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Editor’s note: The following remarks were delivered during an emergency press conference in New Haven, Connecticut on Tuesday, April 14, 2026 in response to recent comments and actions by President Donald J. Trump.

“You shall have no other gods before me.” —Exodus 20:3

“All who make idols are nothing, and the things they treasure are worthless.” —Isaiah 44:9

“Therefore, since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill.” —Acts 17:29

“God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship him in Spirit and in truth.” —John 4:24

There are times that compel people of faith to speak, servants of Jesus to speak, proclaimers of the gospel to speak and engage in truth-telling and forms public exorcism rooted in deep radical love with the hope of repentance and a commitment to faithful witness—without fear of what any man or woman administration can do to us.

Two weeks ago the Moral Monday movement held Moral Monday gatherings in Washington, DC, 16 states, and Canada to denounce this war and the President’s declaration that if another country didn’t do what he said, he would “reign” down Hell on them and wipe out their entire civilization.

Why has he been talking about “reigning” down hell? Why does he write “reign,” not “rain”? What authority is he claiming to serve?

Why was he so threatened by Easter that he had to try to make it about him?

Why is the Pope teaching what Jesus and the church have always taught getting under his skin? The religious nationalist movement for so long has been saying he is an imperfect instrument being “used by God.” But he’s not satisfied with that. He wants to be God.

The AI image of him as Jesus is so bad that some of his own people have called it blasphemy. So now he’s trying to walk it back and say he thought it was a portrayal of him as a doctor.

This is exposing the madness that we’ve seen in policy. He wants to be some kind of God like messianic figure—to decide who lives and who dies; who gets citizenship and who doesn’t; which parts of the Constitution still matter and whose rights have to be respected.

Just 10 days ago, on the anniversary of the assassination of Dr. King, Trump told Russell Vought, the director of the federal Office of Management and Budget, “Don’t send any money for day care, because the United States can’t take care of day care. That has to be up to a state. We can’t take care of day care. We’re a big country. We have 50 states. We have all these other people. We’re fighting wars.”

And then during Holy Week, he went to the Supreme Court to seemingly intimidate them to support undoing birthright citizenship for babies.

Not only is war unholy, but when any human or president acts in word and deed as though they can determine who lives and who dies—who has citizenship and who can “reign” down hell and wipe out an entire civilization—assuming God-like authority, represents a war on divinity.

We live in a nation that has declared some things are inalienable, endowed by our Creator. And for people of faith, even if the nation didn’t say it, we believe and know that some things are only God’s authority, and to violate them is sin because the gospel of Jesus says so.

This AI pic represents idolatry—a false image offered for us to bow down to, and it is blasphemy and heresy and an affront to Jesus Christ. To do it represents a kind of demonic madness, no matter who would do it—Democrat or Republican. To equate Jesus with a person, a flag, bombs and war planes—and to say that’s what heals us and saves us: this is sin and attempts to exalt a person above God. It is a dangerous war on divinity that is a turn from the God of the gospels, the truths of the gospel.

This is why Pope Leo said: “I have no fear, neither of the Trump administration nor of speaking out loudly about the message of the gospel.”

And he said this even after the reports of the Trump administration calling the ambassador of the Vatican to the Pentagon earlier this year.

I’m not Catholic, but as a bishop in the Lord’s church, in this moment, Pope Leo is my pope.

As much as Pope Francis was, as I had the opportunity to respond to his encyclical on the environment and address the Pontifical Academy for Social Sciences as addressed the moral issue of poverty and people’s movements around the world.

But we must be careful in this moment to act as though this is the first moral and spiritual violation by Trump and religious nationalism. His embrace of a Messianic-type role has been pushed by the delusion of Franklin Graham and others.

When he allows people in his administration to say empathy is the cause of the decline of Western civilization.

These are deep, sinful contradictions of the gospel which says a nation will be judged by how it treats the least of these.

His constant demeaning of other nations and cultures and his constant claim that no one ever did anything as great and wonderful as him before him—the constant self-congratulation and adoration—is idolatry that, when unchecked, has led to where we are now.

Some of the church must repent of far too much silence in the public square confronting these thing public sins and idolatries and other policies with the truths of the gospel and our response to this image and his ridiculous attacks on the Pope cannot be one off.

This must be a moment of entering the public square with the truths of the gospel, with love, the truth of the prophets, and the courage to say we are not afraid of this administration or any, and we won’t be silent any more. We must lift a clear call that this nation and any nation in its words, deeds, and policies must work to have good news for the poor, healing of the broken hearted, deliverance to the captive, recovery of sight to the blind, and a declaration of acceptance to all who have been marginalized if we even hope to be pleasing to God.

“The tendency to claim God as an ally for our partisan value and ends is the source of all religious fanaticism,” Reinhold Niebuhr wrote. This is why when we as people of faith enter into the public space, we do so not with partisan facts and focus, but with the truths of the gospel.

This is why we have been here in New Haven. More than 400 public theologians are returning to their communities later today with a renewed sense that we have a responsibility to help the nation make this choice and build a movement that can take back our government and insist that it serve all the people.

When conservative activist Charlie Kirk was assassinated last year, President Donald Trump and his supporters vowed that his death would change things. In at least one tragic sense, this has been true — politicians are now spending campaign money on personal security.

“Since the assassinations of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and Democratic Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman, more than 15 states have passed laws or approved rule changes allowing lawmakers to access campaign funds for personal security, a sign of growing concern about political violence in America,” Politico’s Natalie Fertig reported on Sunday. Since the start of 2026 Alabama, Nebraska, Oregon, South Dakota and Utah altered their policies so that state lawmakers can use campaign funds for personal security, while states like Tennessee are discussing similar laws.

“The suspect in Hortman’s killing, Vance Boelter, is facing federal murder charges, and authorities said he allegedly confessed in a letter in which he recounted a confusing and convoluted scheme to punish Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz,” Fertig wrote. “Boelter has pleaded not guilty. In Kirk’s killing, the suspect, Tyler Robinson, allegedly inscribed bullet casings with anti-fascist phrases and meme-culture phrases. A preliminary hearing in his case is scheduled to start this month.”

The newfound vigilance is not limited to politicians; even political activists have to be on their guard. Turning Point USA head Erika Kirk pulled out of a University of Georgia speaking event, where she would have been joined by Vice President JD Vance, because of “serious threats.”

“I take my security team’s recommendations extremely seriously,” Kirk explained in a post on X, with Turning Point USA’s Andrew Kolvet adding the threats against Kirk were “a terrible reflection on the state of reality and the state of our country.”

Trump himself has been accused of inciting violence against politicians who disagree with him. When he accused Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey of “domestic terrorism” for disagreeing with him, former Department of Justice's (DOJ) Civil Rights Division attorney Julia Gegenheimer told Slate legal writer Mark Joseph Stern that Trump’s rhetoric is designed to harm the Minnesota Democrats.

"It is profoundly disturbing. And the reason why this feels different to you is that it is a bit of a different flavor," Gegenheimer said. "It’s pitting the federal government against the states and creating tension where it doesn’t need to be. And frankly, it’s implicitly encouraging acts of political violence against these elected officials by turning them into the enemy." Indeed, Trump has issued subpoenas against Walz, Frey, St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison.

"We’ve seen this throughout history, even recent history: When you put people in opposition like that — when you portray them as the enemy, when you describe them as kind of threatening a person’s way of life or things that they hold dear — that creates the conditions under which people are more likely to resort to political violence, and it becomes more and more the norm," Gegenheimer explained.

Speaking with this journalist for Salon in 2024, New School for Social Research history department chair and author of "A Brief History of Fascist Lies" Federico Finchelstein explained that Trump and his supporters engage in a "kind of dissonance between what Trump is saying and what is going on. And this has been the case with totalitarians and fascists for decades, that they say stuff that doesn't connect to reality." He described as “shocking” "the idea that the person that has promoted violence through rhetoric, and even sometimes the glorification of that violence, the idea that that person can complain about the 'rhetorical violence' of his enemies.” Finchelstein then added that Trump "does this kind of thing again and again, and that's why he reminds us of [Nazi Germany dictator Adolf] Hitler." The former and possibly future president "follows Hitler's playbook in projecting onto his enemies all his desires, fantasies, and aspirations. This includes, of course, as he said, 'retribution' and violence."

In response to Finchelstein’s comment to Salon, press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Salon that "it's been less 72 hours since the second assassination attempt [by Ryan Wesley Routh] on President Trump's life and the media is already back to comparing President Trump to Hitler. It's disgusting. This is why Americans have zero trust in the liberal mainstream media."

Catholic Trump voters graded Pope Leo XIV more harshly for criticizing war than they graded President Donald Trump for committing the blasphemy of presenting himself as Jesus.

While the general public is reacting harshly to Trump’s recent AI calamity, unscientific surveys conducted by Bulwark staff last week reveled that Trump-voting Catholics imposed a higher standard upon Pope Leo that they did not apply to the president.

“The one thing that we don't like about him is also the one thing that we do like about him,’ said one 2024 Trump voter who presented himself as Catholic. “[Trump] doesn't ask for permission. He doesn't take prisoners. He says what he wants and then he does what he wants. And that's one of the things that we like about him that makes him not a politician.”

“I'm not so upset about what he said to Leo because he has every right,” said another Trump voter, defending the president for proclaiming the Pope “WEAK on Crime.” “Leo has his own house to clean, … and he needs to worry about the Catholic church and let [Trump] take care of business.”

Among the Catholic Trump voters who responded to the survey, Bulwark Editor Sarah Longwell said five awarded Trump A's, three B's and one C.”

“These were the highest grades I have seen a group [of Trump voters] give Trump,” said Longwell, adding that most Trump voters in most surveys these days awarded Trump “B's and C's.”

“I haven't seen him get an ‘A’ in a really long time. And this was a group full of A's,” said Longwell.

Bulwark editor Jonathan Last, however, could not bear what he called the double standard, and he blasted one respondent for saying “I just think the Pope's trying to become very judgmental on something that's not his realm.”

“How dare a Catholic Pope be judgmental.” Last said, mockingly. “… Only six of them were upset, and of the six, I think all of them gave some version of, ‘But, you know, yeah, I didn't love [the Jesus meme]. But also, I love that he does stuff like this. And this is kind of why we like him. I just wish he didn't do this one.’”

Last went on to complain that one Catholic Trump voter said sometimes Trump’s “delivery is off, but he's truthful,” and pronounced it “important that somebody has those values.”

“She's talking about the values of just saying what's on your mind,” said Last. “But notice that doesn't apply to the Pope. The Pope can't just say, ‘I do think war is bad.’ When that happens, all f—— hell breaks loose. But when Donald Trump says, ‘look at me, I might be like the late great Jesus, or even better: He rose on the third day. I could have done it in two. And they're like, ‘well, you know, it's a little out there, but I do like that he's honest — these f—— people! The Pope has a line he can't cross or they will turn their back on the teachings of the Catholic Church. But the president? No lines.”

“Yep. That is the takeaway,” said Longwell. “In the battle between Trump and the Pope, these Catholics take Trump.”

Airline pilot and former Republican George Poncy says he was furious when he discovered Republican Florida Gov. Ron Desantis planned to slap the name “Donald Trump” on his Palm Beach International Airport.

“Well, the guy’s a criminal,” said Poncy, speaking to the Miami New Times about Trump’s conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records. “I don’t know anything that’s named after a criminal. There’s no Lucky Luciano Bridge or Jeffrey Epstein Highway. It’s insane. It is. It’s not much more complicated than that.”

The Times reports Poncy filed a lawsuit in Palm Beach County Circuit Court, arguing that Desantis and the state has “unlawfully stripped” the county of its home rule authority by mandating the name change.

The name change to the “Donald J. Trump International Airport” arose from a bill in the Republican-dominated Florida Legislature describing Trump as “the most consequential president of our lifetime,” but that’s not the way 83-year-old Poncy sees it.

“Nobody stands up to the guy, ever. And so somebody should try,” said Poncy, who says he has been a Republican long before Trump first ran for office.

The president is eager to put his name on buildings, including the now renamed “The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts," which accelerated the trend of artists canceling their scheduled performances at the venue before Trump finally closed it. He has also hung his face on large banners draping at least three buildings since getting re-elected to office.

These include the Department of Justice, the Department of Labor and the Department of Agriculture.

The United States Constitution provides two paths for removing a sitting president from office: impeachment and the procedures outlined in the 25th Amendment. Both approaches are being raised again, and with increasing fervor, as ways to bring an early end to Donald Trump’s second term of chaos, incompetence and corruption. Both are clearly warranted, but structural hurdles built into both render them legally infeasible.

Instead of looking for a magic bullet in the Constitution to bring Trump down, progressives and anti-Trumpers should concentrate on building a lasting, broad-based and genuine pro-democracy movement. Impeachment hearings and calls for invoking the 25th can play a role in that process, but only an ancillary one.

Here’s why.

Impeachment

The Founding Fathers were well aware of the dangers of unbridled one-man rule. Along with removing the yoke of King George III, they sought to prevent the rise of homegrown tyrants driven by ambition, greed and vanity.

At the Constitutional Convention in 1787, after prolonged debate about the extent of presidential powers and whether the new federal charter should include a provision authorizing the impeachment and removal of the president, the delegates adopted the now-famous clause inscribed in Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution that provides, “The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”

To strike a balance between a strong chief executive and what the antifederalists dreaded would eventually devolve into monarchy, they created a two-step process for impeachment. As set forth in Article I of the Constitution, the House of Representatives holds the sole power of impeachment, akin to a grand jury’s authority to return an indictment against a criminal defendant. A simple majority vote is all that is needed to accuse federal officers of committing an impeachable act and send their cases to the Senate, which is given the sole power to try cases of impeachment. In the upper chamber, however, a two-thirds vote (67 senators today if all are present) is needed to sustain a guilty verdict and remove a defendant from office.

The conventional thinking that Trump will eventually suffer Nixon’s fate has been proven wrong.

As it was designed to do, the two-thirds requirement has drastically curtailed the frequency and impact of impeachment. Including Trump, only 21 federal officials have been impeached in our history. Fifteen were judges, two were Cabinet members, and one was a senator. The other three were presidents — Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1998 and Trump in 2019 and 2021. All were acquitted by the Senate. To date, there have only been eight impeachment convictions, all handed down against federal judges.

Trump is often compared to Richard Nixon for his abuse of power, ruthlessness, paranoia and relentless pursuit of revenge against real and imaginary enemies. Both men have also been accused of believing in the “madman theory” of the presidency — the idea that if the president appears to be temperamentally extreme and unhinged, he will be seen as willing to do anything, no matter how vile or illegal, to impose his will.

But the conventional thinking that Trump will eventually suffer Nixon’s fate has been proven wrong. The Republican Party of the 1970s was tethered to constitutional governance. Today’s GOP has degenerated into a neofascist political cult. Trump has given the party control of all three branches of government, and he has given party leaders permission to be the most authoritarian versions of themselves. The party did not abandon Trump even when presented with overwhelming evidence in his second impeachment trial that he had incited the Jan. 6 insurrection. There is no reason to believe it will abandon him now.

Still, hope springs eternal. On April 6, Democratic Rep. John Larson of Connecticut introduced a resolution to initiate impeachment proceedings against Trump. Drafted by Ralph Nader and constitutional scholar Bruce Fein, the resolution consists of 13 articles that charge Trump with, among other derelictions, violating Congress’ war powers by unconstitutionally initiating wars as a belligerent or co-belligerent against Iran, Venezuela, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, Nigeria and Gaza; militarizing domestic law enforcement with deployments of the National Guard; and using Immigration and Customs Enforcement to racially profile citizens and suspected immigrants.

In a rational country with leaders committed to the rule of law, the resolution would swiftly lead to Trump’s demise. But we are not that country today.

The 25th Amendment

Ratified in 1967, the 25th Amendment was drafted in the aftermath of the assassination of John F. Kennedy to clarify the law of succession when the president becomes disabled. According to the first paragraph of Section 4 of the amendment:

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments [the Cabinet] or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

As Trump continues to unravel, invoking Allah in threats to obliterate Iranian civilization and attacking the pope as too liberal and weak on crime, calls to invoke Section 4 have accelerated. But Section 4 is an even weaker remedy than impeachment.

The second and final paragraph of Section 4 instructs that the president can attempt to override a declaration of disability by notifying the Senate and House leadership that no such disability exists. Thereafter, the vice president, with the support of either a majority of the Cabinet or “the other body” of the first paragraph, can contest the president’s override. To resolve the conflict and place the vice president in charge, a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress — not just the Senate — is required to confirm that the president is, in fact, “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.”

The procedures outlined in Section 4 have never been invoked, and it strains credulity to think they will be used against Trump as long as JD Vance is the vice president and the Cabinet is staffed by sycophants and grifters who routinely pledge their loyalty to their dear leader.

This is not to say that agitating for impeachment or calling for Trump’s removal on 25th Amendment grounds is pointless. But we should not view the avenues for forcing Trump’s early exit as ends in themselves. Rather, they are best seen as organizing tools that can be useful in drawing Americans into a broad-based movement to restore democracy. In Hungary last week, 16 years of authoritarian rule ended with the defeat of Viktor Orbán. It can and must happen here.

President Donald Trump's recent social media posts, including an AI-generated image depicting him as Jesus Christ, have ignited debate within evangelical Christian circles about his relationship with religious values and his base.

The controversial posts — which included a profanity-laced Easter message and mocking references to Islam — prompted conservative author Rod Dreher to suggest Trump is "radiating the spirit of Antichrist," though he stopped short of calling Trump the Antichrist himself.

Speculation about the Antichrist's identity has long been a feature of Christian thought. Historical candidates have included Franklin D. Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan, and more recently, Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin, according to an analysis featured at Religion News Service.

What distinguishes Trump's posts is the division they've caused within his own evangelical support base, notes RNS. Calvin University professor Kristin Kobes Du Mez noted that the image "caused some real division within his religious base," marking a rare moment when Trump's supporters rejected rather than embraced his social media content.

Matthew Sutton, a religious history scholar at Washington State University, traced modern evangelical Antichrist speculation to early 20th-century fundamentalism and end-times theology. While some theological elements of Trump align with evangelical Antichrist expectations — such as his charismatic communication through Truth Social — traditional interpretations suggest the Antichrist will oppose Israel, a position Trump does not hold.

Rev. Franklin Graham defended the image, arguing Trump had no intention of depicting himself as Jesus. Trump later claimed it was meant to show him as a doctor with the Red Cross.

Religious technology scholar Heidi Campbell emphasized how AI-generated images reflect and shape contemporary religious consciousness, particularly on social media platforms.

Sutton suggested this moment may represent a turning point in Trump's relationship with his evangelical base, noting that while previous controversial acts seemed to carry no consequences, this image has struck a different chord.

Ronald Reagan’s former asst. attorney general tells The American Conservative that it’s time for President Donald Trump to go before his damage to the nation becomes permanent.

“Trump has said and done appalling things no other president has dared — not even close,” said attorney Bruce Fein, pointing out that Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) has introduced 13 articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump through House Resolution 1155, “to save the nation from a worse tyranny than provoked July 4, 1776.”

Fein ticked down a long list of reasons to jettison Trump, including exploiting the powers of office “for billions of dollars in personal or family enrichment indistinguishable from bribery or extortion,” and “commercializ[ing] his pardon power as if he were a Sotheby auctioneer selling a Hieronymus Bosch painting.”

He also razed Trump for “militariz[ing] domestic law enforcement by concocting national emergencies divorced from reality in Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Minneapolis to deploy the National Guard,” and for “retaliat[ing] against universities, lawyers, journalists, and lawfully present aliens for refusing to join Trump’s claque.”

Not to mention, said Fein, Trump “threaten[ing] the death of the 6,000-year-old Iranian civilization,” and murdering “nearly 200 alleged drug traffickers in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific without even providing evidence of their crimes to the public.”

“Congress should not idle like Nero while the Constitution is in flames,” said Fein. “… Trump must be impeached and removed from office immediately before it is too late. He is a dictator, pure and simple, who may well seek to disrupt the 2026 congressional elections by illegally invoking the Insurrection Act to dispatch the military to seize voting machines and occupy voting places.”

Fein added that Trump orchestrated the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol “to prevent Vice President Mike Pence from counting state-certified electoral votes,” and this shows “Trump will move heaven and earth to remain in power.”

“Our constitutional dispensation glorifying the rule of law and liberty may be destined to pass away. But it is the duty of Congress to be the last, not the first to surrender,” said Fein.

President Donald Trump was eager to claim victory on a ceasefire deal with Iran, which he unilaterally declared war on a few weeks ago.

The historically unpopular president is facing midterm destruction of his party in November and was keen to proclaim success on his explosive war, which has similarly blown U.S. and global fuel prices from the water within the last month. Trump declared at a Friday TPUSA event that Iran has agreed to virtually all of his demands to end its nuclear program forever, and that “No money will exchange hands in any way, shape or form.”

But even as MAGA crowed victory on social media Iran officials were throwing Trump’s claims in reverse through both word and deed.

The Guardian reported on Saturday that Iranian military’s operational command, Khatam Al-Anbiya, described Trump’s ongoing US blockade of the strait as “piracy,” and declared the region under the strict control of the armed forces “until the U.S. restores the complete freedom of navigation for vessels from an Iranian origin to a destination, and from a destination back to Iran.”

Critics on social media were quick to blast Trump’s Friday claims the next day as the Iranian reality came to light Saturday.

“Trump is entirely full of sh——,” posted former MS NOW anchor Keith Olbermann on X. “There is no deal with Iran. Its leaders insist the strait is closed. The emperor not only has no clothes; he has no brain.”

“But if the Strait of Hormuz is open again, they've agreed on pretty much everything, Iran has agreed to let the US take its enriched Uranium without paying any money, and he's ‘decimated’ their military, why threaten to go back to war? Could what he says not be entirely true?” asked criminal defense attorney Scott Greenfield on X.

Podcasters Danielle Moodie and Wajahat Ali roasted President Donald Trump for crowing about a heavily flawed deal with Iran after first blowing up a superior international pact formed by former President Obama.

“This to me is the epitome of whiteness,” said Moodie, speaking on the “re-deal” Trump’s flaunted at a Friday TPUSA event in Phoenix, Arizona. “When I talk about white privilege, when I talk about white supremacy, this is the epitome of this s——. A Black person had already done something super well. You f—— it up, right? Whether it is a town, a city, a school, whatever. And then you want to redo it and then take credit for it, as if you had an original thought in your f—— head!”

“It's like [artist] Elvis [Presley] doing a rendition of ‘Hound Dog,’ and people saying ‘this is amazing,’ and people always forget that Hound Dog was originally sung by a Black woman,” said Ali, who then went on to cite Christopher Columbus as example.

“When they discover countries that are already inhabited by indigenous people, like when Christopher Columbus discovered America — except that he thought he discovered China. And to his dying day, he said, no, no, I discovered China. No, dumba——. You stumbled upon America. And also, you were an insane, vicious, violent slaver.”

Moodie further burned Trump for bumbling his way into a worse agreement at considerably more cost than Obama. Trump is reportedly negotiating an agreement that would stop Iran from producing a nuclear weapon in exchange for unfreezing $20 billion in Iranian assets — only Obama orchestrated a much cheaper deal releasing less than $2 billion in Iranian assets.

“Trump tore up Obama's agreement, spent $55 billion on war, got hundreds of Americans injured, killed 165 plus kids, and exploded oil prices to try and negotiate the same basic deal that Obama did without a single f—— weapon, without hampering the global economy, and did so within diplomatic means,” said Moodie.

Ali pointed out that Trump showed all the characteristics of feeble white men by demanding statues and a taxpayer-financed 250-foot arch.

“It literally goes to your point. It's the delusion of white supremacy,” said Ali. “It's these fickle, weak, broken, fragile men who need to cosplay as crusaders, who need to cosplay as heroes, who know that they're weak, but they believe in these strange myths that allow them to act in such a reckless manner.”

Podcaster Joe Rogan's disappointment in President Donald Trump has continued after the Republican leader posted a photo depicting himself as Jesus Christ.

The photo has since been deleted and Trump explained that he thought it was depicting him as a doctor, but Rogan didn't buy it, The Hill recounted.

“It’s hard. AI God. AI God has to come alive and take over the system,” Rogan said.

“AI God: the one that created that Jesus meme that Trump just posted," he added.

“Joe, I told you. He explained it. He was a doctor,” responded retired Navy SEAL Andy Stumpf, sarcastically. Rogan burst out laughing.

“That’s what they call them. That’s what AI God calls Jesus. Jesus is a doctor,” Rogan replied.

Rogan shifted from backing Trump in 2024 to criticizing him after the Iran war, immigration crackdowns and other issues he views as reckless. He has called MAGA supporters “dorks” and “unintelligent." After he abandoned Trump, Rogan called himself “politically homeless,” and argued that Trump betrayed voters by promising “no more wars” and then taking the U.S. into another Middle East conflict.

Rogan has called Trump's mass deportation effort "insane," and openly questioned whether the Iran war was a distraction from other issues, like the files for the investigation of trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

While Rogan hasn't bought into being a Democrat, the broken promises from Trump sent him over the edge.

“It’s so stupid. Neither one of them make any sense to me. We need like, a logical, centrist government that, like, just says there’s a lot of things that we should do to make this country a better place," Rogan said, complaining about both parties.

The MAGA base has been similarly divided between Trump loyalists and those who bought into the "America First" principle that promised a withdrawal from all U.S. funding being sent to other countries. One of Elon Musk's big reasons for supporting Trump was the idea of reducing the national debt, but additional conflicts have already prompted Trump to ask Congress for the funds to continue the war.

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President Donald Trump is historically unpopular and his approval ratings are underwater in Arizona and the other six swing states he won in 2024, largely because independent voters have abandoned him. With the mid-terms rapidly approaching, the president came to Phoenix to gin up support for Republicans — not by reaching out to those disaffected voters but instead by rallying the MAGA faithful and calling for Republican Party unity.

The rally at a north Phoenix church, hosted by Turning Point USA, brought conservative activists and Trump die-hards together to support a slate of candidates in order to “Build The Red Wall.”

The rally also served as a platform to drive Trump-supporting voters to support U.S. Rep. Andy Biggs in his bid for governor.

Biggs, a Trump loyalist who has connections to the events surrounding the 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, is facing off against fellow GOP Congressman David Schweikert in the Republican primary election. The winner will challenge Democratic incumbent Katie Hobbs in November.

While the thousands of MAGA voters inside Dream City Church got to hear from Biggs himself, Schweikert’s campaign was blanketing cars in the parking lot with fliers for the Scottsdale Republican.

Biggs has Trump’s endorsement, which may serve him well in a primary election but could be a liability in the general election, especially given Trump’s broad unpopularity.

And if Biggs does get his party’s nomination, he is likely to face an uphill battle against Hobbs, who ended this March with nearly $7.2 million in the bank, about six times what Biggs and Schweikert combined have in the bank.

Democrats see 2026 as a chance to repudiate Trumpism, and are expected to spend heavily to defeat Republicans up and down the ballot.

That was front of mind for many of the speakers, including some GOP officeholders who could be on the receiving end of a Democratic campaign operation that is flush with cash and hoping to capitalize on voters’ dissatisfaction with Trump and Republican governance.

“Republicans are not the solution to all of your problems, but Democrats are pretty much the cause of all your problems,” U.S. Rep. Eli Crane, whose district is a prime target for Democrats, told the crowd. “It is time for us to coalesce right now as much as possible.”

Crane and U.S. Rep. Juan Ciscomani, who represents the most competitive district in Arizona, have gotten influxes of cash this cycle from Republican leadership with Ciscomani getting one of the highest amounts of any other Republican outside of Republican House leadership.

Ciscomani bragged about his victory in 2022 in what he said is “the most competitive district in the entire country,” and which gave Republicans control of the U.S. House of Representatives.Ciscomani also emphasized to the crowd the importance of electing the man running to replace Biggs, former Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb and former NFL kicker Jay Feely, who is running to take the seat that Schweikert currently holds — another top target for Democrats.

While speakers openly praised each other and pushed for unity, some division was seen.

At one point, a cacophony of boos filled the church sanctuary when U.S. Rep. Paul Gosar urged attendees to vote for Rodney Glassman for attorney general over Senate President Warren Petersen. Hours later, Trump gave Petersen a shout-out from the stage.

The elected officials and candidates who spoke gave typical stump speeches, with many focusing on culture war issues that have become the party’s bread and butter in the Trump era.

Last year’s shooting death of TPUSA founder Charlie Kirk loomed over many speeches, with many of the speakers talking about their past interactions with the man and their support of his widow, Erika Kirk, who now serves as TPUSA’s CEO.

When Trump took the stage late in the afternoon, he spent roughly 40 minutes jumping from topic to topic.

The president bragged about the war in Iran, claiming that he was winning it and it would be the “tenth war” he has ended. His claims of ending wars are over-inflated.

“This was just a military excursion,” Trump said of Iran. “This wasn’t the big time.”

The U.S. and Israel launched the war seven weeks ago. So far, 13 American soldiers have died and hundreds have been wounded. Negotiations with Iran are ongoing.

Trump also made light of the arguably illegal boat strikes conducted by his administration, which have resulted in the deaths of at least 170 people. Trump claimed they had stopped 97% of boats carrying drugs.

“Trying to find the 3%, because I believe them to be the bravest people in the world. Boom,” Trump said to the crowd, who erupted in cheers and laughs.

After speaking about a surprise raid earlier this year to arrest Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, he alluded to some sort of impending action against the nation of Cuba, saying that the administration was working on something that was “70 years in the making.”

“We are going to help them out with Cuba,” the president said.

Earlier this week, USA Today reported that the Pentagon has begun quietly ramping up for a possible invasion of Cuba.

Towards the end of his speech Trump personally called out a number of lawmakers in attendance, including Rep. Alexander Kolodin, who is running for Secretary of State. He is facing off against Gina Swoboda, the former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, who had gotten Trump’s endorsement when she was running to replace Schweikert in Congress.

The men in President Donald Trump’s circle appear to be primping for their leader and reaching Mar-a-Lago levels of vanity, says New York Times columnist Jesse McKinley,.

“For the men of the Trump administration … the concentration on their appearance is a constant, with policy pronouncements and social media feeds suffused with displays of physical strength, tough-guy talk and masculine mojo,” said McKinley. “At the same time, those traditional tenets of masculinity have been accompanied by flashes of vulnerability about how the men look and dress.”

Men like Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and especially Trump, frequently fuss at media for not helping them present their very best face. Trump complained that Time Magazine made him look bald. Rubio castigated a raft of Vanity Fair photos for allegedly being “manipulated” to look less awesome, and Hegseth has barred reporters from Iran war briefings because he found photos to be “unflattering.”

“It’s constant attempts at trying to cultivate a persona that in their eyes seems strong and powerful and dominant and stoic,” said Zac Seidler, a clinical psychologist and the global director of research at Movember, a men’s health charity. “But once you scratch the surface of that, all you see is fragility.”

Trump, who is known for thick makeup, has normalized critiquing men’s appearances, which McKinley says “is ushering in a new era of fawning assessments and regular commentary about the appearance of his cabinet members and others.”

Trump’s obsession with outward appearance is echoed by his staff, said Fairleigh Dickinson University government and politics professor Dan Cassino. “Men in the Trump administration are performing a very specific type of masculinity in order to try and appeal to Trump,” said Cassino.

But Seidler said all the focus on Trump’s men is triggering insecurity with the “overarching belief that you must look and appear a certain way or you have failed.”

“[Trump’s] surrogates frequently tout his vitality,” said McKinley, “and the president often connects himself with men who evince masculine traits, including musclebound influencers.

Masculinity is a constant evaluation among men in the Trump community, but that process of evaluation has been “supercharged,” said “Manhood in America,” author Michael Kimmel, adding that many male members of the Trump administration are seemingly “cosplaying their Rambo-ness” to impress the president.

Former CIA Director John O. Brennan is among the foes of President Donald Trump who has been the target of a probe by the Trump-era U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). The Brennan probe, however, isn't going well so far.

According to reporting from CNN, DOJ federal prosecutor Maria Medetis Long has been removed from the investigation.

Ivan Perez and Hannah Rabinowitz of CNN report that on Friday morning, April 17, Long "notified attorneys representing people involved in the case that she was no longer handling the investigation, the people familiar with the matter said."

"She has led the politically sensitive probe for months amid demands from Trump to prosecute Brennan and other critics," Perez and Rabinowitz note. "The investigation into Brennan is focused on one of the president's longest standing political grievances — the 2017 intelligence assessment that found Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election to help him."

The CNN reporters add, "Trump's demands have taken on more urgency for the Justice Department after Trump fired former Attorney General Pam Bondi, in part because of dissatisfaction at the slow pace of cases he wants brought. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has redoubled efforts to satisfy the president's demands as he seeks to keep the job after Bondi's ouster."

Brennan, a frequent Trump critic, has called for Congress to use the U.S. Constitution's 25th Amendment to remove him from office.

The Brennan investigation stems from Trump's long-standing grievance over the 2017 intelligence community assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election to benefit Trump's candidacy. Brennan, who served as CIA Director under President Barack Obama from 2013 to 2017, played a key role in that assessment and has remained one of Trump's most vocal critics since leaving office. He has repeatedly called for Trump's removal via the 25th Amendment and has been a prominent voice warning about threats to democratic institutions.

Trump has repeatedly demanded that his Justice Department prosecute Brennan and other intelligence officials involved in investigations related to his 2016 campaign. These prosecutorial demands intensified after Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi over frustration with the pace of cases he wanted pursued. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has since accelerated efforts to meet Trump's prosecutorial agenda. The removal of the lead prosecutor from Brennan's case suggests internal friction within the DOJ over the politically sensitive investigation, raising questions about whether the probe can proceed or will stall further under the current administration.

On Friday morning, April 17, Iranian and Trump Administration officials announced that the Strait of Hormuz — a waterway crucial to the flow of oil in the Middle East — had been reopened. Oil prices, according to NBC News, fell by 12 percent in response to the news.

During an early afternoon appearance on MS NOW, The Lincoln Project's Stuart Stevens — a veteran conservative strategist who is very much in the Never Trump camp — stressed that despite the reopening, the Republican Party is facing a "really toxic cocktail" of political liabilities in the 2026 midterms.

Stevens told host Chris Jansing, "Now, for the first time since Vietnam, there's going to be automatic draft registration for these voters. That didn't happen before the war. So, that's a really toxic cocktail in politics. You have low job opportunities, high gas prices, not a good job situation for young people, and the draft. I mean, that's a pretty bad mix."

Trump's "style," according to Stevens, is to "say things are better than they are."

"So, he'll just deny this," Stevens explained. "And then, he'll attack someone else."

Over the years, Stevens (now in his early seventies) worked with a who's-who of conservatives — including former President George W. Bush, the late Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) and 2012 GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney. And Stevens, drawing on his experience, told Jansing that in 2026, Trump is "running into a particularly dangerous political environment."

Stevens told Jansing, "There is no way that Republicans can separate themselves from Trump. Because if their opponent doesn't attack them, Trump will attack them. So, they're sort of tied to the mast here, and I think it looks very bleak for him."

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Much has been written about the damage being done by President Donald Trump's abuse of presidential pardon powers in his second term, but according to a new report from The Trace, the trend has been quietly obliterating millions in funds for the victims of violent crime, particularly shooting victims.

On Monday, The Trace released the findings of an investigation into Trump's impact on the Crime Victims Fund. This fund was created as part of the 1984 Victims of Crime Act and offers funding for "state and local programs including domestic violence shelters, rape crisis centers and child abuse treatment programs." The fund is kept up predominantly "by criminal fines and penalties from convictions in federal cases, typically white-collar prosecutions." Shooting victims or their surviving family members, the outlet noted, "rely routinely on VOCA funding to reimburse medical expenses, funeral costs and lost wages."

While Trump's pardons can tend to wreck legal accountability for the perpetrators of these sorts of crimes, they also relieved them of the "fines, penalties and restitution" they might be required to pay out as part of their sentence, resulting in less money flowing into the Crime Victims Fund.

Analyzing each of Trump's second-term pardons, The Trace found that Trump's impact on the fund has been severe, removing $113 million that "would have gone into the fund absent a Trump pardon." Restitution payments were not included in the calculus, as those always go straight to victims.

The fund had already suffered notably in the first Trump administration as well. It peaked in the waning days of the Obama administration at around $13 billion, according to a graph created by The Guardian, and cratered to less than $2 billion partway through the Biden administration. By the end of Biden's tenure, however, it had begun to creep back up, reaching $3.5 billion by 2025.

The Trace noted that most of the damage done to the fund by Trump in his second term was the result of one pardon for the owners of a crypto exchange that was convicted of violating money laundering laws.

"Most of that figure is from a single case," the report explained. "Last year, Trump pardoned HDR Global Trading Limited, the owner and operator of the crypto exchange BitMEX, which had been ordered to pay $100m in fines for flouting anti-money laundering laws. Trump issued the pardon, the first for a corporation, just hours before the payment was due. Because the pardon calls for the 'remission of any and all fines, penalties, forfeitures, and restitution ordered by the Court,' that $100m will never make it to the Crime Victims Fund."

“What really drives the fund are these very large, very few cases, which are all corporate cases,” Steve Derene, a co-founder of the National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators who helped craft the original 1984 bill, told The Trace. “Just a couple settlements can really mean the difference in keeping this fund afloat.”

Donald Trump has spent much of his second presidency running roughshod over the rules and regulations meant to rein in the White House post-Watergate. Now, a conservative writer has put forward the changes that must be made after his term to prevent "power-hungry" Trump wannabes from harming the country in the future.

Myra Adams is a conservative political commentator and columnist for The Hill, who previously worked on Republican presidential campaigns in 2004 and 2008. In her latest piece from Friday, she observed that Trump's "administration has figuratively bulldozed post-Watergate laws and norms while physically bulldozing the White House East Wing," and argued that "his I-am-above-the-law presidential overreach has reached critical mass."

"Daily headlines document power grabs, high-stakes international aggression, extreme weaponization of federal power, especially the judicial branch, and blatant, ongoing personal and family enrichment, earning billions," Adams wrote. "Therefore, post-Trump, no matter which party controls Capitol Hill or the White House, numerous pieces of bipartisan legislation must be enacted to protect constitutional integrity, prevent executive-branch abuses, and serve the national good."

Adams further urged the American leaders of the near future to take a page from the post-Watergate reforms and aggressively pursue reforms that will help prevent a similarly abusive leader from doing the same level of damage as Trump.

"First: The incumbent president should be prohibited from owning a public company," Adams wrote. "There are inherent conflicts of interest, ample profit-generating opportunities, potential for dirty dealing through access to power, and investor risk due to political volatility."

She continued: "Second: The incumbent president should be prohibited from owning a public or privately owned communication platform that channels official presidential messages."

Adams noted that, despite being president, Trump remains "the majority stockholder (52 percent) of Trump Media and Technology Group, which owns Truth Social (stock symbol DJT)," and is "the settlor and sole beneficiary of the Trust" set up to hold those shares, despite supposedly passing control of it to his family.

"Third: We must prohibit the president and his family members from owning stakes in companies engaged in cryptocurrency that could benefit from presidential policies," Adams continued. "We should also outlaw presidential family involvement with prediction market companies due to direct access to inside information. Fourth: The president, his closest family members and their spouses should be forbidden from engaging in foreign real estate transactions or any foreign investment valued over an amount set by Congress, on behalf of a company in which they own or are employed... The law must also include military weapons companies."

Adams added five more rules to her list of proposals: making it "mandatory" for presidents and vice presidents to disclose their taxes on April 15; restricting, to a degree she did not specify, the president's pardon powers; giving Congress the power to nullify executive orders if it both chambers do not pass a measure approving them within a set period of time; "establishing a bipartisan watchdog organization to review what appears to be politically motivated weaponization of any agency or Cabinet department that unleashes the power of the federal government"; and lastly, outlawing "licensing fees or any profit earned from the sale of merchandise that the president actively promotes, which degrades the office."

On Monday, April 13, U.S. President Donald Trump received a well-publicized delivery at the White House: two bags of McDonald's food dropped off by 58-year-old DoorDash employee Sharon Simmons, now being dubbed "DoorDash Grandma" in media reports. Trump and his allies used the delivery to promote his "no tax on tips" policy, claiming that Simmons — who is reportedly using her DoorDash earnings to help pay for her husband's cancer treatment — is a prime example of someone who is benefitting from it.

Some liberal and progressive social media users are accusing Simmons of being a "paid plant" — a claim that Salon's Amanda Marcotte considers "not fair" in an article published on April 17. Marcotte also says there's "no reason to doubt" the "veracity" of reports that Simmons is "hustling for DoorDash because her husband has been battling cancer."

Marcotte, however, describes "DoorDash Grandma" as a "troubling example of how so many white working-class Americans have been persuaded into voting against their own economic self-interests by Republican politicians who promote dangerous myths centering on bootstraps and personal responsibility."

"Hers is a story of a society failing to meet basic responsibilities to its citizens," Marcotte argues. "As Paul Waldman wrote Thursday, (April 16) in The Cross Section, in a halfway decent political system, Simmons should be 'settling into a comfortable retirement.' Her family should have access to health care coverage that would ensure 'no one was crushed financially when they got sick.'"

Marcotte continues, "Simmons seems to have fully absorbed decades of toxic right-wing messaging that foists all the blame for an unjust system onto the very people who are being robbed blind. Last summer, she testified in a congressional field hearing, offering her support of DoorDash and GOP tax policy in a congressional field hearing — and her words made it clear how much she has internalized the view that it's OK for people like her to work their fingers to the bone without any real hope of getting ahead. Simmons spoke of having a 'strong work ethic' that was instilled by her parents, who started bringing her to work when she was only four."

The Salon journalist notes that while Simmons made $22,000 in 2025, DoorDash's CEO made $313 million last year.

"As Waldman noted, Simmons is just the latest in a long line of would-be Republican folk heroes — like 'Joe the Plumber' — meant to illustrate the party's supposed connection to working people," Marcotte writes. "The reality is a story involving the exploitation of working-class Americans by parasitic elites like Trump and the people in DoorDash's C-suites. The country's limited social safety net causes people — especially women like Simmons — to face impossible choices. By her own account, Simmons can't take on steady, stable employment to make sure her husband is cared for. Instead, she has to take a shadowy job as an 'independent contractor.' This allows the executives at DoorDash to extract often-excruciating hours of work from people like Simmons, without having to pay benefits or salaries that direct employees would receive…. Terms like 'work ethic' allow Americans who are being exploited to reimagine themselves as heroes, a personal identity that is psychologically soothing, even as they still struggle to make ends meet."

Marcotte adds, "Racist tropes have also been useful in selling this story to many white working-class people…. But it might also help if Democrats, progressives or anyone that is troubled or outraged by the DoorDash Grandma stunt to be more outspoken about the foul class politics this bit of Donald Trump's reality TV-style business is meant to hide."

There are always unanswered questions heading into any election. But usually those questions are more along the lines of “who’s going to win?” and less “will the federal government interfere with the election?”

This article was originally published by Votebeat, a nonprofit news organization covering local election administration and voting access.

But here in 2026, President Donald Trump’s broadsides against the legitimacy of U.S. elections and efforts to overhaul election laws have generated lots of uncertainty — and anxiety — about whether this will be a normal election year. Election officials and voters alike are left to wonder whether there will be new requirements for voters, physical interventions at the polls, or attempts to overturn results after the fact.

Despite seemingly endless speculation, no one knows for sure how likely any of these things is. But to get the most well-informed assessments, we turned to the people who spend the most time thinking about elections.

We asked 37 experts in the field of election administration — academics, lawyers, former election officials, etc. — to answer 26 questions about the likelihood of various scenarios coming to pass in the 2026 midterms.

Their answers reflect a general sense of cautious optimism about the most dire scenarios — such as an election getting overturned — and skepticism that the federal government will successfully change voting rules. But they also still believe the election will face serious challenges, including federal agents potentially showing up at polling places.

Election experts say new federal laws are unlikely, but split on state laws and court intervention

Since retaking office in 2025, Trump has pushed aggressively for the federal government to set more rules around how elections are run, promoting legislation that would require registering voters to prove their citizenship with documentation and issuing two election-related executive orders. (The first executive order has largely been blocked in court, though the administration has appealed. The second is currently under litigation, and the conventional wisdom is that it will be halted as well.)

However, experts were skeptical that these measures would ever take effect. Thirty-four of our 37 respondents said it was unlikely that the federal government would successfully require new registrants to prove their citizenship for the midterms, and 32 said it was unlikely that the federal government would successfully require all voters to show an ID or restrict the use of no-excuse absentee or mail ballots. (They provided their answers before Trump issued his second executive order, which sought to regulate mail voting through the U.S. Postal Service.)

Likewise, virtually all respondents thought it was unlikely that the federal government would restrict the hours or locations of in-person voting or limit or eliminate the use of voting machines to tally ballots in the midterms.

However, experts were more open to the possibility that some of these policies could take effect in individual states. Although none thought it was likely that a significant number of states would limit or eliminate the use of voting machines, about a quarter of respondents thought it was at least somewhat likely that a significant number of states would restrict the use of no-excuse absentee or mail ballots in the midterms. About one-third thought it was at least somewhat likely that a significant number of states would strengthen their voter ID requirements or restrict the hours or locations of in-person voting.

Even more respondents, 15 of the 37, thought it was at least somewhat likely that a significant number of states would pass proof-of-citizenship requirements before the election — perhaps unsurprisingly, given that such laws were working their way through several state legislatures at the time. Those laws have since passed in Florida, Mississippi, South Dakota, and Utah, although Florida’s does not take effect until 2027 and Mississippi’s is limited in scope.

Overall, though, most experts didn’t expect states to significantly change their election laws this year. Derek Muller, an election law professor at the University of Notre Dame, pointed out that many states have part-time legislatures that won’t be in session between now and the election. “I expect new legislation in the months ahead that might affect the 2026 election to be negligible,” Muller said.

If there are going to be major election-law changes before the midterms, experts expect them to come from the third branch of government: the judiciary. Seventeen experts said it was at least somewhat likely that pre-election court rulings would significantly alter election rules shortly before the midterms, although 19 still said that was unlikely.

In follow-up interviews, those who thought this was likely said that they were keeping an eye both on currently pending cases — such as a U.S. Supreme Court case that could require all mail ballots to arrive by Election Day — and those that have not yet been filed. That said, a Supreme Court ruling earlier this year will probably encourage litigants to bring any cases challenging election rules well before the election, making last-minute rule changes less likely.

Experts expect federal agents to disrupt the 2026 election

For many election officials and voting advocates, the nightmare scenario for the 2026 midterms is if federal agents, such as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, attempt to disrupt voting or the counting of ballots. It’s already illegal for armed troops to visit voting locations, and the Trump administration has repeatedly said that it will not send ICE agents to polling places this year. However, new Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin has declined to absolutely rule it out, and a majority of the experts we surveyed expected something like this to happen.

Twenty-seven of the 37 respondents said it was at least somewhat likely that the federal government would deploy some form of military or law enforcement at or near polling places in the midterms. A slight majority said it was likely that Trump would ask the National Guard or federal agents to seize voting equipment during the election, and over three-quarters said it was likely that Trump would ask them to seize voting equipment after the election. (It’s worth noting that respondents gave these answers just a few weeks after the FBI raided an election office in Fulton County, Georgia, and Trump said that he regretted not asking the National Guard to seize voting machines after the 2020 election.)

Multiple respondents told Votebeat that the seizure of voting equipment was more likely after the election because the election results will be known at that time. “Before the election, no one will know where seizing equipment or ballots could shift pivotal races,” said Christopher Mann, the research director at the Center for Election Innovation and Research. “After the election, a bad actor will have a better picture of where seizing voting equipment or ballots can shift the overall outcome.”

Twenty-eight experts said it was at least somewhat likely that there would be physical threats to voters or polling places in the midterms, including 11 who said it was very likely. (They were perhaps recalling 2024, when a string of bomb threats forced some polling places to close temporarily, though election officials were able to minimize disruptions to voting.) However, experts were divided on whether these threats would deter people from voting. Twenty-one experts said it was unlikely that a significant number of voters would decide not to vote because of threats or physical intimidation, while 16 said that was likely.

Notably, experts were not very confident about their predictions about armed intervention in the midterms. Some also pointed out that, even if it’s likely that Trump might order federal agents to interfere in the election, that doesn’t mean they will succeed. “Election officials, courts, and other state and local officials are going to stop any attempt to seize voting equipment or ballots,” Mann predicted.

And some experts emphasized that even if there are incidents at specific polling places, they expect the election overall to run smoothly. “I’m an optimist, which probably led to many of my answers,” admitted Jeff Greenburg, a retired election official in Pennsylvania and a senior adviser at the Committee of Seventy, a Philadelphia-based government watchdog group. But Greenburg said he doesn’t expect that physical threats to voting “will significantly impact elections nationwide. I have faith and trust in our election officials, as well as the rule of law, and believe in the end every vote cast will be counted.”

Losers may claim fraud, but it’s unlikely an election gets overturned

Election experts of all stripes are confident that U.S. elections are secure. All 37 respondents said it was unlikely that a significant number of ineligible voters would cast ballots in the midterms, including 35 who said it was not at all likely. Experts also unanimously said that it was unlikely that voter fraud would influence the outcome of a 2026 congressional race.

However, that isn’t expected to stop candidates from questioning the election results. Almost three-quarters of experts thought it was at least somewhat likely that a significant number of losing candidates would claim fraud influenced the outcome of the election. All 37 thought it was likely that at least one congressional or statewide election would be legally challenged, with 30 calling it very likely.

At the same time, though, most experts don’t expect those challenges to succeed. Thirty-one of the 37 respondents thought it was unlikely that any congressional or statewide elections would be successfully overturned.

Nathaniel Rakich is Votebeat’s managing editor and is based in Washington, D.C. Contact Nathaniel at nrakich@votebeat.org.

Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization covering local election integrity and voting access. Sign up for their newsletters here.