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Good evening, everyone. I did it. This morning, I finished my first ever marathon in 4 hours and 35 minutes. My legs are destroyed, and I cramped the entire second half, but I kept going, and I’ve never been prouder to cross a finish line. Thank you to everyone who sent good energy my way this morning. I felt it, especially around mile 20.
And what a day to finish. Tonight, in Serbia, a student-led movement that spent two years marching against corruption just toppled Aleksandar Vucic, one of Europe’s longest-serving strongmen, with the highest turnout in more than 30 years. It’s a powerful reminder that when ordinary people refuse to give up, even entrenched power can fall.
Here at home, the cracks are showing too. Trump told a rally he “doesn’t give a damn” about Americans struggling at the pump. Republicans’ own polling shows the bottom falling out in once-safe seats. And Elon Musk is now openly cheering for Zelensky’s removal while the Pentagon hands his company sensitive military data.
The next nine days will decide the direction of this country, and I’m going to be with you every step of the way. I have some big interviews coming this week that you won’t want to miss, daily coverage as the final stretch unfolds, and a major election night livestream on November 3rd with guests I can’t wait to share with you.
None of it is possible without you. I don’t have a corporate owner or a billionaire backer. This work runs on readers who believe in independent journalism. If you want to be part of what we’re building as we head into the most important week of the year, become a paid subscriber today. It’s the single most powerful way to make sure this reporting keeps reaching the people who need it, all the way to the finish line.
Here’s what you need to know tonight.
Serbia’s Aleksandar Vucic has conceded defeat to a student-led protest movement, ending his more than decade-long grip on power in a historic election. “It is clear that we have lost these elections, the Student List has won,” Vucic said Sunday, projecting the students would take between 135 and 140 seats in the 250-seat parliament to his party’s 105. A representative sample by pollsters showed the student list winning 138 seats to 104 for Vucic’s party. Turnout hit nearly 70 percent, the highest since the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1992, with long lines snaking from polling stations across the country. The vote followed almost two years of student-led protests against corruption and creeping authoritarianism, sparked when a train station canopy collapsed in Novi Sad in 2024, killing 16 people. Belgrade’s streets erupted in celebration, with cars honking and students chanting “victory” and “he’s done,” as one celebrating woman said, “We have finally got rid of this mafia.”
Brazil’s Supreme Court extended voting by two hours in the razor-close presidential runoff between President Lula and far-right Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro. Lula’s campaign requested the extension citing “incidents” affecting buses in several states, while Bolsonaro’s campaign also asked for more time in areas hit by heavy rain, and polls will now close at 6 p.m. ET. Bolsonaro, the son of jailed former President Jair Bolsonaro, beat Lula by 2.2 million votes in the first round, turning the 80-year-old president into the underdog as voters across Latin America shift right amid concerns over crime, corruption, and the cost of living. The race may hinge on women, who make up 53 percent of voters and favor Lula 49 percent to 40 percent, and on turnout, after one in five eligible voters stayed home in the first round. Trump said Sunday he is “monitoring” the election and has praised Bolsonaro, though he hasn’t formally endorsed him. A Bolsonaro win would pull Latin America’s largest economy closer to the Trump administration, while a narrow result could test Brazil’s stability after Jair Bolsonaro’s attempt to overturn his 2022 defeat led to the Jan. 8, 2023, attacks on government institutions.
The Bottom Is Falling Out for Republicans as Trump’s Own Words Drag Down His Party
Trump told a Georgia rally he “doesn’t give a damn” about Americans paying more at the pump, bragging that the U.S. is “making a freaking fortune” off high oil prices. “We’re making hundreds and hundreds of billions, trillions of dollars, but my people said, ‘Please don’t mention that, sir,’ because people are paying a little higher,” Trump said Saturday. He predicted the headlines would say he was bragging about money while people suffer at the pump, then added, “I don’t give a damn. I’m going to say it.” The remarks came as inflation rose to 3.7 percent in September, hotter than expected, and consumer sentiment sits near the lowest point on record. “Congratulations to Big Oil on their very successful, record-profits presidency,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom responded, while former Obama adviser David Axelrod quipped it was “not a great closing message.” New Yorker writer Susan Glasser called it “the epigraph for the entire Trump 2.0 presidency.”
Republicans’ own internal polling shows the bottom falling out in seats that were once considered safe. GOP leaders received polling in late September showing that districts Trump won by 10 points or more in Kentucky, North Carolina, Nevada, and elsewhere are now competitive, and all three vulnerable GOP-held seats in Iowa look likely to fall, according to Politico. Even longtime incumbents who haven’t faced serious races in years, from Oklahoma to Wisconsin, are now at risk. “I think the scary part is we don’t know where the bottom is,” one senior House Republican said. Their worst fear is that white working-class voters, angry over fuel prices and the Iran war, won’t just stay home but will vote for Democrats. Arkansas Rep. French Hill, whose deep-red seat is now a Democratic target, blamed “President Trump’s lack of favorability at the top.” Democrats say they’re confident of winning the House and could reach as many as 240 seats.
Election analysts say Trump himself is the reason, warning of a “red undertow” that could sink Republicans in both chambers. Cook Political Report founder Charlie Cook said rising prices, tariffs, and the Iran war all hit at once just as voters started paying attention: “It was almost like the bottom fell out suddenly.” He said the coming wave “isn’t pro-Democrat. It’s anti-Trump,” predicting Democrats will flip 20 or more House seats and likely four Senate seats, enough to take both chambers. A New York Times poll this week showed Democrats leading by 11 points, with Trump’s approval at a new low. Early voting data also shows Democrats and independents far more energized than Republicans. And Trump’s own past attacks appear to be backfiring: after spending months calling mail-in voting fraudulent, he’s now frantically urging Republicans to vote early by mail.
Obama Hammers Trump Over the Iran War as Trump Fumes Over Obama’s Crowds
Obama blasted Trump for starting an unnecessary war with Iran, arguing he had already kept Iran from getting nuclear weapons without firing a shot. “Iran didn’t have nuclear weapons, because I put a deal in place that everybody acknowledged kept them from getting nukes,” Obama said in Cleveland. “And I didn’t have to fire a missile to do it; I just had to engage in diplomacy.” Trump withdrew from that 2015 deal in his first term, then launched strikes on Iran alongside Israel in late February, promising a quick operation that has now dragged on for nearly eight months. “So seven months later, how’s that war going?” Obama asked, noting that 21 Americans have been killed, 865 wounded, missile stockpiles depleted, and Iran now holds “veto power” over the Strait of Hormuz, driving up the price of oil, diesel, and “just about everything.” The war has become a liability for Republicans, with a new AP-NORC poll finding 56 percent of Republican voters and 47 percent of Democratic voters say ending it should be a top priority for the next Congress. In Ohio, Amy Acton now leads Vivek Ramaswamy 50 percent to 43 percent in a Marist poll taken before his controversial ad aired, and Sherrod Brown leads Sen. Jon Husted 48 percent to 44 percent.
Trump lashed out over the size of Obama’s Detroit rally, complaining that the media “never” talks about his crowds. Obama rallied Saturday in Detroit with Michigan Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed and gubernatorial nominee Jocelyn Benson on the first day of in-person early voting in the state. Speaking at a rally in Georgia that night, Trump mocked the turnout: “A massive crowd has shown up? Where are they? They never talk about my crowd.” He referred to El-Sayed as “Mohamed,” a name drawn from the candidate’s middle name that Trump has repeatedly used against him. Trump then revived an old grievance about Sen. Bernie Sanders, claiming Sanders drew “like 900 to 1,000 people” while he drew tens of thousands. In reality, Sanders’ tour with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez drew an estimated 36,000 people in Los Angeles and more than 34,000 in Denver last year. He attacked Obama on Truth Social too:
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Musk Doubles Down on Ukraine Starlink Cuts as Kyiv Fires Back and Pentagon Hands SpaceX Sensitive Military Data
Elon Musk is defending his decision to throttle Ukraine’s Starlink, lashing out at critics as “bloodthirsty warmongers” and agreeing that Zelensky “needs to go.” In a string of posts Saturday night into Sunday, Musk said Ukraine violated Starlink’s terms of service by using it for offensive drone strikes, writing, “We simply enforced our terms of service when they were bypassed.” He warned that if Starlink were switched off, “the Ukrainian front line would collapse immediately,” adding, “This is NOT a threat, it is simply a statement of fact.” Musk accused his critics of wanting the war to continue “until every last man in Ukraine has died in a ditch,” and when one user wrote that Zelensky needs to go, Musk replied, “Yes.” Until this weekend, neither Musk nor the U.S. government had taken responsibility for the cuts, with Musk previously insisting that limits were “decided by the US military and ultimately POTUS.” Earlier this month, Putin envoy Kirill Dmitriev hailed Musk’s attacks on Zelensky as a “tipping point” in the war. Today, he celebrated Musk again:
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Ukraine flatly denies Musk’s claim, saying it would have been physically impossible to use commercial Starlink the way he described. “It’s very strange that Elon Musk doesn’t know about the restrictions on Starlink in Ukraine,” said Ukrainian presidential adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov, noting that Starlink doesn’t work over Russian territory, so Ukraine “PHYSICALLY CANNOT USE COMMERCIAL STARLINK” for deep or mid-range strikes. A former drone adviser to Ukraine’s defense ministry said any drone mission requiring satellite links had to run through Starshield, the U.S. government-controlled military version, and that Ukraine “did not violate the terms of use.” Ukrainian officials say the cuts capped Starshield at about 100 miles per hour, hampering their ability to shoot down Russian drones and forcing them to cancel operations. The restrictions came as Trump struck a diesel deal with Russia, waived sanctions, and called for Ukraine to get a new president, and coincided with an interruption in U.S. intelligence warnings of incoming Russian attacks. Zelensky has said he believes both Trump and Musk were involved.
Russia pounded Ukraine as the satellite fight played out, and Kyiv is now racing to build its own system so it never depends on Musk again. Zelensky said Russia launched about 1,600 guided bombs, 48 missiles, and nearly 2,300 attack drones at Ukraine in the past week alone, killing and injuring people almost every day. Ukraine’s defense ministry has partnered with Nokia and Finnish satellite firm ICEYE to develop a “sovereign” Starlink-style network built on European technology. “We must all rely on capabilities that we can control,” Zelensky said. A security analyst told NBC News that Musk’s control over Starlink gives him “enormous leverage,” which is exactly why Europe is pushing to build independent space infrastructure. This isn’t the first time: Reuters reported last year that Musk ordered a 2022 Starlink disruption during a pivotal Ukrainian counteroffensive, which SpaceX called inaccurate.
At the same time, the Pentagon has handed SpaceX access to sensitive military space-tracking data, raising new national security and conflict-of-interest concerns. The Space Force gave SpaceX “enhanced” access to U.S. Space Command’s most detailed catalog of objects in orbit, a first for any commercial company, including radar tracking data on objects as small as about 4 inches. The data has been closely held because it could expose the limits of U.S. defense capabilities used to monitor other countries’ satellites. Critics say it gives Musk an edge over competitors and moves toward privatizing space traffic control, after Musk’s DOGE fired much of the staff at the federal program meant to handle it and the administration twice tried to defund it. “It’s like giving a trucking company control of all the traffic lights,” said a former employee of that program. Public Citizen said Musk “has bought his way into the favor of President Trump,” and his “political investment is paying off very, very handsomely.”
Other news:
The Trump administration has pushed 13 percent of Americans off food stamps, forcing more families to turn to food banks or go hungry. SNAP enrollment fell from 41.6 million in July 2025, before Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill took effect, to 36.5 million in June 2026, according to USDA data. The law expanded work requirements to people ages 18 to 64 without children under 14, up from 18 to 54, and shifted more administrative costs onto states, with Arizona’s enrollment plunging 50 percent. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins called it “a pretty big win” to “move 5 million people off of food stamps,” but advocates say job data doesn’t show people are leaving for work, with the economy adding just 776,000 jobs from January 2025 to September 2026. Food banks report empty shelves, Michigan’s food helpline was forced to suspend service after calls tripled, and 26 Houston schools lost eligibility to serve free meals to all students. “If people were getting paid enough, they would not be on the SNAP program,” said one anti-hunger advocate.
White House staffers are publicly floating Nicki Minaj as Trump’s next press secretary, days after Katie Zacharia was fired after just five days on the job. Communications Director Steven Cheung shared a video of the rapper praising Trump’s foreign policy aboard Air Force One, writing, “Ladies and gentlemen, I think we may have found the new White House Press Secretary!” The official White House account replied with an “eyeballs” emoji, and Trump adviser Alex Bruesewitz chimed in, “Hey Barbz, what do we think about this idea??” Minaj responded with an American flag and a nervous-laughter emoji, while posting her own video marveling at the inside of Air Force One. It’s unclear whether the White House is seriously considering her, but the episode comes as the administration scrambles to fill the role amid a string of staffing embarrassments. Minaj, who last month urged young fans to vote Republican, is set to appear alongside Trump at a rally in Port Huron, Michigan, Sunday evening.
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Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado has returned to Venezuela after nearly a year in exile, despite reported opposition from the Trump administration. “I’m here. With you,” the opposition leader posted Sunday, with footage showing her surrounded by supporters at a church in Barquisimeto. Machado left Venezuela last December to accept her Nobel Prize, weeks before the U.S. seized Nicolás Maduro, and has reportedly made more than half a dozen failed attempts to return since. Many expected Trump to back Machado, whose movement is widely believed to have won the 2024 election, but he instead embraced Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, who now governs a country widely seen as a U.S. protectorate. The Trump administration reportedly opposed Machado’s return, fearing it would complicate its relationship with Rodríguez, her political archrival. Asked about it Sunday, Trump said, “She gave me her Nobel prize, so how can I say anything else? I hope she’s safe.”
The Southwest is bracing for more flooding after days of heavy rain forced evacuations and rooftop rescues. The National Weather Service issued a flood watch for much of the Four Corners region, where Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah meet, even as swollen rivers begin to recede. The home of San Juan County, New Mexico, Sheriff Shane Ferrari took on about four feet of water. County officials say floodwaters left behind mud and silt contaminated with sewage after failures at waste plants, and power outages could last several more days. “It’s a pretty active disaster zone,” a county spokesperson said. “We’re not on the downswing by any means.” The flooding follows two months of on-and-off heavy rain from tropical Pacific moisture, ending a summer of drought.
A Cornell fraternity member is asking a judge to dismiss him from Jane Doe’s gang-rape lawsuit. Diego Sarabia, one of seven men originally sued over the alleged assault at the Chi Phi fraternity house in October 2024, denies the allegations and says the claims against him were filed too late. His attorney argued that as far as Sarabia is concerned, “this is essentially a lawsuit about a forced kiss,” and that the complaint doesn’t allege he supplied drugs or took part in the alleged sexual assaults. Doe accuses him of grabbing her face, kissing her, and snorting ketamine off her body with other fraternity members. The local district attorney declined to bring charges in 2024, but Gov. Kathy Hochul called that review inadequate and appointed Attorney General Letitia James as special prosecutor, a move two of the accused men are now trying to block. Cornell has also hired former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates to lead an independent review of how the university handles sexual assault.
Bulgaria is voting for president in an election dominated by economic hardship and Russian drone attacks on Black Sea shipping. The race is the first major test for Prime Minister Rumen Radev’s Moscow-friendly Progressive Bulgaria party, which won parliamentary elections in April. Incumbent President Iliana Yotova, backed by Radev’s party, leads polls with 40 to 45 percent and favors improved relations with Russia and lifting sanctions. Her main challenger, pro-Western former caretaker Prime Minister Andrey Gyurov, polls at 25 to 30 percent and signed a security agreement with Ukraine during his time in office. With 27 candidates and turnout expected below 40 percent, a Nov. 1 runoff is likely, where Gyurov could gain ground. Recent drone strikes on commercial vessels off Bulgaria’s coast have heightened security fears in the NATO and EU member country.
Twelve people, including six children, were injured in a shooting near Florida A&M University’s stadium during homecoming weekend. The shooting broke out around 8 p.m. Saturday near Bragg Memorial Stadium in Tallahassee, after the historically Black university’s homecoming football game. Eleven people were shot, three with serious injuries, including one minor, and the youngest victim is just 11 years old. Police believe a single shooter was involved in what they called “an isolated incident between two or three individuals,” but no arrests have been made. Tallahassee’s police chief praised officers who ran in not knowing where the shooter was, some carrying victims in their arms because vehicles couldn’t get through the crowd. Police are asking witnesses to come forward.
A bus crash in Kenya killed at least 22 people on the same highway where 17 died just three weeks ago. The bus collided with a truck on the main highway linking Nairobi and the coastal city of Mombasa on Sunday morning, injuring 24 others. The passengers were returning to Mombasa after attending the funeral of their church pastor in western Kenya. One survivor said a truck hit the bus from behind, causing it to roll, while transport authorities suspect improper overtaking led to a head-on collision. “I don’t know the fate of my two children who were on the bus,” said one mother who survived. Speeding and poor road conditions have long contributed to deadly crashes in Kenya.
See you soon.
— Aaron
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