Politics

There are primary elections Tuesday in Ohio and Indiana as well as a key state Senate race in Michigan that will decide control of the chamber.

In Ohio, Democratic former Sen. Sherrod Brown is running to reclaim his old job. Vivek Ramaswamy, a tech entrepreneur and former presidential candidate, faces auto-racing engineer and internet personality Casey Putsch for the Republican nomination for governor.

In Indiana, President Donald Trump’s push to gerrymander districts across the country hit a snag last year when half of the state’s Republican senators sided with Democrats to defeat the plan. Now the president has endorsed primary challengers against seven of those state senators.

Here is the latest:

Challengers in Indiana who haven’t kept up fundraising pace are getting help

Outside groups have spent more than $8 million targeting incumbents in Indiana, in some cases outspending the money those candidates raised on their own.

In state Senate District 23, Trump endorsed Paula Copenhaver against state Sen. Spencer Deery. Deery raised $500,000, according to the latest state filings, while Copenhaver raised about $15,000. However, outside groups spent more than $2 million in ad reservations boosting Copenhaver, according to AdImpact.

In state Senate District 1, Trevor de Vries — a challenger endorsed by Trump — raised just over $30,000 as of latest filings, while incumbent Dan Dernulc has raised over $200,000. But AdImpact shows outside groups spending more than $200,000 to help defeat Dernulc.

Polls remain open in 12 counties in northwestern and southwestern Indiana that are in the central time zone.

“I think it might have some bearing on the country, because I know Trump is obviously looking to hold onto the House and Senate and maintain his advantage there, which is pretty razor-thin I think at this point,” said John Hall, a 69-year-old self-described independent who voted for Democrat Chedrick Greene. “So, I’m sure he’s going to be paying close attention to this particular race.”

Hall, a retiree who worked for years at an area radio station, said the economy is a key issue for him. He spent $58 at the gas station before driving to the public library in Bay City to vote.

“It’s taking a bite out of a lot of people’s budgets right now,” Hall said, adding it would have cost between $35 and $40 to fill up his car’s tank two months ago.

In a social media post while voters were headed to the polls, Trump said Republican state senators who voted against redistricting “couldn’t care less about our Country, or about keeping the Majority in Congress.”

Trump described the senators who crossed him as RINOs, which means “Republican in name only.” And he hailed “Great Patriots” that he’s endorsed to oust them.

Groups allied to defeat Indiana state Sen. Spencer Deery will have spent $2 million in ads attacking him by the time polls close. That’s more than any other district where incumbents are trying to fend off Trump-backed challengers.

Deery is completing his first term and was the first Republican senator to publicly oppose redistricting.

Paula Copenhaver is challenging him. She’s a close ally of Republican Lieutenant Gov. Micah Beckwith and is Fountain County GOP chair in rural, western Indiana. Deery beat Copenhaver in a four-way Republican primary for the seat four years ago.

The super PAC run by Indiana U.S. Sen. Jim Banks, Hoosier Leadership PAC, will have spent more than $1.1 million on ads attacking Deery through Election Day, according to the ad-tracking service AdImpact. Gov. Mike Braun’s American Leadership PAC will have spent more than $900,000 doing the same, according to the group.

Deery is on track to have spent more than $745,000 on this year’s primary, far more than last time.

An engineer and vehicle designer who calls himself “The Car Guy,” Putsch is making a long-shot bid for Ohio governor against Republican Vivek Ramaswamy.

After the last-minute disqualification of another candidate’s ticket, the 44-year-old from northwest Ohio ended up as Ramaswamy’s only primary opponent.

Putsch has attracted fans and critics with his provocative YouTube videos, which often — subtly or overtly — take aim at Ramaswamy’s Indian heritage or Hindu faith.

On the campaign trail, he’s also been critical of President Donald Trump, energy guzzling data centers and national Republicans’ support for Israel and handling of the Epstein files.

Trump is throwing his name behind Republican challengers to GOP senators who opposed redistricting. But Braun is carrying out much of the work.

After Trump’s pledge last year to rally against GOP senators who blocked the effort and are seeking reelection, Braun picked the candidates.

Frustrated by Rodrick Bray, the Senate GOP leader who opposed redistricting, Braun recruited the seven Republicans challengers on the pledge that they oppose Bray for leader.

In his break with party orthodoxy, Braun has also committed $3 million to advertising from his American Leadership PAC attacking those incumbents on the wishes of the president, according statistics collected by the ad-tracking firm AdImpact.

That includes almost $900,000 alone in ads attacking Republican state Sen. Spencer Deery of West Lafayette, the first Republican senator to oppose redistricting and a protege of former GOP Gov. Mitch Daniels, who is an opponent of the redistricting measure.

The Republican-controlled Indiana Senate in December rejected the measure that would have shaded all nine of the states congressional districts as favorable to the party, and halted progress on the party’s effort nationally.

The move defied months of urging by the White House led by Vice President JD Vance, who traveled twice to Indianapolis and hosted many in the caucus in Washington, where Trump phoned in to address the group.

While Indiana was considering the measure, voters in Democratic-leaning California approved Proposition 50, which allowed the state Legislature to bypass the independent commission to redraw districts for the next three biennial elections.

Republicans think they could win up to nine more seats under revised districts in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio. But Democrats think they could win as many as 10 additional seats under new districts in California, Utah and Virginia, though legal challenges remain in both Missouri and Virginia.

Emily Bohall Board, 37, an occupational therapist in Columbus, Indiana, said she had never voted in a Republican primary before Tuesday. But the issue of redistricting compelled her to cast a ballot for Sen. Greg Walker.

“Greg Walker is the only option not supported by Donald Trump, and I have been very upset about everything Trump has done,” Board said.

Madison Long, 28, an attorney, who also voted for Walker, criticized Michelle Davis, Walker’s opponent, for her ties to Trump.

“She doesn’t have any promises of her own or any agenda of her own. Her goal is to just follow Trump,” Long said. “I find that extremely concerning given the nature of the nationwide politics.”

The race will determine whether Democrats maintain a majority in the state Senate for the final months of the year.

Democrats currently control the state Senate 19-18. If Democrat Chedrick Greene wins, Democrats keep their majority.

If Republican Jason Tunney wins, the Senate would be tied, making it tougher for Democrats to advance Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s agenda. While Democratic Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist II would serve as the tie-breaking vote, Republicans could effectively block any measure from passing by not having all members vote.

There’s another reason people are watching the race: The swing district in a battleground state could give clues to what will happen in November’s midterms..

Vance backed Vivek Ramaswamy for governor and Jon Husted for Senate. Husted was appointed to fill Vance’s seat after he became vice president.

“Well, I think Jon’s going to do a great job. He’s a good guy, and he’s been good for Ohio,” Vance said.

Vance was with his son Vivek, who filled out a paper ballot for children.

“He voted for the Easter bunny over the tooth fairy,” the vice president said.

The Democrat is fighting to get back to the U.S. Senate.

The former three-term U.S. senator, long one of Ohio’s most electable Democrats, briefly left politics after losing a reelection bid to Republican Bernie Moreno in 2024.

Brown, 73, faces first-time Democratic candidate Ron Kincaid in his quest to unseat Husted this fall. Husted was appointed to the chamber in January 2025 to fill a seat formerly held by Vice President JD Vance.

Before entering the Senate in 2007 after a surprise victory over now Gov. Mike DeWine, then the incumbent, Brown was a seven-term U.S. representative and a two-term secretary of state. Prior to that, he was the youngest person elected to the Ohio House, where he served eight years.

Brown is married to Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Connie Schultz and has two grown children. The couple lives in suburban Columbus.

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YEREVAN, Armenia (AP) — Armenia hosts its first bilateral summit with the European Union on Tuesday, a landmark diplomatic moment for the Caucasus Mountains nation that has formally declared its ambition to join the bloc and is cautiously loosening its ties with longtime ally Russia.

The EU-Armenia summit in Yerevan follows the eighth gathering of the European Political Community, or EPC, which brought dozens of European leaders to the Armenian capital on Monday to address European defense issues and the Iran war.

Meanwhile, Tuesday’s bilateral meeting saw Armenia and the EU sign a connectivity partnership to strengthen economic ties and deepen security cooperation.

The two events underscore how Armenia is seeking to turn westward and shed Russia’s influence. Armenia’s relations with Moscow, its longtime sponsor and ally, have grown increasingly strained since 2023, when neighboring Azerbaijan fully reclaimed the Karabakh region and ended the decadeslong rule by ethnic Armenian separatists.

Armenian authorities accused Russian peacekeepers who were deployed to the region of failing to stop Azerbaijan’s onslaught. Moscow, busy with the war in Ukraine, rejected the accusations, arguing that its troops didn’t have a mandate to intervene.

The war was “a belated demonstration that Russia is dangerously unreliable as a partner,” Richard Giragosian, director of the Regional Studies Center in Yerevan, told The Associated Press.

Since then, the government of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has pursued closer ties with the West, a move welcomed by the 27-nation EU.

The opening ceremony of the EU-Armenia summit on Tuesday saw European Council President António Costa walk the red carpet side by side with Pashinyan and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, while a military band played in front of Armenian and EU flags.

In her opening statement, von der Leyen said that Europe was ready to aid Armenia in becoming a regional hub for global trade routes, including the building of physical infrastructure.

“We’re ready to invest in the local energy production and the energy links across the Black Sea, and we are ready to connect your booming digital scene to Europe’s digital market and turn Armenia’s position at the heart of this region into a motor of growth,” she said.

The new EU-Armenia connectivity partnership will focus on strengthening transportation, energy and digital links. Meanwhile, EU investments in Armenia are expected to reach 2.5 billion euros ($2.9 billion) under its global gateway infrastructure program, both sides said in a joint statement.

“Today’s EU-Armenia summit sends a clear signal of the EU’s firm commitment to deepen our relations with Armenia, and to strengthen cooperation across many new areas,” Costa said. “Bringing Armenia and its people closer to the European Union.”

The EU, rather than the United States, has stepped into the vacuum left by Russia, Giragosian said.

“EU engagement is much more prudent and much more productive than the U.S. becoming involved, simply because European engagement is less provocative to Russia over the longer term,” he said.

In 2025, Armenia’s parliament passed a law formally declaring the country’s intention to seek EU membership.

However, Giragosian described Tuesday’s summit as “a focus on deepening the preexisting relationship” rather than a step toward candidacy, referencing the Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement that has governed EU-Armenia ties since fully taking effect in 2021.

“The symbolic significance is much greater as a message to Russia,” he said.

Armenia has also taken other symbolic steps. It joined the International Criminal Court in 2023, a move that Moscow condemned as an “unfriendly step.” The court has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin, accusing him of personal responsibility for the abductions of children from Ukraine.

Armenia also froze its participation in the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization in 2024.

However, Armenia remains a member of the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union, or EEU, a single market allowing the free movement of goods, capital and labor. The organization also includes Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan — and Putin has made the trade-offs plain.

Speaking at talks with Pashinyan in Moscow earlier this year, Putin warned that Armenia couldn’t simultaneously belong to both the EEU and the EU, noting that Yerevan currently receives Russian natural gas at prices far below European market rates. Pashinyan acknowledged the incompatibility, but said that Armenia could, for now, combine EEU membership with deepening EU cooperation.

Pashinyan, who has been in office since 2018 and faces a parliamentary election in June, stands to benefit politically from the international profile of the European meetings. Giragosian said that Pashinyan’s government is likely to be reelected largely by default, with the opposition unable to offer a credible alternative program.

But Giragosian warned against framing Armenia’s foreign policy as purely a pivot from Russia to the West.

“Armenia is also pivoting beyond the black and white zero-sum game paradigm,” he said, pointing to significant diplomatic investment in Asia, including with Japan, South Korea and China. “This is not about replacing Russia with the West. This is much more innovative, much more sophisticated.”

The summit also comes at a moment of diplomatic strains between Azerbaijan and the EU. Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned the EU ambassador last week to protest a European Parliament resolution demanding the release of Armenian prisoners of war and criticizing the treatment of Armenians in Karabakh. Lawmakers in Azerbaijan subsequently voted to suspend all cooperation with the European Parliament.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who addressed the EPC conference via video link, accused the European Parliament and the Parliamentary Assembly for the Council of Europe, or PACE, of “double standards” for placing sanctions on Azerbaijan’s delegation.

There were also protests outside the EPC summit venue, which was surrounded by tight security. Demonstrators held photos of Armenian prisoners being held in Azerbaijan.

Opposition leader Aram Sargsyan, head of the Democratic Party of Armenia, told the Armenian Press Agency that the European officials were voicing support for Pashinyan before the election and have “forgotten about the Armenians in prison in Azerbaijan.”

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Elise Morton reported from London. Avet Demourian in Yerevan, and Katie Marie Davies in Manchester, England, contributed to this report.

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President Donald Trump’s campaign to politically punish Republicans who stand in his way moves through Indiana on Tuesday, when seven state senators face Trump-backed primary challengers.

In neighboring Ohio, primaries for U.S. Senate and governor will lock in the candidates for two major races with national implications.

And in Michigan, voters in a bellwether district will fill a vacancy in the state Senate, a race with implications for the balance of power in a battleground state.

Here’s what to watch for.

Trump is taking aim at seven Republican state senators in Indiana who opposed his plan to redraw congressional district boundaries to help the party gain seats in the U.S. House.

Groups allied with the president have spent millions on advertising, an extraordinary flood of cash and attention into races that are typically low profile.

The races are a test of Trump’s enduring grip over his party as Republicans grow increasingly anxious about the midterm elections in November.

The results will signal to Republicans everywhere about how big a price they’ll pay with their voters if they distance themselves from Trump even as his popularity fades. And it will show the president whether he can still credibly threaten consequences for Republicans who cross him.

The Trump-targeted state senators all represent districts he carried in 2024, mostly by 20 percentage points or more.

The key races to watch are districts 1, 11, 19, 21, 23, 38 and 41.

The state’s primary is the wind up to the big show. Although Ohio has become increasingly conservative, Democrats believe their path back to a U.S. Senate majority runs through the state.

They’re putting their hopes behind former Sen. Sherrod Brown, who lost Ohio’s other Senate seat to Bernie Moreno in 2024.

He’s expected to face off with Republican Sen. Jon Husted, who was appointed last year to fill the vacancy created when JD Vance became vice president.

The race is a special election to fill the last two years of Vance’s term.

In the campaign for governor, Republican Vivek Ramaswamy has parlayed his national name recognition, tech industry connections and alliance with Trump into a record fundraising haul. He’s largely ignoring Republican rival Casey Putsch, focusing his rallies and television ads on the general election.

An engineer and vehicle designer who calls himself “The Car Guy,” Putsch has attracted fans with provocative YouTube videos that troll Ramaswamy and criticize national Republicans over their handling of the Epstein files, positions on energy-guzzling data centers and support for Israel.

Amy Acton, Ohio’s former public health director, is running unopposed for the Democratic nomination. She played a key role in the state’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The special election for a state Senate seat in central Michigan carries outsized importance.

It’s another test of enthusiasm in a series of special elections that have swung almost universally toward Democrats since Trump returned to the White House. It also could affect the balance of power in the Michigan State Capitol. A Democratic victory would give the party a firm majority in the state Senate, while a Republican win would deadlock the chamber in a 19-19 tie.

The district is closely matched. Democrat Kamala Harris beat Trump there by less than 1 point in the 2024 presidential election.

The seat has been vacant for more than a year, since Democrat Kristen McDonald Rivet resigned to take a seat in Congress.

Democrats are showing surprising strength in special elections and off-year contests across the country, winning races in unexpected places and significantly narrowing the gap, even when they fall short.

There’s no guarantee the trend will continue through the midterms, when turnout will be much higher, but it has nonetheless energized Democrats and spooked Republicans worried about keeping their congressional majorities.

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By John Kruzel

WASHINGTON, May 4 (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday allowed a recent ruling that gutted a key part of the Voting Rights Act to take effect ahead of schedule, bolstering Louisiana Republicans as they pursue a new congressional voting map ahead of the November midterm elections.

The action by the justices, though procedural, is likely to undercut legal challenges to Louisiana Republicans’ decision to delay the state’s congressional primary elections and seek a new electoral map that could be beneficial to Republicans.

President Donald Trump’s fellow Republicans are fighting to maintain their control of the House, as well as the Senate, in the November elections.

The court’s move, which came in an unsigned order, granted a request from a group of Louisiana voters who described themselves in court papers as “non-African American”. Their lawsuit led to the 6-3 ruling on April 29 striking down an electoral map that had given Louisiana a second Black-majority U.S. ​congressional district. The ruling gutted a key provision of the Voting Rights Act that had barred electoral maps if they would result in diluting the clout of minority voters.

To give the losing side of a decision the chance to ask for a rehearing, the Supreme Court typically waits 32 days before its formal judgment is issued. But the prevailing party can ask the court to issue its judgment more quickly, as the “non-African American” voters did here.

Governor Jeff Landry responded to the court’s ruling by declaring an emergency and announcing he would postpone his state’s congressional primary elections that had been scheduled for May 16.

Landry’s move prompted lawsuits. Some challengers have argued, among other things, that the governor exceeded his authority to declare an emergency because the Supreme Court’s ruling had not yet taken effect.

Liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented from the court’s move to bypass its usual waiting period, saying the decision “has spawned chaos in the State of Louisiana.”

The rapid developments underscored how the court’s decision on April 29, which severely weakened the landmark Voting Rights Act passed in 1965, has injected more uncertainty into what had already been a dizzying national fight over redistricting.

Black people make up roughly a third of the population of Louisiana, which has six U.S. House districts. Black voters tend to support Democratic candidates. 

The state legislature in 2024 ​drew a map with a second majority-Black district in response to a judge’s decision that an earlier map, with just one majority-Black ​district, illegally harmed Black voters in violation of the Voting Rights Act. 

But the Supreme Court ruled that the redrawn map relied too heavily on race, in violation of the constitutional principle of equal protection under the law.

In a process called redistricting, the boundaries of legislative districts across the United States are reconfigured to reflect population changes as measured by the national census conducted every 10 years. Redistricting typically has been carried out by state legislatures once per decade.

Republicans and Democrats have been waging a multistate redistricting fight ignited last year by an unprecedented mid-decade effort by Trump to redraw maps in Republican-led states, starting with Texas.

(Reporting by John Kruzel; Editing by Will Dunham and Edmund Klamann)

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DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Vice President JD Vance will visit Iowa on Tuesday, marking his first visit since taking office to the state where Republicans in less than two years will cast the first votes to pick their party’s next presidential nominee.

Vance, who is seen as one of the GOP’s strongest potential candidates for president in 2028, is making the trip to campaign on behalf of Republican Rep. Zach Nunn, who faces a competitive race to keep his Des Moines-area seat in the November midterms.

But the visit offers Vance an opportunity to test his reception before Iowa’s voters, whose leadoff caucuses give them an outsized role in determining the next presidential nominee. Campaigning for a local congressman in his role as the sitting vice president gives him an opening chance to make an impression on Iowa Republicans, seasoned evaluators of those who seek the nation’s highest office before the campaign begins in earnest.

Vance’s appearance comes days after Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who is also considered a possible 2028 candidate, spoke to a group of evangelical Christians who are influential in Iowa’s GOP contest.

Des Moines-based Jimmy Centers, a Republican political consultant, said the 2028 contest is “light-years away,” but said the Republicans who hear Vance speak on Tuesday will be evaluating how he might measure up in an election for the White House.

“I certainly think, as of right now, Vice President Vance would probably be a straw-poll winner of Iowa Republicans for 2028. But I don’t think anyone is saying, ‘We won’t consider anybody else,’” Centers said.

Vance, who has not said whether he will run for the presidency in 2028, is scheduled to appear with Nunn at a manufacturing facility in Des Moines. His office did not comment on the trip’s impact on Vance’s political future.

The vice president’s visit follows a trip President Donald Trump made in January to tout the administration’s tax cuts, part of a string of stops they’re making this year on economic issues ahead of the midterm elections that will determine control of Congress.

But Vance’s visit comes at a time when his own political prospects — and the message he’s expected to deliver on the economy — have been complicated by the war in Iran.

The vice president, who has long been skeptical of foreign military interventions, has seemed a reluctant defender of the nine-week-old war for which Trump has struggled to find an off-ramp. Iowans, like much of the rest of the country, are grappling with higher gas prices because of the conflict. But the state’s farmers are also feeling the pinch of high fertilizer costs from the war and have been hurt by the tariffs Trump has imposed.

While Iowa’s farmers have steadfastly supported the president, they have been looking to the White House for assurances that the current troubles won’t last.

Vance’s visit to Iowa was originally scheduled for last week, but the timing shifted because the House moved to pass a sweeping farm bill that Nunn was due to vote on.

The vice president also had been slated to appear last week at an Iowa State University event with Turning Point USA, but the organization said it was not able to reschedule the event with the university until sometime in the fall.

Kim Schmett, a longtime Iowa GOP activist, said the presidential cycle starts “deceptively slow.”

Republican figures testing the waters often drop by the Westside Conservative Club, which Schmett hosts, but he said it’s still too far out from the caucuses, which are typically held in January of the presidential election year.

He said Trump’s Make America Great Again political movement “is very alive and going here” in Iowa, which would benefit Vance — as well as Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is also thought to be another potential candidate.

“I think there’s going to be a lot of MAGA support,” he said. “And Vice President Vance and Marco Rubio seem to be the recipients of where that is going at the moment.”

But Schmett cautioned, “it’s awfully, awfully early in the process.”

On the Democratic side, at least half a dozen presidential prospects have been making visits to the states with the earliest presidential primary contests, including recent visits to Iowa by former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Michigan U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin.

Meanwhile, potential Republican presidential candidates “are treading very lightly,” said GOP strategist Alex Conant, who worked on Marco Rubio’s 2016 presidential campaign.

“I think Republicans are going to be very reluctant to get in Trump’s way until Trump gives the green light for the campaign to start,” Conant said.

That means much of the groundwork to meet with donors or activists or recruit political staffers might happen slowly and subtly – for now.

After the midterms? Conant said: “It’ll be irresistible.”

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Price reported from Washington.

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NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — As civil rights advocates protest, Republican lawmakers in several Southern states are seizing on the opportunity afforded by a U.S. Supreme Court ruling to redraw congressional districts ahead of the November midterm elections.

The latest state to jump on the redistricting bandwagon is Tennessee, where a special legislative session is to begin Tuesday, a day after a similar session kicked off in Alabama. In Louisiana, lawmakers are making plans for new U.S. House districts after the Supreme Court last week struck down the state’s current map.

The high court’s ruling said Louisiana relied too heavily on race when creating a second Black-majority House district as it attempted to comply with the Voting Rights Act. The ruling significantly altered a decades-old understanding of the law and provided grounds for Republicans in various states to try to eliminate majority-Black districts that have elected Democrats.

Its impact on congressional representation, specifically for Black Americans, is threatening to undo decades of progress to ensure minority voting rights.

President Donald Trump has been encouraging more states to join in redistricting as Republicans seek to hold on to their narrow House majority in this year’s elections.

Several hundred people protested on Monday shortly before Alabama’s special session began, including some carrying signs declaring “No new map” and “We fight back! Black Voters Matter.”

Opponents of the redistricting session gathered across the street from the historic Alabama Capitol, where the Confederacy was formed in 1861 and where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed a crowd of thousands after the 1965 Selma-to-Montgomery voting rights march.

“Much blood, sweat and tears was shed in an effort for us to gain the right to vote,” said Sheyann Webb-Christburg, who as a child participated in the 1965 Bloody Sunday voting rights march in Selma. “In 2026, there are still people who are still not exercising that right to vote, and we are still fighting today, even in an effort to keep our right to vote.”

Republican Gov. Kay Ivey called legislators into a special session to consider contingency plans for special primary elections in hopes the U.S. Supreme Court will let Alabama switch congressional maps ahead of the November midterms.

A three-judge federal panel previously ordered Alabama to use a court-selected map — with a second district that has a substantial number of Black voters — until a new map is drafted after the 2030 Census. Alabama appealed that decision and has asked the court, in light of the Louisiana ruling, to let it revert to a 2023 map drawn by Republican state lawmakers. That map could give Republicans a better chance of winning at least one of the two seats currently held by Black Democratic lawmakers.

“This is the voice of the people,” Alabama House Speaker Nathaniel Ledbetter said while promoting the Republican plan. “We had three judges determine how five million people were supposed to vote, and I don’t think that’s the way.”

At a town hall held by a pro-Democratic group, Doug Jones, a former U.S. senator who is running for governor as a Democrat, said Alabama was “ground zero for voting rights, and we are going to be ground zero to make sure we retain those voting rights.”

Republican Gov. Bill Lee called Tennessee lawmakers into a special session to consider a plan that could break up the state’s lone Democratic-held U.S. House district, centered on the majority-Black city of Memphis. The move comes after pressure from Trump.

The candidate qualifying period in Tennessee ended in March, and the primary election is scheduled for Aug. 6. Lee had said.

Clergy members concerned about plans to split Memphis’ congressional district came together Monday to denounce the move.

“This latest attempt at redistricting is not just about lines on a map. It is about misrepresentation,” said the Rev. Earle Fisher, a pastor at the Abyssinian Missionary Baptist Church and the founder of Up the Vote 901, referring to the Memphis area code. “It’s about whether the voices of Black people in this state will be heard or hidden.”

After last week’s Supreme Court decision, Louisiana moved quickly to delay its May 16 congressional primary to allow time for lawmakers to approve new U.S. House districts.

Louisiana state Sen. Caleb Kleinpeter, a Republican who chairs a Senate committee tasked with redistricting, told The Associated Press that his committee plans to hold a public hearing Friday on congressional redistricting. Kleinpeter said lawmakers are still weighing their options, including bills that would eliminate one or both of the state’s two majority-Black Congressional districts

Democrats and civil rights groups have filed several lawsuits challenging the suspension of the state’s congressional primary, including another filed Monday in federal court. They are encouraging people in Louisiana — where early voting already is underway — to go ahead and cast votes in the congressional primaries in case courts later allow them to be counted.

Legislative voting districts typically are redrawn only once a decade, after a census, to account for population changes. But Trump urged Texas Republicans last year to redraw U.S. House districts to give the party an advantage. Democrats in California responded by doing the same, and then other states joined in.

Florida became the eighth state to enact new House districts ahead of the midterm elections when Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis announced on Monday he had signed a redrawn map passed by the GOP-controlled Legislature. It could help Republicans win as many as four additional House seats. The new map was immediately challenged in court as a partisan gerrymander that violates a Florida constitutional provision against drawing districts that favor one political party over another.

All told, Republicans think they could gain as many as 13 seats from new congressional districts in five states, while Democrats think they could pick up as many as 10 seats from new districts adopted in three states. The newly proposed redistricting in Southern states could add to the Republicans’ tally.

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Chandler reported from Montgomery, Alabama, and Lieb from Jefferson City, Missouri. Associated Press writers Jack Brook in New Orleans and Nicholas Riccardi in Denver contributed to this report.

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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Republican Vivek Ramaswamy has spent his campaign for Ohio governor focused on November’s general election and finally gets the chance Tuesday to put the long primary season behind him, as the Trump-endorsed biotech entrepreneur positions for an expensive run against Dr. Amy Acton, the former state health director.

Contests on the ballots also will set the stage for Ohio’s third competitive U.S. Senate race in the last four years, as well as a handful of U.S. House races that are expected to be closely fought in the fall.

Every statewide executive office is open this year due to term limits, but the governor’s race has captured the bulk of the attention so far.

Ramaswamy, a 2024 GOP primary presidential candidate, swept onto the state’s political scene early last year as a mad shuffle was taking place. Then-Sen. JD Vance was ascending to the vice presidency and front-running gubernatorial candidate Jon Husted was being appointed to replace him in Washington.

That opened a window of opportunity at the top of Republicans’ statewide ticket.

Though he is a newcomer in state politics, Ramaswamy’s national profile, tech industry connections and proximity to Trump landed him the Ohio Republican Party’s endorsement. With it, he cleared a prospective field that included the sitting state attorney general, state treasurer and lieutenant governor.

But Democrats also saw opportunity with the open governors seat, even as the state, a former bellwether, has tipped convincingly toward Republicans during the Trump era. The president’s lagging approval ratings on the economy and dissatisfaction over the war in Iran are contributing to a competitive contest.

Acton, a physician and public health expert, emerged as their choice. She became a household name across Ohio in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic as she stood alongside Republican Gov. Mike DeWine during daily coronavirus broadcasts. Her comforting presence during the crisis made her a beloved figure with many Ohioans.

But the administration’s aggressive actions — including shuttering businesses, closing schools and canceling an election — also earned Acton plenty of enemies and made her the occasional target of people upset about pandemic policies, with some armed protesters showing up outside her home. Ramaswamy’s campaign has sought to capitalize on the lingering anger over pandemic restrictions with attacks on Acton’s role early in the crisis.

Acton is unopposed in the Democratic primary, while Ramaswamy faces a long-shot challenge from Casey Putsch. The engineer and car designer is a YouTube provocateur who has trolled Ramaswamy incessantly over his Indian heritage and Hindu faith and painted him as an out-of-touch billionaire “tech bro.”

Husted is unopposed in the GOP primary for Senate, a special election to fill the remainder of the six-year Senate term Vance won in 2022. Husted’s likely opponent will be Democrat Sherrod Brown, a former three-term senator who lost a reelection bid against Republican Bernie Moreno in 2024, a contest where spending hit $500 million. Brown faces a minor primary challenge from first-time candidate Ron Kincaid.

Early voting began April 7 under some new election laws, including citizenship checks and elimination of the four-day grace period for receiving mailed ballots. There have been no reports so far of any widespread problems for voters related to the changes.

In the wake of a new round of redistricting that slightly favored Republicans, the state also has numerous partisan congressional primaries.

The most heated GOP primary is in the Toledo area’s 9th District for the chance to take on Democratic U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur, the longest-serving woman in Congress.

The five-way contest includes former state Rep. Derek Merrin, whom Kaptur defeated by less than a percentage point in 2024, as well as an Air National Guard veteran, a healthcare industry worker, a sitting state representative and the former deputy director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Madison Sheahan.

In Democratic U.S. Rep. Greg Landsman’s Cincinnati-area district, which his party considers a “must-hold,” the three-way Republican primary includes Eric Conroy, a CIA and Air Force veteran who has been endorsed by Trump, Vance and Moreno.

Landsman also faces a primary challenge from Damon Lynch IV, the grandson of a prominent civil rights leader. Lynch has criticized Landsman for his initial vote against a war powers resolution on the war in Iran, which Landsman later followed up with a favorable vote.

In the Akron area’s 13th District, five Republicans including business owner Neil Patel, a 2022 U.S. Senate candidate, are vying for the opportunity to face Democratic U.S. Rep. Emilia Sykes.

As a Trump-backed national effort to remake congressional maps in Republicans’ favor was underway, Ohio Democrats took a could-have-been-worse approach and passed the map they were given unanimously.

Now party candidates are crowding congressional primaries across the state for the chance to take on sitting Republican representatives, who hold 10 of Ohio’s 15 seats.

The newly redrawn 7th District in the Cleveland area has attracted eight Democrats hoping to challenge Republican U.S. Rep. Max Miller, a former senior Trump adviser, in November. Among them is former Cuyahoga County Executive Ed FitzGerald, the Democratic nominee for governor in 2014.

In northeast Ohio’s 14th District, former state Supreme Court Justice William O’Neill is among three Democrats seeking to take on Republican U.S. Rep. Dave Joyce. Joyce also has two primary challengers.

Meanwhile six Democrats are on the ballot in the Dayton-area 10th District of Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Turner. There are seven in GOP U.S. Rep. Michael Rulli’s 6th District along the Ohio River and five in the 5th District of Republican U.S. Rep. Bob Latta.

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A partisan redistricting battle among states has accelerated ahead of the November midterm elections following a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that weakened the federal Voting Rights Act and opened the way for states to try to eliminate voting districts drawn for racial minorities.

Legislative voting districts typically are redrawn based on census data after the start of each decade. But an unusual spate of mid-decade redistricting broke out after President Donald Trump urged Texas Republicans last year to reshape U.S. House districts to give the party an edge in the midterm elections. Democrats in California countered with their own political gerrymandering. More states followed.

Eight states have already adopted new House maps, and several more are considering it. So far, Republicans believe they could win up to 13 additional seats from new districts in Texas, Florida, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio. Democrats, meanwhile, think they could gain up to 10 seats from new districts in California, Utah and Virginia.

But those tallies presume past voting patterns hold in November. Historically, the president’s party tends to lose seats in the midterms. Democrats need to gain just a few seats in November to wrest control of the House from Republicans, which would give them greater power to oppose Trump.

Lawmakers in at least three states are meeting to consider plans for new U.S. House maps.

Current map: two Democrats, four Republicans

New map: Republican Gov. Jeff Landry has postponed the May 16 congressional primary to allow lawmakers to revise U.S. House districts in response to an April 29 Supreme Court ruling striking down a majority Black congressional district.

Challenges: Several lawsuits have been filed in federal and state court asserting that Landry lacked authority to suspend the primary elections.

Current map: two Democrats, five Republicans

New map: Republican state officials hope to revert to a U.S. House map passed in 2023 — but not previously used — that could help Republicans win an additional seat.

Challenges: The current map was imposed under a court order and is supposed to be used until after the 2030 census. State officials have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to set aside that order in light of its ruling in the Louisiana redistricting case.

Current map: one Democrat, eight Republicans

New Map: Republican Gov. Bill Lee has called lawmakers into special session to consider a new U.S. House map that could carve up a Black-majority district in Memphis and improve Republican chances of winning an additional seat.

Challenges: The candidate qualifying period already has ended for the primaries, which are scheduled for Aug. 6.

New U.S. House districts have passed in eight states since last summer. Six took up redistricting voluntarily, one was required to by its state constitution and another did so under court order.

Current map: 13 Democrats, 25 Republicans

New map: Republican Gov. Greg Abbott signed a revised House map into law last August that could help Republicans win five additional seats.

Challenges: The U.S. Supreme Court in December cleared the way for the new districts to be used in this year’s elections. It has since overturned a lower-court ruling that blocked the new map because it was “racially gerrymandered.”

Current map: 43 Democrats, nine Republicans

New map: Voters in November approved revised House districts drawn by the Democratic-led Legislature that could help Democrats win five additional seats.

Challenges: The U.S. Supreme Court in February allowed the new districts to be used in this year’s elections. It denied an appeal from Republicans and the Department of Justice, which claimed the districts impermissibly favor Hispanic voters.

Current map: two Democrats, six Republicans

New map: Republican Gov. Mike Kehoe signed a revised House map into law last September that could help Republicans win an additional seat.

Challenges: A Cole County judge ruled the new map is in effect as election officials work to determine whether a referendum petition seeking a statewide vote complies with constitutional criteria and contains enough valid petition signatures. The Missouri Supreme Court rejected a lawsuit claiming mid-decade redistricting is illegal. It’s scheduled to hear arguments in May on claims the new districts violate compactness requirements and should be placed on hold pending the potential referendum.

Current map: four Democrats, 10 Republicans

New map: The Republican-led General Assembly gave final approval in October to revised districts that could help Republicans win an additional seat.

Challenges: A federal court panel in November denied a request to block the revised districts from being used in the midterm elections.

Current map: five Democrats, 10 Republicans

New map: A bipartisan panel composed primarily of Republicans voted in October to approve revised House districts that improve Republicans’ chances of winning two additional seats.

Challenges: None. The state constitution required new districts before the 2026 election, because Republicans had approved the prior map without sufficient Democratic support after the last census.

Current map: no Democrats, four Republicans

New map: A judge in November imposed revised House districts that could help Democrats win a seat. The court ruled that lawmakers had circumvented anti-gerrymandering standards passed by voters when adopting the prior map.

Challenges: A federal court panel and the state Supreme Court, in February, each rejected Republican challenges to the judicial map selection.

Current map: six Democrats, five Republicans

New map: Voters approved a constitutional amendment on April 21 authorizing new U.S. House districts backed by Democrats that could help the party win up to four additional seats.

Challenges: The state Supreme Court allowed the referendum to proceed, but it has yet to rule whether the effort is legal. The court is considering an appeal of a Tazewell County judge’s ruling that the amendment is invalid because lawmakers violated procedural requirements.

Current map: eight Democrats, 20 Republicans

New map: Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis announced on May 4 that he had signed revised U.S. House districts that improve the GOP’s chances of winning four additional seats.

Challenges: A court challenge contends the new map violates a state constitution provision prohibiting districts from being drawn with intent to favor or disfavor a political party.

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By Michael S. Derby

NEW YORK, May 4 (Reuters) – New York Federal Reserve President John Williams said on Monday the U.S. central bank’s monetary policy is “well positioned” to deal with the high level of economic uncertainty facing the economy as a result of the war in the Middle East.

“The future is difficult to see, and the risks to both sides of our mandate have increased,” Williams said in the text of remarks to be delivered before a gathering held by the Cynosure Group in New York City.

“The extent and duration of the effects of supply disruptions and higher energy prices that are emanating from the Middle East conflict are key factors that will shape the global economic outlook,” he said. 

Williams noted that high inflation, mixed job market signals and uncertainty about the war present “an unusual set of circumstances” for Fed policymakers, while refraining from providing guidance on the outlook for the central bank’s policy rate, which is currently in the 3.50%-3.75% range.

He said he expected resilient economic growth of between 2% and 2.25% this year amid mostly stable job market conditions, with unemployment holding at a level between 4.25% and 4.50%.

But inflation, challenged by tariffs and energy costs, will likely stay at around 3% this year before moving back to the Fed’s 2% target, Williams said. He added that inflation expectations are also mostly steady while warning that energy price rises could be worse than expected.

“Market expectations of the future path of oil prices are fairly benign, but several plausible scenarios entail more severe dislocations in both prices and quantities,” Williams said. He added that the Iran war “could result in a larger and broader-based supply shock that has more severe adverse consequences for inflation and economic activity.”

Williams’ remarks were his first public comments since the U.S. central bank last week decided to leave interest rates unchanged. Fed policymakers continue to be in a wait-and-see mode with monetary policy as they face considerable uncertainty about the economic outlook due to the war.

That conflict, particularly the closure of the vital Strait of Hormuz waterway, has driven up energy prices sharply. Fed officials are facing an outlook of rising inflation pressures coupled with the prospect that the energy price surge will also depress demand and create risks for the job market.

Three regional Fed bank presidents supported the central bank’s rate decision last week while objecting to the continued inclusion of language in the monetary policy statement that suggests the next move will be a cut in borrowing costs.

Those three officials – the presidents of the Cleveland, Dallas and Minneapolis Fed banks – argued in the wake of the Fed meeting that both monetary easing and tightening were possible.

(Reporting by Michael S. Derby; Editing by Paul Simao)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is waging a retribution campaign against some fellow Republicans in Tuesday’s primary in Indiana. Seven GOP state senators who blocked his push to redraw the state’s congressional districts now face primary challengers endorsed by him.

In a series of social media posts, Trump has lobbed various insults at the incumbents, calling them incompetent, RINOs — Republicans in name only — or losers.

In 2025, Trump urged Republicans in several states to redraw their congressional maps to help the party maintain control of the narrowly divided U.S. House. Texas, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio answered the call, but the effort to create new GOP seats in Indiana failed when more than half the state’s Republican senators sided with Democrats to defeat the plan backed by Trump. Eight of those state senators are up for reelection in 2026, and Trump has targeted all but one for defeat.

Voter-approved maps favoring Democrats in California and Virginia have offset some expected Republican gains in other states, but a new plan in Florida, as well as last week’s Supreme Court decision to weaken the Voting Rights Act of 1965, have given Republicans a boost in their effort to reshape the electoral landscape heading into November.

The Trump-targeted Indiana state senators all represent districts he carried in 2024, mostly by 20 percentage points or more. The most competitive was District 1, near Lake Michigan and just southeast of Chicago. Trump won with about 53% of the vote and a margin of about 7 percentage points over Democratic then-Vice President Kamala Harris. His best performance of the seven targeted districts was in District 19, on the Ohio border, where he received about 68% of the vote and a margin of about 39 percentage points.

Only one of the incumbents, state Sen. Spencer Deery of District 23, faced a contested primary in 2022. He won with about 31% of the vote against a four-candidate field that included Paula Copenhaver, Trump’s pick to oust him this year. Another Trump-targeted incumbent, state Sen. Greg Goode of District 38, filled a vacant seat in 2023 and has not previously faced a full districtwide election.

Half of Indiana’s 50 state Senate seats and all 100 state House seats are up for election in 2026. Republicans hold supermajorities in both chambers.

Indiana voters will also choose nominees for the U.S. House under the existing boundaries, although none of the state’s nine seats is expected to play a key role in the effort to win control of the chamber in November.

Among the notable contests is the Democratic primary in the 7th Congressional District, where U.S. Rep. Andre Carson faces three challengers in his bid for renomination to a 10th full term. George Hornedo is an attorney and political consultant. Destiny Wells is an attorney, an Army Reserve lieutenant colonel and the 2024 nominee for state attorney general. Denise Paul Hatch, a former Center Township constable, is appealing her 2024 felony conviction for official misconduct.

The Associated Press does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover any newsworthy developments, such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory. In doing so, the AP will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.

There are no automatic recounts in Indiana, but the losing candidate may request and pay for a recount regardless of the vote margin. The costs may be partly or fully refunded depending on the results of the recount. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.

Here are some of the key facts about the election and data points the AP Decision Team will monitor as the votes are tallied:

All polls in Indiana close at 6 p.m. local time. Polls in most of the state are in the Eastern time zone and close at 6 p.m. ET, but some polls are in Central time and close at 7 p.m. ET. State Senate District 1 is the only Trump-targeted seat where polls close at 7 p.m. ET. The last polls in the 1st, 2nd, 4th and 8th Congressional Districts also close at 7 p.m. ET.

The AP will provide vote results and declare winners in contested primaries for the U.S. House, the state Senate and the state House. Republican incumbents face Trump-backed challengers in state Senate Districts 1, 11, 19, 21, 23, 38 and 41.

Indiana does not register voters by party, so registered voters are asked to select the primary ballot for the party of their choice. Voter ID is required. An unusual provision in state law requires voters in a party’s primary to have voted for a majority of that party’s candidates in the last general election or plan to do so in the next general election if they didn’t vote in the last election. This is essentially unenforceable, but voters whose party affiliations are challenged at the polls must vote by provisional ballot unless they sign an affidavit aligning themselves with the party.

There were about 4.8 million registered voters in Indiana as of the November 2024 general election. Registration totals in the state’s nine congressional districts ranged from about 442,000 in District 7 to about 505,000 in District 5.

Most of the targeted state Senate races did not have a contested primary in 2022, but those that had a contested general election ranged from about 32,000 to 45,000 total votes.

About 34,000 votes were cast in the 7th Congressional District Democratic primary in 2024, the most of any district. That was about 8% of registered voters. About 25,000 votes were cast in the Republican primary.

About 29% of the 2024 primary vote was cast before Election Day.

As of Friday, more than 175,000 ballots had already been cast in the Democratic and Republican primaries combined.

Absentee ballots in Indiana may be processed once they are received, and counting may begin before the polls close on Election Day. This leads to relatively quick counting of absentee ballots. Elections officials from more than three-quarters of Indiana’s 92 counties have indicated they tend to include all or nearly all the results of absentee and early voting in their first vote update of the night.

In 2024, the AP first reported results in the Republican presidential primary at 6:06 p.m. ET, or six minutes after polls closed in most of the state. The last vote update of the night was at 11:34 p.m. ET, with more than 99% of total votes counted.

The last election night vote update for each congressional district with a contested primary was much earlier. The earliest was 9:10 p.m. ET in the 5th Congressional District, and the latest was 11:34 p.m. ET in the 1st District. The last vote update of the night in the 7th District Democratic primary was at 10:04 p.m. ET.

The first vote result in the state Senate District 23 primary was at 6:59 p.m. ET, almost an hour after polls closed in the district. The last update was at 11:11 p.m. ET, with more than 99% of the total votes counted.

As of Tuesday, there will be 182 days until the 2026 midterm elections.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the 2026 election at https://apnews.com/projects/elections-2026/.

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