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Trump has refused to invite international election observers to the 2026 midterms for the first time in more than two decades. Trump called for the arrest of New York Times reporters after they noted empty seats at his Ohio rally. The Chicago woman who was shot five times by a Border Patrol agent and branded a domestic terrorist has filed a federal lawsuit against the DHS. And the Justice Department is stripping citizenship from naturalized Americans at an alarming rate.
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The country that invented the phrase “if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear” just told the world’s top election monitors to stay home.
The Trump administration has declined to invite the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to monitor the Nov. 3 midterm elections. The OSCE has monitored all federal elections in the United States since 2002, including six midterms and all general elections.
The United States is one of 57 countries that have agreed to allow OSCE observers under the 1990 Copenhagen Document. Only two years ago, the U.S. government publicly criticized Russia for not cooperating with the observers, saying it took their assessments seriously.
Neither the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights nor its Parliamentary Assembly said they had received an invitation from Washington. OSCE Parliamentary Assembly President Pere Joan Pons said the decision “represents a significant departure from an established democratic practice.”
The administration is separately planning to send roughly 1,000 federal monitors to polling places across the country. Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon has publicly called for ICE agents to “surround the polls” in November, which Trump has refused to rule out.
Butler High School has hosted pep rallies with better attendance.
On Monday, Trump said reporters should be arrested for their coverage of his campaign event in Vandalia, Ohio. The remarks were aimed at New York Times correspondent Katie Rogers, who observed that several sections of an upper deck were empty by the time the president finished speaking.
Trump disputed those details in a series of posts on Truth Social, claiming both that the venue was full and that the upper levels were empty because audience members moved to the main floor. He wrote that the arena was “totally MAXED OUT, including all upper sections,” and that thousands of people were unable to get in.
In a separate post, Trump called for legal action against the journalists who reported what they saw. He wrote that the New York Times and many other outlets “should be arrested for their dishonesty and disservice to our Country.”
Trump was in Ohio to campaign for Jon Husted, the Republican running against former Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown for an open Senate seat. Trump told the crowd that thousands of people were trying to get in, even though the event was held in a high school gym that seats 4,500.
The lawsuit asks for eight figures and an apology, and only one of those has any chance of happening.
Marimar Martinez, a 30-year-old Montessori school teacher in Chicago, was shot five times by a Border Patrol agent in her own neighborhood. She has since filed a federal lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security seeking tens of millions of dollars in damages.
Martinez spotted federal immigration agents in an SUV in the Brighton Park neighborhood last October and began following them. Both cars stopped, and agent Charles Exum shot her several times in her right leg and her right forearm.
The Department of Homeland Security said Martinez rammed the agents with her car, but evidence shows the agents never were boxed in and instead swerved into her car. Exum told the FBI he fired through Martinez’s windshield, but the damage to her car suggests he shot her as she drove away.
DHS officials labeled Martinez a domestic terrorist before prosecutors dropped all charges against her with prejudice, meaning the charges can never be refiled in federal court. She is suing for tens of millions of dollars in damages and an apology from the Trump administration.
The paperwork to become an American citizen takes about two years, which is also how long the warranty lasts.
The Justice Department has ordered prosecutors to aggressively pursue denaturalization proceedings against naturalized Americans with criminal records. In a June 2025 memo, Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate named denaturalization as one of the department’s five top priorities, and instructed attorneys to take every possible case.
The administration has filed at least 250 denaturalization cases this year alone. Between 2008 and 2026, the Justice Department filed only 166, an average of fewer than 10 per year.
The memo targets offenses ranging from national security threats and gang membership to financial fraud against Medicare, Medicaid, and the Paycheck Protection Program. The government does not need a conviction to start proceedings, so prosecutors can strip someone’s citizenship based on an accusation alone.
Citizens who were born in the United States are not subject to denaturalization under any circumstances, meaning the United States has a two-tier citizenship system.
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** Trump Administration Sued Over Plan to Deploy 1,000 Federal Election Monitors.** The NAACP sued the Trump administration on Friday for records about its plan to deploy about 1,000 federal personnel to polling places during the 2026 midterms. The suit, brought by former Civil Rights Division chief Kristen Clarke, seeks information about the legal authority, training, and locations behind the operation, which has already led to confrontations with state officials. In Minnesota, DOJ monitors during the primaries were forbidden from entering polling places and told to remain outside a 100-foot boundary, and Wyoming’s Republican governor asked for a state investigation after describing the monitors’ behavior as “a bit aggressive” and “irregular.”
California Passes Law Banning “Ghost Ticket” Sales for Concerts and Sporting Events. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bipartisan measure that makes it illegal to sell tickets to concerts and sporting events that you don’t own. The practice, known as “ghost ticketing,” enables resellers to advertise tickets at inflated prices even before the real tickets have gone on sale, and sometimes buyers end up paying hundreds of dollars for tickets that never show up. Those who break the new law could face misdemeanor charges. A separate bill that would have imposed a 10% cap on resale markups stalled in the Senate Appropriations Committee in August.
** Ohio Lawmakers Push Bill Requiring Utilities to Credit Customers for Power Outages.** A bipartisan group of Ohio lawmakers is preparing to introduce legislation that would require utilities such as FirstEnergy to issue automatic bill credits after long-lasting power outages, and allow residential customers to recover costs such as spoiled food and refrigerated prescription drugs. Credits would be awarded automatically after outages lasting more than 16 hours under normal conditions, 36 hours during a systemwide event, and 72 hours in catastrophic conditions. The bill comes after regulators proposed fining FirstEnergy $3.05 million for repeated summer outages in the city of Lakewood, but the money went to the state instead of the people who lost power.
NYC Announces Free Fall Festivals and Halloween Events Across All Five Boroughs. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has announced free fall festivals and Halloween events at parks and recreation centers across all five boroughs throughout October, featuring haunted houses, pumpkin patches, face-painting, seasonal crafts, and live music. The city is also reviving Trick-or-Streets, with a record 160 car-free Open Streets and plazas hosting Halloween celebrations. Events include the Hallowscream haunted house at J. Hood Wright Recreation Center in Manhattan, which typically draws 1,400 people, and the Ocean Breeze Fall Festival in Staten Island, which draws more than 1,500.
