Campaigning on opposite sides of a pivotal Senate race, President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden appealed to party loyalists in Nevada as early voting began Saturday in the state.

Wrapping up a three-day visit to Western states with midday rally in rural Elko, Trump lent support for Dean Heller, considered the most vulnerable GOP senator on the Nov. 6 ballot as Republicans hope to retain their Senate majority. The GOP-leaning region of the battleground state is crucial to Trump’s hopes of protecting or expanding Republicans’ 51-49 edge in the Senate.

“If you want to protect America’s laws, borders, sovereignty and even your dignity, you need to go out today and vote,” Trump said as he asked supporters to raise their right hands in a pledge to go to the polls.

​Biden: big election

A short time earlier and 400-plus miles south, Biden headlined a Las Vegas rally at a union local to promote Heller’s challenger, Rep. Jacky Rosen, and other Democratic candidates, as he encouraged Nevada residents to get out and vote.

“This election is literally bigger than politics. It’s bigger than politics,” Biden said. “No matter how old or young you are, you have never participated in an election that is as consequential as this election national and locally.”

Trump struck much the same theme throughout the week, as he has tried to frame the choices for voters in the upcoming election. He has sought to focus on immigration as one of the defining election issues and has falsely accused Democrats of wanting “open borders” and encouraging illegal immigration.

“They’ve gone loco,” Trump said.

Trump mocks 

Trump referenced Biden’s appearance in Las Vegas, mocking the smaller crowd drawn by his potential 2020 rival, compared with the thousands he gathered on an airport tarmac in the more sparsely populated part of the state.

Trump deployed a refrain he had fine-tuned during his Western swing, declaring that “Democrats produce mobs, Republicans produce jobs.”

“That’s called hashtag,” he said to the crowd. “That’s a new hashtag. That’s a hot one.”

Trump branded Heller’s opponent “Wacky Jacky,” as he sought to cast Rosen as beholden to Democratic coastal elites, including Democratic congressional leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.

Biden talks American values

In Las Vegas, Biden criticized Trump for his approach to Russia and President Vladimir Putin, his equivocating on white supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia, and his immigration policies, including the separation of migrant families at the U.S.-Mexico border

American values, “are being shredded,” Biden said. “They’re being shredded by a president who is all about himself. It’s all about Donald.”

In a tweet before leaving Arizona, Trump called Heller “a man who has become a good friend” and said he needed the senator’s “Help and Talent in Washington.”

Trump and Heller

Trump praised Heller for his votes for conservative Supreme Court Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh. The later faced allegations of decades-old sexual assault during his confirmation hearings, prompting impassioned Senate hearings and fraught votes.

“We stuck with Justice Kavanaugh, because he was the right man,” Trump said.

But Heller himself once had rocky relations with Trump and had returned a campaign donation from then-candidate Trump over Trump’s immigration rhetoric. Last year, Trump threatened Heller’s re-election chances when the senator held up GOP efforts to repeal the Obama-era health law. But Heller has since become an ally of the president, who has made two fundraising stops for him in Nevada this year already.

Heller and Rosen held their first and only debate of the campaign Friday. Heller accused her of making a visit to see separated families at the U.S.-Mexico border in order to stage a “photo-op,” while she described Heller a “rubber-stamp” for Trump, whose tax plan she said benefits the wealthy at the expense of the middle class.

In a further sign of the state’s importance in the midterms, former President Barack Obama scheduled a stop Monday in Las Vegas.

He won Nevada in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns, and Democrat Hillary Clinton carried the state by 2 percentage points over Trump in 2016. But during the last midterm elections in 2014, many Democrats stayed home and Republicans won key races across the state, which has a 29 percent Latino population.

Immigration

The country’s immigration system has long vexed politicians from both parties, and Republicans themselves have torpedoed near-compromises in recent years. Yet Trump tweeted Saturday that “we could write up and agree to new immigration laws in less than one hour” if Democrats “would stop being obstructionists and come together.”

“Call me,” he told the Democratic leaders in Congress, Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York and Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California. It seemed reminiscent of the time last year when Trump cracked open the door of bipartisanship with those leaders, who emerged from a White House meeting to say Trump had agreed to work toward a deal on protection young immigrants. But no agreement came to pass.

The Biden-Trump circling of one another in the same state happened recently in Kentucky, where Biden campaigned for a Democratic congressional candidate on a Friday night and Trump held a rally the next evening.
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Melissa Madara was not surprised to receive death threats Friday as her Brooklyn witchcraft store prepared to host a public hexing of newly confirmed U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh this weekend.

The planned casting of an anti-Kavanaugh spell, one of the more striking instances of politically disgruntled Americans turning to the supernatural when frustrated by democracy, has drawn backlash from some Christian groups but support from like-minded witch covens.

“It gives the people who are seeking agency a little bit of chance to have that back,” Madara said. The ritual was to be livestreamed on Facebook and Instagram at 8 p.m. EDT Saturday (1200 GMT Sunday).

Seated at a desk phone among bird skulls and crystal balls at Catland Books, the occult shop she co-owns, Madara said the Kavanaugh hex is expected to be the most popular event the store has hosted since its 2013 opening, including spells aimed at President Donald Trump. Madara declined to provide details of what the latest ritual will entail.

More than 15,000 people who have seen Catland Books promotions on Facebook have expressed interest in attending the event, vastly exceeding the shop’s 60-person capacity.

​Irate, threatening calls

Not everyone is a witchcraft fan. Madara said she had fielded numerous irate calls from critics, with at least one threatening violence. 

“Every time we host something like this there’s always people who like to call in with death threats or read us scripture,” she said.

As far as supporters go, some are sexual assault survivors still angry that the U.S. Senate confirmed Kavanaugh’s lifetime appointment to the nation’s highest court despite accusations that he had sexually assaulted multiple women.

Kavanaugh has denied the allegations, and an FBI investigation failed to corroborate his accusers’ accounts.

Democrats hope lingering outrage over Kavanaugh, particularly among women, will translate into election gains for them Nov. 6. Republicans are likewise trying to seize on anger among conservatives at how they perceive Kavanaugh was mistreated.

Counter hexes and prayers

Believers in mysticism on both sides of the political divide are taking matters into their own hands.

Plans for the Catland Books event have sparked “counter hexes” around the country by those seeking to undo the spell that the Brooklyn witches cast against Kavanaugh, Madara said.

Even mainstream clergy was joining the fray. Rev. Gary Thomas of the Diocese of San Jose in California said Friday that he would include Kavanaugh in his prayers at Saturday mass.
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President Donald Trump said Saturday that he would pull the United States from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty because Russia had violated the agreement, but he provided no details of the violations.

The 1987 pact, which helps protect the security of the U.S. and its allies in Europe and the Far East, prohibits the United States and Russia from possessing, producing or test-flying a ground-launched cruise missile with a range of 300 to 3,400 miles.

“Russia has violated the agreement. They have been violating it for many years,” Trump said after a rally in Elko, Nevada. “And we’re not going to let them violate a nuclear agreement and go out and do weapons and we’re not allowed to.”

The agreement has constrained the U.S. from developing new weapons, but America will begin developing them unless Russia and China agree not to possess or develop the weapons, Trump said. China is not currently party to the pact.

“We’ll have to develop those weapons, unless Russia comes to us and China comes to us and they all come to us and say let’s really get smart and let’s none of us develop those weapons, but if Russia’s doing it and if China’s doing it, and we’re adhering to the agreement, that’s unacceptable,” he said.

National security adviser John Bolton was headed Saturday to Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia. His first stop is Moscow to meet with senior Russian officials at a time when Moscow-Washington relations remain frosty over the Ukrainian crisis, the war in Syria and allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential race and upcoming U.S. midterm elections.

There was no immediate comment from the Kremlin or the Russian Foreign Ministry on Trump’s announcement.

​Back to cold war

“We are slowly slipping back to the situation of cold war as it was at the end of the Soviet Union, with quite similar consequences, but now it could be worse because [Russian President Vladimir] Putin belongs to a generation that had no war under its belt,” said Dmitry Oreshkin, an independent Russian political analyst. “These people aren’t as much fearful of a war as people of [former Soviet leader Leonid] Brezhnev’s epoch. They think if they threaten the West properly, it gets scared.”

U.S. officials have previously alleged that Russia violated the treaty by deliberately deploying a land-based cruise missile in order to pose a threat to NATO. Russia has claimed that U.S. missile defenses violate the pact.

The administration of former President Barack Obama worked to persuade Moscow to respect the INF treaty but made little progress.

“If they get smart and if others get smart and they say let’s not develop these horrible nuclear weapons, I would be extremely happy with that, but as long as somebody’s violating the agreement, we’re not going to be the only ones to adhere to it,” Trump said. 
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Alaska Governor Bill Walker, a political independent, halted his re-election campaign Friday and endorsed his Democratic challenger, ending a three-way race in which the Republican candidate had appeared to possess an insurmountable lead.

With 18 days remaining before the Nov. 6 election, Walker, 67, said he concluded that he could not win a second term in a race against former U.S. Senator Mark Begich, a Democrat, and former state legislator Mike Dunleavy, a Republican.

Walker’s withdrawal came three days after his former running mate, Byron Mallott, abruptly resigned as lieutenant governor over admitted but unspecified “inappropriate comments” in a scandal that threw the governor’s campaign into disarray.

Republican well ahead in polls

But public opinion surveys were already showing Dunleavy well ahead of the two other men and indicated Begich had greater support than the incumbent governor.

Consulting for days on whether Walker or Begich had a better shot at running a competitive race against Dunleavy, the “determination was made that, at this point, Begich has the better odds,” the governor said in a statement posted on his campaign’s website.

Walker also said Begich’s positions on various key issues “more closely align with my priorities for Alaska,” including their support for Medicaid expansion in Alaska and state action on climate change. Dunleavy opposes both.

“Today’s developments leave Alaska voters with a clear choice,” Dunleavy’s campaign said after learning Walker halted his re-election campaign.

A retired Air Force lieutenant colonel and outspoken supporter of President Donald Trump, Dunleavy has focused his campaign on criticizing Walker for reducing the annual oil-fund dividends all Alaska residents receive.

Walker has said limiting the payout was necessary to address big budget deficits. Dunleavy has advocated deeper spending cuts and more oil and mining development.

The latest announcement came at the annual convention of the Alaska Federation of Natives, a powerful constituency in the state, just before Walker, Begich and Dunleavy were all scheduled to participate in a gubernatorial debate.

Begich and Walker, whose name will remain on the ballot despite his withdrawal, were widely seen as likely to take votes away from each other in a three-way race.

Walker a former Republican

Walker changed his party affiliation from Republican to independent before launching his successful 2014 campaign for governor on a “unity” ticket with Mallot, a Democrat, as his running mate.

In his remarks at the Alaska Federation of Natives conference, Walker said his supporters would have to decide for themselves who they favored in a two-man race but said he planned to vote for Begich.

Walker’s campaign spokesman previously acknowledged that representatives for the governor and Begich had been in talks on a “path forward” even before Mallott stepped down from office.
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Saudi Arabia has admitted that Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi is dead. Saudi state-run media says Khashoggi died after an altercation in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, and it is promising a one-month investigation. VOA’s diplomatic correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department on the dramatic developments in Riyadh.
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A government computer system that interacts with HealthCare.gov was hacked earlier this month, compromising the sensitive personal data of some 75,000 people, officials said Friday.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services made the announcement late in the afternoon ahead of a weekend, a time agencies often use to release unfavorable developments.

Officials said the hacked system was shut down and technicians are working to restore it before sign-up season starts Nov. 1 for health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

About 10 million people have private coverage under former President Barack Obama’s health care law.

Consumers applying for subsidized coverage have to provide extensive personal information, including Social Security numbers, income, and citizenship or legal immigration status.

The system that was hacked is used by insurance agents and brokers to directly enroll customers. All other sign-up systems are working.

CMS spokesman Johnathan Monroe said “nothing happened” to the HealthCare.gov website used by the general public. “This concerns the agent and broker portal, which is not accessible to the general public,” he said.

Federal law enforcement has been alerted, and affected customers will be notified and offered credit protection.

President Donald Trump promised to repeal “Obamacare” but failed.
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A gleaming new $3.2 billion railway cuts in half the travel time from Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, to the coast. Major investments in transportation, energy and maritime infrastructure are turning Pakistan into a major economic corridor. A new industrial zone in Thailand boasts solar, rubber and industrial manufacturing plants and is slated to host 500 companies by 2021.

All are parts of China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative, featuring billions of dollars in infrastructure investment across Asia, Africa and the Pacific. The global impact is forcing the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump to rethink elements of its plan to cut back on foreign assistance under an “America First” strategy.

When “very senior people” in the administration traveled abroad and “saw that China was eating our lunch, they thought to themselves, ‘We have to do something,’ ” said Daniel Runde, an analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington.

And in a number of quiet moves affecting private investment, humanitarian aid and women’s empowerment abroad, the administration and the U.S. Congress have been doing just that.

Major policy reversal

In what is being seen as a major policy reversal, Trump this month signed the so-called BUILD Act, described by the nonpartisan CSIS as “the most important piece of U.S. soft power legislation in more than a decade.”

The new law merges and boosts agencies and programs that had once been targeted for deep budget cuts, creating a new entity tasked with providing loans, political-risk insurance and equity stakes to U.S. firms investing in developing countries, from Afghanistan to Zambia.

The agency will be known as the U.S. International Development Finance Corp., or USIDFC, and have a $60 billion budget. It will absorb the existing Overseas Private Investment Corp. (OPIC) and more than double that agency’s current budget of $29 billion.

The USIDFC is “a much-needed instrument of commercial diplomacy that the U.S. has been sorely lacking,” said Witney Schneidman, a former deputy assistant secretary of state for African affairs, in a recent blog post for the Brookings Institution.

In a follow-up phone interview, Schneidman said he thought the new agency would help “get U.S. companies interested in Africa on its own merit. … It does put the U.S. on level with the Chinese” by matching Beijing’s policy of making equity investments in companies seeking to do business overseas.

​Dwarfed by China

Even at $60 billion, the new U.S. program will be dwarfed by Chinese investments in Asia and Africa. But Brookings analyst George Ingram said its impact can be magnified by partnering with other international lending organizations.

“The French, the British, the Scandinavians – they all have similar organizations,” Ingram said. “And now that the [USIDFC] has equity authority, this new entity will be able to be a much more effective partner than OPIC could be.”

The BUILD Act has its critics, especially among free-market conservatives who believe the government should not get involved in private business decisions.

“The idea of equity participation was kind of sold politically that it was going to be the U.S. responding to China’s One Belt, One Road [initiative] and yet there was no mention of China in the legislation at all,” James M. Roberts, an editor for the Washington-based Heritage Foundation’s annual “Index of Economic Freedom,” told VOA in an interview.

By ensuring equity stakes, “that means the government is going to be a shareholder in foreign companies,” added Roberts, who has listed a potential for “cronyism and misallocation of capital” among his concerns.

Advocates of the plan include Mark Green, head of the U.S. Agency for International Development, whose Development Credit Authority is being folded into the USIDFC. By encouraging U.S. private investment abroad, he has said, the new enterprise will “spur economic growth in less developed countries and advance the foreign policy interests of the United States.”

Interviewed last week for VOA’s “Plugged In With Greta Van Susteren,” Green, a former Republican congressman who later served as ambassador to Tanzania, said there’s a “fundamental difference” between U.S. and Chinese approaches to development abroad.

China favors loans that can include “unsustainable financing that mortgages a country’s future,” he said. In contrast, USAID expects recipients to implement reforms. 

“We ask them to respect certain rights and values. What we want for them is to become eventual trading partners, but equal partners,” Green added.

Other measures

The Trump administration has demonstrated a renewed openness to international aid in other ways as well, including a recent five-year extension to an anti-hunger measure known as the Global Food Security Act. It supports USAID programs such as Feed the Future initiative. It partners with governments, NGOs, private enterprise and others “to strengthen agricultural markets and then entire food systems,” said Beth Dunford, who oversees the initiative.

Pending in Congress, meanwhile, is the Women’s Entrepreneurship and Economic Empowerment Act, aimed at improving women’s access “to economic participation and opportunity.”

It calls for supporting women’s property and inheritance rights and ending gender-based violence. It also requires that USAID integrate efforts to empower women in all of its programs, and it broadens support for women-run small- and medium-size businesses.

The bill, which enjoys bipartisan backing, is being promoted by first daughter Ivanka Trump. She tweeted her thanks this week to four members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for advancing the bill.

“Women’s economic empowerment doesn’t always get a lot of attention in Congress, so this bill is something we’re quite excited about,” said Nicole Ellis, who manages policy communications for the international relief agency CARE.

Gayatri Patel, CARE’s senior policy advocate, said the agency is working closely with legislators, noting they want “practical recommendations and approaches.”

That might include endorsing approaches such as the Village Savings and Loan program that CARE started in Niger in 1991. “You get women in a community to save, they give each other loans,” Patel said. “It’s really an entry point for women for more formal economic endeavors … to start businesses or pay for their children’s education, to connect with the market and mentor or be mentored by others in the community.”

The goal, she said, is to encourage aid that has “a catalytic effect on women, their families and their communities.”
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In the battle for Congress, Democrats are winning the money game. But will it be enough for them to overtake Republicans?

In what is shaping up to be the most expensive U.S. congressional election in history, Democrats have had a distinct advantage in fundraising over Republicans throughout the midterm election cycle as they seek to break the GOP’s stranglehold on Congress.

While Republicans are widely expected to preserve their slim 51-to-49-seat majority in the U.S. Senate and possibly expand it, polls show the Democrats poised to take back the U.S. House of Representatives for the first time in seven years. Democrats need a net gain of 23 seats to retake the House.

WATCH VIDEO:

On the ballot

All 435 House seats as well as 35 of 100 Senate seats will be on the ballot next month. Candidates vying for those coveted seats have raised a record $2.3 billion from individual donors and political action committees (PACs) through Sept. 30, according to the latest filings this week with the Federal Election Commission.

Overall, Democrats outraised Republicans by an unprecedented $411 million. In House races, Democratic candidates raised more than $850 million from individuals and PACs, compared with $576 million generated by Republicans. In Senate contests, Democrats hauled in nearly $490 million, compared with $337 million garnered by Republicans.

The average House campaign spends a little more than $1 million during a two-year election cycle, yet 30 Democrats have raised more than $2 million each so far this cycle.

In the most expensive non-special House race this cycle, a closely fought contest in Southern California between Republican Young Kim and Democrat Gil Cisneros has cost more than $20 million. Among Senate contests, the most expensive race is between incumbent Republican Ted Cruz and Democrat Beto O’Rourke, who have raised a combined total of nearly $100 million.

Republicans fared as well or better than the Democrats in raising campaign cash from corporate PACs, those high-powered fundraising operations with minimal disclosure requirements or spending restrictions. But the Democrats crushed Republicans in raising individual contributions through the internet or campaign fundraising events. O’Rourke, a U.S. House member from El Paso, Texas, reported last week that he had raised a record $30 million during the third quarter from 800,000 contributors.

Federal campaign finance law prevents individuals from contributing more than $2,700 to a congressional campaign committee in any one election, while allowing traditional political action committees to donate up to $5,000. However, so-called independent-expenditure committees, or “super PACS,” can raise and spend unlimited amounts to advance their causes or political parties.

“There is a tremendous amount of small-dollar energy going on the Democratic side,” said Kyle Kondik of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.

“Democratic House candidates are raising small-dollar donations from donors across the country, who are doing what they can trying to win the House back for Democrats. Republicans are trying to counteract that with third-party groups and outside spending.”

​Fundraising edge, cash on hand

Moreover, Democratic challengers have outraised Republican opponents in a majority of several dozen House races seen as highly competitive. And as the campaign enters its final two weeks, data show Democrats have more cash on hand than Republicans, something that will allow them to fund a last-minute push to mobilize voters.

Sarah Bryner, research director at the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan research organization, said the Democrats’ enormous fundraising edge is “fairly significant and fairly unusual.”

“The trend with election spending is just almost always up due to a variety of factors,” Bryner said. “But this election cycle we have a huge crop of well-funded Democratic challengers and that’s going to increase spending across the board as the incumbents they’re facing try to counteract that spending.”

Money is the lifeblood of American campaigning. Candidates and their consultants use funds to buy expensive TV airtime, pay for personnel and other campaign expenses, and hold events to raise more funds. Advertising represents the single largest expense of a congressional campaign.

Money will continue to pour in throughout the last two weeks of the campaign, helped by some deep-pocketed benefactors seeking to tip the balance in key races.

Last week, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced he was giving $20 million to the Democrats’ Senate super PAC. Most of the money will go toward buying TV airtime for embattled Democratic candidates. That brings to nearly $100 million the amount the billionaire businessman has contributed to the Democrats this cycle, making him one of the largest donors.

“Given the rise of super PACs in the post-Citizens United era, it’s possible for people to make those huge donations late in the game,” Bryner said, referring to a 2010 Supreme Court ruling that found spending limits on outside organizations unconstitutional.

“Right now, this is the Wild West in the United States,” said Martin Frost, a former chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and now president of the bipartisan Association of Former Members of Congress. “People can put as much money as they want in politics. Some of that money is disclosed and some of it is not.”

With Republican incumbents struggling in several dozen key races, party leaders and groups have begun to cut their losses, pulling funding from races they think the Democrats will win and reallocating resources to more competitive contests.

In its first act of triage in late September, the Congressional Leadership Fund, a Republican super PAC, canceled a planned $3.1 million ad buy in two districts in Michigan and Colorado where the Republican incumbents are struggling, the Associated Press reported. That was followed by similar moves in several other congressional districts.

​Infusions of cash or pulling the plug

Parties perform spending triage all the time. But the infusion of cash, such as Bloomberg’s $20 million donation, has put added pressure on the Republicans to pull the plug on uncompetitive races.

“What happens is races that are at the margins, where it’s just going to be a tough slog regardless, they’ll pull out of those races … and they’ll reallocate those resources into races where that $20 million by Bloomberg now may make a difference,” said Michael Steele, a former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Just how much of a difference the Democrats’ money advantage will make remains to be seen. Money is not always a guarantor of electoral success.

In the 2016 presidential election, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suffered an upset despite spending $387 million more than billionaire businessman Donald Trump. In a special election for a congressional seat in Georgia last year, Democrat Jon Ossoff lost to Republican Karen Handel despite a $20 million fundraising advantage.

And O’Rourke’s massive fundraising advantage has failed to cut into Cruz’s substantial seven-point lead in the U.S. Senate race in Texas.

“A lot of people make a big deal about money and sort of think that’s the dark angel of American politics, but I can tell you there are … as many races there where the person with the most money loses as there are where that individual wins,” Steele said. “So at the end of the day, candidates still have to make a credible message, they still have to be credible themselves for the voters … to actually utilize the benefit of those dollars that are getting poured into that campaign.”
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With the US midterm elections weeks away, Democrats have gained the upper hand in fundraising. Analysts say anti-Trump sentiment may be fueling record election contributions as Democrats seek to break the GOP’s hold in Congress. As VOA’s Masood Farivar reports, the 2018 midterms are shaping up to be the most expensive U.S. congressional election in history. But some wonder if rising Democratic campaign contributions is enough to unseat enough Republicans and take majority control of Congress.
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The U.S. Interior Department’s watchdog agency has said in a report that sending a security detail to protect Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke and his wife on a vacation to Turkey and Greece had cost taxpayers more than $25,000, the Washington Post reported Thursday.

The report published by the Post also said Zinke allowed his wife to travel with him in government vehicles in violation of department policy.

Others investigated

The report follows ethics investigations into several Trump administration officials, including Scott Pruitt, who stepped down as the head of the Environmental Protection Agency in July, and Tom Price, who resigned as health and human services secretary in September 2017.

Zinke said he did not ask his security detail to travel with him during the August 2017 vacation to Turkey and Greece, and the decision was made by the U.S. Park Police supervisor, the Interior Department’s Office of Inspector General said in the report.

The report said other officials in the department approved Zinke’s wife, Lolita, riding with him in government vehicles. It said that when Zinke was asked whether he knew the practice violated department policy, the secretary said it was consistent with government travel regulations.

The report listed several instances of official travel in which Zinke was accompanied by his wife and he reimbursed the government for her expenses.

Making wife a volunteer

It said Zinke had asked department employees to research whether his wife could be made an official Interior Department volunteer. He denied his intention in making the request was to enable his wife to travel with him in an official capacity.

“Ultimately, the employees advised him that making her a volunteer could be perceived negatively, and she did not become one,” the report said.

The Interior Department did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

The department’s Office of Inspector General has also said it was investigating Zinke over the use of chartered flights and a Montana real estate deal.
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President Donald Trump suggested without evidence Thursday that Democrats or their allies are supporting a “caravan” of Central American migrants who are traveling north aiming to enter the United States.

Addressing thousands of supporters at a campaign rally in Montana, Trump said immigration is now one of the leading issues in the 2018 midterms, and he accused Democrats of supporting the migrants because they “figure everybody coming in is going to vote Democrat.”

The comments mark the injection of one of Trump’s signature 2016 campaign themes back into national conversation as he looks to boost Republican turnout to maintain their congressional majorities in 2018.

Perhaps no issue was more identifiable with Trump’s last campaign than immigration, particularly his much-vaunted — and still-unfulfilled — promise to build a U.S.-Mexico border wall. For Trump, those pledges are still rallying cries for his supporters, who cheered his call for construction of a wall and booed mentions of Democratic opposition to his hard-line policies.

Unfounded allegation

“A lot of money’s been passing through people to come up and try to get to the border by Election Day because they think that’s a negative for us,” Trump said. “No. 1, they’re being stopped, and No. 2, regardless, that’s our issue.”

He added: “They wanted that caravan and there are those that say that caravan didn’t just happen. It didn’t just happen.”

Trump appeared to be referring to an unfounded allegation promoted by ally Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida. The Republican lawmaker tweeted a video Wednesday of men handing out money to people standing in line. He claimed the video showed people being paid in Honduras to join a caravan and “storm the border (at) election time.” Trump on Thursday tweeted the same video, writing, “Can you believe this, and what Democrats are allowing to be done to our Country?”

Correction issued

After questions about the video’s origin, Gaetz posted a correction later Thursday on Twitter, saying, “This video was provided to me by a Honduran government official. Thus, I believed it to be from Honduras.”

Neither Republican provided evidence of his claim that the people were being paid to join a caravan.

About 3,000 Hondurans are in a migrant caravan passing through Guatemala trying to reach the United States. Mexico’s government says migrants with proper documents can enter Mexico and those who don’t either have to apply for refugee status or face deportation.

On Thursday, Trump threatened to close the U.S.-Mexico border if authorities there fail to stop them.

Trump criticizes Tester

Trump was in Montana to boost GOP Senate candidate Matt Rosendale, who is running against Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, whom the president said has been a “disaster for Montana.”

The president blames Tester for the backlash against former White House doctor Adm. Ronny Jackson, whom the president had tapped to serve as Veterans Affairs secretary. Jackson was forced to withdraw after facing ethics allegations, including claims that he “got drunk and wrecked a government vehicle” at a Secret Service going-away party. Tester had released a list of allegations against Jackson that was compiled by the Democratic staff of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee.

“He was attacked so viciously, so violently by Jon Tester,” Trump said. “That’s really why I’m here.”

He also criticized Tester’s opposition to the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who was accused of decades-old sexual assault. Kavanaugh denied the allegations.

Praise for body slam candidate

Trump also praised Republican Rep. Greg Gianforte, who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault last year after attacking a reporter in 2017.

“Any guy that can do a body slam, he’s my kind of guy,” Trump said. “He’s a great guy, tough cookie.”

Trump accused Democrats of engaging in a “heartless” campaign to sink Kavanaugh’s confirmation, saying voters will “remember” how he was treated at the polls.

“This will be an election of Kavanaugh, the caravan, law and order, and common sense,” Trump said.
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Two of President Donald Trump’s top advisers got into a heated exchange outside the Oval Office on Thursday as passions boiled over about how to handle illegal immigration, two sources familiar with the incident said.

The altercation occurred between White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, who is a former homeland security secretary, and Trump’s national security adviser, John Bolton, the sources said.

One source described the argument as a “tense exchange” but said that it had blown over, and that it involved the job performance of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, a former deputy to Kelly. Another source said it was “not a big deal.”

Trump, asked about the incident, told reporters: “That, I have not heard about.”

A senior White House official said later that Nielsen and Bolton had a nice conversation in Bolton’s office after the exchange and agreed the goal was to protect borders.

Earlier this year, The New York Times reported that Nielsen was close to resigning after being criticized by Trump at a Cabinet meeting for what he said was her failure to secure U.S. borders.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said in a statement: “While we are passionate about solving the issue of illegal immigration, we are not angry at one another. However, we are furious at the failure of congressional Democrats to help us address this growing crisis.”

Trump threatened on Thursday to deploy the military and close the southern U.S. border as Hondurans and Salvadorans joined thousands of migrants in Guatemala hoping to travel north.

“I must, in the strongest of terms, ask Mexico to stop this onslaught — and if unable to do so I will call up the U.S. Military and CLOSE OUR SOUTHERN BORDER!’ Trump said in a tweet.
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If Republican Marsha Blackburn were to win in November, the congresswoman would become the first female U.S. senator in Tennessee history. And yet women have been slow to embrace her campaign.

A Vanderbilt University poll conducted Oct. 8-13 showed Blackburn trailing former Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, 49 percent to 37 percent among women likely to vote. The same poll found that men likely to vote favored Blackburn 50-37 percent, even as the broader poll showed the race is a tossup.

The stark gender divide, which has persisted in polling throughout the campaign, stands out in what has been described as the year of the female voter. Aware of the stakes as Democrats try to take control of the Senate, both candidates have intensified efforts to win over women as Election Day nears — vividly demonstrating that those voters are pivotal even in a deeply red state.

“Women are increasingly more liberal, and men are increasingly more conservative,” said Amanda Clayton, an assistant professor of political science at Vanderbilt University. “That trend is becoming more pronounced and is likely to become more pronounced as it gets closer to the election.”

Blackburn’s tea party roots can appeal to conservative men who oppose traditionally liberal feminist candidates, Clayton said.

The push to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, she added, may have given those men reason to look for women they could support, perhaps in response to more liberal women running for office.

Blackburn, the first female major-party Senate nominee from Tennessee, has previously demurred when talking about the groundbreaking aspects of her campaign. She said she isn’t running on gender and has declined to answer questions about sexism she’s encountered. When she was elected to Congress in 2002, she asked to be called “congressman” rather than “congresswoman.”

But Blackburn’s campaign has been willing to play the gender card.

In February, when some Republicans worried about losing a Senate seat encouraged retiring U.S. Sen. Bob Corker to reconsider, Blackburn’s spokesman said anyone who thought she couldn’t win the general election was a “plain sexist pig.”

More recently, Blackburn herself has suggested a liberal bias on gender matters.

“Republican women are never going to get the attention that Democratic women are going to get,” she said in a recent AP interview. “And you just expect that. I fully understand that Republican women do not fit the narrative that many in the media would like to construct. But I will tell you this: Most women, and you mentioned suburban moms, are very much like me.”

Her campaign has emphasized her attempts to break the glass ceiling: the first woman hired by the Southwestern Company — a marketing business that sells educational materials — and the only Republican woman in the Tennessee Senate in 1998.

“Fighting against all odds is the story of her life,” the narrator of one ad says.

Blackburn’s team also has targeted Bredesen’s handling of sexual harassment claims when he was governor.

In 2005, The Associated Press reviewed more than 600 workplace harassment investigation files collected when Bredesen was elected in 2002. The AP found that sexual and workplace harassment reports in 2005 were on pace to almost double from the previous year. Bredesen argued that reporting was up rather than the actual number of incidents.

Blackburn accused Bredesen of shredding records to cover up poor performance, but Bredesen called that a “total mischaracterization” and said he was trying to protect the privacy of those who complained.

And Bredesen’s decision to support Kavanaugh has raised new questions about his support among women. The move appalled some Democrats, but others saw it as a way to win over Republicans in a state where he needs them.

In September, his campaign unveiled “Women United for Bredesen” — a group it says has roughly 50,000 Tennesseans aimed at providing a “space for women” to focus on their top issues.

Recently, pop superstar Taylor Swift broke her long silence on politics to endorse the Democrat. Swift said in an Instagram post that she wanted to back female candidates but could not support Blackburn because of her voting history on LGBTQ issues, opposition to the Violence Against Women Act and an equal pay law — saying bluntly that the congresswoman’s voting record “appalls and terrifies me.”

On the ground, Blackburn’s core supporters say party loyalty will outweigh gender at the end of the day — though they don’t always disconnect the two.

“She has set an amazing example, and in return, we are seeing more women running for office across the state,” said Barbara Trautman, president of the Tennessee Federation of Republican Women. “We are very loyal to her.”

Yet Bredesen is a looming threat, Trautman added, warning that voter turnout — particularly women — will be key.

“At this point, I’m not putting a lot of stock into polls,” she said. “She’s one of us, and we have high hopes.”

 
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Former U.S. vice president Joe Biden says President Donald Trump may not “know what he’s doing” and coddles dictators.  

The potential 2020 Democratic presidential candidate told CBS “This Morning” Thursday he’s concerned Trump “seems to have a love affair with autocrats” and “coddles” dictators, including North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and the Saudi ruling family.

Biden says Trump either “doesn’t know what he’s doing or he has an absolutely convoluted notion” of America’s leadership in the world.

White House aides suggest that while Trump doesn’t criticize certain world leaders publicly, he’s willing to deliver tough messages behind closed doors.

Biden said he hopes Democrats don’t pursue Trump’s impeachment if the party takes over the House, saying, “I don’t think there’s a basis for doing that right now.”

 
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Don McGahn has returned to civilian life. 

A White House official confirms that Wednesday was McGahn’s last day as White House counsel. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters.

President Donald Trump announced in August that McGahn would leave after the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. 

McGahn is a top election lawyer who served as general counsel in Trump’s election campaign. He played a pivotal role in the president’s remaking of the federal judiciary with young, conservative judges, like Kavanaugh. He was also the main point of contact inside the White House for special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

In an interview Tuesday with The Associated Press, Trump said Washington lawyer Pat Cipollone would replace McGahn
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