The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to allow the Trump administration to immediately enforce new medical restrictions for transgender people in prison. An executive order by President Donald Trump had called on the Bureau of Prisons to revise its medical care policies so that federal funds aren’t spent “for the purpose of conforming an inmate’s appearance to that of the opposite sex.” The new policy, blocked earlier by a lower court, would halt surgeries, taper off hormones and end social accommodations like makeup and wigs.
Meanwhile, Trump plans to visit South Carolina on Wednesday to boost U.S. Sen. Darline Graham, whose stumbles in her first campaign since replacing her late brother have Democratic voters hopeful — but not necessarily optimistic — that their candidate can break Republicans’ grip on the state.
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Kamala Harris encourages hospitality workers to get out the vote ahead of midterms
Former Vice President Kamala Harris rallied about 200 hospitality workers Wednesday afternoon in Las Vegas, encouraging them to campaign for Democratic candidates ahead of Nov. 3.
“Please keep fighting,” she said. “It’s making a difference. You are making a difference.”
The Culinary Workers Union, which represents 60,000 Nevada hospitality workers, is a critical political powerhouse for Democrats, knocking on thousands of doors every election.
She joined Democratic governor candidate Aaron Ford and Democratic Rep. Dina Titus at the union’s headquarters, where the crowd sang “Happy Birthday” to Harris, whose birthday was yesterday.
Harris said for her birthday she wants Attorney General Ford and Titus to win. Ford hopes to oust Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo in one of the most competitive governor races.
“It’s going to be tight,” Harris said. “It will not be easy, but we don’t want to have any regrets on the 14th day about what we could have done these 13 days, right?”
Trump reacts to Ramaswamy ad, says ‘the mother is a witness to things, also’
Trump was asked about the widely criticized ad from Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy that features the estranged mother of his Democratic opponent, Amy Acton, calling her “a liar.”
“The fact is I know nothing about it. But I hear the mother went very rogue on the daughter,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House. Acton’s birth mother, Donna Arthur, “doesn’t have a lot of respect for the daughter. And I think the mother is a witness to things, also. So who knows,” he went on.
Arthur lost custody of her children after their stepfather was indicted for raping Acton as a child.
Still, Trump called it “a very unusual situation to have a mother hate a daughter that much,” adding: “I don’t think that has anything to do with with Vivek.”
Ramaswamy has claimed credit for the ad and has said he will spend $4 million to promote it.
Trump defends decision not to move on late Sen. Graham’s Russian sanctions bill
The president said criticism of his decision to put on hold the sweeping new sanctions package targeting the Russian economy is coming from “people who don’t know how life works.”
Trump argued that holding off enacting the legislation named after South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham helped pave the way for Wednesday’s release of Stephen Hubbard, an American who had been jailed for more than four years in Russia on charges of fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine.
Graham, who had championed the tougher sanctions package, died in July.
“If you would have put those sanctions on or whatever you want to call them, you could forget about him,” Trump said of Hubbard. “You’d never see him again. He’d be back in jail for 25 years.”
Trump added that his team is also “very close to a deal” to end the Russia-Ukraine war.
“When you’re close to a deal and you have very delicate negotiations, you don’t put sanctions on,” he said.
Trump administration asks Supreme Court to lift halt on Big Bend border wall
The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to let it resume building a border wall project through the Big Bend region of Texas.
The government filed an emergency appeal asking the justices to lift a lower court decision halting construction. That ruling marked a setback to one of President Donald Trump’s signature projects.
The administration has been racing forward with construction on a border wall and other infrastructure from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.
But in the Big Bend region, the administration has run into opposition from ranchers, residents, business owners and environmentalists who argue the projects are a waste of money in an area of historically low illegal immigration and say construction could harm the region’s beautiful landscapes.
Opponents have filed numerous lawsuits seeking to stop the project, which in the Big Bend consists of a mixture of walls, vehicle barriers and surveillance technology.
Biographer for founding father Hamilton has contributed to US Senate candidate Hamilton in Kansas
The $1,000 contribution on Monday from author Ron Chernow is listed among more than 160 donations in a report filed Tuesday with the Federal Election Commission by Democratic candidate Adam Hamilton’s campaign.
Chernow wrote the acclaimed, best-selling 2004 biography of Alexander Hamilton, the nation’s first treasury secretary under President George Washington, who also published dozens of essays defending the U.S. Constitution to help get it ratified in 1788. Chernow’s book helped inspire the acclaimed 2016 musical “Hamilton” on Broadway.
Adam Hamilton is trying to unseat incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall to become the first Democrat in Kansas to win a Senate seat since 1932. He is the founder and senior pastor of the nation’s largest United Methodist church.
Trump says he’s been ‘pretty happy with Russia’ for not getting involved in Iran
U.S. Envoy Steve Witkoff called Vladimir Putin a “humanitarian” after the Russian president freed a U.S. citizen, Stephen Hubbard, who’d been jailed for more than four years.
When reporters asked Trump about Witkoff’s description of Putin as a humanitarian, the president said “well I guess you could say for that particular purpose” of releasing Hubbard, but added, “I wouldn’t say anything one way or the other.”
“We have been pretty happy with Russia” for staying out of the Iran war, Trump continued, noting that the U.S. is still trying to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine.
“So the last thing I want to do is upset an apple cart,” he said, “where we’re getting close to settling a war.”
Sister of imprisoned American Stephen Hubbard says he is in disbelief following release by Russia
Hubbard’s younger sister said she spoke with her brother on the phone after his release and described him as in disbelief.
“He was just laughing because he was just, he said ‘I can’t believe this is happening,’” Patricia Hubbard Fox said during a phone interview as she headed to Denver’s airport to catch a flight to San Antonio to meet her brother.
“He really thought he was going to die in prison,” she added, saying her brother suffered beatings and starvation in prison.
Hubbard Fox said her brother was in perfect health when he was “kidnapped” in 2022 and accused of fighting alongside Kyiv’s forces following Russia’s invasion. Now, she said, he likely has post-traumatic stress disorder from the ordeal and suffers from an enlarged heart.
US orders some diplomats, family members to leave Saudi Arabia as fears of Houthi attacks rise
The State Department is ordering some diplomats and the families of U.S. government employees to leave Saudi Arabia following a series of deadly attacks in the country by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels and rising fears of an escalation in hostilities.
The department said Wednesday it had ordered the departure of non-essential staff at the U.S. embassy in Riyadh and its satellite consulates. The embassy had been badly damaged at the start of the Iran war and had been operating with only a skeleton staff