October 30, 2026 - Peltola Denies Knowing Alaska Spoiler

Two Currents.

Yesterday on my radio program, Doug Sosnik gave me the tightest, most data-driven analysis I’ve heard this cycle (watch or listen to the discussion). Doug, a former senior adviser to President Clinton, has long counseled governors, senators, members of Congress and Fortune 500 companies. Now he shares that work on Substack.

His forecast, from a self-described glass-half-empty Democrat: his party picks up 20-plus House seats and probably wins back the Senate. That’s a big night. Just not the tsunami history alone would predict.

“Only a fool ignores history,” he told me. “But also, at this point, a fool who thinks that history is the same now as it’s been in the past 30 years.”

Doug sees two currents. History points to a blue wave: Trump’s approval at a record low, Democrats sweeping last year’s elections, 4 million more Democrats than Republicans voting in this year’s primaries, and early voting in many places two to three times its 2022 pace. On those trends alone, this would be the biggest midterm win for the out party since World War II.

The crosscurrent is realignment. Education now best predicts how people vote, and all politics has become national. Voters pick one party up and down the ballot, leaving far fewer competitive seats. In 1994 and 2010, with approval ratings well above Trump’s, Democrats lost 54 and 63 House seats. That kind of swing isn’t available anymore.

Then came his most provocative point: “I think people are completely underestimating how different American politics is going to be on Wednesday compared to where it is today.”

Doug believes Tuesday marks the end of politics in the age of Trump. Expect questions over whether the president accepts the results, a fractious lame-duck session, a Democratic House with subpoena power, and a Republican Party splintering into MAGA, America First and mainstream wings. Then comes 2028, the first open-seat presidential race in 12 years.

His outlook for the next two years: “combustible” and “volatile.”

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Democratic Senate candidate Mary Peltola denied involvement in an effort to recruit a second candidate with the same name as incumbent Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan, as the Justice Department escalates its criminal investigation into alleged voter confusion ahead of Alaska’s key Senate race.

Associated Press

Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, Rep. Ilhan Omar's ex-husband and rumored brother, identified himself as "a gay man of the East African diaspora" in an August 2026 academic paper, adding to evidence that their 2009 marriage was a sham to secure his legal immigration status.

New York Post

North Korean hackers stole more than $6.3 billion in cryptocurrency from Binance in a sophisticated 20-minute attack, marking the largest crypto heist to date and raising concerns about broader financial system vulnerabilities.

Sky News

Fox News still leads MS NOW and CNN in October ratings but saw its viewership fall 28 percent in primetime and 27 percent full day versus a year ago, the biggest pre-election month decline for any major cable news outlet in the past decade.

The Hollywood Reporter

Israel faces weeks or months of political deadlock as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's bloc won 53 seats in Tuesday's election, while the opposition took 48 and Arab parties a record 19, leaving both camps short of the 61 seats needed for a parliamentary majority, leaving four possible paths to forming a government, including an opposition coalition, a national unity government, defections or another election.

CNN

U.S. GDP expanded at a 3.4% annual rate in the third quarter, fueled by AI investment and consumer spending, but inflation at 3.6% and stagnant wages are leaving many lower-income Americans squeezed just days before the midterm elections.

NPR

A satirical list of 25 alarming actions a hypothetical Democratic trifecta might take in Washington — each one drawn directly from the record of the current Trump administration — argues that no party willing to govern this way should be trusted with complete political power.

National Review

Sir Patrick Stewart, the acclaimed Shakespearean actor — who became beloved as Captain Jean-Luc Picard on 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' and Professor Charles Xavier in the 'X-Men' films — died October 28 at age 86, surrounded by family and friends in his Los Angeles home after a brief battle with Alzheimer's disease and Lewy Body Dementia.

USA Today

Documents within the DOJ's Epstein files release indicate classified material was collected and sent to the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, contradicting Attorney General Todd Blanche's assertion that no files were withheld on national security grounds, while coding gaps suggest over a million pages are missing.

CBS News

Walt Z., a Red Baron employee and father of four received an outpouring of support and a GoFundMe raising more than $330,000 on his behalf after a cruel viral prank showed him confronting an influencer for mocking his financial struggles, using him as the subject of a filmed prank in which the young man pretended to steal money out of Walt's Apple Pay.

Daily Mail