WASHINGTON — Three former U.S. Education Department secretaries and the union representing agency workers on Tuesday urged the department’s top watchdog to investigate the cost and impact of mass firings last year. 

Former U.S. Education Secretaries Arne Duncan and John B. King Jr., who led the department during the Obama administration, and Miguel Cardona of the Biden administration and Rachel Gittleman, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 252, sent a letter including a formal request to Mark Priebe, acting inspector general of the Education Department. 

“We need a full picture of the fraud, waste and abuse carried out by this administration as they continue to play politics rather than doing their jobs to serve the American people,” Gittleman said at a press conference outside the U.S. Capitol.

Democratic members of Congress and other labor leaders also spoke at the press conference, blasting President Donald Trump’s ongoing efforts to dismantle the 46-year-old Department of Education. The mass firings have marked a major part of that effort, which Trump tapped Education Secretary Linda McMahon to spearhead. 

“We may never be able to truly calculate the human cost of all of this, but we at least need to understand the financial cost to taxpayers,” Gittleman added. 

The department announced a reduction in force, or RIF, in March 2025. The U.S. Supreme Court in July 2025 temporarily greenlit those mass layoffs, along with Trump’s plan to dramatically downsize the agency, which he’d outlined in an executive order in March 2025. 

The RIF was delayed while a legal battle played out, but took effect in early August 2025 following the go-ahead from the nation’s highest court. 

Roughly 1,000 department workers were “unlawfully terminated or forced into retirement” that month, Gittleman said. 

The Tuesday letter also called into question another department effort in October 2025 to fire nearly 500 employees that was paused in court and stopped by Congress. 

Gittleman and the former secretaries are also asking Priebe to look into the cost and impact of “the subsequent reinstatements and rehiring of hundreds of employees” at the department. 

In response to the letter, a department spokesperson panned the secretaries’ records.

“It’s interesting that the Education Secretaries who brought you the failures of Common Core, the botched FAFSA rollout, and a campaign to redefine ‘boy’ and ‘girl’ are concerned about the Trump Administration’s efforts to reform a demonstrably broken bureaucracy,” the spokesperson wrote in a statement to States Newsroom. 

The spokesperson defended the RIF, saying it was “implemented carefully and in compliance with all applicable regulations and laws.”  

They added that the agency “will continue our work to return education to the states and improve outcomes for our nation’s students.” 

Dems ‘fighting back’

U.S. Sens. Angela Alsobrooks and Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, and U.S. House Education and Workforce Committee ranking member Bobby Scott of Virginia, as well as a handful of other Democratic lawmakers and union leaders, joined Gittleman outside the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday. 

“The Department of Education’s stated mission is to promote student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness by fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access — since day one, Secretary McMahon has done everything possible to cause this mission to fail,” Alsobrooks said. 

Van Hollen noted that “we are fighting back, and we’re going to keep fighting back, and we’re going to prevail in the long run because they are trying to dismember the department piece by piece and then shut it down.” 

The administration’s sweeping steps to axe the department include more than a dozen interagency agreements that Education has signed with Health and Human Services, Labor, Interior, State, Justice and Treasury. 

The agreements seek to offload several of Education’s responsibilities to those departments. 

Scott said that the administration had been “illegally creating these interagency agreements, which are extremely inefficient and wasteful, and also result in inconsistent enforcement of federal education policy.” 

A Senate education panel in July advanced a bipartisan bill that would block interagency agreements that transfer programs regarding special education, elementary and secondary education, postsecondary education and Native American education. 

Earlier that month, a House education panel advanced a package that would greatly reduce the department’s responsibilities, standing in sharp contrast to the Senate measure. 

WASHINGTON — With the U.S. Senate set to hold a procedural vote in the coming days on a sweeping bill to overhaul college sports, dueling press conferences Monday underscored the fierce debate over how to tackle the biggest issues plaguing that landscape. 

Supporters of a bipartisan measure to set national standards for college athletes’ compensation, including the bill’s lead sponsor, GOP Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, argued it would “protect,” “save” and “preserve” college sports. 

However, opponents of the bill, including Connecticut Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy, blasted the measure over concerns that it “essentially ensconces a system of exploitation,” and would provide “an unprecedented antitrust exemption to an industry that is violating the law every single day.” 

Name, image and likeness battle

The college sports world continues to grapple with the fallout from the NCAA’s 2021 guidelines that allowed student-athletes to profit from their name, image and likeness, or NIL, as well as a patchwork of state NIL laws and gender inequity in NIL deals, among other major issues. 

Earlier this year, Cruz and Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington state — the top members of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee — introduced the bill, with Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri and Democratic Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware as original cosponsors. 

Cruz likened the college sports landscape to the “Wild West,” saying the bill is designed to “bring order to the chaos” and “put simple common sense rules in place so that college sports remain strong and vibrant for decades to come,” during a press conference he hosted outside the U.S. Capitol alongside Cantwell, Senate colleagues, student athletes and coaches. 

Cruz called for “a big bipartisan vote on the floor of the Senate, and with that momentum to go to the House and have it go to the president’s desk.” 

President Donald Trump has thrown strong support behind what he dubs a “great” bill. 

Patchwork of state laws

The Senate could take a procedural vote on the bipartisan measure as early as this week, where it would need at least 60 senators to advance.

The latest version of the bill would create a national NIL standard that preempts the patchwork of state laws, provide certain antitrust protections to the NCAA, establish a five-year eligibility timeline for athletes and bar professional athletes from competing in college athletics. 

The measure is notably neutral on the classification of athletes as employees.

Meanwhile, Sen. Chris Murphy blasted the measure, saying: “What this bill does at its core is to protect a system of exploitation,” during a virtual press conference earlier Monday with college athletes, professional athlete unions and advocates. The event was hosted by the AFL-CIO. 

“This bill protects the billions of dollars that coaches and sports industry executives are making over the suppression of compensation for some of the most highly valued athletes in the world,” Murphy added. 

NAACP critical of bill

Derrick Johnson, president and CEO of the NAACP, also blasted the Senate bill Monday, saying “what makes this bill so inadequate, and in many ways offensive, is the overture as if it’s going to do something special for historically Black colleges and universities,” during the AFL-CIO’s press conference.

“HBCUs, they deserve direct federal investment, not a political trade-off,” Johnson said.

The NAACP in May urged pushback against GOP-led redistricting efforts in Southern states via college sports, including a boycott of public universities by athletes and supporters.

The Congressional Black Caucus, which rallied behind that call in May, has also opposed the legislation, saying in August the bill “falls short of providing Black athletes with the rights, representation, economic opportunities, and meaningful safeguards they deserve, while also failing to adequately recognize the interests of Black coaches, Black agents, HBCUs, and other professionals whose futures will be shaped by this legislation.” 

Powerful U.S. officials past and present faced families, survivors and first responders Friday at ceremonies to honor the 25th anniversary of the day 2,977 Americans died in terrorist attacks in Virginia, New York and Pennsylvania.

At the Pentagon, Condoleezza Rice, who was serving at the time under President George W. Bush as national security advisor, told the crowd she wanted to share something “deeply personal.”

“Those of us in authority on that day did not see the nature of the danger in time to prevent the attack of 9/11. We did what we knew to do, but by definition, it was not enough. … I will always carry deep personal remorse for the pain that you, the families of the fallen, still feel, and for the trauma that our country endured,” she said.

Speakers at all three Sept. 11 milestone anniversary events recounted stories of courage and loss as people found themselves in an unimaginable circumstance. 

Some also flared with frustration at what they say is a lack of justice for those who planned the attacks.

President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, speaking at the memorial service for the 184 people who died when the hijacked United Airlines Flight 77 struck the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, highlighted the anniversary as a justification for their stagnant war with Iran. 

That nearly seven-month-old conflict has killed 18 U.S. service members, injured over 700 more and taken the lives of thousands of civilians across the Middle East.

“We will never, ever forget. That’s why we fight today. We don’t have a choice,” Trump said. “There can only be victory. We fight hard. We fight to win. We will always remember the victims and the families of September 11, 2001, very famous date, unfortunately.”

Hegseth told the crowd, which was only open to victims’ families, survivors and their families, that Americans were “ignorant of the Islamist threat” 25 years ago.

“Every day, enemies plot to curb our power and kill our citizens, including from Islamic terrorists abroad and at home, but we are ever vigilant,” he said, adding that the U.S. has killed Iran’s leaders and put their Navy “at the bottom of the sea.”

The deeply unpopular war has continued, despite early promises from Hegseth and Trump that it would not morph into the prolonged Middle East conflicts that followed the Sept. 11 attacks.

‘No justice’

At the site in Lower Manhattan where the World Trade Center’s twin towers once stood, families read names of the 2,753 victims who died inside the towers, on the ground and on the two hijacked airliners, American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175.

Terry Strada, widow of the late Tom Strada, who died in the north tower, slammed recent presidential administrations of both parties for not holding Saudi Arabia accountable for allegations that the kingdom’s officials knew about the attacks.

“My husband Tom Strada, you are missed more with each year that passes. But how can it be 25 years and still we have no justice for the role that Saudi Arabia played in your murder?” she said to loud cheers from the crowd.

“For 25 years, administration after administration, including leaders in front of us here today, chose to protect the Saudis instead of standing with the 9/11 families,” she said. 

 

“President Trump can still change that. Tell the Saudis to stop lying. Tell them that if they want to be friends with the USA, they cannot continue to deny all of this, all of the pain, all of the destruction that we have all been suffering through. Vice President Vance, thank you for being here today. Please carry that message back,” she said, again receiving loud cheers.

Vice President JD Vance sat in a front row at the ceremony alongside former presidents Bush, Joe Biden, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. 

Former first ladies Michelle Obama, Jill Biden and Hillary Clinton, also a former secretary of state, were seated in the row, as was former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Neither the Embassy of Saudi Arabia nor the White House immediately responded to States Newsroom’s requests for a response.

Painful memories

Families at the site in Lower Manhattan shared memories seared in their minds.

Bob Lee, 67, was a firefighter in the Bronx that day. He remembers how many first responders had to gather together to clean up the dust and debris that had settled around the city.

“When you see the people that were down here, everybody’s eyes was … full of soot and dust, and their eyes were glowing like bright red because all the stuff that was in their eyes,” Lee said. “It was just a crazy scene.”

Lee moved to Kansas City, Missouri, shortly after 9/11. He was 42 at the time and realized he had been exposed to a lot of toxic air.

“I told them I was retiring,” Lee said recalling that he knew a lot of his colleagues would get sick. He was a union representative for his unit in the Bronx. 

“I lost hundreds of those guys. You know, it’s crazy … Quite a few friends have died of cancer.”

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani this week announced that his office had released around 170,000 pages of records that had been closed off over the last 25 years on the level of toxic air pollution people were exposed to in the aftermath of 9/11.

The records suggest that New Yorkers were misled about the air quality and that officials downplayed how dangerous it was to breathe the air. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, close to 50,000 people, including first responders and survivors, developed cancer in relation to the event. 

Christopher Santora, then 23, was a firefighter who responded to the attacks and was enveloped in debris as the towers fell. He lost his life trying to save people that day. His cousin Jason Roettger, 56, was chosen to read the names of people who had died during 9/11 at Friday’s ceremony.

Roettger said it was an honor to be a part of the event and to represent his cousin. He said he’s glad the air quality records were released.

“I think everyone that was here in the city, or even in New Jersey, everyone in this area knew the air wasn’t good,” Roettger said. “Even though the government said ‘No, the air is fine.’ I think everyone knew that that was a lie.”

Wanda Hernandez, 72, lost her daughter Monique de Jesus, who was 28 at the time. She was working at the World Trade Center. 

Hernandez said Friday she was focusing on all the beautiful moments she had with her daughter before that day.

“We went on vacation for my birthday before it happened, like a month before. Yeah. Yeah, we had a good time, you know, and we went to a wedding like a week before it happened,” Hernandez said. “Two weeks, so that was nice. Had a good time. I was a good mother. She was a good daughter.”

‘A vast empty space in the side of the Pentagon’

Over a 13-minute speech Friday morning at the Pentagon, Rice, who also served as secretary of state later in the Bush administration, painted a picture of administration officials caught completely off guard by the attacks, orchestrated by the well-known anti-American extremist terror network al-Qaeda.

“I was at my desk at the White House that day when my executive assistant, a young Army officer, told me that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. ‘What a strange accident,’ I thought,” Rice said.

“I called President Bush, who was reading to children at an education event in Florida. He too thought that it must have just been an accident. But within 17 minutes, a second plane hit the World Trade Center,” she continued.

What followed, according to Rice, was a whirlwind as officials rushed to secure locations — Bush to Air Force One, Rice and Vice President Dick Cheney to a White House bunker and CIA Director George Tenet to an undisclosed location. 

Then-Secretary of State Colin Powell was in Peru “and trying to get home.” Those in the White House “Situation Room,” Rice recalled, just heard the “ringing and ringing and ringing” of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s phone at the Pentagon, where he had been hosting a congressional breakfast. 

The late Rumsfeld would end up outside assisting in rescue efforts “as his security detail begged him to flee,” she said.

“I remember turning to a television screen, and the horror and the shock that I felt. There was a smoking crater, a vast empty space, in the side of the Pentagon.”

Fight with hijackers

A morning observance program was also held at the Flight 93 National Memorial near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to mark 25 years since 40 passengers and crew members died when the hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in a rural field. 

Families read aloud the names of the victims during the ceremony.

Members of Flight 93 fought with hijackers over Western Pennsylvania and forced the flight to crash, which prevented the hijacked aircraft from hitting the intended destination of the U.S. Capitol.

Others expected to speak Friday afternoon included Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum.

Gordon Felt, brother of Edward Porter Felt, one of the 40 people who died on Flight 93, was set to speak, along with retired United Airlines Capt. Morrie Wiener, who piloted Flight 93 prior to the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, and Jessica Bowron, acting director of the National Park Service.

Mullin ties mass deportation to Sept. 11

Outside of the Department of Homeland Security headquarters in Washington, D.C., Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin used the anniversary to promote the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign, and said that lack of cooperation from so-called sanctuary cities is what could lead to another 9/11.

“It’s a safe haven that incubates terrorist activity and it doesn’t just stay local,” he said.

He specifically called out Democratic-led cities of Seattle, Boston and New York City.

“It shouldn’t be political,” he said. “When we start looking at the 25th anniversary, if there’s anything we should agree on, it should be that. Why should the Department of Homeland Security be controversial? We’re taking care of your backyard.”

Immigration enforcement agencies under the department have been roiled in scandal and carried out alleged illegal orders since Trump’s second term began. 

The events have included allowing deportation flights to take off against a judge’s order, erroneous deportations of individuals with legal protections, and the killing by immigration agents of two American citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, of Minneapolis. 

The latest scrutiny of the department comes after a $20 million no-bid contract was extended in Kentucky to outfit agents with electric shock gloves.

Courage and ‘selfless service’

Despite the lasting pain, speakers Friday noted that relatives of those killed in the attacks found ways to move forward and persevere.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine at the Pentagon said the milestone anniversary was not only about remembering those lost, but “it is also a story of great American courage, selfless service, and those who’ve made the choice to carry those memories forward.” 

“The courage of those extraordinary Americans in Pennsylvania, in New York, and right here on these hallowed grounds, did not end when the smoke cleared and the fires went out, because survivors and families have carried it forward through service, through sacrifice, and through remembrance,” Caine told the crowd.

Vice President JD Vance took to the GOP convention stage in Dallas on Thursday in what served as a re-introduction ahead of a widely anticipated run for the party’s presidential nomination in 2028. 

The former U.S. senator from Ohio sought to rally the GOP base on the second and final day of the unusual gathering, as Republicans vie to retain control of the U.S. House and Senate in the midterms less than two months away, even as President Donald Trump faces anemic approval ratings amid the war in Iran and concerns surrounding the economy. 

Vance repeatedly maligned Democrats as “crazies,” referencing some of the more controversial statements recent primary winners have made. And he urged the enthusiastic crowd to put aside policy differences with GOP candidates to keep “the party of common sense” in power.

“It’s so much more than having good politicians in Washington,” he said. “It’s about sending a message to the Democratic Party that if you send your crazies, we’re going to send you packing.” 

At one point during his speech, members of the crowd chanted “48” — an apparent signal of support for Vance to become the 48th president. Vance responded: “We got to take care of business this November — then we’ll worry about what comes next.” 

‘Birthright’

Vance infused the recent birth of his fourth child into his speech. He and his wife, second lady Usha Vance, welcomed son Alec Neel Vance in July.  

And he portrayed what he called Republicans’ support for Americans’ “birthright” as a major theme heading into November. 

“I believe that our founders built this nation on a promise that echoes our creator: That every American child is born an heir — is born with a birthright,” Vance said, adding that “that birthright, ladies and gentlemen, is what this November is all about.” 

Several times, Vance accused immigrants living in the country illegally of stealing what should belong to U.S. citizens. He said that Democrats, particularly former President Joe Biden, encouraged that theft.

“My little boy, he is now our fellow citizen, though he doesn’t know it,” he said. “And I think about what the Democrats have said about our shared birthright as Americans, or frankly, the lack thereof.” 

Vance said the birth of his youngest son shifted his focus to the future.

“Now, because we got a new kid around, I can’t help but look at the future of this country through the eyes of the future of my son,” he said. “And I can’t help but think about what it is that we’re fighting for and what it is that we want for all of our children.” 

Vance honors Charlie Kirk

The vice president also paid tribute to his late friend and conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was fatally shot while speaking on a Utah college campus one year ago Thursday. 

Vance praised Kirk as a devoted husband and father, addressing Kirk’s two young children, saying: “For those of us who loved your dad, we knew him as something even better than a great man. He was a good man.” 

Later in his speech, Vance urged voters to “do what Charlie did: Do not throw the baby out with the bathwater — don’t give the country over to a bunch of crazy people because you happen to disagree with us on a policy issue here or there.” 

‘Trump’s most loyal puppet’

Kendall Witmer, rapid response director for the Democratic National Committee, blasted Vance as “Donald Trump’s most loyal puppet,” noting that the vice president is “working in lockstep to enact an agenda that has hiked prices and made life unaffordable for working families,” in a statement Thursday night.  

“Vance has defended even their most disastrous policies, proving his loyalty to Trump over the American people,” Witmer said. “Vance will continue to gaslight Americans, but voters know the truth: Trump and Vance have tanked the economy, plunged the country into more endless wars, and failed to make life more affordable for everyday Americans.”

Vance is slated to deliver remarks Monday at an industrial manufacturing facility in Olathe, Kansas, during an event hosted by Trump’s super PAC, MAGA Inc. 

On Monday, he will also visit a federal law enforcement facility in Kansas City, Missouri, where he is set to speak on the Trump administration’s sweeping anti-fraud effort, which he has helmed. 

Democratic U.S. Sen. John Fetterman made a surprise video appearance Wednesday at the GOP convention in Dallas, praising Republican Sen. Dave McCormick while vowing the pair of Pennsylvanians would continue working with President Donald Trump to “defend the steel way of life right here in the Steel Valley.” 

The brief, pre-recorded appearance, which wasn’t advertised on the convention’s schedule, showed a deepening rift between Fetterman and mainstream Democrats. The video boosted speculation that Fetterman could switch parties.

“Yes, I’m a Democrat. Why am I here talking to you today? Because, well, I’m a common-sense Democrat,” Fetterman said in the video, where he stood in front of a U.S. Steel mill in Braddock, Pennsylvania, roughly 10 miles outside Pittsburgh. 

Fetterman also distanced himself from a wave of progressive Democrats, some affiliated with the Democratic Socialists of America, who have won primaries this year.

“I’m always going to stand with America,” he said. “I’m always going to reject the extremes and socialism and that anti-American way of life.”

In addition to a more ideological divide with Democrats over issues such as Fetterman’s strong support for Israel amid the continuing war in Gaza, Fetterman has taken heat from former aides who told The Wall Street Journal that he is indifferent toward his job.

Wednesday’s video introduced McCormick before the GOP senator took the convention stage. 

Fetterman lauded McCormick as “the kind of senator that gets the job done” and is “going to fight for Pennsylvania.” 

“I have this opportunity to introduce this great American, a great senator, and yes, he’s in a different party, but I’m proud to count him as my great friend,” he added. 

Dems mock video

Democratic members of Congress criticized Fetterman’s cameo at the convention.

“A year ago I labeled John Fetterman ‘Trump’s favorite Democrat,’” U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle, a Pennsylvania Democrat, posted to social media. “Tonight, he yet again proves why.”

Delaware Democratic U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride compared Trump’s presidency to a historic disaster.

“Being a Democratic politician who decides to speak at Trump’s midterm convention is like boarding the Titanic after it hit the iceberg,” she wrote.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s administration is appealing a federal judge’s temporary pause on a U.S. Postal Service regulation that places new restrictions on mail-in voting, according to a Friday court filing. 

The administration is headed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit to try to halt U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani’s temporary restraining order issued late Thursday that froze for two weeks an administration plan to carry out parts of an earlier executive order to limit vote-by-mail.

Talwani’s order in a Massachusetts federal court reinstated a pause she lifted after the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed a temporary procedural victory to Trump on his March executive order to curb mail-in voting. 

Democrat-led states and voting rights groups refiled lawsuits earlier this week to try to stop the administration from implementing a final rule that executes Trump’s executive order. 

They argue the rule impedes states’ power to administer elections, comes too close to the November midterms to be implemented and would disenfranchise voters that depend on mail-in voting. 

The administration says the rule will help secure elections, though it has not offered evidence that fraudulent mail-in voting is a major problem. The administration said in a Thursday brief the regulation did not affect election administration and dealt only with the federal mail. 

WASHINGTON — With less than 70 days until midterm elections, Democrats remain favored to regain the majority in the U.S. House.  

President Donald Trump’s anemic approval ratings amid the war in Iran, concerns over the economy and a coalitional shift within the party mark some of the largest headwinds facing Republicans heading into November, according to election analysts and political scientists interviewed by States Newsroom. 

Though the GOP’s mid-decade redistricting push could help them shore up several seats and the battleground of competitive districts stands relatively small, Democrats maintain an edge to win the House, said Erin Covey, an editor specializing in U.S. House races for the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter. 

“I would say that Republicans have a path to holding the House, but they kind of have to pitch a perfect game at this point in the cycle,” Covey said.  

The GOP’s current House majority stands at 218-212. The Cook Political Report lists 21 House races as toss-ups, with Republicans defending 16. 

Costs haven’t dropped

Robert Speel, an associate professor of political science at Penn State Behrend in Erie, pointed to Trump’s dismal approval ratings and the impact of the war in Iran on gas prices as among the major disadvantages facing the GOP heading into Election Day on Nov. 3.  

“Trump’s popularity is down below 40% in pretty much every poll now, and even in the low 30s or high 20s in some polls, and the Iran war is not even popular with Republicans, which has led to higher gas prices and his tariffs have led to inflation,” Speel said. 

“It seems, from some numbers, possibly job losses in the last year and a half, so the economy is not doing particularly well, and I … expect it to drag down the Republicans in November,” he added. 

Just 33% of Americans approve of how Trump is handling his job as president, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released Aug. 24. The result tied for the lowest approval rating the pollster found since Trump took office in 2017.

Just 31% of respondents expressed approval of U.S. military strikes against Iran, including 69% of Republicans.  

Among registered voters, 36% said Democrats had a better plan or policy regarding the cost of living, compared with 28% choosing Republicans.   

When the GOP secured a trifecta of the White House, Senate and House in 2024, voters gave the party homework to lower prices and do so right away, but Republicans failed that assignment, said Democratic campaign strategist Reed Adamson. 

“Prices have gone up, and so, you’re going to see them try and wiggle out of that every time, but it comes up in so many different ways, whether it is anecdotes about cost of groceries or gas or just overall cost of living or even just consumer sentiment about the economy,” Adamson said. 

“It is going to be really hard for them to wiggle out of it, and I think Democrats, for the most part, have been just sort of really disciplined in hammering that home,” he added. 

Dems confident

The Democratic Party’s campaign apparatus for House races expressed confidence they will take back the House.

“Democrats are going to flip the House majority in November because we have the better message, better candidates, and strong momentum on our side,” Nebeyatt Betre, a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spokesperson, said in a statement shared with States Newsroom. 

“All Republicans have to offer are higher prices families hate, unpopular rigged maps voters hate, and devastating health care cuts everybody hates,” Betre said. “Democratic candidates are winning over voters because they’re talking about their plans to lower costs, strengthen access to health care, and make Congress work for working people.”

GOP’s map, cash advantages

Meanwhile, the GOP’s campaign arm for House races sees several factors in their favor, including that progressive candidates have won Democratic primaries in some competitive races.  

“House Republicans are running on a more favorable map with historic fundraising, stronger candidates, and a commonsense agenda, while Democrats are saddled with a deeply unpopular agenda and radical socialist nominees hijacking the must-win districts they need to take the majority,” Mike Marinella, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said in a statement shared with States Newsroom. 

Twenty-three Democrats are running in districts Trump won in 2024, including 21 where Trump garnered more than 50% of the vote, according to a June NRCC battleground memo. 

The NRCC also holds a $13.7 million cash-on-hand advantage over the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, as of mid-July.  

And, despite low poll numbers for Republicans, their opponents have not sold voters on a clear alternative, Daniel Scarpinato, a Republican campaign strategist, said.

“Republicans face some headwinds, but Democrats actually have to say, ‘Here’s what we’re going to do differently,’ and they haven’t really been able to articulate that,” Scarpinato said. “It’s really just been a pretty anti-Trump message, but they haven’t told people, ‘Here’s what we’re going to do.’”

He noted that in focus groups, swing voters are not “ecstatic about the Democratic Party.”

Turnout problem

Republicans are also facing a challenge in getting their voters to the polls, as their coalition has transitioned to include fewer college-educated and older people, and those groups historically turn out the most in midterms, according to Ryan Owens, a political science professor and director of the Institute for Governance and Civics at Florida State University. 

Trump has pivoted the party more toward blue-collar voters and away from the more affluent and educated voters whose high turnout rates buoyed the party in past midterm election cycles. 

Without Trump up for reelection, the party will likely struggle to activate the coalition that twice sent him to the White House, Owens said.

“You used to see Republicans do really well in midterm elections,” he said. “But now that they don’t rely so much on that college-educated, white vote, their coalition doesn’t turn out as much as it used to in midterms.

“Without having Trump on the ballot, without having a presidential election that generates that kind of enthusiasm to turn out, Republicans have been doing worse and worse during midterms,” he added. 

Covey, of the Cook Political Report, said Republicans’ redistricting blitz and the number of pickup opportunities Republicans drew themselves across Texas, Florida, Missouri, North Carolina and other Southern states is the main reason they have any path to keeping their majority. 

However, “there’s a lot of variance in that because the seats that were redistricted, many of them are still quite competitive, and so, there’s a world in which Democrats hold on to them this cycle, for sure,” she said.  

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed a procedural victory to President Donald Trump on an executive order to curb mail-in voting, but the administration is still fighting a separate ruling that limits a portion of the order and remains in effect — complicating the administration’s temporary win. 

In light of the ruling in the nation’s highest court, the administration late Monday asked U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Massachusetts to vacate her decision from earlier in August that blocks the U.S. Postal Service from carrying out aspects of Trump’s executive order, while the voting rights groups that brought that challenge argued Tuesday the block should remain in place.

Monday’s decision from the Supreme Court also drew the ire of Democrats, who argued that Trump’s executive order ran afoul of the Constitution and threatens democracy. 

Under the Constitution, states are responsible for administering elections. Many Democrats have said Trump’s order seeks to unlawfully grab that power for the executive branch.

The Supreme Court’s ruling halted a June decision from Talwani in a case brought by more than 20 Democratic-led states and Washington, D.C. 

But that ruling does not apply in a separate case, filed in the same Massachusetts federal court, by the League of Women Voters of Massachusetts and several other voting rights groups challenging Trump’s executive order. 

In its emergency motion in the voting rights groups case, the administration wrote that “the Supreme Court’s order leaves no room for any further dispute: this Court lacked jurisdiction to issue the preliminary-injunction in this case, just as it lacked jurisdiction to enter summary judgment in the (states’) case, because there is no justiciable controversy over a proposed rule until it is actually finalized by an agency.”  

Final rule published

Further complicating the matter, the U.S. Postal Service on Friday issued a final rule that details how the agency would execute Trump’s order. 

The voting rights groups on Saturday asked Talwani to enforce her August order as a result of the Postal Service issuing the regulation. 

Regarding that request, Talwani on Tuesday afternoon said the rule violated her order because she specifically said the administration could not take steps to implement the executive order. However, she declined to take action “other than identifying the violation.”

The groups redoubled their request earlier Tuesday, writing that the Supreme Court’s decision was based on the lack of a USPS final rule.

“That decision addressed a materially different record and did not consider the critical development that occurred last Friday: The USPS Defendants promulgated a Final Rule, transforming the posture of this case and supplying a final agency action that was not before the Supreme Court,” they wrote.

Talwani’s order on the administration’s request was still pending Tuesday afternoon.

Democratic blowback

Meanwhile, Democrats were quick to blast the Supreme Court’s decision, including the top Democrats in the U.S. Senate and House. 

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said it’s “a disgrace that the highest court in the nation is allowing Trump to put a dagger into the heart of our democracy,” in a Monday statement. 

The New York Democrat noted that “Trump’s effort to turn the Postal Service into a voter suppression machine is blatantly unconstitutional – yet his MAGA Supreme Court is refusing to stop it from going forward,” while adding that “Senate Democrats will fight every attempt to hijack mail-in voting and rig the rules before voters have their say this November.” 

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries also blasted the decision and vowed to continue fighting, saying “the sycophantic Supreme Court majority’s decision in the vote-by-mail case is sowing chaos in service to Donald Trump’s effort to undermine our free and fair elections.” 

Jeffries, also of New York, added that “the Trump-aligned justices on the Supreme Court did not and cannot give the President the power to decide how states run elections or who gets to vote by mail.” 

The respective heads of the Democratic National Committee, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and Democratic Governors Association also pushed back against Trump’s executive order.  

“This is the latest attempt from Trump to rig the midterms because Republicans know their corrupt, cost-hiking policies are deeply unpopular and hurting people every day,” DNC Chair Ken Martin, DCCC Chair Suzan DelBene, DSCC Chair Kirsten Gillibrand, and DGA Chair Andy Beshear said in a statement.

“Democrats will not let them get away with it, and we are confident the American people will reject these Republican schemes in November,” they wrote. “We’re going to fight every day until Trump’s illegal executive order, and all of his other attempts to undermine our free and fair elections, are completely thrown out.” 

A spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, the party’s U.S. House campaign arm, did not return a message Tuesday.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon on Monday touted a national private school voucher program set to launch in early 2027.

During a White House Rose Garden event celebrating the back-to-school season, Trump and McMahon lauded the incoming federal school choice effort along with many of the education policies the administration has pursued, including ongoing efforts to dismantle the 46-year-old Education Department.

At least 30 states have already opted in to the school voucher program, which allocates up to $1,700 in federal tax credits for people donating to organizations that provide private and religious school scholarships.

The program, known as the Education Freedom Tax Credit, was created in the GOP’s mega tax and spending cut bill Trump signed into law in July 2025. 

“One year ago, as part of the great, big, beautiful bill, we passed the Education Freedom Tax Credit — the largest ever expansion of school choice — and we want every parent to have the power to send their child to a high-quality school that shares their values,” Trump told the crowd of educators, parents and students. 

Monday’s event highlighted Trump and congressional Republicans’ continued focus on school choice as a central point of their education agenda, with the upcoming voucher program marking a pillar of that effort. 

The umbrella term “school choice” centers on alternative programs to a student’s assigned public school. While opponents argue these efforts drain critical funds and resources from school districts, advocates say the initiatives are necessary for parents dissatisfied with their local public schools.

Attendees at the Rose Garden also included Republican Govs. Jim Pillen of Nebraska and Sarah Huckabee Sanders of Arkansas, as well as GOP Rep. Tim Walberg of Michigan, who chairs the House Committee on Education and Workforce.  

McMahon echoed the president, saying the federal program gives parents “unprecedented freedom to choose the path that is best for their child.” 

She added that “it’s no surprise that over half of our nation’s states — both red and blue — have raced to this historic choice option, benefiting families whether their child attends public or private school.”  

Dems working to reverse program

Meanwhile, congressional Democrats are already attempting to axe the program. 

Sens. Mark Kelly of Arizona and Mazie Hirono of Hawaii in April introduced a bill in the Senate, alongside nearly 30 of their colleagues, that would repeal the program. 

Rep. Gwen Moore of Wisconsin introduced a companion bill in the House in June with Reps. Suzanne Bonamici of Oregon, Maxwell Frost of Florida, Adelita Grijalva of Arizona, Mark Pocan of Wisconsin and dozens more original co-sponsors. 

The legislation faces a dismal fate in the GOP-controlled House and Senate. 

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Justice has sued New York, Connecticut and Vermont over laws that allow immigrants in the country without permanent legal status to pay in-state college tuition in the states where they live.

The suits, filed Aug. 10, are part of a larger push from the Trump administration to go after states with such policies, as the administration seeks to curb any benefits that could be extended to people without permanent legal status.  

Since President Donald Trump re-took office, the DOJ has sued 17 states over laws that allow noncitizen students who meet certain requirements access to in-state tuition at public colleges and universities, regardless of their immigration status. 

In five of those lawsuits the DOJ filed — targeting Texas, Kentucky, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Illinois — courts have already struck down the laws. All of those states, except for Illinois, had joined with the federal government rather than defend their laws. 

Beyond New York, Connecticut and Vermont, lawsuits are also pending in California, Colorado, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Virginia.

The lawsuits argue that the policies allow students without permanent legal status to pay drastically lower tuition for public education than U.S. citizens from other states.

“This is a simple matter of federal law: colleges cannot provide benefits to illegal aliens that they do not provide to U.S. citizens,” Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate of the DOJ’s Civil Division said in a statement regarding the New York, Connecticut and Vermont lawsuits. 

“This Department of Justice will not tolerate American students being treated like second-class citizens in their own country,” Shumate said.  

Landscape of state laws

At least 20 states and Washington, D.C., offer in-state tuition to “the states’ undocumented students,” according to the Higher Ed Immigration Portal, a project of the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization. 

Roughly 525,000 “undocumented students” are enrolled in colleges and universities across the U.S., according to the Portal. An estimated 129,900 “undocumented students” are eligible for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. 

DACA is intended to help people brought into the country without legal documentation as children. The program, created by the Obama administration in 2012, protects participants from deportation and allows them to receive work permits and obtain driver’s licenses. 

Five states, Arkansas, Idaho, Maine, Ohio and Texas, limit in-state tuition access to DACA recipients, according to the Portal.

Ongoing court battles threaten DACA recipients in Texas with the possibility of losing their ability to obtain a work permit. 

‘Unprecedented’

Diego Sánchez, vice president of policy and strategy at the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, said the DOJ’s efforts to pursue states that offer in-state tuition benefits to students without permanent legal status is “unprecedented.”

“It’s a coordinated federal effort to dismantle state tuition equity policies that have existed for decades,” Sánchez told States Newsroom.

Sánchez added that the policies “do not provide free college or special tuition discounts — they generally allow students who attended and graduated from high school in the state and meet additional state requirements to pay the same in-state tuition rate as the classmates they grew up with.” 

The students “still have to apply, they still have to be admitted, pay tuition and meet the same academic requirements as everyone else,” he said. “The state has already invested in these students … these are benefits that don’t only apply (to) undocumented students.” 

DOJ goes after Texas first

The DOJ’s lawsuits came after Trump signed an executive order in April 2025 that calls on the U.S. attorney general to stop the enforcement of state laws and policies “favoring aliens over any groups of American citizens that are unlawful, preempted by Federal law, or otherwise unenforceable, including State laws that provide in-State higher education tuition to aliens but not to out-of-State American citizens.” 

Texas was the first state the DOJ pursued over such policies. 

The Justice Department challenged in June 2025 the Lone Star State’s 2001 law — the first of its kind in the country — signed by former Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican. 

Rather than defend the law, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Trump-aligned Republican, sided with the DOJ to try to permanently block the state law and signed an agreement the same day the DOJ filed suit. A federal judge then blocked the Texas law.  

A federal appeals court in July rejected an attempt from two advocacy groups, a Texas community college and a student to intervene in the case and defend the Texas law. The appeals effort came after the federal judge had earlier rejected the groups’ attempt to intervene. 

“It’s not the end of the road yet, but it’s been an uphill battle,” said Efrén Olivares, vice president of litigation and legal strategy at the National Immigration Law Center, one of several public interest groups that sought to intervene on behalf of one of the advocacy groups, the Texas community college and the student. 

“It’s a shame because for the last year, thousands of kids who, all they’re doing is trying to get a college education to better themselves and their families, are now prevented from doing so by exorbitant tuition.”