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Get the latest midterms campaign developments here. Read our takeaways from Wednesday’s debates in Michigan and Kansas here.
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(55)Takeaways from today's campaign events
• Debate takeaways: Two GOP nominees, facing tough Senate races, put a little bit of distance between themselves and President Donald Trump during debates tonight. In Michigan, Mike Rogers acknowledged that residents were “hurting” from tens of thousands of job losses and high utility bills. In Kansas, GOP Sen. Roger Marshall mostly bear-hugged the president — with a few exceptions.
• Red state rally: In South Carolina, Trump himself faced nearly a dozen interruptions by protesters, calling them “serious losers,” and repeated an anti-transgender slur describing Democratic candidate Annie Andrews as he campaigned for Sen. Darline Graham.
• Ohio ad controversy: Meanwhile, Amy Acton, who is running for governor, told CNN she is “not stunned in the era we live in” by the campaign ad from her GOP opponent Vivek Ramaswamy, which features her estranged mother. Vice President JD Vance defended the campaign, saying the ad “calls it out like it is.”
Ad attacks and heated debates: Here's the latest from the campaign trail
Amy Acton, the Democratic candidate for governor in Ohio, told CNN today she is “not stunned” by the controversial campaign ad from her GOP opponent Vivek Ramaswamy, which features her estranged mother.
Acton added she hopes it can spur a conversation about trauma because “so many people have experienced some sort of trauma or abuse in their lives.” At a campaign event in Wharton, Ohio, Acton received support over Ramaswamy’s incendiary ad, with one woman telling the candidate, “My heart goes out to you.”
Ohio Democratic gubernatorial nominee Amy Acton spoke to CNN’s Lauren Fox as backlash grows against her opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy, whose campaign put out a controversial ad featuring her estranged mother.
Meanwhile, during debates in Michigan and Kansas this evening, Republicans made careful breaks with Trump as the battleground races are shaping up to play a key role in November’s midterm elections.
Catch up on the latest:
- In South Carolina, President Donald Trump again used an anti-transgender slur to describe Senate nominee and pediatrician Annie Andrews, while campaigning for Republican challenger Darline Graham. His rally was also interrupted by nearly a dozen protesters who yelled out opposition to the president at different times during his remarks. “These people are serious losers,” Trump said.
- Earlier, he called the US war with Iran “one of the greatest things we’ve done,” despite the conflict remaining deeply unpopular at home and as many GOP candidates have called for its end.
- Next week, the president is off to Mississippi to continue campaigning in red states — the latest evidence that Republicans are scrambling to shore up their base in the midterms.
- In Michigan, the Senate debate between Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed and Republican Mike Rogers was bitterly personal and ferociously contested — as befits a contest that could decide the chamber’s majority. Read CNN’s takeaways from the debate here.
- Over in Kansas, at the start of the Senate debate, both GOP Sen. Roger Marshall and Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton were asked about some of the biggest subjects of their opponent’s attack ads. Marshall also mostly bear-hugged Trump and his agenda — with a few exceptions.
- Sen. Darline Graham has been working to unite her party since winning a particularly bruising Republican special primary and runoff election this summer.
- Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar said federal agents took 17 items in the recent search of her Washington, DC, home.
CNN’s Betsy Klein, Elise Hammond, Patrick Svitek, Kit Maher, Elise Hammond, Dianne Gallagher, Gloria Pazmino, Stephen Collinson, Kit Maher, Alayna Treene and Aaron Blake contributed reporting.
Could Latino voter anger turn Texas blue?
President Donald Trump made gains with Latino voters. But anger over immigration enforcement and high costs is fueling a desire for change.
President Trump made gains with Latino voters. But anger over immigration enforcement and high costs is fueling a desire for change. Could that shift flip Texas blue in the midterms? John King speaks with voters on the ground to find out.
Rep. Ilhan Omar says federal agents took 17 items during search of her home
Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar said that federal agents took 17 items in the recent search of her Washington, DC, home, including several phones, notebooks and a vintage camera belonging to her husband.
“It was very bizarre,” she told MS NOW in an interview that aired Wednesday, describing the hourslong search that took place earlier this month.
Omar recalled waking up around 6 a.m. the morning of October 12, hearing pounding on both the front and back door of her home. “I thought something was on fire. I thought something was happening to the neighbors. Like it sounded like an urgent evacuation sort of situation,” she said.
CNN previously reported that the search was related to an immigration fraud probe investigating whether Omar’s father lied about her age when she obtained her US citizenship in 2000. Omar has sought to dismantle the basis of the probe, saying she became a lawfully naturalized citizen in 2000 after fleeing Somalia in 1995.
“I take it very seriously, and I’m sure my lawyers are taking it very seriously,” she told MS NOW.
Trump continues using anti-transgender slur to attack Democrat Annie Andrews
President Donald Trump again used an anti-transgender slur to describe South Carolina Senate nominee and pediatrician Annie Andrews, calling her “Trannie Annie” while campaigning for Republican challenger Darline Graham.
“Darline’s running against a radical left lunatic named ‘Trannie’ Annie Andrews,” Trump said in South Carolina Wednesday night. He referred to her by the slur twice tonight and called her a “fanatical transgender activist.”
“She claims to be a moderate. But she’s really a rabid advocate for taxpayer-funded child sexual mutilation,” Trump said. “That’s where she is, and she’s never going to change.”
Earlier this month – a few days after Trump first called her the slur – Andrews released a direct-to-camera ad clarifying her stance on transgender issues.
“I want you to hear me loud and clear: I don’t support biological men playing women’s sports and I don’t support – and haven’t ever performed – gender surgery for minors,” she said.
Trump earlier this week used an antisemitic term during his remarks in Kansas.
Kansas GOP Sen. Roger Marshall mostly bear-hugs Trump — with a couple exceptions
Kansas GOP Sen. Roger Marshall in Wednesday’s debate mostly bear-hugged President Donald Trump and his agenda — with a few exceptions. When asked about Trump being unpopular even in red Kansas, Marshall turned it into an appeal to Trump supporters.
Marshall also embraced Trump’s tariffs, which he credited for revitalizing manufacturing in Kansas.
But when pressed on where he differs with Trump, he cited some of ICE’s tactics and Trump’s move to import beef.
“The first thing I did when I saw what was going on in Southwest Kansas [with ICE raids], I picked up the phone, called [Homeland Security] Secretary Markwayne Mullin and said, ‘Hey, I don’t think this is quite right. What’s going on?” Marshall said.
Kansas hopefuls respond to biggest attack lines against them
At the start of Wednesday’s Senate debate in Kansas, both GOP Sen. Roger Marshall and Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton were asked about some of the biggest subjects of their opponent’s attack ads.
For Marshall, that’s his having sued hundreds of patients over unpaid medical bills as a doctor, according to a New York Times investigation last month. Marshall was asked if he ever intervened to stop his office from sending one of the cases to collection.
Hamilton was pressed on his handling of alleged child sex abuse allegations against a volunteer at a church camp two decades ago, when the initial accusations weren’t immediately reported to police.
Hamilton said the policy was wrong and was later changed to share the information with police. He emphasized the later police investigation was inconclusive but said he should have prevented the man from returning to the camp the next year.
Rogers makes direct appeal to supporters of losing candidate in Democratic primary
As he continued to cast Abdul El-Sayed as too extreme, Republican Senate nominee Mike Rogers made a direct appeal to supporters of Rep. Haley Stevens, who El-Sayed defeated in the Democratic primary.
He also sought to appeal to Jewish Democrats, a group that El-Sayed has struggled to win over after the primary amid his staunch criticism of Israel’s government.
Rogers spent much of the debate trying to tie El-Sayed to the Democratic Socialists of America and suggesting his progressive policies would exacerbate issues of affordability.
“It really isn’t about left versus right anymore. It really is about the heart and soul of the country and who we are as Americans and the future we want for our children,” Rogers said.
El-Sayed says Rogers' Muslim Brotherhood allegations are "shameful"
Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed ripped into his Republican opponent Mike Rogers as he continued to suggest he has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.
In a tense exchange, El-Sayed said Rogers should be ashamed as a former member of Congress who had sworn an oath to defend the Constitution.
In turn, Rogers accused El-Sayed of trying to play “the victim.”
The Islamist political movement has become a flashpoint in Michigan’s Senate race, with Republicans zeroing in on old tweets from his half-sister, including a post from 2012 in which she described having “an amazing talk with my mom about her activism in the Muslim Brotherhood during the early 70s while she was in college.”
El-Sayed, who could make history as the first Muslim elected to the US Senate, has denounced the group and said he is unaware of anyone in his family having ties to it.
“He keeps raising this question about this association with an organization I’ve never been a part of, because my mom was a nurse in Missouri, it doesn’t make any sense,” El-Sayed said. “It’s actually really quite beneath you, Mike, it’s really quite beneath you.”
New Fox News poll on Senate races shows Democratic edge in Ohio and tight race in Texas
Former Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown leads Republican Sen. Jon Husted in the critical Senate race in Ohio, while there is no clear leader in the Senate race in Texas between Democrat James Talarico and Republican Ken Paxton, according to new polling from Fox News and CNN’s Poll of Polls averages on these races.
According to the average, Brown leads Husted 49% to 44% across recent high-quality polling of likely voters in Ohio. Brown held a lead outside of the margin of error in 4 of the 5 included surveys on the race.
In Texas, Talarico averages 49% support to Paxton’s 47% in high-quality polling. Polling on that race largely shows no clear leader.
The new Fox News poll finds a tied contest there.
In Ohio, Democrat Amy Acton holds an edge over Republican Vivek Ramaswamy in the fiercely contested gubernatorial race, according to the CNN Poll of Polls; Acton averages 50% support to Ramaswamy’s 44%. All polls included in the current average were completed before news about an ad featuring Acton’s estranged mother became public.
Trump calls protesters interrupting rally in South Carolina "serious losers"
President Donald Trump’s rally in South Carolina has been interrupted by at least 11 protesters, so far, who have yelled out opposition to the president at different times during his remarks, one within just a few minutes of him taking the podium.
“I don’t mind when they do that, but it’s always right at my punchline … I’ve had three punchlines, and three of them, they time them beautifully. They time them beautifully. These people are serious losers,” Trump said.
Several screamed “f**k you!” at Trump. Some called him a “traitor.”
“These people are crazy,” Trump said. He also credited a man who threw a punch at a protester before law enforcement dragged them out of the event.
“I watched that. I saw that. That was incredible. Wow, that was unbelievable. Is everybody okay?” Trump said. “Who is the guy that threw that punch?”
CNN-affiliate WHNS captured video of the man punching the protester. When police came over, the man lifted his hands up in the air.
“Wow, thank you. That was great,” Trump said.
“They don’t realize it’s really dangerous to do that — you gotta give them credit, it takes courage to do that at a Trump rally,” Trump said. “He got whacked.”
Trump is campaigning for Darline Graham, who is running for her late brother Lindsey Graham’s Senate seat. The president said her opponent, pediatrician Annie Andrews, “would be the most extreme and crazy left-wing politician ever elected in this state.”
On Iran war, El-Sayed and Rogers exchange jabs on Trump and Muslim Brotherhood
Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed said his opponent Mike Rogers and President Donald Trump are “hip to hip” on the Iran war during tonight’s debate.
The remarks came after El-Sayed was asked whether he believed Iran poses a significant threat to US national security and what the country’s strategy should be on the matter. The Democrat did not directly answer the question, saying Iran “had posed” a threat in the past, crediting former President Barack Obama for using diplomacy to contain it during his administration, before criticizing Trump’s decision to launch a war with the country.
Notably, the former congressman had initially voiced support for the war in Iran, but he has since called for an end for the conflict.
He then used the conflict in Iran to again suggest El-Sayed has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, a group the Democrat has disavowed, and questioned his loyalty to the United States.
Rogers and El-Sayed trade barbs: "Pattern of deception" vs. "MAGA bingo"
Republican Mike Rogers’ top debate task tonight is to disqualify Democrat Abdul El-Sayed in the minds of undecided Michigan voters.
He’s therefore arguing that his opponent cannot by trusted — and sympathizes with Islamic extremists and is a Democratic Socialist in disguise.
Pushing back on El-Sayed’s denials that he wants to defund the police, Rogers claimed “this guy has got new, false information about every 30 seconds.”
El-Sayed countered multiple times that it was Rogers who was being untruthful and said he was playing a classic game of distraction practiced by President Donald Trump.
His repeated refrain was that viewers should be playing “MAGA bingo” at home as they tick off Rogers pre-planned attacks.
“That is the debate and the Michigan campaign in a nutshell. Rogers must paint his rival as an unacceptable choice. El-Sayed is arguing that Rogers equals Trump.
Amy Acton hugs woman who offers support over incendiary ad
Democratic candidate for governor of Ohio, Amy Acton, received support at a campaign event in Wharton, Ohio, over the incendiary attack ad from her Republican opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy.
After the two shared a hug, Acton then spoke to the room of supporters about her and her brother’s relationship with their estranged mother, which was the subject of the political ad.
Rogers breaks with Trump's economic vision at top of debate
Unlike the president, who is proclaiming an economic “golden age,” GOP ex-Rep. Mike Rogers admitted near the start of the Senate race debate that Michiganders were “hurting” from tens of thousands of lost jobs and the highest utilities bills in the Midwest.
He walked a fine line on tariffs, arguing that some were working to bring jobs home from Mexico and China, but that the trade war with Canada — a huge issue in Michigan’s border state economy — was not well thought through. Rogers argued that Democratic control of Congress would cause higher taxes and higher costs, including for gasoline.
Democrat Abdul El-Sayed had an easier task given huge public dissatisfaction with President Donald Trump’s handling of the economy — and claimed the president and Rogers stood “hip to hip.” He said voters should send him to the Senate to ensure “money is going to be spent on you and your kids, rather than dropping bombs on somebody else and their kids.”
Mike Rogers immediately tries to tie Abdul El-Sayed to DSA as final debate gets underway
In his opening statement, Republican US Senate nominee Mike Rogers sought to cast his opponent, Democratic nominee Adbul El-Sayed as “aligned” with the Democratic Socialists of America.
El-Sayed is not a member of the DSA, but he is allied and supported by several members of the group, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who campaigned with him through Michigan’s Upper Peninsula last week.
El-Sayed also supports policies backed by the DSA, such as Medicare for All but he has previously described himself as a “capitalist.”
Some South Carolina Republicans see alternative to Darline Graham: "Write In Ralph”
Sen. Darline Graham has been working to unite her party since winning a particularly bruising Republican special primary and runoff election this summer.
But the lingering discontent has led some supporters of losing GOP candidates to start the “Write-In Ralph” campaign, encouraging Republican voters to write in her runoff opponent Rep. Ralph Norman’s name, instead of voting for Graham in the general election.
Norman is not affiliated with the group, has endorsed Graham and says he supports the Republican ticket. But the congressman said in a podcast interview released today that his family would not vote for Graham in November.
One of the founders of the write-in movement, Avery Milton, told CNN this month that the campaign started in part because the heavy national influence on the special primary, especially from President Donald Trump, felt “fundamentally unfair.”
Political experts in the state don’t think the effort has any real teeth, but it has received attention on social media – especially as Democrat Annie Andrews has been gaining ground in the typically reliably Republican state.
Milton says since the race is competitive some Republicans have complained that their campaign could help a Democrat win the Senate seat for the first time since 1998.
“It would be a loss, but we see it as a loss either way. There’s really no winning here for us, as grassroots conservatives,” said Milton. “It could be a lot easier to deal with a one-term Democrat senator than another 20 years of a ‘Graham-nsty.’”
Amy Acton says she's "not stunned" by attack ad featuring her estranged mother
Amy Acton, the Democratic candidate for governor in Ohio, said she hopes that the attack ad produced by her Republican opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy, and featuring her estranged mother can spur a conversation about trauma.
The candidate added that she was heartened by how many people were outraged by the ad, “because so many people have experienced some sort of trauma or abuse in their lives.”
GOP lawmaker blasts Ramaswamy ad as "most shameful" and "disgusting"
South Carolina Republican Rep. Nancy Mace criticized Ohio GOP gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy’s controversial campaign ad that featured his Democratic opponent Amy Acton’s estranged mother.
Ohio Democratic lawmaker gets emotional when asked about the controversial Ramaswamy ad
Democratic Rep. Greg Landsman became emotional today when speaking with CNN’s Kasie Hunt about the controversial Vivek Ramaswamy ad featuring the estranged mother of his Democratic opponent.
Landsman described Amy Acton, who is running against Ramaswamy in the race for governor of Ohio, as an “amazing person.”
