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With days until the midterm elections, a new poll from CNN places Democrats well in the lead in key Senate races in Texas and Michigan, while projecting tighter contests in Kansas and Maine.

In Texas, the poll found 49% of likely voters would back James Talarico, the Democratic nominee, over Republican Ken Paxton, who netted just 43%.

In Michigan, it found Democrat Abdul El-Sayed had received support from 49% of likely voters compared with 42% for his opponent, Mike Rogers.

The poll found no clear winner in the Senate contests in either Maine or Kansas. Maine was once viewed as Democrats best chance to flip a Senate seat, as they aimed to oust Republican incumbent Susan Collins. But the race has been marred by the late replacement of the original Democratic nominee, populist Graham Platner, with Troy Jackson, after Platner dropped out following allegations of sexual misconduct.

Kansas has been a far more unexpected battleground, with Democrat Adam Hamilton mounting a stiff challenge against Republican Roger Marshall in the normally deep-red state.

Key events

1h ago

En route to Texas campaign event, Vance calls for fraud investigation into Peltola

1h ago

CNN poll finds Democrats leading Senate races in Texas and Michigan, tight contests in Maine and Kansas

2h ago

With new Iran strikes looming, Hegseth dispatches the Pentagon's top planner

3h ago

Lisa Murkowski calls Peltola's alleged ballot-stacking scheme 'simply wrong'

4h ago

Alaska governor orders investigation into Peltola campaign claims

4h ago

Judge rebuffs Trump DoJ’s bid to force California to set aside 20,000 ballots

5h ago

How did the Cheesecake Factory end up in a Maga fight over ‘elitism’?

5h ago

Trump and Obama trade barbs in closing week of US midterm election

Officials in the Trump administration lured automakers to expand manufacturing in the US by dangling a chance at tariff relief, according to new reporting from the Wall Street Journal.

The outlet, citing sources privy to details of the plan, reported that the Trump administration had promised Volkswagen executives that companies that invest in the US would soon benefit from a tariff relief program, before the administration unveiled a new $4bn Audi plant in Georgia. (Audi is owned by Volkswagen.)

The tariff relief program the Trump administration promised would come through the US Department of Commerce, the Journal reported. The plan, which is not yet finalized, would establish carve-outs for companies that commit to building factories in the US.

On his way to a campaign event in Texas, JD Vance backed an investigation into Mary Peltola’s alleged scheme to siphon away votes from her Senate opponent by a recruiting a candidate with the same name.

Addressing reporters on the tarmac, Vance said that Peltola had “tried to commit election fraud” in the Alaska Senate race by recruiting a man named Dan Sullivan to run against her primary opponent, Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan.

When asked whether he agreed with Trump’s insistence that Peltola be criminally prosecuted for the tactic (which, while underhanded, has been employed elsewhere, and is not clearly illegal) Vance backed the idea, though in not in quite so strong terms.

“I think that we should certainly look into whether she committed election fraud,” Vance said.

He continued: “She is trying to steal a Senate seat from the voters of Alaska, and it’s disgraceful. So whether it’s criminal or not, she certainly has committed, I think, a great moral failing.”

While Trump is campaigning in South Carolina, Vance is heading to Texas to try and win support for Ken Paxton. Paxton, a scandal-marred former Texas attorney general and Trump devotee, has trailed in the polls in recent weeks, putting the Republicans at risk of losing a Senate seat in Texas for the first time in decades.

With days until the midterm elections, a new poll from CNN places Democrats well in the lead in key Senate races in Texas and Michigan, while projecting tighter contests in Kansas and Maine.

In Texas, the poll found 49% of likely voters would back James Talarico, the Democratic nominee, over Republican Ken Paxton, who netted just 43%.

In Michigan, it found Democrat Abdul El-Sayed had received support from 49% of likely voters compared with 42% for his opponent, Mike Rogers.

The poll found no clear winner in the Senate contests in either Maine or Kansas. Maine was once viewed as Democrats best chance to flip a Senate seat, as they aimed to oust Republican incumbent Susan Collins. But the race has been marred by the late replacement of the original Democratic nominee, populist Graham Platner, with Troy Jackson, after Platner dropped out following allegations of sexual misconduct.

Kansas has been a far more unexpected battleground, with Democrat Adam Hamilton mounting a stiff challenge against Republican Roger Marshall in the normally deep-red state.

Pete Hegseth, Trump’s defense secretary, has jettisoned the top planner in the US military, the Associated Press and other outlets have reported.

The firing, the latest in a string of shake-ups in top staff at the Pentagon since Trump launched the war in Iran in February, comes as the Trump administration is reportedly mulling new, escalated military action in Iran after the midterms.

The removed planned was Army Lt Gen Brett Sylvia, who served on the joint chiefs of staff as head of strategy, plans and policy.

Dan Sullivan, the Republican incumbent running against Mary Peltola – as well as the man with the same name Peltola’s campaign allegedly recruited to run against him – spoke on Fox News about the revelations surrounding Peltola’s purported ballot-stacking scheme.

“She and her team, and at the highest levels of the DSCC, spent over a year scheming in a secret operation to trick Alaskans to get them to throw away their vote,” Sullivan said.

“It’s an outrage,” he added.

The New York Times reported yesterday that Peltola, despite her insistence to the contrary, had knowingly recruited a man who shared Sullivan’s name to join the race.

“Mary Peltola has looked Alaskans in the eyes for the past year and a half and lied to them,” Sullivan wrote in a post to social media.

In a statement posted to social media, Lisa Murkowski, the senior Republican senator from Alaska, condemned Mary Peltola’s effort to peel votes away from her opponent, Dan Sullivan, by recruiting a candidate into the race with the same name.

But she stopped well short of Donald Trump’s calls to disqualify Peltola from the ballot or to criminally investigate her.

“While some may try to write this off as just how politics works now, ballot-stacking should have no place in our electoral process,” Murkowski wrote. “Run and win on your merits: your views, your policy ideas, and your accomplishments.”

Murkowski, a moderate Republican who has broken with Trump on a number of occasions, just yesterday endorsed a Democratic candidate in the state governor’s race.

Peltola continued: “By contrast, recruiting candidates to manipulate the field and influence voting outcomes is simply wrong. Alaskans deserve the honest truth from Mary and her campaign – what has been revealed is a pattern of lies and coverups and a culture of deception that belongs nowhere in our elections or among our elected officials.”

After rallying in Ohio yesterday, Donald Trump will head east to Rock Hill, South Carolina, to stump for an unexpectedly at-risk Republican incumbent in the deep red state.

Senator Darline Graham, the sister of the late South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, was appointed to finish out her brother’s term after his death earlier this year. She’s running to win a full term in the seat, but has found herself in a narrow race against Democratic nominee Annie Andrews.

South Carolina represents the latest in a series of typical Republican strongholds where Trump has traveled in the weeks leading up to the midterms, as the GOP fears losing races it might have normally thought of as safe wins.

An investigation has been launched in Alaska into whether Democratic candidate Mary Peltola’s campaign for Senate should face criminal charges or civil penalties.

Republican governor Mike Dunleavy ordered the inquiry into whether Peltola’s campaign recruited candidates to draw votes from the state’s Republican incumbent.

It follows a New York Times report claiming the Democratic candidate’s campaign was involved in recruiting a retiree named Dan J Sullivan to enter the race against senator Dan S Sullivan.

“Deliberately tricking voters into casting their ballots for someone else strikes at the integrity of our elections,” he said in a post on X. “Anyone or any organization found to have broken the law must be held accountable.”

Republicans condemned the presence in the race of two candidates named Dan Sullivan – one the two-term US senator, the second a retiree living in south-eastern Alaska with scant political experience – calling the newcomer a ploy by Democrats to cost the incumbent re-election by splitting his supporters.

Peltola’s campaign has denied involvement with the other Dan Sullivan, but the NYT reports that her officials together with the party’s campaign arm, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), worked to find other people named Dan Sullivan in Alaska, and encourage them to run.

Their reporting is based on interviews with Peltola’s former campaign manager and other sources, together with documents and text messages related to the recruitment effort.

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