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President Donald Trump is scheduled to hold in-person rallies in Iowa and Kansas on Monday, the final day of campaigning before Tuesday’s midterm elections, as both parties scramble to shore up support in contests that will determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress for the remainder of his presidency.
Kansas, which has not sent a Democrat to the Senate since 1932, has emerged as one of the cycle’s most closely watched races. Republican Senator Roger Marshall faces Democrat Adam Hamilton in a contest that has tightened unexpectedly. Iowa is similarly in play. Over the weekend Trump held tele-rallies targeting five states — Florida, Michigan, New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania — before turning to the two states he is visiting in person.
Tuesday’s elections put all 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 35 of the Senate’s 100 seats before voters, including special elections in Florida and Ohio to fill seats vacated when Marco Rubio became Secretary of State and JD Vance became Vice President. Governors’ races are also on the ballot in 36 states. About 210 million registered voters are eligible to cast ballots.
Alaska lawsuit called ‘disturbing and impossible’
In Alaska, state attorneys asked a federal judge Monday to dismiss a Trump administration lawsuit seeking to halt certification of the state’s Senate election and to keep ballots cast for a challenger named Dan Sullivan — the same name as the incumbent Republican Senator Dan Sullivan — segregated from the rest of the count. Alaska’s attorneys, representing a Republican-led state government, described the demand as both “disturbing and impossible” and called the lawsuit “meritless.”
California governor warns of federal ballot seizure
California Governor Gavin Newsom sent a letter to senior federal judges in the state warning that the Trump administration may attempt to “seek search warrants to seize ballots and ballot materials before the election results are certified.” The letter did not cite specific evidence of an imminent action but asked the judiciary to be on alert.
Michigan Democratic tensions surface
In Michigan, Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed told reporters he did not want “distractions” from his primary rival, Congresswoman Haley Stevens, at a planned Democratic Unity Event at a Detroit church, signalling that intra-party tensions have not fully dissipated ahead of the general election.
Trump criticises former lawyer’s Justice Department contract
Trump separately said it was “unacceptable” for his former lawyer Alina Habba Mildon to have secured a $50 million contract for herself while working at the US Justice Department, a rebuke that added an unusual note of internal Republican friction to the final hours of the campaign.
Control of Congress carries significant consequences for the final two years of Trump’s term, as the legislature controls federal spending and lawmaking. Results from Tuesday’s voting are expected to begin emerging late in the evening on the US East Coast.