Politics

WASHINGTON, May 21 (Reuters) – The U.S. Senate is abandoning President Donald Trump’s June 1 deadline for passing immigration enforcement funding, Republican senators said on Thursday.

Senators Bill Cassidy and John Kennedy, both of Louisiana, told reporters the Senate was beginning its Memorial Day recess without passing the bill that was intended to contain $1 billion for Trump ballroom and related security and $72 billion for migrant deportations.

(Reporting by Richard Cowan, Katharine Jackson; Editing by Caitlin Webber)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is heading to a toss-up congressional district in New York on Friday to test his midterm message on the economy, even as voters largely disapprove of his stewardship of it.

Trump will travel to the Hudson Valley area to appear with Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, who is up for reelection in what will be one of the most closely watched House races this November. The focus of the event is to promote the tax law Trump signed last year, particularly the quadrupling of the deduction for state and local taxes, which is critical in a high-tax state like New York.

The White House has been looking for more opportunities to highlight Trump’s economic accomplishments as his approval rating on the economy has slumped. About one-third of U.S. adults approve of how Trump is handling the economy, according to a new AP-NORC poll, down slightly from 40% at the start of Trump’s second term. Trump had promised to bring prices down, but gasoline prices have surged this year due to the war in Iran.

Lawler is just one of three House Republicans who represent a district won by Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris in 2024. Unlike the other two — retiring Nebraska Rep. Don Bacon and Pennsylvania Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, who’s been a critic of Trump policies — Lawler has chosen to embrace the polarizing president in hopes of not alienating Republican voters who support the party’s leader.

“Look, the people who hate the president — and that’s their sole basis for their vote — are likely never voting for me,” Lawler told The Associated Press in an interview on the sidelines of the White House congressional picnic earlier this week. He described the Trump appearance as a chance to energize supporters.

“Moreover, I have a record in my district that is one I’m very proud of, and a record that appeals to a broad middle,” said Lawler, who was wearing a red ball cap emblazoned with “Mr. SALT,” the acronym for the state and local tax deduction he fought to include in the bill. “I am confident that I will be reelected on my own merits and my own record.”

The president’s remarks at Rockland Community College in Suffern, New York, will “highlight his strong record of making life more affordable for working families,” White House spokesperson Liz Huston said. She added that Trump plans to draw a sharp contrast with Democrats in Congress, who voted against the tax law.

Trump established a SALT cap in 2017 through his Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Last year’s law expanded the SALT deduction to $40,000 from $10,000 after arduous negotiations with Republicans, including Lawler, whose district has high local taxes. The law also raised the average tax refund for New Yorkers to more than $3,800, according to data provided by the White House.

“My constituents were seeing anywhere from $5,000 to $20,000 refund checks, which is pretty massive,” said Lawler, who said he wanted to give Trump one of his “Mr. SALT” ball caps.

Trump formally endorsed Lawler for reelection last year, although it came at a time when the congressman was publicly mulling a run for governor of New York. The endorsement was viewed as a way to keep Lawler in a reelection bid rather than opening up a competitive House seat.

Five Democrats are vying for the party’s nomination to compete against Lawler in the general election. The Democratic primary is June 23.

“Nothing says ‘I don’t understand my district’ quite like Mike Lawler bringing Donald Trump to NY-17 to tout a disastrous economy that’s crushing working families at every turn,” said Riya Vashi, a spokesperson for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

National Republican Congressional Committee chairman Richard Hudson disputed that, arguing that Trump’s Friday appearance will “absolutely” help.

“His poll numbers are pretty good in Lawler’s district,” said Hudson, a North Carolina congressman. The NRCC has been polling in competitive districts and Hudson said the “president’s numbers are good. Democratic numbers are tanking.”

The remarks are an official White House event and not a campaign one, said Lawler, who noted that more than 5,000 people registered to attend in the first 12 hours that a sign-up was available.

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Associated Press writer Joey Cappelletti contributed to this report.

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CORONA, Calif. (AP) — No one would call California Trump country. But a vicious U.S. House primary is playing out southeast of Los Angeles where two Republican incumbents wedged into the same district are fighting over their MAGA bona fides and loyalty to the president.

Rep. Ken Calvert, the longest serving Republican in the state’s House delegation, is running ads calling rival Rep. Young Kim a “traitor” to President Donald Trump and “a liberal and a liar.” His ads resurface past video clips of her criticizing Trump.

After once stressing her independence from the White House, Kim has dubbed herself a “Trump Republican” and aired spots accusing Calvert of “sabotaging President Trump’s agenda” and only “serving himself.” She claimed that he has been in “lockstep with Nancy Pelosi,” the former Democratic House speaker widely reviled by Republicans.

The acidic tone of the advertising in heavy media rotation from two House members who previously were friendly colleagues underscores the stakes in a race neither of them wanted. The June 2 primary is the first since Gov. Gavin Newsom pushed to redraw the California’s congressional map as part of a national redistricting fight, with the goal of winning Democrats five more House seats in the state.

The Republican-versus-Republican contest in one of the few conservative districts left in liberal-leaning California is one example of how the electoral landscape has been reshaped across the country.

The race stands out nationally: Calvert and Kim are the only Republican House incumbents facing each other in the 2026 primaries. In Texas, Democratic Reps. Al Green and Christine Menefee are also facing each other due to redistricting.

The contest is displaying how many Republicans still embrace the president even as his popularity has slipped amid the war in Iran and climbing consumer prices.

Democrats nationally have been encouraged by a string of election results in advance of the midterms, which typically favor the party not holding the presidency. Trump, meanwhile, has reinforced his continuing party clout by ousting several incumbents who ran afoul of the White House. Republicans hold a fragile 217-212 majority in the House, with one independent and five vacancies.

At a recent weekend barbecue hosted by conservative activists in Calvert’s hometown of Corona, retiree and Trump supporter Mike Rutland said he remained undecided amid the torrent of negative advertising from both sides in the race. Mail voting is underway.

“I want my state back,” Rutland said, lamenting years of Democratic control. As for the primary, he added that “we don’t want any RINOs,” using a pejorative term that is an acronym for “Republicans in name only.”

The national battle over for the House continues, with more states maneuvering to reshape districts for partisan advantage following a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling that weakened the federal Voting Rights Act and provided grounds for states to try to eliminate voting districts with large minority populations. In California the new House map has shaken the Republican ranks at a time when the outcome in a single district could determine control.

Long-serving GOP Rep. Darrell Issa announced in March that he would retire rather than compete in a redrawn district favoring Democrats. Former Republican Rep. Kevin Kiley became an independent in the face of a tough reelection fight in a Democratic-leaning district. And GOP Rep. David Valadao is seeking another term in his Central Valley district where Democratic registration was pumped up to try to drive him out.

For Calvert and Kim, it’s possible the election in a district that runs through inland Riverside and Orange counties could be a warmup for a one-on-one rematch in November — California law permits the two candidates who receive the most primary votes to advance to the general election, regardless of party. There are five Democrats on the ballot and an independent, but it’s possible that only the two Republicans would advance given the nearly 9-point GOP voter registration edge in the district.

In a state where Republicans have not won a statewide election in two decades, the GOP-leaning district is a vestige from an earlier time — Orange County was once one of the most solidly Republican places in the U.S., dubbed Reagan country for its ties to former Republican President Ronald Reagan.

GOP strategist Jon Fleischman, a former executive director of the California Republican Party, said both candidates are “giving President Trump a very big bear hug.” But if they both advance to November, a key question then will be, “Where do all the Democrats and nonconservative voters end up?”

“I think it’s going to be ugly,” Fleischman said.

In a preview of what could come, voters have been getting mail from Kim’s campaign alleging that Calvert voted to “force taxpayers to fund sex change operations for children,” a claim that Calvert’s camp says is fiction. For its part his campaign is pointing to Kim’s support for a resolution to censure Trump over his role in inciting the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, calling her a “Trump betrayer.”

“I’m not personalizing it. I’m just pointing out somebody’s record,” Calvert said of her support for the resolution during an interview at the barbecue lunch.

Calvert, first elected in 1992, has represented territory that makes up more than half the redrawn district, and he sits on the powerful Appropriations Committee.

Kim was born in South Korea, grew up in Guam and came to California for college. She became a small-business owner and got elected to the state Assembly and then Congress.

Running for the House in 2018, she emphasized her independence from Trump’s White House on issues like trade. “I’m a different kind of candidate,” she told The Associated Press at the time.

Now Kim has vowed on her website to “stand with President Trump.”

“The great American comeback depends on it,” she said.

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NEW YORK (AP) — Kamala Harris “wrote off rural America” during the 2024 presidential campaign and failed to attack Donald Trump with sufficient “negative firepower,” according to a long-awaited post-election autopsy released Thursday by the Democratic National Committee.

But the document’s key findings, the focus of much mystery over the last year, were almost an afterthought among Democratic officials who expressed deep frustration with DNC chair Ken Martin ‘s handling of the situation and the direction of the party’s political machine.

Martin shared the 192-page report only after facing intense internal pressure from Democratic operatives. He originally promised to release the autopsy even before taking over the committee last year, only to keep it under wraps because he worried it would interfere with Democrats’ focus on the November midterms.

“I didn’t want to create a distraction,” Martin wrote on Substack. “Ironically, in doing so, I ended up creating an even bigger distraction. And for that, I sincerely apologize.”

He said the report was withheld because it “was not ready for primetime,” and the DNC covered the document with annotations and disclaimers saying it was incomplete and unsubstantiated.

The report’s release did nothing to temper irritation at Martin, and Democratic insiders were exasperated as they spent the day talking about a two-year-old election instead of focusing on Trump’s unpopular war in Iran, surging prices or the backlash against the president’s White House ballroom.

Indeed, the initial reaction to the report was a mix of bafflement and anger over Martin’s handling of the situation.

Democratic strategist Dan Pfeiffer, formerly a senior adviser to President Barack Obama, said Martin “must go.”

“It’s hard to imagine anyone handling anything worse than Ken Martin handled the DNC autopsy,” he wrote on social media. “It was a disaster of his own making, and it’s sufficient evidence that he is not the right person to lead the DNC at this time.”

Although the autopsy criticizes Democrats’ focus on “identity politics,” it sidesteps some of the most controversial elements of the 2024 campaign. The report does not address former President Joe Biden’s decision to seek reelection, the rushed selection of Harris to replace him after he dropped out or the party’s acrimonious divide over the war in Gaza.

“I am not proud of this product; it does not meet my standards, and it won’t meet your standards,” Martin said. “I don’t endorse what’s in this report, or what’s left out of it. I could not in good faith put the DNC’s stamp of approval on it. But transparency is paramount.”

During a conversation with staff Thursday, Martin announced that the report’s primary author, consultant Paul Rivera, was no longer working with the DNC, according to a person on the call not authorized to speak publicly about the private discussion.

A spokesperson for Harris did not respond to a request for comment.

The postelection report, which was first released by CNN, calls for “a renewed focus on the voters of Middle America and the South, who have come to believe they are not included in the Democratic vision of a stronger and more dynamic America for everyone.”

“Millions of Americans are suffering from poor access to healthcare, manufacturing and job losses, and a failing infrastructure, yet continue to be persuaded to vote against their best interests because they do not see themselves reflected in the America of the Democratic Party,” the report says.

The autopsy points to a reduction in support and training for Democratic state parties, voter registration shifts and “a persistent inability or unwillingness to listen to all voters.”

Thursday’s release comes as Martin confronts a crisis of confidence among party officials who are increasingly concerned about the health of their political machine barely a year into his term. Some Democratic operatives have had informal discussions about recruiting a new chair, even though most believe that Martin’s job isn’t in serious jeopardy ahead of the midterm elections.

Few were satisfied with how Martin navigated the report’s release.

“The execution, the rollout and the coverup are indicative of how Ken Martin is fundamentally not up to the task,” said Amanda Litman, who leads the Democratic-allied organization Run For Something. “He will be incapable of rebuilding the trust necessary to facilitate a Democratic primary in 2027-2028.”

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said the Gaza omission was “notable.” She also declined to back Martin when asked by The Associated Press whether she supports his leadership.

“I’m glad that there’s something out,” she said. “It’s, of course, taken a very long time.”

The report found that Harris and her allies failed to focus enough on Trump’s negatives, especially his felony convictions. This was part of a broader criticism that Democrats’ messaging is too focused on reason and winning arguments, “even in cycles when the electorate is defined by rage.”

“There was a decision in the 2024 Democratic leadership not to engage in negative advertising at the scale required,” the report states. “The Trump campaign and supportive Super PACs went full throttle against Vice President Harris, but there was not sufficient or similar negative firepower directed at Trump by Democrats.”

The report continues: “It was essential to prosecute a more effective case as to why Trump should have been disqualified from ever again taking office. The grounds were there, but the messaging did not make the case.”

The DNC appeared to reject these conclusions, adding annotations like “no sourcing or evidence provided.”

Trump’s attack on Harris’ transgender policies was cited as a key contrast.

Specifically, the report suggested the Democratic nominee was “boxed” in by the Trump campaign’s “very effective” ad that highlighted Harris’ previous statement of support for taxpayer-funded gender-affirming surgeries for prison inmates.

Democratic pollsters believed that “if the Vice President would not change her position — and she did not — then there was nothing which would have worked as a response,” the report said.

The report criticized Harris’ outreach to key segments of America while condemning the party’s focus on “identity politics.”

“Harris wrote off rural America, assuming urban/suburban margins would compensate. The math doesn’t work,” the report says. “You can’t lose rural areas by overwhelming margins and make it up elsewhere when rural voters are a significant share of the electorate. If Democrats are to reclaim leadership in the Heartland or the South, candidates must perform well in rural turf. Show up, listen, and then do it again.”

The report also references Democrats’ underperformance with male voters of color.

“Male voters require direct engagement. The gender gap can be narrowed. Deploy male messengers, address economic concerns, and don’t assume identity politics will hold male voters of color,” it says.

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AP writer Joey Cappelletti in Washington contributed.

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FORT COLLINS, Colo. (AP) — Colorado Democrats voted overwhelmingly to censure one of their own, Gov. Jared Polis, for commuting the prison sentence of Tina Peters, the election conspiracy theorist who amplified President Donald Trump’s baseless claims that mass fraud caused his 2020 election loss.

About 90% of the state party’s roughly 700 Central Committee members voted Wednesday for censure. It means that Polis, who is term-limited and serving his final year in office, will be barred from being an honored guest, featured speaker, or officially recognized party representative at party-sponsored events.

Peters, 70, is a former county clerk who was sentenced to nine years behind bars after being convicted in 2024 for a scheme to make a copy of her county’s election computer system.

She is set for release June 1 after Polis commuted her sentence Friday.

Trump has championed Peters’ cause. Reducing her sentence set a “dangerous and disappointing” precedent when democracy and voting rights are under attack nationwide, the Colorado Democratic Party said in a statement.

“It sends a message to future bad actors that election tampering has consequences, unless you’re friends with the president,” the statement said.

About 700 state party members, including current and former elected officials, petitioned for the party to condemn Polis. The subsequent censure vote was taken in a regularly scheduled party Central Committee virtual meeting.

In April, a Colorado appeals court upheld Peters’ conviction but ordered her to be resentenced, saying the judge wrongly punished her for speaking out about election fraud.

In commuting her sentence, Polis told Peters in a letter she deserved prison time but had been given an “extremely unusual and lengthy” sentence for a first-time, nonviolent offender.

He defended the commutation after the censure vote.

“The governor made this decision based on the facts of the case and what he believed was the right thing to do. Sometimes the right thing isn’t the popular thing with everybody. Democracy is strongest when disagreement is met with debate and dialogue, not censorship,” Polis spokesperson Eric Maruyama said in an emailed statement Thursday.

Peters thanked Polis and apologized for her crime in a statement after her sentence commutation.

Peters sneaked an outside computer expert, an associate of MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, to make a copy of her county’s Dominion Voting Systems election computer server during a system upgrade in 2021. She then joined Lindell onstage at a “cybersymposium” that promised to reveal proof of election rigging, and photos of the upgrade, including passwords, were posted online.

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By Joseph Ax

May 21 (Reuters) – Bowing to pressure from within its ranks, the Democratic National Committee released on Thursday its long‑withheld “autopsy” of Kamala Harris’ loss to Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential race — only to quickly disavow it.

  The report found that Democrats have ceded ground to Trump’s Republicans through under-funding of state parties and a “persistent inability or unwillingness to listen to all voters.”

In particular, Democrats underperformed among male voters, non-college voters, irregular voters and rural voters, it said. The report was released less than six months before November’s midterm congressional elections.

In a statement accompanying the release, DNC Chairman Ken Martin said it “does not meet my standards, and it won’t meet your standards,” but he said it was being published to restore trust in the party.

The 192-page document includes a disclaimer at the top of each page stating that it “reflects the views of the author, not the DNC,” and notes appended throughout highlight inaccuracies as well as conclusions offered without evidence. 

The report was written by Paul Rivera, a Democratic consultant, who could not immediately be reached for comment. It was completed late last year, and some Democrats were angry it was being kept secret.

While Democrats appear well-positioned to make gains in Congress in the November vote given Trump’s declining popularity, they are still searching for a unifying message ahead of the 2028 presidential campaign.

A New York Times/Siena College poll this week found widespread frustration among Democratic voters of all stripes, even as the party appears to have a sizable advantage over Republicans heading into the election, the newspaper reported.

Martin had initially promised to release the report but changed his mind in December, saying he did not want to encourage Democrats to engage in finger-pointing about 2024 rather than focusing on the future. The turnabout caused some party supporters to question his leadership.

He wrote that he had withheld the report after last November’s Democratic victories in Virginia and New Jersey to avoid distraction, but acknowledged the decision only created a larger one. “For that, I sincerely apologize,” he said.

Both major parties have in the past commissioned autopsies following losses to explore what lessons should be learned, including interviewing party leaders, activists and donors and analyzing spending and messaging. 

The report notes that 2024 was quite close, which might convince Democrats they only need to make minor changes.

But that approach is “denialist at its core,” according to the report, which said the party “has vacillated between stagnation and retrogression” since Barack Obama’s landslide White House win in 2008.

The autopsy also blamed Democrat Joe Biden’s White House for failing to set Harris up for success when she was his vice president, leaving her in a weakened position when Biden abruptly dropped his reelection bid in July 2024.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax, editing by Ross Colvin and Howard Goller)

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By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON, May 21 (Reuters) – A group of six Democratic senators have expressed serious concerns about planned foreign ownership interests, including from Gulf sovereign wealth funds, in the proposed $111 billion Paramount-Warner Bros Discovery merger.

Last month, Paramount Skydance asked the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to approve foreign investments backing its acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery. The senators raised concerns about Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds and Chinese companies taking part.

“Foreign governments hostile to a free and independent press could exert unprecedented influence over a media conglomerate vital to American journalism and culture,” said a letter signed by Senators Maria Cantwell, Ed Markey, Ben Ray Lujan and others to FCC Chair Brendan Carr, seen by Reuters and sent late on Wednesday.

Cantwell is the top Democrat on the Senate Commerce Committee which oversees the FCC, and other signatories of the letter are members of the committee.

The senators noted the deal involves sovereign wealth funds from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Abu Dhabi investing in a company that would control CBS stations, as well as major cable news operations including CNN. They also cited reports that China’s Tencent could also take part.

The combined firm would include the 28 television stations owned by CBS, the movies and television shows of Paramount, and CNN, HBO, and other media properties.

The family of Paramount CEO David Ellison will continue to control voting shares, the company said in its filing seeking a waiver.

Carr told reporters Wednesday the FCC had sought public comment on Paramount’s request and that it would also be reviewed by CFIUS, a Treasury-led interagency committee that vets foreign investments for national security risks.

“We urge you to conduct a rigorous and thorough review of the foreign investment in Paramount, its impact on editorial independence, and its implications for U.S. national security,” the senators wrote.

The FCC did not immediately comment on the letter.

Paramount said last year that Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), Abu Dhabi-based L’imad Holding Company, and Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) had agreed to back its proposed takeover of Warner Bros.

The senators asked what specific assurances had been provided by the Saudi, Emirati, and Qatari sovereign wealth funds and Tencent to the FCC “that they will not attempt to influence the editorial, journalistic, or content decisions at Paramount.”

Last July, the FCC approved CBS-parent Paramount’s tie-up with Skydance Media.

(Reporting by David ShepardsonEditing by Tomasz Janowski and Susan Fenton)

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By Leila Miller and Maximilian Heath

BUENOS AIRES, May 21 (Reuters) – U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Brian Mast has warned U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio of “Chinese malign influence” in a bid for a major contract in Argentina, according to a letter seen by Reuters.

The April 23 letter concerns an auction for a 25-year contract to dredge and operate Argentina’s Parana River, a vital waterway for most of the country’s agricultural exports, that Argentina estimates will reach $10 billion in investment.

The terms of the tender, which is in its final phase with a decision expected in the coming days, explicitly barred state-owned companies, preventing bids from Chinese firms.

But Mast alleged that China was attempting “to circumvent that choice through a private sector proxy.” There is “serious concern” that Jan De Nul, a Belgian dredging company vying for the contract, “maintains deep and ongoing links to PRC state-owned entities” through Servimagnus, an Argentine firm that’s part of Jan De Nul’s consortium, the letter claimed.    

Jan De Nul has managed the Parana waterway for decades and is competing for the contract against the Deme Group, whose consortium includes investment firm KKR & Co and U.S.-based Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Corp. In the bid’s point-score system, Jan De Nul has been ahead.

The Trump administration, a close ally of Argentina’s President Javier Milei, has expressed concern about Chinese influence in Latin America, including Argentina, where Beijing in March was its second-largest trading partner.

Awarding the contract to Jan De Nul “would be unacceptable and damaging to Argentina’s national security, America’s national security and our bilateral relationship,” the letter said.

Jan De Nul, Servimagnus and China’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

In a statement last month, the companies said that they don’t maintain a commercial or contractual relationship with state-run companies and that allegations that the bid hides the participation of Chinese capital are “a malicious fallacy that seeks to hinder the normal development of the process.”

Last Tuesday, Argentina’s National Ports and Navigation Agency celebrated the culmination of the bid, calling it a process that had seen “strong multisectorial support.” The agency did not respond to a request for comment.

U.S. LOBBYING

About 80% of Argentina’s agricultural and agro-industrial exports leave the country via the Parana River, flowing from the Rosario agro-industrial hub and surrounding areas to the South Atlantic Ocean. 

Deme’s consortium was approved by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Advocacy Center, which helps companies pursuing foreign contracts, according to a person in contact with the consortium who requested anonymity.

The lobbying effort resulted in Milei adviser Santiago Caputo flying last week to D.C. to meet with officials, including Mast, Michael Jensen, senior director for Western Hemisphere affairs on the National Security Council, and Alec Oxenford, Argentina’s ambassador to the U.S.

Caputo was told that the U.S. had “grave concerns” about Chinese involvement in the bid, according to a person familiar with the visit. The person said the concerns stemmed partly from allegations of frequent contact between the Chinese embassy and Servimagnus’ office in Argentina.

The consortium, in a May 11 letter addressed to Jensen seen by Reuters, has also alleged “clear bias” against U.S.-backed investment, saying that the timeline for companies to present a technical offer was rushed and had benefited Jan De Nul.

Argentina’s anti-corruption prosecutors’ office has also signaled concern about “serious and obvious” procedural irregularities in the bidding process.

(Reporting by Leila Miller and Maximilian Heath; Editing by Christian Plumb and Nick Zieminski)

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ATLANTA (AP) — For Donald Trump, it seems the 2020 presidential election is never over. That’s especially true in Georgia.

The Republican president’s years of false claims that his defeat to Democrat Joe Biden was due to widespread fraud have shadowed many elections since in the presidential battleground. The issue is almost certain to play a role in a four-week runoff campaign as GOP voters choose nominees for governor, secretary of state and the U.S. Senate.

Among the contenders: one of Trump’s alternate electors in his attempt to overturn Biden’s win in the state, a Trump acolyte who won his first congressional race while saying Trump won in 2020 and a secretary of state hopeful who echoes Trump’s conspiracy theories as he vies to become Georgia’s top elections official.

To be clear, Georgia’s presidential votes were counted three times, including once by hand, and each one affirmed Biden’s victory.

The primary came amid continued legal and political wrangling over how elections are managed in Fulton County — home to heavily Democratic Atlanta. Trump’s questioning of the Georgia results and longtime criticism of Fulton County elections were supercharged earlier this year when the FBI searched the county’s election office, seizing ballots and records from 2020.

The primary election’s first-round results showed that siding with Trump, even on his election lies, is good politics within the GOP. Georgia candidates who opposed Trump’s efforts in 2020 got trounced. But some conservatives worry that misplaying the issue — or emphasizing it at all — could backfire with the general electorate in November.

“We’re going to look stupid,” warned Debbie Dooley, an early tea party organizer who supported Trump from the outset of his first presidential campaign. “What are you going to say — Trump won, and he was always the president? It serves no purpose.”

She said Republicans should instead focus on the economy, and that any mention of election procedures should look to “securing future elections, looking forward.”

Whether Trump sees it that way is another question. The president already has endorsed Burt Jones, one of his 2020 alternate electors, in the governor’s race. Dooley, who is backing Jones, said she wouldn’t be surprised if Trump comes to Georgia to campaign — and air his 2020 grievances again.

“I don’t know if the president gets it or not,” she said.

Jones was a state lawmaker in 2020 when he joined Trump’s cause to overturn Biden’s 11,779-vote margin in Georgia. He parlayed that loyalty into winning the lieutenant governor’s office in 2022 and getting Trump’s early endorsement in his bid for a promotion. On Tuesday, he won about four out of 10 Republican votes.

Trump and Jones don’t revisit the details, but Trump has praised Jones multiple times on his Truth Social platform for his loyalty while Jones has promoted “election integrity.”

Jones’ runoff rival, billionaire and political newcomer Rick Jackson, is among the Republicans who does not talk much about the 2020 election. But he spent a slice of the $83 million he invested in his own campaign on an ad attacking outgoing Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, another GOP candidate for governor who resisted Trump’s urging to help find “find 11,800 votes” to reverse Biden’s victory in 2020.

In the ad, a child is shown asking his mother why she chose the name Brad. The mother replies that her second choice was “Judas” – in the New Testament account, the name of the disciple who betrays Jesus to Roman authorities. The full name “Brad ‘Judas’ Raffensperger” appeared on the screen at the end of the spot.

Raffensperger finished a distant third in this week’s primary, with just 15% of the vote.

Rep. Mike Collins, who led the Senate GOP primary with about 40% of the vote, has never backed off his false claims that Biden’s win was rigged, an argument he featured when he first ran for Congress in 2022.

“You count the legal votes that were cast in the state of Georgia, Donald Trump won this state. Period,” he said in one ad, in which he held a long gun and bemoaned the “federal hijacking” of the 2020 election. He concluded with shooting a mock voting machine.

Collins’ runoff rival, former college football coach and political newcomer Derek Dooley, has been more circumspect. But both men are pledging fealty to Trump, with the president thus far not endorsing in the race to determine who will challenge Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff.

It’s notable that Dooley’s main political benefactor is outgoing Gov. Brian Kemp, who like Raffensperger drew Trump’s ire in 2020 for certifying Biden’s slate of electors.

Kemp ran for and won reelection in 2022, saying Republicans should look forward instead of relitigating the 2020 election. Trump eventually made up with Kemp during the 2024 presidential campaign, and advisers to both men say Kemp has discussed the Senate contest with the president.

State Rep. Tim Fleming, a former deputy secretary of state, and former state Rep. Vernon Jones, a Trump loyalist and perennial candidate, were the top vote-getters in the contest for secretary of state and will face off next month.

Jones, a former Democrat, embraced Trump’s “stop the steal” movement and said during an Atlanta Press Club debate last month, “I stand with those who believe there was election fraud.”

Fleming, who worked under Kemp when the governor was secretary of state, has said there were “irregularities” in the 2020 election — a buzz word among Republicans who stop short of echoing Trump without refuting him. But Fleming said he believes the state has made great strides since then in improving elections and said he wants to focus on future elections.

Fleming and Jones far outpaced one of Raffensperger’s top aides, Gabriel Sterling, who gained attention in December 2020 for urging Trump to help discourage threats of violence against election workers. Sterling got 12% of the primary vote, finishing fourth.

Trump has long fixated on Fulton County, alleging it was the center of Georgia fraud in 2020. The FBI seized 2020 ballots and documents from the county elections offices in January, and the county remained a punching bag for Republicans through vote tabulations on Tuesday.

During voting hours, two voting precincts were closed for four hours in an Atlanta suburb after police received a call about possible gunfire and a suspicious person wearing military-style clothing. While the incident was unrelated to the primary, a judge ordered the precincts to stay open until 11 p.m. to make up for the lost time, and Fulton officials said the law prevented them from releasing any results until those precincts were closed.

State Sen. Greg Dolezal, a Republican runoff candidate for lieutenant governor, tried to capitalize on the delay, despite the fact that he’s seeking an office with no role over tabulating ballots or certifying elections.

“Here we are on Election Night, Georgians are anxiously awaiting the results, and which county hasn’t even started reporting? It’s always Fulton County,” Dolezal posted on social media. “It’s time for Georgia to takeover the process. We will not have another 2020 this November!”

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DETROIT (AP) — Former Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan said Thursday that he is suspending his campaign for Michigan governor citing an increasingly “toxic” political climate due to President Donald Trump’s war with Iran and skyrocketing gas prices.

Duggan, a longtime Democrat, was running as an independent to replace Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer who can’t run again due to term limits. He told The Associated Press that it was going to be “very hard to win” as the Democrats who would have supported him are galvanizing against what’s going on in Washington.

“Democrat anger against Trump and Republicans is extremely high,” Duggan said. “In 60 days there’s been a huge change in the attitudes of this country. People are feeling the pain at the pump and are angry about it.”

An independent has never served as Michigan governor and third-party candidates typically don’t fare well in elections for the state’s top seat. To Duggan, who shunned partisan fighting while choosing to run as an independent, it was clear the odds were stacking against his campaign.

“As long as I knew there was a path for victory, I was going to fight,” he said. “I don’t see a likely path to win.”

Since the beginning of the war with Iran in late February, oil prices have spiked more than 50%. As of Thursday, the price of regular unleaded gas in Michigan averaged $4.74 per gallon, according to AAA Michigan. That’s above the $4.56 national average. A year ago, the average in Michigan was $3.13. Nationally, it was $3.18.

Trump repeatedly has said gas prices will go down once the war ends without acknowledging when that might happen.

Nationally, Trump’s approval rating on the economy has dropped slightly since the start of the Iran war, according to AP-NORC polling. A recent AP-NORC poll conducted in May found that even Republicans are unhappier with Trump’s handling of the economy than they were a few months ago, even as they’re largely continuing to stand behind him. About 6 in 10 Republicans approve of how Trump is handling the economy, down from about 8 in 10 before the war began.

Duggan believed he was trailing Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and Republican U.S. Rep. John James in the governor’s race. Genesee County Sheriff Chris Swanson also is running as a Democrat, while millionaire businessman Perry Johnson is running as a Republican.

Michigan’s primary election will be held Aug. 4, while the general election is Nov. 3.

In December 2024, Duggan announced his pursuit of the state’s top office surprising many when he also said he’d choose the independent route instead of sticking with the Democratic Party.

Duggan told The AP at that time that he wanted to offer Michigan voters “a choice.”

“It’s clear to me that there are a lot of people in this country who are tired of both parties and tired of the system,” Duggan said then. “You have a (state) legislature that’s almost evenly divided that makes the stakes of each issue become magnified. It has gotten harder and harder to address things as the partisan climate has gotten more toxic.”

His decision to run as an independent came as Michigan was one of a handful of swing states that helped Trump in November 2024 win a second term in the White House.

“I’ve done everything I know how to do for almost a year and a half,” Duggan said Thursday. “You could feel the mood of this state wanting the toxic partisanship to end. They wanted the parties to work together.”

Duggan spent a dozen years as Detroit mayor. He first was elected in November 2013 as the city was going through its painful and historic bankruptcy while being run by a state-appointed emergency manager. The former county prosecutor and medical center executive became Detroit’s first white mayor since Coleman A. Young was elected in the early 1970s as its first Black mayor.

Duggan is credited by many for leading Detroit after it emerged in December 2014 from bankruptcy to become a thriving, more vibrant city.

The city with a Black population hovering around 80% reelected Duggan twice. He announced in November 2024 that he would not seek a fourth term. He left the mayor’s office in January.

Duggan, who had been a Democrat for close to 40 years in a largely Democrat voting city, was targeted throughout the campaign by his former party, with many worried he would pull votes away from the Democratic Party’s nominee.

“I was running to change politics, not to be a spoiler,” he said Thursday.

Following Duggan’s announcement that he would run for governor, Republican and former Michigan Lt. Gov. Brian Calley said on X that Duggan checked the boxes of being a “credible, independent candidate with the ability to raise money.”

“But there are huge advantages of having a political party behind you,” Calley wrote. “And being a target of the left and the right will be intense.”

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