote to decide if the bill can move forward. It needed 60 "yes" votes to clear that hurdle. Only 49 senators voted "yes" — far below the threshold. Meanwhile, 50 senators voted "no," including all Democrats and four Republicans: Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, Josh Hawley of Missouri, Jerry Moran of Kansas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina. Tillis, however, added a motion so that the bill can be reconsidered and brought up again for a vote.

Even if the bill had survived the procedural vote on Tuesday, it was never clear that it had enough supporters in the Senate to pass. And because senators have changed the bill since it passed the House last year, both chambers would still have had to agree on a final version.

The crypto sector had been hoping to pass the Clarity Act much sooner — and has amassed tens of millions of dollars to spend on the upcoming elections. But money hasn't been enough to erase the disagreements that have dogged the bill for months.

Why are Democrats so opposed?

Though not all Democrats oppose the bill, for many a key sticking point has been — and still is — an ethics clause intended to prevent presidents and other elected officials from profiting from the crypto industry while in office. Democrats, including Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, have argued the clause doesn't do enough to prevent conflicts of interest.

Notably, the Department of Justice would have been tasked with enforcing the ethics clause, which Democrats strongly objected to since they don't believe the agency would provide a meaningful check on a sitting president. The DOJ is currently led by Todd Blanche, who used to be Trump's attorney.

Those concerns intensified after President Trump disclosed he and his family had earned $1.4 billion last year from his crypto ventures — an unprecedented sum for a sitting president.

Before Tuesday's vote. Republicans tried to break the impasse. Over the weekend, they unveiled new language in the bill to prevent federally elected officials and their spouses from issuing their own cryptocurrencies. That would have effectively prevented Trump from continuing $TRUMP, a meme coin he launched early last year — a point Trump agreed to abide by.

Officials would also have had to divest "significant" financial stakes in the crypto sector, a provision that could affect some of Trump's crypto business interests — though critics said the language was loose enough to allow the president to avoid it altogether.

The new language would also have given state attorneys general more ability to bring lawsuits if they suspected a breach of ethics rules.

Are others opposing the Clarity Act?

Yes. Many people in the banking sector — especially community bank leaders — were against it.

One of the main disputes involved a segment of the crypto market called stablecoins. The bill would have allowed these companies to pay interest to their customers.

Banks, though, argued those incentives would have allowed crypto companies to compete for customers' money without being subject to the same regulations as traditional banks.

Crypto companies have disputed that characterization and have argued that these incentives are similar to what many credit card companies offer their customers, such as cash back or points.

Community bankers have been especially vocal. They have said allowing crypto companies to offer these types of incentives would have posed a direct threat to their business and led them to lose customers.

Rebeca Romero Rainey, president and CEO of the Independent Community Bankers of America, said that keeping their customers' money with local banks is critical because it allows them to provide small business and agricultural loans to members of their communities.

"If community banks aren't there, and those local deposits aren't there to fund it, who's going to fund those small businesses and ranchers and farmers?" she said. "I don't think it's going to be the crypto industry."

So what now?

The bill is not dead — at least not yet.

The vote has been a priority for Trump, who has strongly supported the crypto industry. But the crypto industry will likely face a tough time trying to pass it this year, with the November midterms quickly approaching.

It's also hard to say how the Senate and Congress more broadly will change after the midterms. A Democratic takeover of the Senate or the House would make it even more difficult for the bill to pass, leaving the fate of the Clarity Act up in the air.

Copyright 2026, NPR

Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky moved Tuesday to impeach Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth over the war in Iran.

Congressman Massie, a long-time critic of the Trump administration, read the articles of impeachment aloud from the House floor just after the chamber convened at noon. Massie alleges that Hegseth has waged the Iran war illegally, among other "high crimes and misdemeanors."

Massie alleges that Hegseth initiated the conflict unlawfully, defied Congress' order to withdraw from the conflict and incurred unnecessary civilian casualties.

Massie has repeatedly clashed with members of his own party in recent years and is ending his time in office after losing his primary to an opponent backed by President Trump. Massie's clashes with Trump extend beyond the war with Iran. Working alongside Democrat Ro Khanna of California, Massie led the successful effort to compel the Trump administration to release files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Republicans in theory have enough votes to defeat the proposal, though it could be a complicated vote for their members in competitive elections districts.
The war, which is incredibly unpopular among the American public, has contributed to rising costs in the United States.

The administration maintains the conflict was necessary to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, though experts maintain the country was not close to developing one before the conflict began six months ago.

"Secretary Hegseth has been a transformative leader for the Department of War," Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson wrote in a statement to NPR. "The entire Department is unified behind the Secretary's vision and will continue working to put our warfighters and America first."

The House will have to act on Massie's proposal by Thursday, a quick turnaround. The body is set to leave Washington this week for an extended recess that will end after the midterm elections in November.

Copyright 2026, NPR

The U.S. Court of Appeals revived a lawsuit Tuesday that a leading Republican candidate filed years ago against the Minnesota Board of Medical Practice over its review of his physician’s license.

The decision stems from a lawsuit Scott Jensen, now the GOP nominee for state auditor, filed in 2023 shortly after an unsuccessful run for governor against Gov. Tim Walz, alleging that he was targeted for investigation by the board over his views on COVID-19. The board had received numerous complaints that Jensen, a physician, was spreading misinformation about coronavirus.

“I feel vindicated,” Jensen said. “This is much bigger than just one family doctor who felt like he got squashed.”

According to the decision, the board investigated Jensen multiple times over several years. Jensen sued on First Amendment grounds, arguing that he had to self-censor his campaign messaging while running for governor because he didn't want to draw more board scrutiny.

“Years of investigations by the Minnesota Board of Medical Practice caused Dr. Scott Jensen to speak less and spend more,” Court of Appeals judge David Stras wrote in the decision. “Either would be enough for a court to hear his case, so we reverse.”

The lawsuit has been thrown out by federal judges before, so Tuesday’s reversal is a win for Jensen and his current campaign for state auditor. DFL-endorsed Zach Filipovich, a former Duluth city council member and an accountant, and Forward Independence candidate Jay Reeves, an Army veteran, are also running.

“In regards to my current run for state auditor I don’t think this will play a prominent role, other than that it will remind people I am willing to take a stand and that I do have the courage to fight through difficult things,” Jensen said.

A new Minnesota Star Tribune report is taking a closer look at how the Walz administration responded to fraud allegations across state government and why it took years for the administration to recognize a broader, interconnected problem.

The in-depth report is based on interviews with people who worked in and around the administration, as well as testimony from a congressional investigation.

Ryan Faircloth led the reporting for this piece and joined Minnesota Now host Nina Moini to talk about his reporting.

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.

Subscribe to the Minnesota Now podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

We attempt to make transcripts for Minnesota Now available the next business day after a broadcast. When ready they will appear here.

FBI Director Kash Patel on Tuesday defended the bureau's loosening of hiring requirements regarding prostitution and bestiality, saying the changes were meant to enable victims of those acts to apply for employment without fear of automatic disqualification.

The FBI quietly issued guidance this past spring lifting a categorical hiring ban on applicants who had previously engaged in prostitution, and said that it would instead consider the context of the behavior in at least some cases. The bureau made a similar change with regard to bestiality.

Pressed about the moves at a Senate Judiciary Committee oversight hearing, Patel denied that the changes reflected a lowering of employment standards and insisted that they were designed to protect victims who had been forced to engage in that conduct and preclude them from being automatically disqualified.

“We did not want to punish victims of bestiality, victims who were trafficked. We did not want to make it an automatic disqualification for the FBI to consider you,” Patel said.

The answer did little to satisfy Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana, who grilled Patel about the rationale for a change that the FBI director said was proposed to him by subordinates.

“When you saw bestiality, I say this with respect: The person who recommended it, why didn't you just say what planet did you parachute in from?” Kennedy asked.

Patel replied that that was his initial reaction but he came to see it as a way of supporting victims.

The Republican-led panel tried to keep the focus on Patel's efforts to combat violent crime, counter drug trafficking and pursue the Trump administration's agenda from his perch at the nation's premier federal law enforcement agency.

But Democrats seized on the tumult inside the FBI over the last year, including sweeping firings of agents who participated in investigations into President Donald Trump, efforts by the bureau to investigate Trump's perceived political adversaries and Patel's travel schedule that has blended private leisure with professional responsibilities.

“Mr. Patel is the least qualified and most partisan FBI director in our nation's history,” Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the panel's top Democrat, said in his opening statement at the hearing. He accused Patel of wielding the bureau's law enforcement powers to seek retribution against Trump's political opponents and pursue the president's grievances, including his false claims that the 2020 election he lost was stolen.

Patel has made multiple appearances before Congress while serving as director, including to testify about the FBI's budget, but this was his first time since last September before the Senate committee that has principal oversight jurisdiction over the bureau.

That hearing featured feisty and personal exchanges with Democrats, with Patel at one point shouting over Sen. Adam Schiff of California as he called him an “utter disgrace” and a “coward.”

"You can make an internet troll the FBI director, but he will always be an internet troll,” Schiff shot back.

Tuesday's hearing was expected to be no less contentious given Democrats' fierce criticism of his leadership and conduct. Durbin called for Patel to be replaced as director in April following an article by The Atlantic magazine that raised allegations of excessive drinking.

Patel later filed a $250 million defamation lawsuit, calling the article false and a “malicious hit piece.” The Atlantic said it stood by its reporting and would vigorously defend against the “meritless lawsuit.”

Minnesota’s top judge is retiring at the end of this month.

Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Natalie Hudson has been on the Supreme Court since 2015 and was elevated into her role as chief justice in 2023.

She is one of only a few Black justices in state history and is the first person of color and the third woman to lead the state’s highest court.

MPR News host Angela Davis talks with her about her long career and why she thinks it’s important for the public to understand and trust the role of the courts, especially in politically divisive times.

Guest:

• Natalie Hudson is chief justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court. She was appointed to the position by Gov. Tim Walz in 2023 after serving since 2015 as an associate justice on the court. She previously served 13 years on the Minnesota Court of Appeals. Earlier in her career, she practiced housing and employment law, served as the St. Paul city attorney and worked in the criminal appellate division of the Minnesota attorney general’s office.

Subscribe to the MPR News with Angela Davis podcast on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify or RSS.

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.    

The Supreme Court has ruled against President Trump, rejecting his efforts to enact new mail-in voting restrictions for the midterm election.

The ruling released Monday by the high court means the U.S. Postal Service is expected to continue delivering ballots as usual.

Voting by mail has already begun in states including Alabama, North Carolina and Wisconsin, with more soon to follow — including Western states such as Hawaii, Oregon and Washington, where elections are held primarily or fully with mail ballots.

Under the still-blocked USPS plan, which followed an executive order by Trump, states would have had to turn over lists of voters' names and addresses and have certain specific barcodes on ballot envelopes in order to have them delivered by the mailing agency.

Earlier this month, a federal judge in Boston issued a preliminary injunction against USPS, blocking it from imposing those new ballot requirements on states. The judge found the requirements are likely illegal because the Postal Service has no authority to control mail-in voting. A second federal judge issued another preliminary injunction late Sunday.

Now, a majority of the Supreme Court decided to keep that injunction in place. The court said the Trump administration was unlikely to succeed on the merits of its challenge.

Conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote a short concurring opinion, saying "there is at least a fair prospect that the final rule falls within the Postal Service's statutory authority." But, he added, "applying the rule in the 2026 elections would be arbitrary and capricious in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act because state and local election officials do not have sufficient time to reasonably implement the rule before the elections."

Indeed several Republican state election officials, including from the mostly vote-by-mail state of Utah, signed on to a Supreme Court brief, warning that any attempt to carry out the USPS plan now "will almost certainly lead to mistakes, delays, and confusion for both voters and election officials."

Conservative Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissented from the order, and would have granted the administration's request to pause the Boston-based judge's ruling.

Trump said he issued the call for USPS to change its rule for mail ballots as a way to stop illegal voting by non-U.S. citizens, a problem that many studies and audits show is extremely uncommon. For this legal fight over the USPS plan, the administration's lawyers have provided the courts with no evidence of mail-voting fraud.

Trump has been a vocal critic of the way about one-third of voters cast ballots in the last two federal elections. In 2024, the share of voters who reported casting ballots by mail was higher among Democrats (37 percent) than Republicans (24 percent), according to a national survey by the MIT Election Data and Science Lab.

In a social media post last year, Trump said he is "going to lead a movement to get rid of MAIL-IN BALLOTS" and claimed that "ELECTIONS CAN NEVER BE HONEST WITH MAIL IN BALLOTS/VOTING."

This year, Trump himself voted by mail in Florida.

Editor's note: USPS is a financial supporter of NPR.

Edited by Benjamin Swasey

Copyright 2026, NPR

President Trump on Sunday downplayed concerns that AI could go rogue after several leaders in the tech industry called for putting the brakes on its development.

Speaking to reporters at his Doonbeg golf resort in Ireland, the president said the dire warnings about AI were exaggerated and that “negative forces” are making claims about things that won’t happen.

“We’re leading China in AI, we’re the most sophisticated country in the world, and frankly, I want to keep it that way because whoever wins AI, wins,” Trump said. “And we can put guardrails, we can do this and that. But I think you have a lot of negative forces that are bringing it up that shouldn’t be bringing it up.”

President Trump did not explain what he meant by “negative forces.”

During an interview on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, House Speaker Mike Johnson said there should not be a moratorium on the technology because “China will overlap us.” Instead, Johnson said he would like for tech companies to take the lead creating safer AI.

“If Congress just races in and does some sort of emergency session to try to regulate AI, we will lose the race to China,” the House Speaker said. “And that is a threat to every single American. So, we’ve got to have balance. We got to have steady hands at the wheel.”

Trump’s and Johnson’s comments follow warnings from Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who posted an essay online Saturday, calling for companies and governments to slow down how fast the capabilities of AI are improved. Amodei warned that humans can lose control of AI systems and there are also opportunities to use AI in cyberattacks and bioterrorism.

Amodei wrote that there should be international cooperation around AI development and that labs should embed third-party evaluators to report incidents and track safety practices. He said Anthropic would take those steps unilaterally.

On Saturday, tech leaders Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman both said in social media posts that they agree with Amodei’s concerns. Altman also told Fortune Magazine in an interview released Saturday that he would delay OpenAI going public until at least 2027 because of safety concerns and that company officials have discussed pausing tests on the technology to make it safer.

David Sacks, co-chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, responded to Altman and Amodei on social media writing “go ahead.”

“I don’t see what you see in the lab,” Sacks wrote on X on Sunday. “If the unreleased models are scary enough that you think you should slow down, I support your decision to be responsible.”

But Sacks admonished tech leaders to “stop pretending you need anyone else’s permission” to make such moves.

“Most of all, stop pretending the motivation to slow down is purely altruistic,” he wrote. “You face massive product-liability exposure if your products enable a truly damaging cyberattack.”

NPR's Shannon Bond contributed to this report.

Copyright 2026, NPR

Fresh off a historic primary turnout, an even wider pool of Minnesota voters will begin casting their ballots in the general election on Friday.

In Minnesota, the entire Legislature and a slate of statewide offices are on the ballot, including governor, attorney general, secretary of state and auditor. So is every U.S. House seat and one U.S. Senate seat.

Absentee voting begins Friday. Ballots will begin to be mailed to voters who request them and select early voting locations will be open for in-person absentee voting.

The Minnesota secretary of state’s website is the one-stop-shop for all things voting. That’s where voters can request mail-in ballots, track their mail-in ballots, register to vote, find their polling location and more.

What’s on my ballot?

Every eligible voter will get to make their picks in the statewide races.

No matter what, Minnesota is set to make history by electing its first woman governor; voters will decide between Republican Lisa Demuth and Democrat Amy Klobuchar. Demuth is speaker of the state House while Klobuchar is a U.S. senator.

Democratic nominee Peggy Flanagan and Republican nominee Michele Tafoya are vying for retiring U.S. Sen Tina Smith’s seat. Flanagan is lieutenant governor and Tafoya is a former sports broadcaster and a conservative commentator.

Meanwhile, DFLers Attorney General Keith Ellison and Secretary of State Steve Simon are running to keep their seats and face Republicans Ron Schutz and Tad Jude, respectively. Three candidates, two from the major parties and one from Forward Independence, are facing off to fill the open state auditor position.

Every U.S. House seat in Minnesota is up for election, but most incumbents are running for reelection and are expected to win. However, Rep. Angie Craig declined to run for her seat in the 2nd District to launch her unsuccessful bid for Senate, leaving a competitive contest between DFLer Matt Little and Republican Eric Pratt. Little is a former state senator while Pratt is a sitting state senator.

Depending on where you live, you’ll have the chance to vote in plenty of downballot races. You can find your sample ballot here.

What is absentee voting?

Absentee voting begins 46 days before the election in Minnesota. Absentee voters need a witness to look at their blank ballot and then sign a signature envelope after the voter fills out the ballot. Voters tuck their ballots in special envelopes and a ballot board verifies the envelope. Election officials don’t actually generate vote results until after the polls close on Election Day.

Voters can vote absentee by mail or in person.

Katie Smith, director of elections in Minneapolis, said her office is busily preparing to receive voters Friday. She said she expects everything to go smoothly.

“If you're already registered, you don't need to bring anything with you,” Smith said. “If you need to register, that's when you're gonna need to bring your proof of residency with you.”

Is absentee voting the same as early voting?

Yes and no. The terms are often used interchangeably because most voters vote absentee before Election Day, which is early.

But there’s also an official early voting period that starts 18 days before an election — Oct. 16 for the 2026 general election — when voters can deposit their ballots directly into a tabulating machine. That early voting process mimics the Election Day process and doesn’t involve an absentee ballot application or envelope.

Can I change my vote?

If you vote early but later change your mind about candidates you supported, you can claw back your ballot. However, you have a limited window to do that. You have to contact your local election office by the close of business on the 19th day before the election, which this year is Oct. 15.

Besides voting, how else can I get involved in the election process?

The biggest need election offices across the state have is election judges. Certain duties on Election Day can only be performed by party-balanced election judges.

A recent Minnesota Supreme Court decision made it clear that cities and counties must hire election judges to staff early voting locations during the early voting period in the 18 days before an election as well. Minneapolis hadn’t been doing that and historically has had difficulty finding enough Republican election judges in a Democratic-dominated city.

Smith said Minneapolis will comply with the order and can look to other jurisdictions to find enough Republican judges if necessary.

“We're always looking outside of the city. When you are an election judge in the state of Minnesota, you don't necessarily have to serve where you live,” Smith said.

Smith said some voters are concerned about federal interference in Minnesota’s elections and have asked how they can get involved in the election process.

“We're discouraging people from just showing up. There's a lot of laws and rules that specifically say who is and isn't allowed to be at the poll or within the 100 feet of the polling place itself,” Smith said.

However, Smith said her office has put together a list of ways people can help others vote, including giving rides to the polls and providing translation.

“Just some good ways to get involved and be a part of how we can support democracy together this year,” Smith said.

Is the Trump administration changing mail-in voting?

The Supreme Court is set to consider a Trump administration to plan to restrict mail-in voting. For now, a federal judge has blocked the implementation of the plan.

In March, President Donald Trump directed the U.S. Postal Service to only send mail ballots to voters on citizenship lists created by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and the Social Security Administration, arguing a voter list would ensure only eligible voters get ballots.

A whistleblower came forward alleging the online portal USPS created to implement the plan is "rushed," "risky" and "haphazard" and could reject batches of ballots if just one can't be verified.

States including Minnesota and several nonpartisan voting rights groups have sued the Trump administration on the grounds that states run elections, not the federal government. They also argued the federal lists violate voters’ privacy, and they say are unnecessary because studies have shown noncitizen voting is negligible and the lists could be incomplete and disenfranchise voters.

“Right now, we're business as usual for anybody who wants to cast their ballot via the mail,” Smith said.

A Republican congressman said he had to swim to safety after a plane he was traveling in made an emergency landing in a lake late Saturday.

U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany says he was returning from the La Crosse County Lincoln Day Dinner when the light aircraft lost power as it approached Wausau Downtown Airport. The pilot made an emergency landing in Lake Wausau. They both ended up in the water and swam to safety.

“After landing, we called 911. As the plane began to submerge, we exited the aircraft and swam to a shallow area, where we waited until emergency responders reached us by boat," he wrote on X.

The Marathon County Sheriff's Office said in a statement that the emergency landing happened just before 9 p.m. Saturday. Tiffany and the pilot, Leonard Boltz, got out of the plane and called 911. They were rescued by emergency responders in a fire department airboat just after 9 p.m.

Both men were taken to a nearby hospital, where they were treated for minor injuries.

A no-wake buoy was placed near the plane and boaters are being asked to avoid the area until the plane can be removed, the sheriff's office said. The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board have been notified and will investigate.

Tiffany is running for governor on the Republican ticket in Wisconsin and has been endorsed by President Donald Trump.

David Crowley, the Democratic candidate wished Tiffany a “quick recovery” in a post on X and lauded the “heroism of the pilot.”

The plane Tiffany was traveling in was a single-engine, four-seat Bonanza aircraft.

All Things Considered host Clay Masters and the MPR News politics team break down a week in Minnesota politics with a recap of the 2026 Republican National Convention and a deeper look into the state’s competitive congressional races.

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation and subscribe to the Politics Friday podcast on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or RSS, for a deeper dive into state politics.

Guests:

• Brian Bakst is politics editor for MPR News and host of Politics Friday.

• Dana Ferguson is a political correspondent for MPR News. 

• Laura McCallum is an editor and previous politics reporter for MPR News.

The country is acknowledging a somber anniversary: 25 years ago, America suffered its worst terrorist attack on Sept. 11, 2001.

MPR News politics editor Brian Bakst explores how that event hit home in Minnesota with former Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak, whose first ballot-box victory came the same day as the attack. We’ll also look at whether the lessons from the attack endured and how that day changed the country in many ways.

Later, one last — brief — trip to the Great Minnesota Get Together.

The Minnesota State Fair was a hotbed of political activity with people sizing up candidates in between stops at attractions and food booths. We’ll hear from an underdog congressional candidate and what is on the minds of some voters with an election that's less than two months away.

Guests:

• R.T. Rybak is the former mayor of Minneapolis and the president and CEO of the Minneapolis Foundation.

• Doug Chapin, a Democrat, is the congressional candidate for Minnesota's 6th Congressional District.

• Dana Ferguson is a politics correspondent for MPR News.

• Laura McCallum is an editor and previous politics reporter for MPR News.

Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation or subscribe to the Politics Friday podcast on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or RSS.

Donald Trump's pitch to send Americans $5,000 checks should Republicans prevail in the November midterms is drawing scorn from some members of Congress — the very people who have constitutional authority over federal spending.

Economists and other political observers are voicing concerns about the potential effects on inflation and the national balance sheet. Taken together, it's a swift reaction that makes clear that Trump's dubious election-year gambit is likely little more than another grand promise from a politician with a long history of them.

“Donald Trump is a known liar. This is the biggest liar to ever serve in government. Period,” said Rep. Robert Garcia, a California Democrat who was in Dallas on Thursday as part of his party's effort to counter Republicans' midterm convention. “The dividend is not happening.”

Trump previously pledged to use savings from the Department of Government Efficiency and revenue from tariffs on foreign imports to distribute payments of $2,000 or more, but none of that came to pass.

His latest idea comes as the U.S. economy is reckoning with persistent inflation and rising interest rates, two forces that have politically undermined Republicans after previously helping them reclaim power from Democrats. Trump claimed the payments would be possible because of the economy’s strength, yet consumer sentiment is weak as gasoline prices are increasing because of the war with Iran and wages are struggling to keep pace with inflation.

Trump told CBS News Texas in an interview that he doesn’t believe Congress would need to approve his planned payments, though he did not specify how he could spend more than $1 trillion without Congress.

“Well, we think not,” Trump said about congressional approval. “I think they will do it if we needed it. But we think not.”

Later, when pressed by a reporter at the airport before he left Dallas, Trump denied the $5,000 was meant to turn out the vote even though he originally said the money would be distributed “if the Republicans win.” Instead, he described the payments as a “reward” for citizens who endured Joe Biden's presidency.

“It’s almost a reward for the people having to put up with Biden’s policy,” he said.

Trump’s idea is mocked by critics

A few of Trump's allies embraced the idea, including Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno, who said he would prepare legislation for the payments. Michigan Rep. Tim Walberg, the Republican chairman of the House Education and Workforce Committee, said “it was the first I heard of it last night” but called it good economic policy.

“If it can be done, the American taxpayer deserves the benefit of having more in their pocket than the government,” Walberg said ahead of a brief session in the Capitol on Thursday.

But critics accused him of trying to buy votes at a time when Republicans are trying to maintain slim majorities in Congress.

“I don’t know about you all, but frankly I’m insulted by the notion that my vote this November could be bought for 5k,” Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican who is one of Trump's least favorite lawmakers, wrote on social media. “Not to mention the inflation this would cause.”

Rep. Ted Lieu, vice chairman of the House Democratic caucus, outright mocked the president.

“If Democrats flip the House and Senate everyone will get a $10,000 dividend, and a pony, and free ice cream for life,” he posted on social media. “(Folks can also choose free yogurt for life, because we’re Democrats after all).”

The president's proposal, unveiled in his nearly two-hour speech Wednesday night in Dallas, would carry a price tag exceeding $1.3 trillion if Congress were to authorize $5,000 payments to the nation's 270 million adults.

The Treasury already is running a current annual deficit approaching $1.8 trillion, and the total national debt topped $40 trillion this year. According to Treasury Department data, that interest expense for fiscal year 2026 will come to about $1.27 trillion, similar to the projected cost of Trump's idea.

The price tag prompts concerns about debt and inflation

Economists raised concerns about inflationary effects from such a large infusion of cash into the economy.

Michael Strain, director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, a center-right think tank, said Trump would be repeating the same policy mistake as his predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden.

As part of his 2021 pandemic relief package, Biden provided $1,400 payments to most Americans, which Strain had warned at the time would spark inflation.

“But Mr. Trump’s proposal would be worse than the Biden stimulus in the sense that in 2026 the economy already has an inflation problem,” Strain said, while Biden's policy was intended to shore up an economy disrupted by COVID-19.

“Trump would be pouring gasoline on lit inflationary embers and hoping it wouldn’t ignite,” Strain said.

At the center-left Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, senior policy director Marc Goldwein agreed with the comparison to Biden's policy and emphasized the potential impact on the deficit.

“The idea that we’ve had fiscal success is backwards and bordering on laughable,” he said. “We don’t have surpluses to give away.”

The financial markets appeared to be unimpressed by Trump’s promise. Interest rates on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note climbed above 4.9 percent in Thursday afternoon trading, meaning that the cost of mortgages and auto loans will likely rise in ways that hurt the middle class.

Trump allies are faced with their own arguments

Many Republicans, including from Trump's inner circle, are in a difficult spot after they’ve spent years blasting Biden and other Democrats for their spending.

As recently as last week, Vice President JD Vance and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent blamed Trump's predecessor when asked about current price levels and consumer concern.

In the White House briefing room, Vance said at once that he was not interested in assigning blame while in the same answer noting “how endemic inflation became during the Biden administration.”

Bessent told CNBC that Biden and his allies “torched the American people” with their approach. “Almost 50 percent of the great inflation came from the out-of-control spending that went on then,” he argued.

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, one of Trump's press secretaries during his first presidency, ran into the same conundrum Thursday — after the president's speech — when she shared on social media her appearance on Fox Business Channel.

“You do not build a strong economy by giving things away,” Sanders said.

“At the end of the day, though, somebody has to pick up the check,” she continued, “and it’s the taxpayers that will ultimately pay the price.”

Goldwein said ultimately that political and constitutional realities could spare the president.

“You never want to say it’s impossible,” he said. “But within the confines of the law, at least the law as everybody understands it, the president does not have legal authority to send people $5,000 per adult, and he needs Congress to pass a law.”

The majority of Minnesota’s more than 300 public school districts will have school board seats up for election in November.

But, according to Kirk Schneidawind, executive director of the Minnesota School Boards Association, the people competing for those seats are less likely than in the past to hold their positions for multiple terms.

“We are seeing school board members’ terms shrink,” Schneidawind said.

In the past, he said, board members served an average of 12 to 16 years. That figure has fallen by about half, to one or two terms — eight years or less.

“I always get concerned when I start talking about these statewide perspectives, but that’s about on average what we’re seeing,” Schneidawind said.

‘More partisan in nature’

The increase in turnover means a loss of experience in the people who hold positions with the power to make decisions on curriculum, staff contracts, and budgets that are sometimes hundreds of millions of dollars.

Schneidawind believes the increase in turnover is partly due to a generational difference. He also thinks the increase in partisan politics in school board elections is discouraging long-term involvement in running schools.

“It seems to be a little bit more partisan in nature that perhaps people, when they ran for the school board. weren't really prepared for,” said Schneidawind. “Perhaps (they) step aside or move on.”

Since the pandemic, school board races in Minnesota and across the country have seen a dramatic increase in competition, partisanship, outside spending and nationalized political influence.

Schneidawind isn’t sure whether the increased turnover in school board members is a net negative or positive. He just hopes board members will take their duties seriously.

“People have more things that they want to do in their lives, right? And I think most people will find out that serving on the school board isn't just showing up for two meetings a month. There's a lot of work on the committee level, community-relation level that require more time from our school board members.”

Competition in ‘kind of the normal range’

This election cycle, there are 316 open positions on Minnesota school boards. Nearly 200 of those seats have more than one candidate vying for positions. 24 seats have no candidates stepping up to run and the rest have just one person seeking to fill an open position.

Some districts, such as South St. Paul, Detroit Lakes and Ortonville have particularly competitive races. But Schneidawind said he believes school board elections aren’t as intensely contested as they were in the years directly following the pandemic.

“There are certainly going to be some nationalized issues,” Schneidawind said “I don’t think it’s as prevalent or as hot as it was during the pandemic. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t some national issues that do trickle into local school board governance.”

A campaign staffer for a Republican nominee in a competitive Minnesota congressional race resigned Thursday after his many racist and violent social media posts were highlighted by the rival DFL campaign.

Republican Eric Pratt and Democrat Matt Little are competing in the closely watched race for U.S. Rep. Angie Craig’s seat in the 2nd Congressional District that runs from south of the Twin Cities through exurbs and into farm towns.

Pratt, a state senator from Prior Lake, announced his staffer’s resignation and strongly condemned the posts. His statement read, in part: “I have always been clear that antisemitism, racism, and discrimination of any kind have no place in our politics or our communities.”

Austin Brown was hired as a field director and moved to Minnesota from Ohio for the role. Though now inaccessible, his X account had been public until Thursday and he identified himself as working for the Pratt campaign on his social media accounts.

Brown posted many aggressive statements up through 2026, including calls for transgender people to be put in “asylums,” a post calling for immigration agents to physically attack observers and posts railing against Jewish and Muslim people. In one post, Brown calls himself a “White Christian Nationalist.”

Little, Pratt’s opponent and a former state senator, highlighted the posts and gathered community leaders and DFL lawmakers at the Minnesota Capitol on Thursday to call for the staffer’s removal.

“This type of rhetoric from a candidate or their staff is unacceptable,” Little said.

Imam Yusuf Abdulle, the executive director of the Islamic Association of North America, urged Pratt to remove Brown from his campaign.

“When Jewish people face antisemitism, Black Americans are attacked through racist stereotypes, or Muslims and other communities are demonized for political gain, the dignity and safety of every American is threatened,” Abdulle said.

The Pratt campaign did not respond to questions about why Brown’s public posts hadn’t prevented him from being hired.

A Washington County judge on Thursday sentenced a woman who made repeated threats of violence against Minnesota’s House Speaker Lisa Demuth to supervised probation and community service.

Rachel Welsch, of Hugo, pleaded guilty in July to one felony count of making threats of violence. She made a series of calls to Demuth, R-Cold Spring, beginning in January and left voicemails insinuating that she would commit violence against her.

Washington County Judge Juanita C. Freeman sentenced Welsch to three years of supervised probation and 180 hours of community service work. She is also barred from contacting Demuth and her staff and possessing firearms during the course of her probation. Welsch also must complete mental health counseling.

The Washington County Attorney’s Office sought longer probation and community service sentences for Welsch. They said given the assassination of former DFL House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and the attempted assassination of DFL state Sen. John Hoffman and members of his family showed that threats of violence are serious and pose a real danger.

Demuth, now the GOP nominee for governor, told MPR News that she felt the sentence was appropriate. She urged people to avoid making threats when they disagree politically.

“Threats of violence are illegal. You cannot make threats of violence. Whether it's by phone or anything like that, you can't do that,” Demuth said. “I think we have every right to express differences of opinions, but violence and threats of violence have no place in Minnesota or any place else in the political realm or any other.”

She noted that if the threats had come before the assassinations of her legislative colleague, she might not have taken them seriously. Minnesota public safety officials report that threats against elected officials have surged in recent years.

Lawmakers took steps to add safeguards to track and investigate threats and to boost security of elected officials and judges earlier this year.

At the Republican midterm convention in Dallas, President Trump made a stunning and implausible pledge: to send every American adult a $5,000 cash dividend. But only if his party maintains control of the House and the Senate in November's midterms.

"If the Republicans win, you win with us," Trump said to applause. "And it will be called the 'Trump dividend'. Congratulations. Now all we have to do is win."

That's a big "if." Republicans are facing significant political headwinds.

"We might not win," Trump admitted.

Quick math puts the bill for this proposed "dividend" at more than $1 trillion. Plus, it's illegal to pay or be paid to influence voting.

Trump's speech last night was a wide ranging, rally-style speech where he did everything from defend the Iran war to criticize the fashion sense of one Republican Senate candidate. He attacked Democrats as communist and extremists and begged Republicans to vote in November as if he were on the ballot.

"Please pretend that I'm running," he said. "If we don't have the majorities, so much can be lost."

Trump spoke for an hour and 44 minutes, far longer than scheduled.

He will deliver closing remarks tonight as well.

"But I'm not doing a big deal like this," he joked. "I gave you a lot of material. I don't have to do it twice."

The two-night event, hatched by Trump, was meant for Republicans to energize the base ahead of the midterms.

"It took a little imagination to think of it," Trump said of the first ever Republican midterm convention.

In a preview of what to expect tonight, the focus on Trump was clear as the event kicked off Wednesday, with a lineup of Republican lawmakers, candidates and everyday Americans, praising the president and his policies. It was capped off by Trump's headlining speech.

Speaking to an arena with whole sections of empty seats, Trump rallied the party faithful.

"The midterms are not supposed to be won by [the party of] the sitting president, and we're going to change that," Trump said, promising to visit the states and districts of every Republican facing a close race.

Tonight, Trump will share the convention's final hour with Vice President Vance. By the time Republicans hold their next convention in 2028, Trump will no longer be the center of the party's attention. There will be a new nominee and de facto party leader charting a course for Republicans.

The program tonight will include a tribute to the late republican activist Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated one year ago, and an observance of the 25th anniversary of the September 11th attacks, which is Friday.

MAGA celebrities and cabinet members will also grace the stage tonight. Former White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt is set to speak, along with Donald Trump Jr. and Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Over the course of the convention, 19 Republicans in competitive House and Senate races will deliver short stump speeches. Many of them have used the stage to position the Republican Party as the party of the American people, painting Democrats as aligned with "socialism" and "communism."

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is running to represent the state in the US Senate made those points, but also used his speech to ask for money.

"I need your prayers, your vote and your support," Paxton said. "If we lose Texas, we lose the common sense revolution. If we lose the common sense revolution, we lose America."

His Democratic opponent, state Rep. James Talarico has a campaign cash advantage but Trump's Super PAC, MAGA Inc. just committed to spend $10 million, propping up Paxton and hitting Talarico. A Republican shouldn't be in a tight race in Texas, but Paxton has been plagued by scandal and weak fundraising.

Trump, in his remarks, urged Texans to vote for Paxton despite what the president considers to be his flaws.

"Some may not like the way he dresses. I don't," Trump said as part of a lengthy and lighthearted critique of the man he endorsed.

Copyright 2026, NPR

A new audit suggests the state needs to better regulate how assisted living facilities are licensed.

A Minnesota’s Office of the Legislative Auditor report published Wednesday found that a report card program designed for the public to compare group homes and other assisted living facilities does not include information about serious maltreatment findings. It also found that 40 percent of inspections of assisted living facilities were more than 90 days late.

“[The report card] is kind of the one way in which the state says anything about the quality of assisted living facilities compared to one another,” said David Kirchner, an audit project manager with the Office of the Legislative Auditor. “We found that some facilities that have been cited for fairly serious violations had average or even high ratings in these report card ratings.”

The report from the legislative auditor follows a series of investigations by MPR News and APM Reports into Minnesota’s booming group home industry. One investigation found that a government official in Liberia was running group homes in Minnesota while living and working overseas. Another investigation found that a group home was initially fined only $1,000 after a resident was found dead in the group home's backyard.

“The star rating ideally would reflect those [maltreatment] findings,” said Temporary Department of Human Services Commissioner John Connolly. “We agree that this needs work.”

MPR News and APM Reports reviewed thousands of state maltreatment investigations and found that at least 50 residents have died since 2022. In 19 of those cases, state investigators concluded the homes had neglected those vulnerable people. But even when a resident dies, fines are often capped at $5,000 for neglect and it’s uncommon for a facility’s license to be revoked.

Historically in Minnesota, the Department of Human Services has overseen group homes. But since 2009, there’s been a moratorium in place prohibiting the department from licensing any new group homes. Still, providers were able to seek exemptions from the Department of Human Services, or receive a license from the Health Department to open a group home as a small assisted living facility.

But no matter which state agency licenses the group homes, the Department of Human Services pays the bills, because it administers the state’s Medicaid program, also called Medical Assistance. That means Health Department-licensed group homes are jointly overseen by both agencies. Auditors said that dual oversight has created potential problems when it comes to licensing.

The report card was designed to help people with mental or physical disabilities or their family members compare different group homes and other assisted living facilities. The report card tool is managed by the Department of Human Services, even though the facilities are licensed by the Department of Health. Auditors said the Legislature appropriated $6.7 million for the report card tool.

The Department of Human Services only uses information from routine, biennial inspections when creating the report card, and does not include any information from maltreatment investigations.

A Human Services administrator told an auditor that developers intended to incorporate both types of investigations into their report card ratings but said the different formats of investigation findings and inspection findings “created challenges.” The audit also found that the report cards do not indicate when the Health Department has suspended or revoked a facility’s license.

The audit also found that the Health Department has a significant backlog in inspections. Only 29 percent of the inspections due in the first half of 2025 were completed on time.

A review of the state’s Assisted Living Report Card website found that the state gave a five-star rating for safety to a Golden Touch Health Care facility, the group home company run by Liberian government official Sekou Dukuly, where a 46-year-old woman with a serious lung condition died after collapsing on the bathroom floor.

The state determined the facility neglected her because its staff members weren’t trained in CPR. The state revoked licenses for Golden Touch Health Care group homes, citing “credible allegations of Medicaid fraud,” following reporting by MPR News and APM Reports.

Questioned about Golden Touch Health Care’s report card, Health Department Deputy Commissioner Wendy Underwood said, “We are continually working with DHS on how to improve and collaborate and work together and I think those things happen in real time and we’re continuing to do that every day."

The state also gave a three-star rating for resident health and a four-star rating for safety to a group home in Brooklyn Center where a resident who had been missing for 20 days was found dead of a suspected overdose in her bedroom. Police said she had been dead “for a significant amount of time.” It also gave Fortunate Homes, where a man who went missing was found dead 29 hours later in the facility’s backyard, a four-star rating for resident health and a five-star rating for staffing.

“It’s just a failure of the system again,” said Julie Riggs, whose husband Ryan died in the backyard of the Fortunate Homes facility. “Families need to know if somebody died there.”

The Health Department hasn't shared clear, accurate data with the Human Services Department about licensure status and facility capacity, the audit said. In one case, an assisted living facility licensed for only six residents received Medical Assistance payments for 18 residents during a single month in 2024. The same year, over 100 facilities were paid for more than their licensed capacity, the audit found. Most of those providers ran multiple facilities, but the audit couldn't explain some of the discrepancies.

The state has traditionally relied on county case managers to check if all those services are being provided. But the audit said that approach might miss staffing shortages that affect the entire group home.

Among its recommendations, the legislative auditor’s office said the Human Services department should improve its assisted living report card methodology and request additional data-gathering authority from the Legislature if necessary.

The report also raised concerns that the fragmented oversight of the industry could lead to gaps in oversight and overpayment and pointed out that Health Department inspectors have not been verifying whether assisted living facilities are providing care consistent with what’s being billed to the Human Services Department. In May, the Minnesota Legislature set aside $150,000 for the Health Department to find a new way to license group homes currently classified as assisted living facilities.

APM Reports journalist Jennifer Lu contributed to this story.

Kelly Rand's teenage twin boys playing hockey in St. Paul, Minnesota, are going through growth spurts that force the family to buy new equipment what seems like all the time.

The goaltender’s $400 helmet in 2022 now runs $1,000. The chest protector they got last year for $465 now goes for $900.

For a sport that is increasingly expensive for everything from gear and ice time to travel and coaching, the latest round of 50 percent tariffs levied by President Donald Trump’s administration against Canada was most unwelcome news as they threaten to ramp up prices even more.

“If a kid on the ice breaks a stick, every other parent is looking at that mom or dad going, ‘Ahhh oh, no!’” Rand said. “You feel for them. How many $400 sticks can you afford in one season?”

Hockey sticks and skates are among the more than 550 goods named in the tariffs by the White House. Custom equipment is also manufactured by True Hockey in Canada and imported into the U.S., according to B&R Sports Director of E-commerce John Merola, who said skates and goalie gear fit into that category.

An average stick is now $200, Merola said, with high-end versions ranging up to $400. He noted that Bauer, CCM and True still make many custom items in Canada.

“This not a minor blip by by any means,” Sports & Fitness Industry Association CEO Todd Smith said. “Even if manufacturers have moved over the last several years from Canada to other countries, there’s still healthy amount being manufactured in Canada and, yeah, this 50 percent tariff is a big deal.”

Rising prices and popularity amid production shifts

When Rand’s family bought custom goalie gear a couple of years ago, the entire setup cost $3,300. Skate pairs that in 2016 went for between $80 and $900 are now $200 to $1,230, according to HockeySkates DB, a database that charts the prices from various companies.

Inflation, as well as tariffs on other countries, are behind the price jumps in recent years. The Sports & Fitness Industry Association’s manufacturers sales report said the amount spent on hockey equipment increased 45.4 percent from 2020-25, up to $332.9 million from $228.9 million, dovetailing with increasing participation in the sport.

According to U.S. International Trade Commission data, which does not separate ice and field hockey equipment, gear from Canada made up roughly 8.5 percent of imports last year, fourth behind 52.7 percent from China, 13.2 percent from Vietnam and 9.5 percent from Thailand. Of the 2.1 million hockey sticks imported last year, trade data shows more than 1.5 million (74.1 percent) came from China and 268,000 (12.8 percent) from Mexico, compared to 18,909 (0.9 percent) from Canada.

Chris Douglas, a professor of economics at the University of Michigan-Flint, called it unlikely that stick prices will go up 50 percent across the board, noting Canada’s modest market share, but wonders what will happen if demand increases.

“Maybe that causes the price of hockey sticks to rise somewhat — maybe by $50 or something like that,” Douglas said. “Hockey is expensive with the equipment, ice time and so forth, so maybe there’s a family right on the margin where $50 or $100 in additional cost causes them not to enroll their kids at hockey any longer.”

The question is how long the tariffs will last

When Trump imposed tariffs on China, Merola said that had a bigger impact on business but not right away.

“Bauer, CCM — the big, heavy hitters in the market — came in and said: ‘We’ll absorb these costs. Don’t worry about it,’” Merola said. “And then as nothing happened, they kind of came back and said, ‘We can’t cover this, so we’re gonna have to increase pricing.’”

That wait-and-see approach could happen again this time, delaying how long manufacturers and retailers pass on the increase to consumers. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney saidtrade talks could resume if Washington became serious about negotiations.

Douglas said it all comes down to expectations for how long the tariffs will be in place.

“It’s hard to form expectations of the current tariff regime where tariffs are changing basically every day, it seems like,” Douglas said. “But if there’s an expectation that tariffs are going to be permanent or at least in place for the long term, then I think prices rise pretty instantaneously because the cost of production has risen and that gets passed on to consumers via a higher price.”

Merola thinks long-term tariffs will lead companies to move more production to the U.S., Asia or elsewhere. Roustan Hockey, the last major hockey stick factory in Canada, last week reaffirmed it will keep making them there, despite the challenges.

“We remain committed to our employees, our customers and our manufacturing operations here in Canada,” founder W. Graeme Roustan said in a statement after hosting federal minister Evan Solomon for a tour of the facility in Brantford, Ontario.

The Sports & Fitness Industry Association is advocating for the tariffs to go away, especially given what Smith said was a 7 percent increase in hockey participation in the U.S. over the past three years, a boom attributed to the 4 Nations Face-Off, Winter Olympics and more.

While pointing out the National Hockey League, USA Hockey and teams have contributed significant efforts with learn to play programs that include free equipment and ice time, Smith is concerned about the long-term impact of tariffs.

“This has, obviously, the potential to really stunt that growth,” he said. “It couldn’t be a worse time for tariffs to hit in terms of really having the having the possibility to increase costs.”

Most Republicans in top Minnesota offices or seeking them are skipping a national party convention or reluctant to say if they’ll be in Dallas this week for an event that President Donald Trump pushed for to rally the GOP and raise money in a tough election year.

MPR News contacted several GOP campaigns about whether the candidate will attend the convention that begins Wednesday and concludes with a primetime speech from Trump on Thursday.

U.S. Rep. Pete Stauber's campaign says the northern Minnesota congressman plans to be there at least one of the days.

U.S. Senate nominee Michele Tafoya's campaign says she is not going.

State Sen. Eric Pratt won't attend either, citing a full schedule back home as he competes for a U.S. House seat in the competitive 2nd Congressional District.

The campaigns for U.S. House members Brad Finstad, Michelle Fischbach and Tom Emmer didn't respond. Emmer is the third-ranking Republican in the U.S. House.

The Republican National Committee announced over the weekend that Emmer is on the list of convention speakers, and the House GOP is hosting a series of major fundraisers during the convention’s run.

For Republicans, their fall fortunes might be tied to Trump no matter what. But with Trump’s approval rating sagging, it makes navigating the GOP midterm convention with him as the central figure difficult for some.

"President Trump isn't very popular with independent voters,” said Kathryn Pearson, a professor of political science at the University of Minnesota. "And so, Republicans running in competitive states, competitive districts, will think twice about whether or not they should go to Dallas and be seen with the president when they're really trying to distance themselves from the president at home."

The state GOP is sending a 45-person delegation but hasn't said who is in it.

Politico reports it contacted 70 GOP candidates, at least 45 of them said they were not attending.

At the Minnesota State Fair last week, Republican governor nominee Lisa Demuth greeted voters as a heavy downpour hit.

"I won't be attending,” Demuth, the state House speaker, said about the convention.

She said she wants to “stay focused” with the election less than two months out. “I'll be here in Minnesota working with the people here in Minnesota, and our schedule is completely packed."

Demuth said she doesn't believe the event will have a big bearing on the campaign.

"I don't think the midterm convention will impact the change that Minnesotans are desperate for-that fresh start, the change in direction, because of what we've experienced with the fraud and the waste here,” she said.

Ford Johnson, a Republican voter from Little Canada, said he can see positives and negatives for candidates.

"I think any time you can interact with the public a little bit more and get your message out to, not just parties or systems of politics, and instead of just the average person, it's a good thing,” he said. "At the end of the day, it's going to just be a Trump rally the whole time, and that doesn't help our seats as much as they should."

Still, he said Trump has a strong base and has historically been strong at getting voters excited and to the polls.

Pearson said Republican candidates are in a tough position.

"Those Republicans who don't go, I don't think will be honest about the reasons they're not going. I think they'll cite scheduling conflicts and a host of other reasons,” she said. “Because, for the most part, Republicans don't want to criticize the president, even as they may want to distance themselves from the president."

State DFL Party Chair Richard Carlbom said Republican candidates can't easily escape Trump's shadow.

“Republicans are either racing towards Trump in order to get some of the money he has, you know, the $400 million war chest he has, or they're just doing everything they can to prove their support of him,” he said.

Deputy Republican Party Chair Donna Bergstrom said the Dallas convention tickets have been popular. But she said candidates have to decide between things like time on the campaign trail and meeting more donors.

"The question really comes down to what are you going to gain from it,” she said.

But she doesn't think skipping it is a slight to the president.

"I don't think people are necessarily shying away from Trump,” she said. “I think people really feel strongly for the good things he's done, and there have been many of those."

Germany's populist, far-right Alternative for Germany party has declared victory in the state of Saxony-Anhalt after more than doubling its share of the vote in the first of several regional elections this fall.

Falling just shy of an absolute majority, it's not yet clear whether the AfD will be able to govern the state of Saxony-Anhalt. But the outcome is already causing a political earthquake.

According to preliminary final results, the AfD won 43.8 percent of the vote — its strongest performance in any German state election, which puts the far-right party within reach of power for the first time since the time of Nazi Germany.

The center-right Christian Democratic Union more than halved its share of the vote, falling to a historic low of 17.2 percent. The centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) received 9.3 percent, the Greens 8.9%, and the Left party 8.6 percent.

All of these parties refuse to form a coalition with the AfD. But the AfD can come to power with the help of BSW, a small, anti-immigration, left-wing populist party. BSW got 5.3 percent of the vote on Sunday, potentially giving it enough seats to form a parliamentary majority with the AfD — something the party has not ruled out.

AfD's candidate for state governor, Ulrich Siegmund, said the result "sends a very clear signal to Berlin: this is the end of the line; people don't want to go on like this."
"They want their good, old, secure Germany back," Siegmund told German public broadcaster, ARD.

Christian Democrat candidate Sven Schulze took to the stage on Sunday evening to congratulate the AfD on its win. While polls had shown the AfD with a comfortable lead for weeks, the CDU fared worse than predicted.

Whether Schulze will attempt to cobble together a "firewall" coalition — a platform by Germany's main political parties to keep the AfD out of government — is unclear. Such a strategy would require the Christian Democrats and others to work with the far-left party, Die Linke — something the conservatives refuse to do.

Addressing supporters, Schulze sounded resigned.

"Some say this is a dark day for Saxony-Anhalt. I say this is democracy," he said.

Alice Weidel, co-chair of AfD at the federal level, told public broadcaster ZDF that the CDU will never win another election. She said the AfD is seeing "explosive growth" across the country.

In Saxony-Anhalt, that growth is down to 35-year-old Siegmund, a former marketing executive and a salesman who, observers say, showed a knack for packaging his party's policies in positive slogans and pop-star-like appearances at campaign events and on TikTok.

His personable and amiable style is uncharacteristically upbeat for the AfD and he distinguishes himself from others in the party for being more happy-go-lucky than angry.

Germany's domestic intelligence classifies the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt as extremist. Its regional platform is the party's most radical and is seen by the AfD as a blueprint for the rest of Germany.

If Siegmund ends up as state governor, he will be privy to foreign and domestic intelligence, which is a major concern for the other parties considering the AfD's push to revive relations with Russia. Several state interior ministers from Germany's other 15 states say they are already preparing to meet separately.

At the top of their platform agenda is what the AfD calls its "remigration" policy, which promises mass deportations. Speaking to public broadcaster ARD on Sunday night, Siegmund spelled out the policy in more detail.

"Remigration is far more than just deportation," he said, adding that "remigration applies to anyone who does not contribute to society." He included Ukrainian refugees without jobs.

The AfD also wants to segregate refugees and disabled children in schools and revamp the curriculum to focus on what it refers to as a "more positive" teaching of Germany's history.

After the results, Siegmund declared: "We have made history in this country."

"This isn't just about Saxony-Anhalt," he told supporters, "It's a signal for the whole of Germany - a self-confident signal."

On Sunday evening, President Trump posted a screenshot of the projected election results on Truth Social. Trump's post was shared by Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev, who described the result as a "historic win."

The AfD has called for an end to support for Ukraine and seeking to revoke the refugee protections currently granted to Ukrainians.

Also among those hailing AfD's success was Tesla CEO Elon Musk. In response, Siegmund thanked Musk for his "support" and "clear and highly important perspective on the political developments of our time."

But neighboring Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk took a very different view, posting on X that "in Poland, only idiots or traitors can rejoice at the triumph of the AfD in Germany."

France's Europe minister, Benjamin Haddad, described the election results as a "grave moment in Europe."

Copyright 2026, NPR

The Trump administration has again asked the Supreme Court to allow the U.S. Postal Service's plan to restrict mail-in voting for the midterm elections.

In an emergency application on Sunday, lawyers for the government urged the high court to clear the way for new USPS rules on federal mail ballots to fully go into effect. For now, key parts of that plan are blocked by a preliminary injunction that a federal judge in Boston released on Sept. 4.

That ruling, by U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani, replaced an earlier temporary order, which the Trump administration had asked the Supreme Court last week to review.

The Supreme Court is not expected to issue a ruling on the administration's Sunday request until sometime after 4 p.m. ET on Wednesday. That's the deadline Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson has set for legal briefs from the plan's challengers, although the administration has asked Jackson to immediately pause the injunction against USPS while the high court prepares to rule.

Meanwhile, the administration has also asked the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review the judge's injunction. Based on deadlines for legal briefs that the appeals court has set, the 1st Circuit is not expected to decide whether to pause the injunction until sometime after 5 p.m. ET on Tuesday.

As the legal fight over Trump's mail-in voting order continues, here's what to know about the state of voting by mail for the midterms:

Has the USPS plan directly changed mail-in voting for the midterms?

No, key parts of the plan, including requirements for states, are currently blocked by a court order. Voting by mail is still available to all voters who are eligible for it in their states, and USPS is expected to deliver mail-in ballots for the midterm election as usual.

How could the USPS plan change mail-in voting?

State election officials would be required to turn over lists of mail-in voters' names and addresses to USPS and have certain barcodes on their mail ballot envelopes, according to a revised rule for federal ballot mail the Postal Service issued in August. USPS says it would not deliver ballots to voters for election officials that don't meet those requirements.

When does mail-in voting start for the midterms?

North Carolina has to start mailing out its absentee ballots on Friday, which officially kicks off the voting season for this year's midterms. Many other states are set to begin sending out their mail-in ballots later this month.

Is it possible for the USPS plan to be carried out for the midterms?

Many election experts say it is too late for USPS to carry out this plan without causing major disruptions. A whistleblower report claims USPS has not properly tested the online portal system that would collect mail-in voters' information. The report also alleges the agency has set up a policy for verifying ballot envelopes that could result in many voters not getting their ballots in time for the midterm election or at all.

What are the legal arguments for and against the USPS plan?

USPS came up with this plan in response to a March executive order by President Trump, who said he issued the directives to USPS to stop illegal voting by non-U.S. citizens. Many studies and audits show, however, that problem is incredibly rare. While USPS claims its revised rule is an effort to regulate mail, challengers of the USPS plan argue it is illegal because the mailing agency has no authority to control voting by mail.

Hasn't the Supreme Court already ruled on Trump's mail-in voting order?

Yes, the Supreme Court ruled in August on a procedural question about one of the lawsuits. But so far, the justices have not ruled on the legality of the order or the USPS plan.

How long has mail-in voting been around in the United States?

Historians consider the Civil War election of 1864 — the year Abraham Lincoln was reelected president — as the start of large-scale voting by mail, although there are earlier examples of mail-in voting at the state and local levels going back to the 18th century.

Editor's note: USPS is a financial supporter of NPR.

Edited by Megan Pratz

Copyright 2026, NPR

There are plenty of issues Republicans and Democrats disagree on, but increasingly, they're aligned on this: they want Flock surveillance cameras gone.

The widespread backlash against AI-powered license plate readers, which allow police to track people over time, is becoming more of a political issue as the midterm elections approach in races from Florida to Ohio and Wisconsin.

At a press conference late last month, Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro said he believes law enforcement needs public safety tools, but Flock cameras are not among them.

"I would welcome bipartisan legislation to ban these across the state," Shapiro said. "This is not something in the public interest."

Earlier this week, Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis announced plans to revoke permits for license plate readers on state highways.

"I'm all about having law enforcement have tools," DeSantis said. "But I don't want to have this become a surveillance state."

Every month, Flock cameras capture billions of license plates, along with other vehicle data. Police say this tool helps them find stolen vehicles and missing people. But the technology has been abused. Officers have used it to stalk ex-partners, for instance.

Flock recently changed some of its features to prevent abuse.

But the concerns are proving sticky, and largely bipartisan. Last week, Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott froze state spending for the cameras. And Senate Republicans are investigating concerns over police misuse.

Jay Stanley, a senior policy analyst at the ACLU, says a wide swath of people across the political spectrum opposes Flock cameras. Americans have a strong distaste for government surveillance, Stanley said.

"Now you have to live your life with what sociologists call the third eye that is watching you," he said, "and I think a lot of Americans don't want to live that way."

The reasons people on the left and right oppose Flock are different.

Progressives have pointed out that the technology has been used to track immigrants and people seeking abortions.

Conservatives have warned that the cameras could be used to create a national gun registry.

Others, such as conservative commentator Glenn Beck, say it's a form of government overreach.

"You cannot allow this to happen. We are creating a panopticon," he said, referring to a circular prison design that allows a single guard to see all the inmates at once.

Many people find that unsettling, regardless of political party. Recent polling shows that more Americans now disapprove of Flock Cameras than approve of them.

Copyright 2026, NPR

In campaign ads airing everywhere from Georgia to Iowa, Republicans and Democrats are confronting the same enemy: data centers powering the artificial intelligence boom.

An NPR analysis of political advertising data from the firm AdImpact found that since January, campaigns and outside groups have spent more than $45 million on ads mentioning data centers in this year's gubernatorial, House and Senate races.

The two major parties driving that spending are largely making the same argument: the sprawling facilities get too many tax breaks, drive up electricity bills and need reining in.

From January to August, spending was nearly identical: over $22 million supported Republican candidates and more than $21 million for Democratic candidates, with independents driving the rest. Still, Democrats ran almost twice as many ads as Republicans — 127 compared to 67 — and spread their messaging across more states and races. The ads are clustered in states with competitive races, like Wisconsin and Michigan.

Mentions of data centers have grown from just a handful in ads from January, to 62 in June, more than 110 in July and about 164 in August, as the election draws nearer and the issue continues to heat up.

A June Reuters/Ipsos poll found that 77% of Americans are concerned about data centers raising electricity costs and two-thirds of Democrats and half of Republicans said they'd oppose a data center in their community.

This bipartisan anxiety helps explain why candidates in both parties are talking about the issue. Michael Franz, co-director of the Wesleyan Media Project, which tracks political advertising, said data centers give each side the talking points it wants.

Apart from a chance to talk about affordability, "Democrats can latch on to environmental concerns," Franz said, adding that for Republicans, criticizing data centers is a way "to go in opposition to big corporations, in opposition to a system that doesn't care about you."

Data centers are a unique issue where "MAGA Republicans and liberal Democrats" land in the same place, he said.

The convergence around affordability

Ads from both parties are tying data centers to rising energy costs.

A Believe in Wisconsin PAC ad for Wisconsin's Democratic gubernatorial nominee David Crowley, which the group spent $634,795 to air in August, promises that Crowley "will lower costs, make housing affordable, stop AI data centers from making your energy bills skyrocket."

Byron Donalds, Florida's Republican gubernatorial nominee, casts himself as a check on data centers, by vowing to "protect Florida families and communities from data centers that jack up utility rates and make everything else more expensive," and "fight for a ratepayer protection plan." The Friends of Byron Donalds PAC paid over $2.5 million to air the ad.

Similar ads have run in support of Democrat Rob Sand in Iowa and Republican Ty Masterson in Kansas.

A Republican Party operative spoke to NPR about this on condition of anonymity, and said the party is not commenting publicly on data centers because the views within the party vary. They said "The most popular answer that we've seen is: We could potentially have data centers as long as they pay for their own energy," adding that data centers are necessary to win the race against China "and increase jobs in local communities."

Similarly, Olivia Davis, a spokeswoman for the Democratic Governors Association said data centers are creating deep concerns around affordability and utility costs.

"That's why it's being included in paid media," she said.

Georgia and Ohio: where data centers take center stage

According to data from AdImpact, more than half of the GOP's spending on ads mentioning data centers has been in Georgia and the state has captured about 30% of total spending on data center ads.

Georgia's contest for governor is the race that has spent the most on ads mentioning data centers — $12.8 million across nine ads.

Six ads discouraged voters from backing Republican Lt. Gov. Burt Jones who lost the June runoff to healthcare billionaire Rick Jackson. The ads, some of which were run by Georgians for Integrity, a group that has dropped millions attacking Jones since 2025, used data centers as a bogeyman for Jones' alleged corruption.

In Ohio's U.S. Senate race, supporters of Democratic nominee Sherrod Brown have spent millions to describe his opponent, Republican Sen. Jon Husted, as the "the face of data centers," and accuse him of "giving corporations over $2.5 billion in out of control tax breaks and causing electric bills to spike by thousands of dollars."

Republicans are aware of the shifting tide. In an internal memo obtained by NPR and first reported by Axios, the National Republican Senatorial Committee singled out the Ohio race, called data centers a "sleeper issue for the entire election cycle," and warned the tech industry that a Husted loss would make politicians nationwide wary of them.

Husted isn't airing ads on the topic. He championed data centers as Ohio's lieutenant governor but has since introduced congressional legislation to protect ratepayers from the higher electric rates that data centers can cause.

In an interview with Spectrum News, Husted addressed a seeming shift in his position.

"It's not really a shift. I was always trying to hold these companies accountable by making them pay local property taxes," he said, also highlighting his push to require the companies to hire locally. "So this is very consistent for me, holding them accountable."

A local issue with national attention

The Ohio contest is a rare Senate race with heavy spending on ads mentioning data centers.

According to AdImpact data, gubernatorial races spent the most on such ads, about $32 million, with House races in second place, spending $8 million and Senate races coming in third at roughly $5.3 million.

"The federal government doesn't really play a role in permitting the construction of new data centers," said Darrell M. West, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution's Center for Technology Innovation and co-editor in chief of TechTank. "Governors are under a lot of pressure to slow the construction of new data centers just based on public opposition to them."

The issue, however, has spilled beyond gubernatorial races. In some of the country's marquee Senate contests, candidates such as Texas's Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico have said that Washington should step in.

The Republican turn against data centers is more striking because experts say that the party has positioned itself as pro-business. West said Republican incumbents and nominees "want to slow down the movement towards data centers because they can see so many of their own voters are opposed."

That leaves the party at odds with President Trump who has urged states to keep building data centers while admitting that they could "use a little public relations help."

"Trump seems oblivious to public opinion on a number of fronts," said West. "Typically, when the public shifts, politicians shift with them. Trump is not doing that on data centers."

Copyright 2026, NPR