memeorandum: Trump administration ban on $1B in Canadian imports goes into effect (Max Rego/The Hill)

10:55 AM ET, September 29, 2026

Top Items:

“Brace for losing everything”: Farm crisis fears grip GOP in Iowa — Iowa is on the verge of a farm crisis that threatens to wreck the agricultural heart of the state and hurt the fortunes of Republicans at the top of the midterm ticket, GOP strategists acknowledge.

Discussion: CNBC and The Hill

New York Times:

How a Planned Steel Mill in Iowa Reveals Trump's Midterm Strategy — As President Trump travels the country, he is expected to focus on his economic accomplishments at a time when Americans have expressed deep frustration with his policies. — President Trump, staring down a rough midterm season …

Discussion: The Hill, USA Today, The Independent, Breitbart, Deseret News, The White House, NewsMax.com, Radio Iowa, Al Jazeera, Washington Examiner, MPR News, The Guardian, Politico, Bloomberg and CBS News

Politico:

‘On a scale of 1 to 10, 10’: Trump's midterm travel schedule underscores GOP troubles — President Donald Trump intends to spend the next 30 days campaigning for Republicans, many of whom are underwater in states the president easily carried two years ago. — Bastions of conservatism …

Discussion: PoliticusUSA, NewsMax.com and No More Mister Nice Blog

E.J. Dionne Jr / New York Times:
Kansas Hasn't Elected a Democratic Senator Since 1932. Is This the Year?

Discussion: Breitbart and Talking Points Memo

Paul Krugman:

The Beclowning of Scott Bessent — One iron law of current politics is that nobody who associates themselves with Donald Trump emerges with a shred of credibility. For some, that's not a big loss — it's not as if anyone respected Pete Hegseth even before he decided that the key …

Discussion: NewsMax.com and Townhall

Kristen Holmes / CNN:

Trump personally helped orchestrate taxpayer-funded ads promoting himself and his policies, source says — President Donald Trump has personally driven the controversial, taxpayer-funded video ads promoting himself and his administration's policies, including helping select the imagery and videos used …

Discussion: CBS News, The Independent, ABC News, Mediaite, Robert Reich, Politico, The Hill, New York Magazine, Time, Daily Kos, Mother Jones and Washington Post

Will Saletan / The Bulwark:
Congratulations, You're a Trump Campaign Donor

Discussion: MS NOW, The Message Box, The Dean's Report, Military.com, The Independent, Deadline, Reason and NBC News

Ali Swenson / Associated Press:
Taxpayers have funded nearly $1.5M in pro-Trump ads. Criticism is mounting, including from the GOP

Discussion: MS NOW, Los Angeles Times, Vox, The Hill, Truthout, Washington Examiner, PolitiFact and Executive Functions

Jordain Carney / Politico:
Trump controversies pile on Senate Republicans as they seek midterm escape

Discussion: The Bulwark, Bloomberg, The Hill, CNN, Associated Press, Mediaite, Washington Examiner, MS NOW and NewsMax.com

Asher Price / Axios:

How Paxton vs. Talarico compares to Cruz vs. O'Rourke … The similarities … Talarico, a state legislator from Austin, was relatively unknown outside of Central Texas before he launched his Senate bid. — Cruz first won election to the Senate as a tea party insurgent who defeated a better-funded …

Discussion: Washington Examiner

Dan Merica / Washington Post:

Democrats coalesce around a message about the cost of corruption — Loading... In today's edition ... It's worth watching where Trump is traveling ... We ask you about a midlife sabbatical ... but first ... A message centered on the cost of corruption — Voters often think all politicians, from both parties, are corrupt.

Discussion: Associated Press

New York Times:
Democratic Turnout Surged in the Primaries. Will It Matter in November?

Discussion: Reason

Rebecca Beitsch / The Hill:

Jack Smith stresses strength of Trump cases, says he will not be ‘silenced’ by threats — Former special counsel Jack Smith stressed in prepared remarks that it was the evidence tied to President Trump's own actions that prompted him to bring charges against Trump.

Discussion: Associated Press, Washington Post, Washington Examiner and Straight Arrow

New York Times:
Jack Smith, Former Special Counsel, Will Appear Before Congress

Discussion: PBS NewsHour, The Guardian and The Federalist

David Gilbert / Wired:

A Pentagon Influencer Called Liberal Women a ‘Pestilence’ Who Will End Western Civilization — Kurt Schlichter was part of a task force rooting out so-called woke ideologies at the military's war colleges. He has called to bar childless adults from voting.

Lisa Song / ProPublica:

“A Massive Power Grab”: White House Proposal Threatens Funding That Helps Disabled Americans Vote — Without Amy Miller, some elderly and disabled people wouldn't be able to vote. — The attorney for Disability Rights Nebraska travels the state, investigating the quality of nursing homes and assisted living facilities.

Jamie Grierson / The Guardian:

Rubio says foreign actor was ‘clearly’ behind suspected RAF Fairford plot — US secretary of state, who offered no evidence for claims, also says many people ‘disturbed’ that five suspects released on bail — A counter-terrorism operation near RAF Fairford in the UK was mired in confusion …

Discussion: CBS News, Stars & Stripes, New York Times, Associated Press, Washington Examiner, abc7NY, WTOP News, The Independent, Townhall, American Greatness, Reuters, RedState, HuffPost, The Hill, Instapundit, Deseret News and Breitbart

Marist Poll:

Midterm Elections in Ohio, September 2026 — Democrats Lead in Ohio's Senate & Gubernatorial Contests... Impressions of Trump Loom Large — Brown (51%) leads Husted (43%) among registered voters statewide in the race for U.S. Senate in Ohio. Independents break for Brown (58% to 33% for Husted).

Jonathan Edwards / Washington Post:

GOP senator blocks bill to stop Trump from demolishing Kennedy Center — The bipartisan effort to ban the demolition of presidential memorials was thwarted in the Senate by an objection from Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah). — Loading... A bipartisan effort to ban the demolition of presidential memorials …

Discussion: The Guardian

Sarah N. Lynch / CBS News:

Top FBI official Andrew Bailey, who was once widely seen as Patel successor, resigns — Andrew Bailey, FBI co-deputy director who was once widely viewed as a potential successor to FBI Director Kash Patel, is resigning, he announced Monday. — His resignation takes effect Oct. 2, multiple sources said.

Damian Paletta / Wall Street Journal:

Here's What Could Happen if Democrats Win in November — Plus, RFK Jr.'s plan to get Americans to eat healthily hits White House resistance, and Iran is losing its leverage over the Strait of Hormuz — Good morning. This is the second in a two-part series where we explore what could happen …

Max Rego / The Hill:

Trump administration ban on $1B in Canadian imports goes into effect — President Trump's ban on nearly $1 billion worth of Canadian goods went into effect Tuesday, marking the latest salvo in a trade war between the U.S. and its longtime ally to the north.

Discussion: New York Times, Washington Examiner, Associated Press, Canadian Press and The Independent

Washington Post:

Tennessee to execute a woman for first time in over 200 years — Christa Pike was convicted in a brutal 1995 killing committed when she was 18. Advocates pushing for her life to be spared point to abuse she suffered as a child. — SummaryLoading... A Tennessee woman scheduled …

Discussion: Washington Examiner, Straight Arrow, The Guardian, TMZ.com, NBC News, Associated Press and New York Times

Echo Wang / Reuters:

Anthropic's IPO prospectus shows sweeping AI vision, surging costs — Anthropic is making a massive bet that AI will transform the global economy more profoundly than industrialization, electricity and the internet, according to its IPO prospectus seen by Reuters. — But the cost to get there will be staggering.

Discussion: Financial Times, The Register, The Information, The Guardian, The Verge, TechCrunch, Blue Virginia and Semafor, more at Techmeme »

Washington Post:

How Trump's sweeping changes are remaking Washington — June 3, 2025. Sept. 1, 2026. — President Donald Trump has focused on remaking Washington in his second term, from blades of grass on the White House lawn to new monuments around the city. — He regularly directs the presidential helicopter …

Bloomberg:

Lithuanian Premier Offers to Pay for Permanent US Troop Presence — Lithuania is “ready to pay the bill” to permanently host US troops and has raised the issue with Washington as the Baltic nation seeks to lock in American security guarantees, Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevicius said.

Morgan Phillips / Fox News:

EXCLUSIVE: Hegseth to double cuts to generals, admirals in major Pentagon shakeup — The War Secretary's State of the Force address doubles last year's 10% reduction target, with changes due by Jan. 1, 2027 — War Secretary Pete Hegseth will announce plans to reduce by 20% the number …

Amber Neely / AppleInsider:

Unsurprisingly, Meta's new Muse AI agent blatantly ignores users permissions — In a completely unsurprising turn of events, Meta's Muse AI is stealing Apple Messages, past and present, and uploading the contents to its cloud, even if explicitly told not to.

Discussion: Gizmodo

Politico:

Cotton calls for review after F-35 parts vanish — Sen. Tom Cotton is pushing the Pentagon to review military equipment shipping after sensitive F-35 components were diverted to Hong Kong early this summer — the first formal indication that a senior Republican is concerned about the incident.

Discussion: NewsMax.com

The Texas Tribune:

ICE agent who shot Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston identified — The federal government has withheld his identification, even as major state and local law enforcement agencies across the country typically identify officers involved in shootings on the job soon after the incident.

José Olivares / The Guardian:

Three deaths, three states, 24 hours: one day in ICE's quiet but ‘gruesome’ surge — These men in Maine, Georgia and Florida shared no ties - until they became casualties in the latest phase of Trump's anti-immigration campaign — It was 7am on 13 July this year.

CNBC:

House Speaker Johnson says he hopes AI guardrails are ‘voluntary’ amid Congress inaction … House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., who is joining a meeting of artificial intelligence officials in Washington later Tuesday, said on CNBC's “Squawk Box” that he favors “striking the right balance” …

Discussion: Financial Times

Perry Bacon / New Republic:

Why Democrats Should Stop Using the Phrase “Culture Wars” — Texas Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa, who is surprisingly close in polls against Republican incumbent Greg Abbott, attributes that strong standing to her campaign strategy. She says her secret sauce is avoiding the “culture wars.”

Discussion: The Washington Sun and HotAir

Maxwell Zeff / Wall Street Journal:

OpenAI Scraps Release of New AI Model Over Safety Concerns — Model dubbed GPT-6.1 Astra was due to make its debut inside ChatGPT and Codex in October — OpenAI says it is scrapping the release of its next-generation AI model over safety concerns that researchers raised during internal testing …

Discussion: The Hill, Wired, The Register, New York Times, Associated Press, CNBC, RedState, Reuters, NewsMax.com, CBS News, The Wrap, Al Jazeera, Gizmodo, The Information, TechCrunch and Washington Examiner, more at Techmeme »

David R. Lurie / Public Notice:

Will Democrats offer Americans a New New Deal? — Ahead of PN's 5th anniversary next week, we're offering paid subscriptions at the special yearly rate of $40 (or about 16¢ per edition). This newsletter is only possible thanks to the support of paid subscribers.

Bridget Bowman / NBC News:

Obama boosts Senate Democrats with October fundraiser — The former president is set to hold his first fundraiser this election cycle for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. — Former President Barack Obama is looking to give Democrats a financial boost, headlining a fundraiser next month …

Jay Willis / Slate:

It Was the Essential Home of Supreme Court News. Now It's a Joke. What Happened? — Earlier this month, SCOTUSblog hosted its annual Supreme Court “summit” in Washington. For nearly a quarter century, SCOTUSblog has been the go-to outlet for information about the court and its docket …

Jonathan Bernstein / Good Politics/Bad Politics:

What's Gone Wrong For the GOP — And some speculation about why. — A two-part item today: I'm looking again at the state of the election, focused this time mainly on the Senate, and then shifting to some first thoughts about why things have gone so badly so far for Republicans.