First-time candidate Josh Harder defeated four-term Republican U.S. Rep. Jeff Denham Tuesday, giving Democrats their fourth pickup of a GOP House seat in California. Harder, 32, a venture capitalist, had anchored his campaign to Denham's vote against the Affordable Care Act, while arguing that he would push for universal health...
Trump Says Government Will Halt if Dems Investigate Him
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump, emboldened by Republican election wins in the Senate and scornful of GOP candidates he felt didn't sufficiently embrace his support, delivered a stark warning to the new Democratic House majority on Wednesday: Investigate me, and I'll investigate you — and the government will grind to...
Dems Flip 2 GOP Seats in Early Returns for House Battle
WASHINGTON — The Democrats flipped their first two Republican-held House seats Tuesday in Florida and Virginia but fell short in a closely watched race in Kentucky as they worked to wrest control of the chamber from the GOP and confront President Donald Trump. With polls closing across the East, one...
GOP Aims to Keep Senate Control, Aided by Trump-Friendly Map
WASHINGTON — Republicans aimed to retain Senate control in Tuesday's voting and renew their role as guardians of President Donald Trump's conservative agenda, banking on a lopsided electoral map that imperiled far more Democratic seats to offset Trump's deeply divisive effect on voters. Democrats' longshot prospects for capturing a Senate...
Election Pits Trump’s Incendiary Politics vs Dem Resistance
WASHINGTON — A turbulent election season that tested President Donald Trump's slash-and-burn political style against the strength of the Democratic resistance comes to a close as Americans cast ballots in the first national election of the Trump era. With voters going to the polls Tuesday, nothing is certain. Weather could...
Nothing Certain on the Eve of First Trump-Era Elections
WASHINGTON — The day of reckoning for American politics has nearly arrived. Voters on Tuesday will decide the $5 billion debate between President Donald Trump's take-no-prisoner politics and the Democratic Party's super-charged campaign to end the GOP's monopoly in Washington and statehouses across the nation. There are indications that an oft-discussed "blue...
Walters: Feinstein-De León Senate Debate Changed Nothing
With voting already underway and trailing in the polls, Kevin de León desperately needed to score big in Wednesday’s one-and-only quasi-debate with U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein. Billed as a “conversation” by the Public Policy Institute of California, the event was carried live only on the Internet in the middle of...
GOP Plays Blame Game While Fighting to Save House Majority
NEW YORK — Republicans have begun to concede defeat in the evolving fight to preserve the House majority. The party's candidates may not go quietly, but from the Arizona mountains to suburban Denver to the cornfields of Iowa, the GOP's most powerful players this midterm season are actively shifting resources...
GOP Hopes Testimony Showdown Can Save Kavanaugh's Nomination
WASHINGTON — Republicans are forging ahead with plans for a Senate hearing they had hoped to avoid on a woman's claims that Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when they were high schoolers, hoping to salvage the judge's endangered Supreme Court nomination with a risky, nationally televised showdown between him and...
Trump Says Sessions' DOJ Has Placed GOP in Midterm Jeopardy
WASHINGTON — Showing his disregard for the Justice Department's independence, President Donald Trump tweeted that federal indictments against two Republican congressmen placed the GOP in midterm election jeopardy. Trump again attacked Attorney General Jeff Sessions in the tweet suggesting that the Justice Department consider politics when making decisions: Two long...