This week, attention in Washington is focused on two major national security documents: the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy (NSS) and the annual defense spending bill, known as the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which passed the House and is headed for a Senate vote. The former is a high-level policy document that lays out the administration’s perspectives on U.S. national interests, threats, and priorities, setting the tone for the rest of the presidential term on great power competition, economic security, terrorism, migration, relations with allies and partners, and nonmilitary tools like sanctions and diplomacy. The latter translates those guidelines into legally binding terms to authorize and shape defense programs and set policy directives on issues like Ukraine military aid or China AI policy. The two documents can align or clash, depending on how much Congress agrees with the president’s strategy.
The current iterations of the two documents, one strategic and the other practical, differ on several important points, with their contrasting approaches to Europe being the most dramatic. The NSS portrays the region (particularly Western Europe) as facing economic decline and “civilization erasure,” and pledges to “help Europe correct its current trajectory.” It introduces a stronger expectation of NATO burden-sharing and calls for an end to NATO expansion. The document avoids direct criticism of Russia and casts the U.S. as an arbiter rather than an equal participant in allied efforts to end the war in Ukraine. By contrast, the $900 billion NDAA package includes several provisions that clearly position Russia as a threat and boost European security, such as demanding congressional approval for any further big U.S. troop reductions in Europe, providing $400 million for Ukrainian arms purchases, and allocating $175 million in security assistance to frontline NATO members Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia.
Their approaches to China also differ. The NSS largely plays down ideological differences, emphasizing economic engagement and indirectly alluding to China’s unfair trade practices, supply chain threats, and encroachments into the Western Hemisphere, an area of singular importance to the administration. The NDAA takes a more traditional direction, setting new restrictions on U.S. investments in China’s advanced technology and authorizing security funding for Taiwan and the Philippines. It omits provisions that would have codified existing restrictions on chip sales to China and other adversarial nations and created rules governing the global spread of frontier-level AI, but lawmakers in both parties are already working on legislation to address those issues in 2026.
Considering the differences between the two documents, especially on Europe, it remains to be seen how the push from Congress to keep strong support for NATO, Ukraine, and close ties with European allies will balance a Trump White House that often uses those same issues to score political points at home. The future of the U.S.-Europe relationship will likely depend on whether lawmakers from both parties, career officials, and European governments can sustain day-to-day cooperation on security and economic issues despite sharper rhetoric and more confrontational moves from the administration.
AI governance, one of the few remaining bipartisan issues in Congress, is emerging as a major campaign theme ahead of next year’s midterm elections. Since returning to office, President Donald Trump has championed a lightly regulated, nationally uniform AI framework, using executive actions to promote innovation while discouraging states from adopting their own, often stricter, rules.
Congressional Republicans twice tried, unsuccessfully, to fold a temporary ban on new state AI laws into larger bills, exposing deep intra-party divisions over federalism and tech oversight. Democrats have generally advocated for stricter guardrails, but many of the most prominent proposals have been bipartisan, including measures to curb the use of AI in elections, protect consumer safety and data privacy, shield creative work from AI cloning, and secure the AI chip supply chain against China.
In the absence of comprehensive federal rules, states have increasingly acted as testing grounds for AI governance — much as they have in areas like food and environmental policy — producing consequential measures in Colorado, Tennessee, California, New York, and elsewhere. But a new Trump executive order, heavily lobbied for by tech companies, threatens to block future state-level AI rules, intensifying concerns about a lack of accountability for Big Tech and, more broadly, about the industry’s influence over the direction of America’s AI policy.
In the meantime, politicians, from conservative populists to establishment Democrats, are already integrating AI into campaign messaging, explicitly tying the technology, via data centers, to high energy costs, environmental strain, and job risks. Influential MAGA voices warn that AI threatens the working-class voters who brought Trump to power, while the tech elite benefits. Voters overwhelmingly voice concerns about AI-related job losses, environmental impact, and high energy demands (71%, 71%, and 61%, respectively), with Democrats more likely than Republicans or independents to be highly concerned. A plurality of Americans have little or no trust in the government’s ability to effectively regulate AI, and a full 77% believe the technology could be used to stir up political chaos. (As a case in points, research shows that AI chatbots can shift voters’ views by a substantial margin, far more than traditional political ads tend to do.) As midterm campaigning gets underway, we will be watching Big Tech super PACs, which are laying out plans to boost pro-AI candidates in an alignment with David Sacks, Trump’s top adviser on AI and crypto — turning AI policy itself into an early test of who will set the terms of the emerging AI-driven economy.
President Trump remains conflicted about adopting “affordability” as his party’s main message heading into the midterms. His administration, however, is embracing the theme by reframing recent moves to roll back climate regulations as a strategy to lower the price of consumer goods — namely, autos. The administration argues that relaxing Biden-era fuel economy standards to 34.5 miles per gallon by 2031, rather than 50.4 mpg, would save Americans $109 billion over five years and shave $1,000 off the average cost of a new car. Earlier this year, a provision in Trump’s Working Families Act eliminated penalties for manufacturers that violate Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards, encouraging production of more profitable but less fuel-efficient vehicles like SUVs and pickup trucks. Another provision lets buyers deduct up to $10,000 a year of interest on loans for U.S.-built vehicles through 2028, effectively lowering financing costs. In Congress, Republican lawmakers are questioning the need for safety features such as automatic emergency braking systems, arguing they are ineffective and drive up vehicle costs.
Recent data point to a challenging environment for U.S. auto buyers, driven by a combination of surging sticker prices, higher interest rates, stretched household budgets, and the end of subsidies like Biden-era EV tax breaks. Experts warn that any upfront savings could prove short-lived as drivers spend more on gasoline and become more vulnerable to price swings at the pump. They also caution that the new Trump regulations are all but certain to face legal challenges and could be overturned by a future Democratic administration, heightening compliance uncertainty for vehicles hitting the market after 2028. Time will tell whether the rule change further slows the industry’s investments in EVs, but analysts still expect EV adoption to continue to grow, albeit at a slower pace. Reasons for optimism include new models becoming more affordable, the price gap between used EVs and gas-powered cars falling to around $900, an all-time low, and EV charging networks expanding across the nation.
Like many second-term presidents, Donald Trump is pursuing a more activist foreign policy in search of legacy-making accomplishments that are becoming increasingly elusive at home as the 2026 midterm election cycle gets underway. In the last few weeks alone, he has hosted nearly a dozen foreign leaders at the White House, ordered military strikes against alleged South American drug smugglers, promised a $20 billion bailout to Argentina (now being reduced to about $5 billion), personally brokered trade deals across Asia, and threatened regime change in Venezuela. More challenging initiatives remain a work in progress, including a fragile, structurally unstable Gaza ceasefire and ongoing Ukraine peace talks, where proposed solutions have included NATO-style security guarantees against further Russian aggression that would be shouldered by the U.S. and key European allies.
Trump’s MAGA base has mostly been deferential to his foreign policy moves, especially in Central and South America, where he has focused lately. The proposed Argentina bailout has been a notable exception, drawing strong opposition from voters, libertarians, and farm-state Republicans who have criticized it as fiscally reckless. On Gaza and Ukraine, response has been mixed. Conservative media have cast the Gaza ceasefire as evidence that America First 2.0 could deliver a complex foreign policy outcome without U.S. boots on the ground. But some MAGA figures questioned whether backing Israel serves U.S. interests, and younger Republicans have increasingly viewed current aid levels as excessive. On Ukraine, MAGA non-interventionists have urged a pause in aid and warned that security guarantees could pull the U.S. into a wider war, even as Republican voters as a whole have become more supportive of arming Ukraine in response to Trump’s tougher rhetoric toward Russia.
MAGA deference aside, polls suggest many voters view Trump’s focus on foreign affairs as offering limited tangible benefit while diverting attention from key domestic issues. A plurality (46%), including a slim majority of independents (51%), say the Trump administration is not spending enough time on their top priorities — the issues that shape their view of the president’s job performance. For 44%, those priorities are economic, including tariffs and trade; only 4% name foreign policy. Nearly half of voters (48%) say America’s leadership in the world has weakened under Trump, and just 37% say his peace deals make the world safer. Heading into the midterms, shifting emphasis from high-profile foreign initiatives to Republicans’ standing on economic issues — where Democrats now hold a 4-point edge on keeping America prosperous — could be critical to helping Trump’s party keep control of the House come 2027.
Next year’s midterm elections could be among the least competitive in modern history, with as few as 16 congressional seats projected to be true toss-ups. Democrats need only to win three additional seats to reclaim control of the House — and historically, the party out of power in the White House has gained an average of 28 seats in a president’s first midterm. These considerations have locked both parties into an intense competition to boost their advantage by redrawing the boundaries of existing congressional districts outside of the usual once-a-decade process designed to reflect population changes.
As of this writing, new congressional maps adopted by Republican-held legislatures are giving the party an advantage in three Democratic-held districts across Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio. Florida could follow suit, making another couple of competitive districts more favorable to Republicans, but the party’s chances to strengthen their position in Indiana and Kansas are far less certain. On the Democratic side, new maps in California and Utah make four to six current seats more favorable to the party’s candidates, and two more are possible in Maryland and Illinois, where redistricting efforts are in early stages.
Taken together, Republicans stand a chance of gaining three to five seats through redistricting, compared with four to eight for Democrats. A Supreme Court ruling reinstating a recently redrawn electoral map in Texas would tilt five more Democratic-held seats to the right, bringing the total number of newly Republican-leaning districts to as many as ten — and leaving a slight overall Republican advantage once Democratic gains are taken into account. Another Supreme Court ruling, on a challenge to majority-minority congressional districts in Louisiana, is expected by July and could theoretically shift a few additional seats toward Republicans, although the timeframe for that to happen is very tight.
To be sure, Democrats are facing a more challenging electoral map, with 13 seats in districts Trump won in 2024, compared with only three Republican-held seats in districts carried by Kamala Harris. Latest polls show Democrats ahead on the generic congressional ballot (which measures voters’ preference for a party representing them in Congress) by 5 percentage points, an advantage that has grown since March but remains smaller than at a similar point in the 2018 election cycle, the last time the party won control of the House in the midterms. Democrats also benefit from an uptick in voter enthusiasm following a strong performance in this month’s state and local races. If they can coalesce around affordability as the party’s main message, they could again prove history right by flipping the House, this cycle’s smaller, tighter electoral battlefield notwithstanding.
After months of downplaying public concerns about the rising cost of living, President Trump is pivoting to a 2026 midterm campaign message of “making America affordable” with a series of actions aimed at reversing a growing deficit in an area of traditional Republican strength. Polls show that perceptions of the Trump economy continue to erode and most voters (65%), including nearly a third of Republicans (32%), say his policies are driving up grocery prices. Voters are evenly split on which party they trust more to manage the economy overall (38% Democrats, 40% Republicans), but give Democrats a clear edge on making things more affordable (+10 points), raising wages (+14), and reducing healthcare costs (+21). A majority (60%, including 39% of Republicans) say they are tuning out Trump’s economic rhetoric, believing he makes conditions sound better than they are.
So far, the Trump administration has responded by cutting tariffs on about 200 food products and lowering prices on some medicines. Next on the agenda is a healthcare proposal to extend expiring Obama-era health insurance subsidies that were at the center of the recent government shutdown. That bill currently appears short of votes in the House, but lawmakers are also weighing a bipartisan effort to reduce housing costs, the second-most frequently cited affordability challenge (38%, after groceries at 45% and ahead of healthcare at 34%). Heading into the midterms, Republicans are expected to tout the Trump tax cuts passed earlier this year, although the president’s proposed $2,000 tariff “dividend” checks now appear a remote possibility. We will be watching to see whether Republicans’ new affordability focus resonates with voters — and whether Democrats can maintain and build on their current advantage.
Democrats outperformed expectations in a series of state and local elections last week, sweeping statewide offices in blue and swing states and regaining ground with key voter groups — independents, young people, Latinos, suburban women — that shifted right in 2024, helping reelect President Donald Trump.
As in last year’s races, the winning message centered on economic issues, the dominant concern across demographics. But this time, roughly two-thirds of voters expressed disappointment with Trump’s handling of the economy and the cost of living, and 63% said his tariffs made inflation worse. Just 38% trusted Republicans to do a better job on the economy, compared with 37% for Democrats — the smallest lead for the party since 2017, when it faced a five-point trust deficit on the issue at a similar moment in Trump’s first term.
Party leaders are framing the results as a comeback for Democrats still grappling with their loss of the White House and Senate majority. Yet the diversity of the winning slate — establishment figures in Virginia and New Jersey, a democratic socialist elected New York City mayor, and moderates in down-ballot races focused on affordability and social issues — underscores the party’s big-tent nature, highlighting the challenge it faces in balancing centrist pragmatism with an energized progressive left.
Voters remain disillusioned with the Democratic brand, with 68% saying the party is out of touch with their needs and concerns, compared with 61% who say the same of Republicans. Working-class voters, once a core Democratic constituency, increasingly see the party as having misplaced priorities, while many Democrats themselves view it as weakand leaderless — despite California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s efforts to position himself at the national forefront of the opposition to Trump.
Whether last week’s results mark the start of a true rebound for the Democrats may depend less on their strengths than on growing frustration with Trump’s performance, historically a key predictor of midterm election outcomes. His net approval now stands at -13 points — the lowest since January — with 45% of Americans strongly disapproving. Polls from late October show Democrats more enthusiastic than Republicans about voting next year, with more voters ruling out supporting a Republican than a Democrat (42% to 35%) and saying their vote will send a message of opposition to Trump rather than support (41% to 21%).
In response, Republican leaders are refocusing their message on specific steps to reduce living costs, including new tax breaks and lower drug prices. Trump himself recently conceded that Americans are paying more for goods because of his tariffs. The question now is whether he can stay on message, rather than continuing to insist that prices have fallen, while Democrats confront yet another internal rift over the Senate vote to end the government shutdown.
With the nation’s longest government shutdown finally over, Senate Democrats are facing anger from the party’s progressive flank after some of them joined Republicans in voting to reopen the government. A resolution they backed will keep most of the government funded through Jan. 31, 2026, with some agencies and programs, including food assistance, extended through September, and prevent further layoffs of federal workers at least until February.
What it won’t do is renew the expiring pandemic-era subsidies under the Affordable Care Act, leaving about 45 million Americans facing steep increases in health insurance costs. The chamber’s Republican leaders have promised a vote on a Democratic proposal to address this, but their counterparts in the House have yet to make a similar commitment — even as 38% of voters say they would blame congressional Republicans for ending the subsidies, and another 37% would blame President Trump.
History suggests that a party seeking concessions during a government shutdown rarely if ever achieves its goals. Yet Democrats’ relative unity and emphasis on protecting constituents have been key to their strong showing in last week’s elections, while Republicans have shouldered most of the blame for the standoff. Trump himself acknowledged the shutdown hurt his party, particularly in Virginia, home to more than 180,000 federal employees. Although health care ranks as a secondary issue nationally, it was a leading concern for voters in Virginia and New Jersey, where 21% and 16%, respectively, named it the top issue facing their states (compared with just 5% nationwide).
Heading into next year’s midterm elections, Democrats — who hold a six-point advantage on handling health care costs — are expected to make the issue central to their broader affordability message, putting Republicans on the defensive over the effects of Trump’s signature legislation, the Working Families Act, which is projected to leave as many as 10 million people without public health insurance over the next decade. Whether Democrats can overcome internal divisions to sustain that message remains to be seen.
Over the next few weeks, the Supreme Court will consider a challenge to President Trump’s use of broad tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a 1977 law. The tariffs in question include fentanyl-related duties on China, Mexico, and Canada; “reciprocal” levies on most U.S. trading partners aimed at reducing trade deficits; and tariffs on countries such as India and Brazil imposed for political rather than trade-related reasons. The case does not cover Section 232 tariffs on steel, aluminum, and autos, or Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods tied to unfair trade practices.
The challengers argue that Trump exceeded his authority because Congress never granted presidents the power to impose tariffs under emergency law. Administration lawyers counter that such flexibility is needed to protect the U.S. economy and national security. Most justices appear at least somewhat skeptical that the statute authorizes such sweeping actions, emphasizing that Congress alone has the power to tax Americans, although some have stressed the president’s inherent authority in foreign affairs. Based on early deliberations, some legal analysts expect the Court to strike down or limit use of the IEEPA for tariff purposes, a significant shift for a bench that has generally sided with Trump so far this year. Others foresee a narrower decision that sends the case back to a lower court for further consideration.
In the meantime, the administration is exploring other options to preserve its tariff regime, including Section 122 of the 1974 Trade Act, which permits temporary 15% tariffs for up to 150 days to address trade imbalances; Section 338 of the 1930 Tariff Act, which allows tariffs up to 50% on nations that discriminate against U.S. commerce; and expanded use of Sections 232 and 301 — none of which provide the same breadth or flexibility as the IEEPA. An expedited ruling could come as early as December.
The U.S. government remains closed for business after 15 days of congressional back-and-forth that failed to produce a bipartisan deal to keep federal agencies running into November (or beyond) while addressing Democrats’ demands to preserve funding for public health insurance programs. The Trump administration is using the shutdown to accelerate mass layoffs of federal workers and reduce the scope of government, drawing complaints from fellow Republicans and lawsuits from employee unions. Democratic leaders in Congress are trying to reframe the shutdown as a battle over health care – a traditional Democratic strength – evoking the 2018 midterms, when the party used threats to roll back Obama-era reforms to galvanize voters and reclaim the House majority during President Donald Trump’s first term in office.
So far, Americans are more likely to blame Republicans rather than Democrats for the impasse, 47% to 36%, with the share of Republican voters holding their own party responsible up six points since before the shutdown, at 39%, polling by Morning Consult shows. Data by Reuters indicates that 63% of respondents blame Trump, who has largely remained on the sidelines, preoccupied with orchestrating the Gaza ceasefire and hostage release agreement. But time will tell whether Democrats’ strategy proves effective in a longer term, given that only 2% of voters view health care as the most important problem facing the country. Today, the issue ranks well below the economy (16%) and political polarization (13%) – and far below its salience in 2018, when 41% named health care as the top factor driving their vote.
As the shutdown enters its third week, 49% of Americans are concerned about possible delays in services they rely on, a share likely to rise as the full economic effects of the shutdown come into view. So far, layoffs and furloughs have affected hundreds of thousands of federal workers and contractors, although the administration has managed to keep paying active-duty troops – arguably removing one of the biggest pressure points that might otherwise have pushed both sides toward compromise. In the meantime, analysts expect GDP growth to decline by as much as 0.2 percentage points for every week the government remains closed, compounding economic challenges in states with large federal workforces.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, predicts the shutdown could be the longest ever – but the political calculus may shift once Trump, fresh off his Middle East victory tour and ready to turn his attention to Russia, refocuses on the high-stakes negotiations in his own backyard.
Last week, President Trump announced deployment of the U.S. National Guard to Chicago, ostensibly to bolster public safety while carrying out an increasingly aggressive immigration enforcement campaign. If not for a court order blocking it, Chicago would have been the fourth Democratic-run city since June, after Los Angeles, Washington, and Memphis, to receive federal troops for civil-order purposes.
Trump’s approach marks the first domestic troop deployments for law-enforcement purposes since 1992, and the first in decades to occur over the objections of state and local officials. For that reason, it has sparked sharp political backlash and a series of legal challenges forcing the administration to scale back or suspend deployments to additional cities, such as Portland.
The administration frames these actions as a law-and-order initiative to protect federal property, assist immigration enforcement, and reassert control in cities where local authorities have “failed.” Politically, the deployments are intended to rally the Republican base with vivid displays of strength, position immigration and crime as the twin crises facing the nation, and force Democrats to defend local authority in the face of federal intervention.
This strategy seems to be succeeding with Republican voters – but it is making independents, who broke Trump’s way in 2024 across several swing states, increasingly uneasy. Their disapproval of the troop deployments has climbed to 64%from 47% in June, when the National Guard was first sent to Los Angeles. Their net approval of Trump’s handling of immigration now stands at -28 percentage points, down 18 points since July, and their net approval of his overall job performance has eroded even further, to -38 points, down 12 points since July and compared to -8 points among all voters. Unless the administration scales down its show of force, these warning signs underscore real risks for the Republican Party in the midterms, where outcomes tend to correlate more closely with presidential approval, which remains consistently negative, than with any other metric.
Consumer tax credits on electric vehicle purchases, funded by the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act, ended Sept. 30. Still, many states continue offering their own incentives to sustain EV sales momentum. Seventeen states provide purchase credits, ranging from a $1,500 tax credit in Rhode Island to $7,500 in Oregon and Maine. New York maintains a $2,000 Drive Clean Rebate, and California offers up to $7,000 in rebates. Starting next month, Colorado will raise its rebates on new and used EVs by roughly one-third (to $9,000 and $6,000 respectively) when high-emitting vehicles are traded in, even as its broader tax credits are set to shrink next year. At the same time, 40 states now impose higher annual registration fees on EV owners to offset lost gasoline tax revenue, while four (Oregon, Virginia, Utah, and Hawaii) charge per-mile road usage fees applied to all drivers.
Whether state-level incentives and an expected influx of used EVs can sustain sales remains to be seen. Meanwhile, the EV charging network is expanding rapidly, with the number of fast-charging ports nationwide up more than 80% over the past two years. California recently launched a $55 million program to subsidize public fast chargers, particularly in rural, low-income, and tribal areas, and introduced the country’s first reliability and data-sharing standards for publicly funded stations. Other states are taking similar steps: Oregon requires “EV-ready” wiring in new buildings, Maryland offers rebates for home and commercial charger installations, and Colorado and Florida are exploring uptime and performance rules for public chargers.
These moves complement major private-sector investments: Tesla and automaker-backed networks like Electrify America and EVGo are expanding fast-charger access, while retailers such as Walmart, large gas stations, and travel centers are adding stations of their own. Together with the federal NEVI program, which is building out a nationwide highway network following a six-month funding freeze, these efforts mark brighter spots in an EV landscape that otherwise faces near-term headwinds.
For months, President Donald Trump has dismissed weak economic indicators as remnants of the “Biden economy.” Yet Americans are increasingly holding him responsible for lingering inflation, a stagnant labor market, and a manufacturing downturn, an awkward trend for a president who campaigned on promises of an industrial renaissance. (To be fair, revised 2024 employment data suggests the economy he inherited was weaker than once thought, and the impact of his trade and immigration policies has been less immediate and dramatic.)
Over half of voters say Trump has made the economy worse rather than better (52% to 30%). Perceptions of his economic management remain deeply negative: Seven-in-ten disapprove of his handling of the economy overall, roughly where things stood when he took office, and 67% disapprove of his handling of the cost of living. Views of his tariffs are also negative, with net support at -27 percentage points, largely unchanged from two months ago, as many companies have held off on passing higher import costs on to consumers. Seventy-one percent of U.S. adults describe the economy as fair or poor, and 54% believe conditions are worsening. Two-thirds expect prices to rise over the next year, including 37% who think they will rise “a lot” — another difficult trend for a president who vowed to bring prices down on day one.
With more than a year until the midterms, the White House is in full campaign mode. Some Republicans worry inflation could jeopardizetheir narrow House majority, and Trump has only months to improve his standing on this issue. His signature domestic legislation, which extends the 2017 tax cuts while reducing social safety net programs, is unpopular. Nonpartisan analysts expect economic growth to remain flat through the rest of his term, with negative effects from tariffs and deportations offsetting gains from the tax cuts.
Nevertheless, efforts to shift the narrative — including high-profile immigration raids (such as one at Hyundai’s Georgia plant, which cast a pall over Trump’s efforts to attract foreign investment) and deploying troops to Washington, DC to crack down on crime — are resonating with Republican voters, who prioritize border security and public safety, and whose approval of Trump has been rising modestly. The White House is betting that an interest rate cut Trump has long pushed for will spur growth and investment, creating space to rebrand his signature law as a boon for working families — even as nonpartisan economists dispute that framing.
The Trump administration’s global tariff regime suffered a major setback when a federal appeals court ruled that the president exceeded his authority by invoking the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose tariffs on dozens of countries. The White House argued that persistent trade surpluses constituted a national emergency, but plaintiffs countered that the Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to levy tariffs. The Supreme Court will hear arguments in November, but for now, the tariffs remain in place. Other duties, such as Section 232 tariffs on steel, aluminum, and autos and Section 301 tariffs on Chinese imports, are unaffected.
Since President Trump’s reelection, the Supreme Court has generally ruled in his favor. In this case, legal analysts suggest the conservative majority could partially uphold the tariffs while limiting their scope or duration. But Trump has warned that losing would “literally destroy” America, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said the U.S. could owe more than $70 billion in refunds —nearly half of all tariff revenue collected through August. Officials are exploring alternatives, including expanding Section 232 and 301 tariffs and invoking a 1930 law permitting short-term duties of up to 50% on imports from countries deemed to discriminate against U.S. commerce. Each option, however, faces legal and practical obstacles and would take longer than IEEPA to show results.
Tariffs remain a centerpiece of Trump’s foreign policy, deployed to pressure trading partners, renegotiate agreements, and claim leverage in diplomacy. He has argued that unilateral tariff authority strengthens America’s role as both an economic power and a peacemaker — part of his case for a Nobel Peace Prize. The record is mixed: He has hesitated to impose secondary tariffs on Russian oil, citing hopes of reviving Ukraine peace talks while prioritizing trade negotiations with Beijing and other concerns. Until the Supreme Court rules, we expect uncertainty to continue clouding trade diplomacy, making major commitments in talks with China and others less likely (but not impossible; see below) while the legality of Trump’s tariff strategy hangs in the balance.
After months of stalled bilateral talks, a tentative agreement with China on American ownership of TikTok marks a major milestone — significant enough that it may serve as a precondition for a possible meeting between President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping later this fall. Under the emerging terms, TikTok’s U.S. operations would be spun off into a separate company. An investor consortium including Oracle, Silver Lake, Andreessen Horowitz, and KKR is expected to hold about 80% of the shares, while Chinese shareholders would retain the rest. The new entity would license TikTok’s content-recommendation algorithm from its parent company ByteDance, while Oracle, already a key TikTok partner, would manage U.S. user data. The deal may take weeks to finalize, and the app will continue to operate in the U.S. during negotiations.
Trump, who tried to ban TikTok in 2020, now embraces the platform, where he maintains a personal account with roughly 15 million followers, in addition to the official White House account. TikTok’s 170 million U.S. users make it a powerful political tool with bipartisan reach, and it is expected to be influential in the 2026 midterms. The recent assassination of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk has heightened scrutiny of TikTok and other social media platforms, which many lawmakers from both parties blame for inflaming political divisions.
Members of Congress also remain deeply concerned about the potential for Chinese government access to Americans’ data and influence over TikTok’s content, pledging close scrutiny of any future deal to ensure compliance with a 2024 U.S. law that requires a “qualified divestiture” to guarantee TikTok is no longer “controlled” by a foreign adversary. Some of their demands — such as a full decoupling of TikTok’s algorithm from Chinese systems or explicit guarantees blocking any Chinese Communist Party access to U.S. user data — go beyond the statute’s text, potentially complicating negotiations and adding friction to broader U.S.-China trade talks ahead of a possible Trump-Xi summit.
Seven months into his second presidency, Donald Trump’s efforts to exert direct, personal authority over U.S. business are drawing comparisons to China-style state capitalism, albeit “with American characteristics.” Examples include a 10% government stake in Intel, a 15% stake in critical-minerals producer MP Materials, and a “golden share” in U.S. Steel. More controversial is the Trump administration’s deal with NVIDIA and AMD, which would allow limited sales of semiconductor chips to China in exchange for a 15% cut of revenue. Critics on both sides of the aisle warn that the arrangement risks incentivizing sales of dual-use technology to a strategic rival, undermining America’s edge in AI, and even violating the constitutional ban on export taxes. But the White House frames the Intel move as part of a broader strategy to create a sovereign wealth fund that could include more companies. Coupled with $1.5 trillion in pledged investments from Japan, the EU, and South Korea that Trump insists he will personally direct, the approach is putting a distinctly transactional, pay-to-play stamp on the U.S. economy that could last well beyond 2028.
Trump’s direct involvement in business is already unprecedented for an American president. He and his family have reportedly made $3.4 billion since his return to office, with more than $2.3 billion from cryptocurrency ventures alone, bringing his estimated net worth to about $10 billion. Over the past decade, his most loyal supporters — about 11% of U.S. adults — have consistently backed his commercial ventures, whether buying Trump-branded products or staying in his hotels, though many likely lost money on his crypto projects. His second inauguration drew $239 million in contributions, an all-time record, with many corporate donors later receiving favorable treatment. Trump also holds large personal stakes in Apple and NVIDIA, both of which have benefited from concessions his administration has extended to technology companies.
Preparations for the U.S.’s 250th anniversary next year are already generating an uptick in corporate contributions, widely seen as efforts to remain in Trump’s good graces. Coca-Cola, Goldman Sachs, Amazon, and Palantir have all contributed undisclosed amounts, while Chrysler brands signed on as exclusive automotive sponsors. These gestures fit into a larger system of measuring and rewarding corporate loyalty that continues to take shape, including administration-maintained “trackers” of which companies support Trump’s tax and spending law or announce “Trump effect” investments in U.S. manufacturing and innovation. Taken together, they signal that Trump’s direct interventions in the economy are not only deepening but also increasingly designed to pressure corporations to align with his political and social priorities — particularly with the midterm elections approaching.
President Trump is spearheading a campaign to redraw congressional maps in Republican-led states ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, aiming to cement his party’s hold on the House majority and advance his policy agenda in the second half of his term. About 40 congressional districts could be competitive this cycle, split roughly between Republicans and Democrats. In Texas, a mid-decade redistricting push could enable Republicans to flip as many as five House seats currently held by moderate Democrats. Similar efforts being weighed in Indiana, Missouri, Ohio, and elsewhere could create more safely Republican districts.
Across the aisle, California’s push to redraw its own electoral maps could help Democrats grow their margin by three to five seats. Other Democrat-led states like New York and Illinois could follow suit, threatening moderate, blue-state Republicans who were instrumental in delivering the House majority in 2024. Regardless, Republicans have a clear advantage in the total number of states that could ultimately redraw their maps,simply because there are more states with Republican trifectas (both chambers of the state legislature and a governor’s office) where Democratic-held seats could be in play.
In Texas, the new maps become official once signed by Gov. Greg Abbott, although legal challenges are expected. In California, a November 4 special election will let voters decide whether to temporarily replace an existing map drawn by an independent commission with a new, partisan one. The state’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, widely assumed to harbor 2028 presidential ambitions, is framing the move as a direct rebuke to Trump’s increasing authoritarianism — the kind of decisive action Democratic voters say they want from their leaders.
The party is historically unpopular, with voter registrations down in 2024 (although possibly already rebounding) and voters skeptical that it has what it takes to defeat the Trump agenda. At the same time, Democrats are highly enthusiastic about voting in the midterms, and independents are slightly more likely to lean Democratic and say sitting Democrats in Congress deserve reelection. Time will tell whether Democrats’ retaliatory redistricting — in California and possibly beyond — marks the beginning of their own populist, anti-establishment makeover, persuading voters that they are willing to go beyond mere rhetoric and use whatever power they do have to win.
A series of recent actions by the Trump administration are intensifying pressure on wind energy projects across the U.S., casting doubt on the industry’s near-term outlook. Developers face several headwinds: an accelerated phase-out of clean energy tax credits created under the Inflation Reduction Act, federal reviews of offshore and onshore regulations, and new or proposed tariffs that could significantly raise turbine and component costs. These measures build on earlier steps, including a pause on new wind energy leases and a halt to project approvals on federal lands and waters. BloombergNEF estimates that, combined, they could drive a 50% decline in onshore wind installations through 2035 compared with a business-as-usual scenario.
More recently, the administration canceled a major wind farm in Idaho and paused three offshore projects near New York, Rhode Island, and Maryland, two of which were nearly complete — fueling concerns that reviews of projects approved under former President Biden could set a precedent for reversing prior permits or blocking approval of any future projects.
Wind currently supplies more than 10% of U.S. electricity, making efforts to constrain the industry appear at odds with Trump’s declared “energy emergency” and the rising demand from AI-driven data centers. The impact could be particularly acute in Republican-led states such as Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas, which together stand to lose a significant share of the roughly $317 billion in planned investment now at risk.
In Congress, some centrist Republicans and lawmakers from wind-heavy states have spoken out in defense of tax credits and permitting stability. But the most consequential activity has been at the state level: Since January 2025, more than 20 states have advanced wind-related legislation or regulatory changes, with restrictive measures only slightly outnumbering those designed to support or protect projects.
Democratic-led states such as Massachusetts, and New York have moved to accelerate offshore wind development before credit eligibility narrows, while several Republican-led ones, including Arkansas and Oklahoma, have advanced bills tightening siting, permitting, or decommissioning requirements. With many federal actions facing legal challenges, the trajectory of U.S. wind energy will hinge on both the courts and the pace of state-level policymaking. We will continue tracking developments as the industry adapts to a shifting policy landscape.
