Politics

By Jarrett Renshaw

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden is calling on his administration and Congress to explore ways to boost U.S. energy production and reduce OPEC’s control over energy prices after the cartel’s “shortsighted” production cut, the White House said on Wednesday.

Biden will also continue to direct releases from the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve “as necessary,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan and National Economic Council Director Brian Deese said in a statement.

Previously, the White House had committed to ending releases from the Strategic Petroleum Reserves in the coming weeks, but said on Wednesday it will continue to release them “as appropriate.” Earlier this year, Biden ordered up to 180 million barrels released from the reserve.

OPEC+ at a Vienna meeting on Wednesday ignored pleas from the White House to keep oil flowing and agreed to cut output by 2 million barrels per day, its deepest cuts in production since the 2020 COVID pandemic.

“The President is disappointed by the shortsighted decision by OPEC+ to cut production quotas while the global economy is dealing with the continued negative impact of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine,” the statement said.

(Reporting by Susan Heavey and Jarrett Renshaw; editing by Tim Ahmann and David Gregorio)

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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Republican Tim Michels was talking to a roomful of party activists in early September when he fielded a question about his position on abortion. Michels vowed he would never change, and said he was “winning” his race against Democratic Gov. Tim Evers precisely because people saw him as “a man of conviction, a man who doesn’t waffle.”

Two weeks later, Michels retreated from his unqualified support for Wisconsin’s 1849 law banning abortion except to save the life of the mother, saying if elected he would sign legislation to grant exceptions for rape and incest.

It wasn’t the first time Michels changed course on a significant issue. Since getting into the race in April, Michels endorsed Donald Trump for a 2024 run, after first declining to support anyone; said the state’s bipartisan election commission should be eliminated, after first saying he wanted to keep it; and began welcoming big-dollar donations after earlier saying he wouldn’t take any larger than $500.

Michels and Evers are in a close race with broad implications for national politics in 2024 and beyond. Evers has highlighted his status as the only barrier to total GOP control, including his vetoes this year of Republican legislation that would have made it more difficult for some voters to cast ballots in the key battleground state. A Michels victory would give the GOP free rein to pass those changes and more.

It’s the most expensive governor’s race in the nation in terms of ad spending, with both sides spending about $55 million on TV so far, according to AdImpact Politics, which tracks spending by major campaigns.

Michels declined an interview request. But when asked about his change in position at a campaign stop Tuesday, Michels said, “I’ve been very clear and consistent throughout that I am pro-life, and I make no apologies for that.”

Michels said he would sign a bill creating abortion exceptions in cases of rape and incest because if the Legislature passes it, that means “the people have spoken.”

It’s not clear whether Michels will pay any price with voters for his evolving position on abortion or other issues. Brandon Scholz, a Republican strategist, said he doubted it. Most voters have already decided whom they support, he said.

“The independents that started in this race after the primary have picked their sides,” Scholz said. “Republicans have made up their minds on Michels. I don’t see anything out there that would move Republicans to vote for Tony Evers.”

That hasn’t stopped Evers from seeking to batter Michels on the abortion issue.

“It’s not surprising he would make a last-minute, dishonest attempt to hide his radical record on abortion, education, and more,” Evers said in a statement to The Associated Press.

Michels is in his first campaign since an unsuccessful run for U.S. Senate 18 years ago. Barry Burden, a political science professor and director of the Elections Research Center at the University of Wisconsin, said such candidates “make mistakes sometimes.”

“They say things that commit then to a position or a path that they eventually don’t want to be on so that creates inconsistencies with their positions as they try to walk back earlier views,” he said.

Michels’ abortion shift came after a primary fight where his chief rival, former Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, also opposed the rape and incest exceptions. After winning, Michels clearly came under pressure to soften his position, Burden said.

A Marquette University Law School poll taken shortly before Michels’ reversal found 83% of respondents — including 70% of Republicans — supported exceptions for rape and incest.

“Abortion is a little bit of a worrying sign for Republicans as an issue and it might be the only thing that ends up saving some Democrats who are having a tough go of it,” Burden said.

To push back, Michels accuses Evers of breaking promises with voters on a variety of issues, including changes in approach to fighting COVID-19 in 2020. He also points out that Evers proposed tax increases, after saying he didn’t intend to raise taxes, and then later took credit for tax cuts passed by the GOP-controlled Legislature that he signed into law.

As part of his strategy to make the race about crime and safety, Michels has also attacked Evers over his administration paroling people convicted of murder and rape and said that Evers has broken his promise made in 2018 not to release violent offenders.

Evers does not determine who is granted parole, something that has occurred routinely under both Republican and Democratic governors for decades.

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Follow AP for full coverage of the midterms at https://apnews.com/hub/2022-midterm-elections and on Twitter at https://twitter.com/ap_politics

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawyers for former President Donald Trump asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday to step into the legal fight over the classified documents seized during an FBI raid of his Florida estate, escalating a dispute over the powers of an independent arbiter appointed to inspect the records.

The Trump team asked the justices to overturn a lower court ruling and allow the arbiter, called a special master, to review the roughly 100 documents with classification markings that that were taken in the Aug. 8 search of Mar-a-Lago.

A three-judge panel from the Atlanta-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit last month limited the special master’s review to the much larger tranche of non-classified documents. The judges, including two Trump appointees, sided with the Justice Department, which had argued there was no legal basis for the special master to conduct his own review of the classified records.

But Trump’s lawyers said in their application to the Supreme Court that it was essential for the special master to have access to the classified records to “determine whether documents bearing classification markings are in fact classified, and regardless of classification, whether those records are personal records or Presidential records.”

“Since President Trump had absolute authority over classification decisions during his Presidency, the current status of any disputed document cannot possibly be determined solely by reference to the markings on that document,” the application states.

It says that without the special master review, “the unchallenged views of the current Justice Department would supersede the established authority of the Chief Executive.” An independent review, the Trump team says, ensures a “transparent process that provides much-needed oversight.”

The FBI says it seized roughly 11,000 documents, including about 100 with classification markings, during its search. The Trump team asked a judge in Florida, Aileen Cannon, to appoint a special master to do an independent review of the records.

Cannon subsequently assigned a veteran Brooklyn judge, Raymond Dearie, to review the records and segregate those that may be protected by claims of attorney-client privilege and executive privilege. She also barred the FBI from being able to use the classified documents as part of its criminal investigation.

The Justice Department appealed, prompting the 11th Circuit to lift Cannon’s hold on investigators’ ability to scrutinize the classified records. The appeals court also ruled that the department did not have to provide Dearie with access to the classified records.

Trump’s lawyers submitted the Supreme Court application to Justice Clarence Thomas, who oversees emergency matters from Florida and several other Southern states. Thomas can act on his own or, as is usually done, refer the emergency appeal to the rest of the court. Late Tuesday the court said the government was being asked to respond to the petition by Oct. 11.

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Biden planned to meet Wednesday with residents and small business owners in Fort Myers, and to thank government officials providing emergency aid and removing debris.

“There will be plenty of time, plenty of time, to discuss differences between the president and the governor — but now is not the time,” Jean-Pierre told reporters at a White House briefing. “When it comes to delivering and making sure that the people of Florida have what they need, especially after Hurricane Ian, we are one. We are working as one.”

Before the storm hit, the president had intended to visit the Florida cities of Orlando and Fort Lauderdale last week, where he planned to stress his efforts to strengthen Social Security and Medicaid. Biden has accused Scott of wanting to end both programs by proposing that federal laws should expire every five years, although the Florida senator has said he wants to preserve the programs.

Biden and DeSantis have had a multitude of differences in recent years over how to fight COVID-19, immigration policy and more. In recent weeks, they tussled over the governor’s decision to put migrants on planes or buses to Democratic strongholds, a practice that Biden has called “reckless.”

The hurricane changed the purpose and tone of Biden’s first trip to Florida this year.

The president is visiting an area especially devastated by winds and surging tides. Boats, including huge yachts, were capsized and hurled inland.

As water receded, the destruction at Fort Myers’ Fisherman’s Wharf become evident. Homes and businesses lay in ruins amid debris and muck.

The wharf lies on one side of the bridge that leads into Fort Myers Beach, which was brutalized by the Category 4 storm. FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell told reporters on Air Force One Wednesday that the cost of rebuilding will be huge.

“It will certainly be in the billions and perhaps one of the more costly disasters that we’ve seen in many years.”

DeSantis made a point Wednesday of praising FEMA along with local and state agencies, saying coordination among them has been exceptional during Ian’s aftermath.

“There’s been less bureaucracy holding us back in this one than probably any one I’ve ever seen,” DeSantis said a briefing in Matlacha. He gave a 30-minute midday briefing on hurricane recovery efforts, including news that running water had been restored through much of the affected zone.

The White House message of bipartisan unity marks a difference from Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, who at times threatened to withhold aid to Democratic officials who criticized him, including Democratic Govs. Gavin Newsom of California and Andrew Cuomo of New York.

Politicians’ responses to natural disasters have the power to make or break political careers.

As Florida’s governor for eight years, Jeb Bush maintained a steady response to a parade of hurricanes and was rewarded with sky-high approval ratings. The response by President George W. Bush and Louisiana lawmakers to Hurricane Katrina in 2005 hangs over their legacies.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, the Republican who welcomed President Barack Obama to his state to survey Hurricane Sandy damage just days before the 2012 general election, said that during natural disasters “the best political strategy is to have no political strategy, to do your job.”

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SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — A county commission in rural New Mexico that has been roiled by election conspiracies is trying to oust its election director just five weeks before Election Day for improperly certifying ballot-counting equipment.

Torrance County is repeating the certification of its vote-counting machines for the Nov. 8 general election based on revelations that County Clerk Yvonne Otero pre-signed certification forms before testing and did not attend the inspection of election equipment.

Torrance is one of a handful of rural counties in New Mexico that considered delaying certification of the results of its primary election as angry crowds gave voice to unproven conspiracy theories about voting systems. The chaotic coda to the June primary drew national attention to a state that is expected to have several tight races this year for high-profile offices, including governor.

County Manager Janice Barela said the three-member commission voted unanimously Monday to submit a complaint with state and local prosecutors that seeks to remove Otero, a Republican, from her elected office. The commission said she botched the certification of the county’s 22 ballot-counting machines and cites separate allegations that Otero harassed employees of the clerk’s office on multiple occasions.

The New Mexico secretary of state’s offices said certificates for ballot tabulation machines should be signed by the clerk or deputy clerk who attends the inspection and the testing of the machines.

Otero, whose elected term runs through 2024, did not immediately return phone calls and text messages.

Torrance County Commission Chairman Ryan Schwebach urged Otero to resign at a special meeting of the commission in Estancia on Monday. Otero attended the meeting and declined to respond, citing the advice of legal counsel.

The politically conservative county continues to grapple with simmering mistrust about voting systems as a national network of conspiracy theorists pushes false allegations of fraud in the 2020 presidential election.

Torrance County’s all-Republican board of commissioners has responded to that anger and skepticism by assigning county staff to monitor preparations for the November general election and conduct a hand recount of primary election results.

Barela is at the forefront of that oversight effort. She attended the certification of voting machines last week and said pre-signed certificates struck her as “dishonest” because the county clerk was not in attendance.

“That goes to the core of what her duties are,” Barela said Tuesday. “That’s the very first thing, is certifying the machines. … That means something. We need to have trust.”

Torrance County Deputy Clerk Sylvia Chavez said technicians began a second round of ballot-machine testing last Friday, after consulting with state election regulators. She oversaw the testing again and signed the recertification of eight machines — enough equipment to tally ballots from early voting that begins Oct. 11. That still leaves time to review other machines before Election Day voting on Nov. 8, she said.

Chavez said the physical inspection and testing of election equipment by technicians, using mock ballots, never strayed from procedures set out by the secretary of state.

New Mexico uses paper ballots that are machine tallied and stored for possible recounts. County clerks oversee a canvass to double-check ballot tallies, and a certified public accountant conducts an audit after each statewide election with hand tallies of randomly selected precincts to verify accuracy.

County officials also are forwarding to prosecutors a complaint that Otero’s mother was hired by the clerk’s office as a paid precinct judge and member of a county voter registration board, a possible conflict with state regulations against nepotism. The family connection was first noted by Libertarian Party officials.

State Elections Director Mandy Vigil reviewed the nepotism complaint and found the restrictions against family serving on election boards do not apply because Otero has not been up for reelection. Otero has said her mother is highly qualified and was hired by agency staff and not by herself directly.

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By Andrew Chung and Nate Raymond

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in his fight with the Justice Department over classified documents seized from his Florida home as part of a criminal investigation into his handling of government records.

Trump filed an emergency request asking the justices to block part of a lower court’s ruling that prevented an independent arbiter requested by Trump, known as a special master, from vetting more than 100 documents marked as classified that were among 11,000 records seized by FBI agents at the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach on Aug. 8.

The Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Sept. 21 repudiated a decision by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who had temporarily barred the department from examining the seized classified documents until the special master had weeded out any that could be deemed privileged and withheld from investigators.

Justice Clarence Thomas, who is assigned to assess emergency appeals from the 11th Circuit, late on Tuesday requested a response from the Justice Department by Oct. 11. Thomas is one of six conservatives on the nine-member Supreme Court.

The 11th Circuit also prevented the special master, Judge Raymond Dearie, from having access to the documents with classified markings, noting the importance of limiting access to classified information.

Trump’s lawyers in Tuesday’s filing said Dearie should have access to “determine whether documents bearing classification markings are in fact classified, and regardless of classification, whether those records are personal records or presidential records.”

The Justice Department has “attempted to criminalize a document management dispute and now vehemently objects to a transparent process that provides much-needed oversight,” Trump’s lawyers added.

The court-approved Mar-a-Lago search was conducted as part of a federal investigation into whether Trump illegally retained documents from the White House when he left office in January 2021 after his failed 2020 re-election bid and whether Trump tried to obstruct the probe.

The investigation seeks to determine who accessed classified materials, whether they were compromised and if any remain unaccounted for. At issue in the 11th Circuit ruling were documents bearing classified markings of confidential, secret or top secret.

Cannon, presiding over Trump’s lawsuit seeking to restrict Justice Department access to the seized documents, barred review of all of the materials and named Dearie to review the records, impeding the investigation.

On Sept. 15, Cannon, who was appointed to the bench by Trump, rejected the Justice Department’s request that she partially lift her order on the classified materials as it impeded the government’s effort to mitigate potential national security risks from their possible unauthorized disclosure.

The three-judge 11th Circuit panel included two judges appointed by Trump and one by former President Barack Obama.

Noting that classified records belong to the U.S. government, the 11th Circuit doubted Trump has any “individual interest” in them and that he “has not even attempted to show that he has a need to know the information contained in the classified documents.”

The 11th Circuit also rejected any suggestion that Trump had declassified the documents – as the former president has claimed – saying there was “no evidence” of such action and that the argument was a “red herring because declassifying an official document would not change its content or render it personal.”

In Tuesday’s filing, Trump’s attorneys said he had “broad authority governing classification of, and access to, classified documents.” In an interview on Fox News last month, Trump again asserted without evidence that he declassified the documents and claimed he had the power to do it “even by thinking about it.”

The three statutes underpinning the search warrant used by the FBI at Mar-a-Lago make it a crime to mishandle government records, regardless of their classification status.

Cannon had tasked Dearie to review all of the seized materials, including classified ones, to identify anything subject to attorney-client confidentiality or executive privilege – a legal doctrine that shields some White House communications from disclosure.

The document investigation is one of several legal woes Trump is facing as he considers whether to run again for president in 2024. New York state’s attorney general last month filed a civil lawsuit accusing Trump and three of his adult children of fraud and misrepresentation in preparing financial statements from the family real estate company. The Trump Organization also is set to go on trial on Oct. 24 on New York state criminal tax fraud charges.

(Reporting by Andrew Chung and Nate Raymond in Washington; additional reporting by Kanishka Singh; Editing by Will Dunham and Grant McCool)

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PHOENIX (AP) — A spokesman for Kari Lake said Tuesday the Republican candidate for Arizona governor didn’t mean to suggest abortion should be legal, saying she’s not calling for changes to abortion laws weeks after a judge ruled that prosecutors can enforce a near-total ban on terminating pregnancies.

In her most expansive comments on abortion since the ruling last month, Lake told a Phoenix talk radio host that it should be “rare and legal” before saying twice that it should be “rare but safe.” Ross Trumble, a spokesman for Lake, said she meant to say only “rare but safe.”

“You know, it would be really wonderful if abortion was rare and legal — the way they said it before, remember? Rare but safe, rare but safe, I think is what they said,” Lake told conservative host Mike Broomhead on KTAR radio. “It’d be really wonderful if that’s how it turned out. But that’s not what they want, Mike. They don’t want rare but safe.”

Lake appeared to be referring to former President Bill Clinton’s famous line that abortion should be “safe, legal and rare.”

Arizona doctors stopped performing abortions late last month after a judge in Tucson ruled that prosecutors can enforce a law dating to 1864 that bans abortion unless it’s necessary to save a woman’s life. Arizona also has a law passed this year that bans abortion after 15 weeks, creating speculation about what’s allowed.

Trumble said either the total ban or the 15-week law would fit Lake’s standard of abortion being “rare but safe.”

“’Rare but safe’ would apply to whatever the current law is interpreted to mean,” Trumble said.

He said Lake has no plans to ask the Legislature to change abortion laws and declined to say whether she would sign legislation expanding access, saying he wouldn’t address “hypotheticals.”

Asked in the radio interview whether she would support allowing abortion in cases of rape and incest — both are disallowed under the total abortion ban and the 15-week law — Lake demurred.

“That’s a very small percentage of abortions,” she said. She said her Democratic opponent, Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, has the more extreme position, accusing her of supporting abortion without restrictions. Hobbs says decisions about abortions should be made by women and their doctors without government interference.

Lake has spoken positively of Arizona’s total ban on abortion, which she called “a great law that’s already on the books.” She has called abortion “the ultimate sin,” said abortion pills should be illegal and that she would sign a bill banning abortion as soon as fetal cardiac activity can be detected, usually around six weeks gestational age and before many women know they’re pregnant.

Democrats have seized on the ruling, which revived the issue ahead of next month’s midterm elections. Democratic lawmakers sent a letter on Tuesday asking Republican Gov. Doug Ducey to call a special session of the Legislature to repeal the 1864 abortion ban.

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — The founder and CEO of a software company targeted by election deniers was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of stealing data on hundreds of Los Angeles County poll workers.

Konnech Corporation’s Eugene Yu, 51, was arrested in Meridian Township in Michigan and held on suspicion of theft of personal identifying information, while computer hard drives and other “digital evidence” were seized by investigators from the county district attorney’s office, according to the office.

Local prosecutors will seek his extradition to California.

“We are continuing to ascertain the details of what we believe to be Mr. Yu’s wrongful detention by LA County authorities,” Konnech said in a statement that ended: “Any LA County poll worker data that Konnech may have possessed was provided to it by LA County, and therefore could not have been ‘stolen’ as suggested.”

Konnech is a small company based in East Lansing, Michigan. In 2020, it won a five-year, $2.9 million contract with LA County for software to track election worker schedules, training, payroll,and communications, according to the county registrar-recorder/county clerk, Dean C. Logan.

Konnech was required to keep the data in the United States and only provide access to citizens and permanent residents but instead stored it on servers in the People’s Republic of China, the DA’s office said.

The DA’s office didn’t specify what specific information allegedly was taken. But officials said it only involved poll workers, not voting machines or vote counts and didn’t alter election results.

“But security in all aspects of any election is essential so that we all have full faith in the integrity of the election process,” District Attorney George Gascón said in a statement.

“With the mid-term General Election 35 days away, our focus remains on ensuring the administration of this election is not disrupted,” said a statement from Dean C. Logan, the LA County registrar-recorder/county clerk.

There wasn’t any evidence that any election worker was bribed or extorted and an investigation was pending into whether any of the data went into inappropriate hands, the DA’s office said.

Konnech previously said that all the data for its American customers were stored on servers in the United States, the New York Times reported Monday.

The paper reported that Konnech and Yu, who was born in China, became the target of claims by election conspiracy theorists that the company had secret ties to the Chinese Communist Party and had supplied information on 2 million poll workers.

There wasn’t any evidence to support those claims, but Yu received threats and went into hiding, the paper said.

Konnech also has contracts with Allen County, Indiana, and DeKalb County in Georgia, the Times said.

On its website, Konnech said it currently has 32 clients in North America.

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NEW YORK (AP) — Leading Republicans are entering the final month of the midterm campaign increasingly optimistic that a Senate majority is within reach even as a dramatic family fight in Georgia clouds one of the party’s biggest pickup opportunities.

And as some Democrats crow on social media about apparent Republican setbacks, party strategists privately concede that their own shortcomings may not be outweighed by the GOP’s mounting challenges.

The evolving outlook is tied to a blunt reality: Democrats have virtually no margin for error as they confront the weight of history, widespread economic concerns and President Joe Biden’s weak standing. There is broad agreement among both parties that the Democrats’ summertime momentum across states like Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin has eroded just five weeks before Election Day.

“There’s reason to be apprehensive, not reason to be gloomy,” veteran Democratic strategist James Carville said. “It looked like at the end of August we had a little momentum. I don’t know if we’ve regressed any, but we’re not progressing in many places.”

That tepid outlook comes even as Republicans confront a series of self-imposed setbacks in the states that matter most in the 2022 midterms, which will decide the balance of power in Congress and statehouses across the nation.

None has been more glaring than Herschel Walker’s struggles in Georgia, where the Republican Senate candidate’s own son accused him of lying about his personal challenges — including a report from The Daily Beast alleging that the anti-abortion Walker paid for a girlfriend’s abortion in 2009. Walker called the accusation a “flat-out lie” and said he would sue, an action his campaign hadn’t taken as of late Tuesday.

“Everything has been a lie,” Christian Walker responded Tuesday.

The Republican establishment, including the Sen. Mitch McConnell-aligned Senate Leadership Fund, and former President Donald Trump himself remained staunchly behind Walker on Tuesday in his bid to oust first-term Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock. The Walker campaign also reported a massive fundraising haul that coincided with the latest allegations.

“If you’re in a fight, people will come to your aid,” said Steven Law, head of the Senate Leadership Fund and a close ally of McConnell, R-Ky.

Law said the Georgia race had grown increasingly competitive despite the Democrats’ focus on Walker’s personal life. And looking beyond Georgia, Law said the political climate was predictably shifting against the party that controls the White House, as is typically the case in midterm elections.

“It certainly seems that voters are returning to a more traditional midterm frame of mind,” Law said.

Should Republicans gain even one Senate seat in November, they would take control of Congress’ upper chamber — and with it, the power to control judicial nominations and policy debates for the last two years of Biden’s term. Leaders in both parties believe Republicans are likely to take over the House.

Even facing such odds, it’s far too soon to predict a Republican-controlled Congress.

Democrats remain decidedly on offense and are spending heavily to try to flip Republican-held seats in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and North Carolina. Voter opposition to the Supreme Court’s decision this summer to strip women of their constitutional right to an abortion has energized the Democratic base and led to a surge in female voter registrations.

Republicans are most focused on Democratic incumbents in Arizona, Georgia, New Hampshire and Nevada, although Republican officials believe that underwhelming Trump-backed nominees in Arizona and New Hampshire have dampened the party’s pickup opportunities.

“The Republican candidates they’re running are too extreme,” said J.B. Poersch, who leads the pro-Democrat Senate Majority PAC. “I think this is still advantage Democrats.”

Meanwhile, conditions in the top battleground states are rapidly evolving.

In Pennsylvania, Republican Senate nominee Mehmet Oz faced difficult new questions this week raised by a Washington Post article about the medical products he endorsed as a daytime television star. Another news report by the news site Jezebel detailing how his research caused hundreds of dogs to be killed rippled across social media.

Still, Democratic officials acknowledge the race tightened considerably as the calendar shifted to October. And White House officials are concerned about Democratic nominee John Fetterman’s stamina as he recovers from a May stroke.

“Senate Republicans had a very bad start to October, but we know each of our races will be tight and we’re going to keep taking nothing for granted,” said Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, who leads the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm.

The GOP Senate candidates’ latest challenges in Georgia and Pennsylvania dominated social media Monday and Tuesday, according to data compiled by GQR, a public opinion research firm that works with Democratic organizations.

News stories about Walker’s abortion accuser and Oz’s animal research had the first- and second-highest reach of any news stories on Facebook and Twitter since they surfaced Monday, topping content related to the television show “Sons of Anarchy,” another report about Planned Parenthood mobile abortion clinics and news about Kanye West. GQR used the social listening tool NewsWhip, which tracks over 500,000 websites in more than 100 languages roughly in real time.

In swing-state Nevada, the rhetoric from Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto has become increasingly urgent in recent days as she fends off a fierce challenge from former state Attorney General Adam Laxalt. Within the White House, there is real fear that she could lose her reelection bid, giving Republicans the only seat they may need to claim the Senate majority.

“We have a big problem, friend,” Cortez Masto wrote in a fundraising appeal Tuesday. “Experts say that our race in Nevada could decide Senate control — and right now, polling shows me 1 point behind my Trump-endorsed opponent.”

Democrats and their allies continue to hope that backlash against the Supreme Court’s abortion decision will help them overcome historical trends in which the party controlling the White House almost always loses seats in Congress. Democrats, who control Washington, are also facing deep voter pessimism about the direction of the country and Biden’s relatively weak approval ratings.

The traditional rules of politics have often been broken in the Trump era. In past years, Republicans may have abandoned Walker. But on Tuesday, they linked arms behind him.

Law, of the Senate Leadership Fund, said he takes Walker at his word that he did not pay for a former girlfriend’s abortion, despite apparent evidence of a “Get Well” card with Walker’s signature and a check receipt.

He said voters believe that “Walker may have made mistakes in his personal life that affected him and his family, but Warnock has made mistakes in public life in Washington that affected them and their families.”

There were some signs of Republican concern on the ground in Georgia, however.

Martha Zoller, a popular Republican radio host in north Georgia and one-time congressional candidate, told her audience Tuesday that the latest allegations require Walker to reset his campaign with a straightforward admission about his “personal demons” and what he’s done to overcome them.

“He needs to fall on the sword. ‘I was a dog. … And I have asked forgiveness for it,’” she said, detailing the kind of message she believes Walker must give voters. “It would be so refreshing to have somebody just tell the truth.”

Veteran Democratic strategist Josh Schwerin warned his party against writing off the Georgia Republican.

“I wouldn’t say Walker is done. Over the last couple of cycles we’ve certainly seen Republican candidates survive things that are not supposed to be survivable,” Schwerin said. “There are a lot of close races, and the dynamics of this election are difficult to predict. Everybody is expecting multiple shifts in momentum between now and Election Day.”

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Associated Press writers Zeke Miller in Washington and Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.

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By Jeff Mason

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Joe Biden intends to nominate Surgeon General Vivek Murthy to be the U.S. representative on the World Health Organization’s executive board, administration officials told Reuters on Tuesday.

Murthy has served as the top U.S. doctor under Biden and under former President Barack Obama. He will continue in that role while taking on the WHO position, if confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

“With his experience and expertise, the president is confident that Dr. Murthy will build on his commitment to an era of relentless diplomacy by representing our nation on the world stage,” one official said.

“Rejoining the WHO requires an experienced and seasoned physician and public health expert,” who can expand on the U.S. commitment to global health, the official said. “Dr. Murthy is the perfect person for that.”

Upon taking office in January 2021, Biden declared that the United States would reengage with the WHO after his predecessor, former President Donald Trump, said in 2020 that the country would withdraw from the organization because of its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

“If confirmed, I will continue to elevate U.S leadership on the global stage and ensure public health is at the forefront of our planning and preparation for global challenges,” Murthy said in a statement provided to Reuters.

A second administration official said Murthy would remain in Washington, where he lives with his wife and two children, but travel to Geneva “whenever necessary to fulfill the responsibilities of this role.”

The WHO’s executive board has 34 members who serve 3-year terms. Its purpose, according to the organization’s website, is to prepare an agenda for and implement policies by the World Health Assembly, which is made up of the WHO member states. The U.S. has not had a Senate-confirmed representative on the board since 2020.

(Reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

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