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Trump’s US-Russia diesel deal draws bipartisan criticism

2026-10-11T21:26:10.209Z / CNN

By Alison Main

2 hr ago
PUBLISHED Oct 11, 2026, 5:26 PM ET

Russia Donald Trump War in Ukraine

US President Donald Trump stands with Russian President Vladimir Putin, as they meet to negotiate for an end to the war in Ukraine, at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, US, August 15, 2025.

Kevin Lamarque/Reuters/File

President Donald Trump’s diesel deal with Russian leader Vladimir Putin is facing bipartisan blowback in the US as lawmakers warn that the Trump administration is defying a federal law meant to crackdown on Russia after the invasion of Ukraine.

Seven senators, among them four Republicans, released a statement on Sunday asking the Trump administration to “immediately reverse course” on its plan to supply markets with Russian diesel fuel.

The bipartisan group points out that Congress passed a ban on energy imports from Russia in 2022 to “prevent American dollars from financing Putin’s brutal war against Ukraine.”

“President Trump’s decision to allow Russian diesel imports to the U.S. runs directly counter to that law,” the senators said, adding that the administration did not consult with Congress or submit a justification for the decision as the law requires.

“The United States should not provide Putin with a financial lifeline while Russia continues to kill Ukrainian civilians. The Administration must immediately reverse course,” they urged.

Trump announced in a social media post on Friday that Putin agreed in a call to “immediately supply” more than 300,000 tons of diesel to global energy markets, with another 500,000 tons promised in November.

Related article President Donald Trump departs after speaking at a campaign rally, Friday, Oct. 9, 2026, at the Oncenter convention center in Syracuse, N.Y. Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP Trump’s diesel deal with Putin drives a wedge through the Western alliance 4 min read

The White House has scrambled to find ways to decrease skyrocketing fuel prices ahead of this fall’s pivotal midterm elections, though former US officials have said it is unclear whether Putin even has the amount of diesel that Trump cited to sell. Energy market analysts say the amount promised by Trump is unlikely to make much of a difference in global diesel prices.

Sen. Thom Tillis, one of the Republican signatories, along with Sens. Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and John Curtis, predicted the choice to enter into a deal with Russia would have “deadly consequences” by “giving Vladimir Putin any sense that we’re going to put our foot on the brakes versus put on our foot on the accelerator to ending this war and ensuring peace in Europe.”

The North Carolina Republican, who is retiring after this term, said in an interview Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he thinks Trump’s agreement with Russia is “tarnishing Lindsey Graham’s efforts,” echoing a sentiment made by former vice president Mike Pence on Saturday.

Congress passed a bipartisan bill last month spearheaded by the late Sen. Lindsey Graham to place heavy sanctions on countries that import Russian oil and gas.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent contended that the administration is working within both its legal authorities and political mandate to purchase the diesel.

“Look, President Trump they came into office with a with a mandate to work for the American people, and this is good for the American people,” he said in an interview on “Fox News Sunday,” also slamming European critics of the deal as “hypocritical” because they “cannot wean themselves off Russian energy.”

Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso also downplayed the contradictions between Trump’s actions and the broadly popular support for Russia sanctions, arguing that Graham’s law was meant to give the president another “point of leverage” against Putin. “The high diesel prices that are impacting everyone. The president is balancing and has to make tough decisions,” he told CBS on Sunday.

Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, who’s facing a tough reelection race in a Pennsylvania district that Kamala Harris carried in 2024, announced over the weekend that he’ll try to force a House vote on bipartisan legislation to block “any and all purchases of Russian oil.”

The Republican said he plans to introduce the “Ronald Reagan Peace Through Strength Act” and collect the at least 218 signatures needed to bring a bill to the floor under a procedural maneuver known as a discharge petition.

Transcript: Sen. John Barrasso on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” Oct. 11, 2026

2026-10-11T12:04:19-0400 / CBS News

The following is the transcript of the interview with Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso, Republican of Wyoming, that aired on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on Oct. 11, 2026.

MARGARET BRENNAN: And we turn now to Senate Republican Whip John Barrasso, who joins us from Casper, Wyoming. Good morning to you, Senator.

SEN. JOHN BARRASSO: Well, it’s great to be here in Wyoming. I’ll be hitting the trail again tomorrow. It was interesting listening to Chris Murphy ignoring the craziness of the Democrat candidates for the Senate, and that’s why I’m going to be out talking about the difference between the common sense Republicans who I’m supporting and our party is.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.

SEN. JOHN BARRASSO: And the crazy Democrats who’ve been nominated and are now causing the direction of their party to go way to the left.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, I understand you are headed to Midwest and the West. Of the 10 Senate battleground races CBS is tracking, six are Republican held seats. How challenging is this midterm going to be for your party?

SEN. BARRASSO: Well, I’m optimistic with opportunities to pick up seats. New Hampshire, Michigan, Minnesota- you talk about corruption, that’s what we’re seeing in Minnesota in their state run by the- the Democrats. In Michigan, I don’t know if you saw the debate this past week. El-Sayed was on, the Democrat nominee for the Senate in Michigan against Mike Rogers. He was asked, “Who’s more of a threat to the United States, Iran or Israel?” He could not answer and refused to answer the question. Everyone in the world knows that Iran is much more of a threat to the United States. They chant, “Death to America.” Israel is our friend and ally. He would not admit it. Iran is at war with the United States. They’ve been killing Americans for 50 years, and the candidate in Michigan is so extreme that he will not even admit the reality of what the American people see.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, the Republican candidate in Michigan has tried to distance himself from the very war you’re talking about though. Mike Rogers has talked about the Iran war has got to end. He’s acknowledging that the high fuel prices related to it are a problem for him. How do you explain that?

SEN. BARRASSO: Well, everyone wants the war to end. Everyone wants fuel prices to come down who’s a Republican. Democrats don’t seem to want fuel prices to come down. They like high fuel prices. They were a lot higher when Biden was in office than they are today. And when you look about the lawsuits that the Democrats are bringing, you look about the fact that in- in California this past year they shut down two refineries. They are against fossil fuels.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well–

SEN. BARRASSO: Last week at the Supreme Court, there was a lawsuit to say–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.

SEN. BARRASSO: –we want to sue. They do- the Democrats sue oil companies for making gasoline because they say it contributes to climate change.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, it’s- Colorado–

SEN. BARRASSO: Democrats want high gas prices. They want us in electric vehicles, and that’s- that’s the difference.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.

SEN. BARRASSO: That’s the difference between common sense–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Okay.

SEN. BARRASSO: –Republicans and these crazy Democrats who’ve been nominated all around the country.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, Senator, I don’t- I don’t mean to cut you off. I want to let you finish this in a minute when we have more time. So, stay with us while we take the commercial break, and we’ll talk on the other side.

[ANNOUNCEMENTS]

MARGARET BRENNAN: Welcome back to Face the Nation. We return now to our conversation with Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming. Senator, we’re talking about those upcoming midterm races and the pressure of higher fuel prices. We saw President Trump on Friday announce he’s going to start importing Russian diesel fuel to help American farmers, ranchers, and truckers, as he put it. Congress banned Russian energy imports back in 2022. And even more recently, they put in place more possible financial penalties to the buyers of Russian oil. Doesn’t the president’s action violate the laws? And- and how do you justify giving Vladimir Putin a lifeline?

SEN. BARRASSO: Well, the president is focused on getting down the cost of energy. He’s focused on ranchers, farmers, truckers, as you said. I’m right in the middle of that here in Wyoming. This is cattle country. I heard it last night in an event that I was at- the high diesel prices that are impacting everyone. The president is balancing and has to make tough decisions. He’s balancing his effort to stop and end the war of- Putin’s war in Ukraine and lowering prices for American families. What we really need to do long-term is produce more American energy, but we’re running into a problem with the Democrats who want us to produce less American energy and want high energy prices. So, I know what the president is trying to do. I agree, we need to lower the prices and the problem is the Democrats are blocking us long-term from doing what’s going to be best for the American people.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well–

SEN. BARRASSO: We all want this war to end. We want to do it as quickly as possible in a way that Ukraine is protected with long-term peace and that energy prices come down. And the sooner that happens, the safer America will be–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.

SEN. BARRASSO: –and the lower prices will be for American consumers.

MARGARET BRENNAN: But letting Russia sell oil would seem to put money and more mobility to Vladimir Putin and not necessarily make a dent in diesel prices, according to most energy analysts that I’ve read. Former Vice President Pence said the decision to lift sanctions on Russian fuel makes no sense and is a betrayal to the legacy and leadership of the late Senator Lindsey Graham. He’s talking about that Graham Law you voted for. And I know you’ve got to make a decision by October 18, at least the president does, about putting in place the powers you helped to give him to punish buyers of Russian oil. Doesn’t the president’s action make a mockery of that law you just passed?

SEN. BARRASSO: We passed that law to give the president the flexibility and the firepower to use another tool against Vladimir Putin. We want to end this war. We want to get fuel prices down. The president wants that as well. This is just another point of leverage for the president to use against Putin in an effort to get a long-term solution in that- in that part of the world. So, I want him to- I voted for that law. The president signed that law. And he needs to use that because he now has the flexibility to do it in the best interest of world peace and lower energy prices here in America.

MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to ask you about your role on Senate Foreign Relations. You have oversight there. The Wall Street Journal has had a series of reports about the U.S. Ambassador to Greece, Kimberly Guilfoyle. Can you confirm at all that there is an investigation on some level into her actions? Perhaps an inspector general probe, if not something more on the ethics front?

SEN. BARRASSO: Well, what we’ve seen in the reports is very troubling. It’s concerning and I’m sure there’s going to be an investigation. I would assume the State Department would be conducting that. I know that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee will have oversight and look into that as well. But I think the public has a right to know what was- what is found. And it is a- quite a bit of concern.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah. I mean, among the things that were made public by a Trump donor were text messages in which she asked him to give her $100,000 to pay off credit card debt and asked not to put some of these things in writing because it could endanger her job. Are you comfortable with any U.S. official asking someone to pay off debt in exchange for access to government officials?

SEN. BARRASSO: No, I’m not. And you know, we’re going to be back after the elections, but for the next three weeks, we’re going to be out campaigning across the country, and I’m sure we’ll discuss that later. But the focus today is making sure that the American people know just how far to the left the Democrats have gone. And they are now the party, and they have- they have a manifesto. And you highlighted one of the candidates from Florida–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.

SEN. BARRASSO: –the Democrat nominee in Florida. They want to eliminate Immigration and Customs Enforcement, open the border. They want to open the prisons, put these people into our communities. They want to defund the military, defund the police, raise taxes to pay for health care–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well–

SEN. BARRASSO: –for illegal immigrants, and have boys in girls locker rooms. And when you were on with Murphy and you’d asked about the military–

MARGARET BRENNA: Yeah.

SEN. BARRASSO: –the Democrats have blocked the National Defense Authorization Act.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.

SEN. BARRASSO: He says, “well, we ought to not fund things.” This is the first–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well–

SEN. BARRASSO: –time in 65 years that we’ve not passed a National Defense Authorization Act, which funds the military, makes sure–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.

SEN. BARRASSO: –they have what they need to be able to be the warfighters that they are.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.

SEN. BARRASSO: And yet the Democrats are all voting no on supporting our troops.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, he said that he did want more information. He said that briefings weren’t being shared, details weren’t being shared. So, approving money without those briefings is something he said he was not willing to do. Would you ask the administration to be more forthcoming and give details, including on these damage to bases?

SEN. BARRASSO: Well, you’re talking appropriation, I’m talking about the actual authorization act to get- make sure the military has what they want. The Democrats in the Senate–

MARGARET BRENNAN: Got it.

SEN. BARRASSO: –are so afraid of these candidates who have won nominations in primary elections, that when those candidates and their manifesto calls for defunding the military, all the Democrats in the Senate voted against the National Defense Authorization Act. And that’s just wrong.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Senator Barrasso, we will watch what you get done in- on the campaign trail and when we get back to work in November. Thank you for your time. We’ll be right back.

Transcript: Sen. Chris Murphy on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” Oct. 11, 2026

2026-10-11T12:37:28-0400 / CBS News

The following is the transcript of the interview with Sen. Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut, that aired on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on Oct. 11, 2026.

MARGARET BRENNAN: And we’re joined now by Connecticut Democratic Senator Chris Murphy. Good morning–

SEN. CHRIS MURPHY: Good morning–

MARGARET BRENNAN: –Good to have you here in person. Yesterday there were 309 people injured, 12 killed, including one American, in this attack on the airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. President Trump said the U.S. both may join strikes, but also that the U.S. is talking to the Houthis, that’s the Iran-backed group that carried out this strike. Do you support retaliation? And do our Saudi partners who you were just visiting, deserve the American support?

SEN. MURPHY: Yeah, I was in that airport the day before, having visited the Saudis and the Qataris, who are trying to negotiate an end to the war. I mean, listen, what I saw on the ground is a war that is spiraling out of control. You have a dozen dead, a full blown new war between the Houthis in Yemen and Saudi Arabia. You have the Iranians restarting their missile programs. They never- we never eliminated their drone program. They’re restarting a nuclear program. Gas prices are at $6 in some states.–

MARGARET BRENNAN: They are restarting their nuclear program?–

SEN.MURPHY: There’s evidence that it- one of the primary sites in which we think they are digging underground, they are restarting nuclear research activities, gas prices, diesel prices, food prices through the roof, 20 Americans dead, $100 billion spent. If the Trump administration was trying to lose this war, they couldn’t do worse than they are doing. This is a humiliation to the United States. The war is getting bigger and more dangerous, not smaller and more limited. and it’s an advertisement for every single member of the House and the Senate who voted for this war, who continues to support this war, to be booted out of office this November.

MARGARET BRENNAN: But in regard to this particular strike, the U.S. has not committed to retaliating on our partners, the Saudis behalf. Do you think that that would be appropriate?

SEN. MURPHY: No, I don’t think the United States should go to war in Yemen. I mean, this administration is absolutely incompetent in war making. And so, just as we have made the Middle East worse and more chaotic by getting involved in a war against Iran, we would simply escalate and make the situation even more dangerous if we then went to war not only with Iran, but with the Houthis in Yemen as well.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, in many ways, there’s this argument about U.S. credibility in the region and continued presence. The Congressional Budget Office says it’s unable to estimate the cost of damage to American bases because the Pentagon hasn’t provided the information, and the extent of rebuilding is unclear. The extent is unclear because the intent is unclear. And some Democrats have even said they want to shrink the U.S. presence. I believe you also favor drawing down the U.S. military presence. Are you going to vote to rebuild the installations you saw that were damaged?

SEN. MURPHY: Well, I didn’t see any installations. I mean, that’s the issue is that we have no–

MARGARET BRENNAN: –I thought you saw the embassy, that was–

SEN. MURPHY: –Well, I saw the embassy, but the most expensive rebuild would be of the naval base in Bahrain and our air base in Qatar. And right now, members of Congress are being denied the ability to see the damage at these bases. Because there is a cover up underway, there is a cover up underway to try to hide from the American public the cost of this war and the debacle that it has caused in the region. So how could we assess whether we want to rebuild these facilities, if the administration is denying us the ability to see them, or even to understand the scope of the damage? I mean, the- the blockage of basic congressional oversight responsibilities here is absolutely egregious.

MARGARET BRENNAN: You said that you had evidence shared with you of possible rebuilding of Iran’s nuclear program. Was that a classified briefing? Was that a briefing that the administration did share with you?

SEN. MURPHY: No, that’s open source reporting–

MARGARET BRENNAN: –okay–

SEN. MURPHY: –that the Iranians are potentially starting to dig deeper to rebuild some of the capacity–

MARGARET BRENNAN: –Pickaxe Moun–

SEN. MURPHY: at Pickaxe Mountain.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Okay, because the Pentagon does say they need additional funds for the war we are currently in, with Iran. How do you balance the political statement and the intent to end it against the question of whether we are supporting and protecting our people who are still in the region?

SEN. MURPHY: Yeah, the best way to support our troops and our people in the region is to end this war, to unilaterally end American hostilities, and to frankly, ask our partners in the region to do the work of reopening the strait and reopening the Red Sea. The reality is, so long as the potential continues for–

MARGARET BRENNAN: –just walk away.–

SEN. MURPHY: –Well, the president is saying that he is considering after the election, going back to war with Iran. And so, of course, Iran’s response to that is going to be an escalation of the war. The president needs to bring this war to an end, and that will be the quickest way that the waterways will be reopened. Again, this is a president who is showing, just humiliating levels of incompetence in war making and escalation is just going to bring more misery for the American taxpayers and for people who live in that region.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Just to put a fine point on it, I mean, the Iranians want the U.S. to withdraw from the region. Do you favor a drawdown of U.S. troops from the region?

SEN. MURPHY: Well, I think the United States is always going to have to have a presence in that region. But let’s just be honest, we don’t have a naval base any longer in Bahrain. We don’t have an effective base in Qatar because minutes into the war, the Iranians took those bases out. So at the very least, if we’re going to rebuild any capacity in that region, we’re going to have to find a way to protect it. Donald Trump was so fundamentally unprepared for this war that within days of the war starting, our billion-dollar air bases and naval bases in the region were obliterated by the Iranians. Every single American should be furious about that. Not just because Americans died but because their taxpayer dollars at scale were wasted. And so, yes, we should reconsider whether we should rebuild them if we can’t protect them. And this president is incapable of protecting our people in the Middle East.

MARGARET BRENNAN: The Pentagon did disclose yesterday 20 fatalities, American fatalities.–

SEN. MURPHY: Extraordinary.

MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to ask you a bit about politics. Our CBS polling shows Republicans, they do have perhaps a turnout problem compared to Democrats. But when it comes to perception, 58% of registered voters polled by CBS say they view the Democratic Party as weak. What is the affirmative Democratic message other than we’re not Trump?

SEN. MURPHY: Well, I mean, we are in the middle of a war that is a disaster for the American people. I mean, people can’t afford food. They can’t afford to fill their gas tanks, farms are going bankrupt in- the Middle East at a record rate. So let’s just be honest, the most important thing that the American people are thinking about right now is getting these people out of power, because this has been a disaster for the world, for America’s reputation and for the economy. But yes, I think we need to be bold in our ideas and our proposals for how we’re going to fix this mess. And so we should promise that if we win this election, we are not going to fund this war. Right? We’re not going to approve money for the Department of Defense without a commitment from the Trump administration that this war ends. We’re going to take on this corruption, not just Trump’s corruption, but the entire corruption of the federal government. If you elect us, we’re going to work to get billionaire and corporate and anonymous money out of politics. To the extent that people see us as weak, I think historically it’s been because our ideas haven’t been big enough, our tactics haven’t been bold enough. And yes, in the closing days of this campaign, we can promise people, if you elect us, we are going to take on his corruption. We are going to end this war. And that supplemented with the higher prices and the debacle of the war with Iran, I think could result in a landslide.

MARGARET BRENNAN: You’re hitting the trail, as I understand it, North Carolina, Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, you’re going to help out one of our other guests in New Hampshire. But let me ask you about the Florida decision. The Senate candidate, Angie Nixon there has aligned herself with democratic socialists over the summer. Does that give you pause at all? Or when you talk about big ideas, is that the kind of big idea you want to endorse?

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, I also think we should just be a big tent, right? There’s- I think, a pretty big difference between Chris Pappas in New Hampshire and Angie Nixon in Florida. And if we want to win elections, we should welcome people who have a diverse set of ideas into the party. The people–

SEN. MURPHY: –But then you’ve got to govern–

MARGARET BRENNAN: –The people of Florida will decide right, right whether they want Angie Nixon or whether they want Senator Moody, who has basically said nothing about the growing massive corruption scandals in this administration. But as a party, I think we should welcome a lot of different people with a lot of different ideas in and then let the voters decide.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Senator Murphy, thank you for your time today.

SEN. MURPHY: Appreciate it.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Face the Nation will be back in a minute. Stay with us.

DHS secretary defends livestream of Fort Hood shooter’s execution, says he doesn’t see an “elevated risk” to U.S.

October 11, 2026 / 1:41 PM EDT / CBS News

By Kaia Hubbard

Washington — Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin on Sunday defended the Pentagon’s plan to livestream the execution of an ex-Army major who was convicted of the 2009 killing of 13 people at Fort Hood, while saying that he doesn’t see an “elevated risk” to U.S. security amid criticism.

“I think people need to understand, if you attack America, we will come after you and we will make sure that the punishment fits the crime,” Mullin said on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan”.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said last week that the Pentagon planned to publicly livestream the execution of Nidal Hasan, who is set to die by firing squad on Dec. 3 in what will be the first military execution since 1961. The announcement sparked intense criticism, including from some Republicans, like Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who urged the Pentagon to reverse the “gruesome decision,” saying there is “no need to livestream any execution, including this one.”

“I would expect this from terrorists and dictators, but not here in America,” Murkowski wrote in a post on X. “It would give this individual, who deserves no further notoriety, the martyrdom he seeks.”

While Mullin defended the Pentagon’s move, he said, “No one has to watch it if they don’t choose to.”

“I follow President Trump. He’s the commander in chief of the country, and he does a phenomenal job,” Mullin said. “He leads this country with a very, very, very direct, forward, straight hand, and he’s restoring America values.”

Mullin added that he has “no sympathy” for Hasan, adding, “I give absolutely zero thought to the way that this man dies.”

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“My job as secretary of homeland security is to protect the homeland, and that’s what we do,” Mullin said.

The comments come as Vice President JD Vance on Friday cast some doubt on whether the Pentagon will go ahead with the plan, saying he would not tune in if the livestream happens. The vice president said Hasan committed “the worst terrorist attack on American soil outside of 9/11” when he killed 13 people and wounded more than 30 others in the attack on the Fort Hood Army base in Texas in 2009.

“So whatever the controversy is about the method of the execution, I hope that people don’t forget that this is a guy who brutally murdered a lot of innocent people,” Vance said. “Now that said, I mean, look, if it’s ultimately livestreamed, I’m not going to be watching it.”

Mr. Trump told reporters on Saturday that there are two schools of thought on whether to livestream the execution, saying, “I’ll make a decision, ultimately.”

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Early voting figures suggest Democratic gains in Ohio’s most Trump-friendly counties

2026-10-11T16:52:42.803Z / CNN

By Ethan Cohen

3 hr ago

PUBLISHED Oct 11, 2026, 12:52 PM ET

Democratic Ohio Senate candidate Sherrod Brown, a former three-term U.S. senator, speaks at a campaign event in Akron, Ohio, on July 16, 2026.

Sue Ogrocki/AP

After the first days of early voting in Ohio, a state that could help determine control of the Senate, there are clear signs Democrats are more enthusiastic to vote.

So far, affiliated Democrats make up larger shares of pre-election voters than they did two years ago, even in the most Republican parts of the state.

At this point in 2024, Republicans had a 30-percentage point lead over Democrats in counties that voted for President Donald Trump by 20 points or more, according to data from the Ohio Secretary of State. This year, that’s shrunk to just five points.

Voters in other counties have also shifted, including in the counties that voted most strongly for former Vice President Kamala Harris, where they’re about 25 points more Democratic.

That’s based on the latest available set of statewide data, from after early voting on Thursday. There’s evidence from the counties for which later data is available that Friday was slightly better for Republicans.

The data is just the latest sign of a positive midterm environment for Democrats, as former Sen. Sherrod Brown looks to defeat Republican Sen. Jon Husted, and it comes as a CNN poll finds Brown leading by six points. In the governor’s race, Democrat Amy Acton leads Republican Vivek Ramaswamy by eight points.

The overall electorate so far is about 27 points more Democratic than it was at the same point in 2024.

Voters receive stickers at early in-person voting in Cleveland on Wednesday, October 7, 2026.

Sue Ogrocki/AP

It’s important to note that while these signs align with other data that have shown Democrats more enthusiastic to vote this year than Republicans, it’s far from determinative.

Even party registration data doesn’t reveal who voters marked their ballots for, and these trends could change, as Republicans in recent years have much been much more likely to vote early in person or on Election Day.

Plus, it’s still very early. Ohio is at about 11% of its total early voting turnout from 2022.

Related article What early voting data is showing ahead of the 2026 midterms 3 min read

That’s happening at the same time that the state’s most Democratic places are also turning out more quickly than the most Republican places.

Those counties that went most strongly for Harris were at 74% of their turnout from the same point in 2024, while the strongest Trump counties were at 67%.

That gap is similar to the one we’ve seen in Virginia, where there’s also a 7-point difference, according to data from Catalist, a company that provides data, analytics and other services to Democrats, academics and nonprofit advocacy groups, including insights into who is voting before November.

That gap is smaller than it was earlier this month.

A Garden State shift

This partisan difference is also apparent in other states.

Voters in Ohio don’t select a party when they register, but the state reports party affiliation based on which primary a voter participates in. That’s not the case in New Jersey, where voters do register with a party.

Democrats had an unusually weak election in the Garden State in 2024. Former Vice President Kamala Harris beat Trump there by less than 6 points, the narrowest margin for a Democrat since 1992.

The counties that were strongest for Trump have seen the biggest partisan shifts towards Democrats in pre-election voting so far, according to Catalist’s data.

Voters fill in their ballots in privacy booths during early in-person voting in Cleveland on Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026.

Sue Ogrocki/AP

The breakdown of voters who have returned ballots so far in the state’s three counties that voted for Trump by 20 points or more has shifted nearly 11 points toward Democrats compared to this point in 2024.

Turnout is also more Democratic in the strongest Harris counties, but by less than two points.

In-person early voting hasn’t started in New Jersey yet, so these shifts could also reflect Republicans continuing to shift away from voting by mail.

A shift in method

Ohio’s data also reveals a shift in the way people are voting.

Since pre-election voting started, there have been indications that 2026 would continue the trend of Americans moving away from voting by mail after the Covid-19 pandemic.

It’s early in Ohio, but while early in-person voting is at 72% of what it was at this point in 2024, mail voting is at just 25%.

CNN’s Edward Wu contributed to this report.

WATCH: CDC director discusses US government response to Russian plague concerns: ‘We are protected’

October 11, 2026 12:00pm EDT / Fox News

Death of a young worker at a Siberian plague research lab sparked fears and international demands for answers from Moscow

By Alec Schemmel Fox News

WATCH: CDC director discusses US government response to Russian plague concerns

CDC Director Erica Schwartz discusses agency safety efforts amid a reported plague outbreak in Russia at WSJ’s “Future of Health” summit Wednesday. (Credit: The Wall Street Journal and WSJ The Future of Health, Oct. 7)

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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is coordinating with federal agencies to monitor travelers entering the United States from Siberia amid concerns about a possible pneumonic plague outbreak in Russia, the agency’s director revealed Wednesday.

CDC Director Dr. Erica Schwartz said the Trump administration is working across multiple agencies to identify travelers arriving from the region following the mysterious death of a Russian laboratory worker, while emphasizing that the risk to Americans remains minimal.

“We are very confident that the threat to the United States is extremely low,” Schwartz said during a Wall Street Journal health forum Wednesday.

MOTHER OF DEAD RUSSIAN ANTI-PLAGUE INSTITUTE WORKER: ‘I KNOW THE TRUTH’

Darya Shipilova, 28, an employee of the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute of Siberia and the Far East, died after developing pneumonia of an unknown cause, prompting quarantines and heightened health precautions in the region. Russian authorities say testing has found no evidence her illness was linked to pathogens she worked with.(East2West news)

The concerns stem from the Oct. 2 death of Darya Shipilova, a 28-year-old employee of the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute in Siberia, whose death has fueled speculation about a possible pneumonic plague infection.

Russian authorities have maintained that Shipilova died from pneumonia of unknown origin and have not confirmed that she was infected with Yersinia pestis, the bacteria that causes pneumonic plague.

Schwartz said the CDC is working with the departments of Homeland Security, State and War, among other federal agencies, to track potential arrivals from the region.

“There are about 200 flights that come into the United States from Siberia, that region,” Schwartz said, adding that those flights typically arrive at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.

“We have a port health station set up in JFK so that we can do appropriate surveillance and screening if anyone from that area comes into the United States,” she continued.

The CDC director stressed that while pneumonic plague is a serious bacterial infection capable of spreading between people through respiratory droplets, early detection and treatment can prevent deaths.

TRUMP RESPONDS TO CONCERNS OVER SUSPECTED PLAGUE CASE IN RUSSIA, SAYING US ‘WILLING TO HELP’

The Senate confirmed Dr. Erica Schwartz to be the next director of the Centers for Disease Control.(Finn Gomez/Getty Images)

“The one good thing, if I could say there’s a good thing, is that it’s a treatable, highly treatable bacterial disease with common antibiotics that most physicians within the United States can utilize,” Schwartz said.

The illness is caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis and is considered the most serious form of plague, according to the CDC. Symptoms can include fever, chest pain, coughing and rapidly developing pneumonia. Without prompt antibiotic treatment, the infection can be fatal, the agency warns.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has pressed Moscow for additional information about Shipilova’s death.

Russian authorities placed approximately 200 people who had contact with the deceased laboratory worker under quarantine, according to Euronews. On Thursday, Irkutsk Gov. Igor Kobzev said preventive measures had been completed and roughly 5,000 laboratory tests had detected no pathogens, according to the Associated Press.

RUSSIAN RESEARCHER’S MYSTERY DEATH COULD BE ‘FAR WORSE’ THAN THE PLAGUE, FORMER SENIOR TRUMP OFFICIAL WARNS

A view of the entrance to the grounds of the anti-plague institute in the city of Irkutsk on Oct. 7, 2026.(TATYANA MAKEYEVA / AFP via Getty Images)

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However, Russian officials have not publicly identified the pathogen responsible for Shipilova’s pneumonia or definitively ruled out pneumonic plague as the cause of her death, according to The Associated Press.

Asked whether Moscow was being sufficiently transparent with American authorities, Schwartz indicated that the administration was still seeking answers.

“We are still having those conversations about what exactly happened in Siberia,” she said, adding that U.S. officials were working with information about an unconfirmed case of pneumonic plague.

Alec Schemmel is a Politics Reporter for Fox News Digital who is originally from Charlotte, North Carolina but now resides in the Washington D.C.-Baltimore Metro Area.

Kansas GOP Sen. Roger Marshall pays off 6-year-old campaign cookie bill

2026-10-11 1:04 PM ET / CNN

By Alison Main

Republican Sen. Roger Marshall settled his debts this weekend with a bakery in Kansas after a bill for hundreds of treats his campaign ordered for a 2020 event sat unpaid for six years.

Holly Thomas, the owner of the shop that made cookies, brownies and cupcakes for Marshall’s primary election watch party, said in a social media post on Friday that she will not vote for the senator in this year’s election, where he is facing an unexpectedly strong challenge from Democrat Adam Hamilton, after he failed to pay the $678.75 he owed her small business.

“This isn’t about political parties or policy disagreements. It’s about my personal experience as a small business owner and the importance of honoring financial commitments,” Thomas said. “That experience is why Roger Marshall will never get my vote.”

Thomas said she reached out several times but never heard back, noting that the lack of payment came as her business was just beginning and at the height of the coronavirus pandemic. “Six years later, I haven’t forgotten,” she said.

Marshall posted a screenshot of a payment for $1,300 on Saturday, showing that he had paid the half-a-decade-old cookie bill, and then some.

“We have absolutely no idea how this happened, but rest assured as soon as it became known to us, we immediately attempted to contact the business in order to apologize, and we have repaid the bill from 2020, double,” Marshall said on social media.

Thomas confirmed a few hours later that she can “finally mark the invoice paid.”

Senator Roger Marshall listens as US Vice President JD Vance speaks during an event at Webco Manufacturing on September 14, in Olathe, Kansas.

Mark Schiefelbein/Pool/Getty Images

​The Republican senator is facing a competitive reelection race this fall, with voters’ strong disapproval of President Donald Trump and widespread economic anxiety raising the possibility that Kansas could send a Democrat to the Senate for the first time in nearly a century. A recent poll by The New York Times and Siena University showed Marshall tied with Hamilton at 45% among likely voters.

The repayment of the bakery bill come as Marshall, a former obstetrician-gynecologist, has faced criticism over a report last month that he sued hundreds of patients over unpaid medical debt.

The New York Times found that he had filed lawsuits against more than 700 patients with outstanding bills and at least 81 of those individuals were arrested for missing court dates. Democrats have leaned on the story in ads, accusing Marshall of disregarding people’s concerns about healthcare costs.

A spokesperson for Marshall told the Times that the longtime doctor spent many years treating patients regardless of their ability to pay.

“Judges issue warrants when people repeatedly miss court dates, not doctors,” spokesperson Payton Fuller said in a statement to the outlet.

Trump’s multimillion-dollar taxpayer-funded ad campaign ends Sunday, officials say

2026-10-11T19:54:07.756Z / CNN

By Betsy Klein

7 min ago

PUBLISHED Oct 11, 2026, 3:54 PM ET

Donald Trump National security

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President Donald Trump speaks to the media before departing the South Lawn of the White House on October 3.

Aaron Schwartz/Getty Images

The Trump administration has spent $19 million in taxpayer money on the controversial ad campaign to promote President Donald Trump and his policies, a push that officials say will end on Sunday.

The administration allocated $20 million for the ads, which were classified as “public service announcements,” from US Customs and Border Protection, CNN previously reported. An advertising company, LMD Agency Inc., “purchased media buys under the terms of the Order through Sunday, October 11, 2026, at an approximate cost of $19,000,000,” senior Department of Homeland Security official Holly Mehringer said in a sworn declaration in a court case surrounding the ads.

The Department of Homeland Security, which includes CBP, directed LMD “to not make any additional media buys past October 11,” she added. Mehringer noted there are “no plans” to purchase any additional ads.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle expressed concerns about the campaign, and last week, Trump announced that he will pay for the ads with funds raised for his super PAC, MAGA Inc.

The Trump administration created at least 13 campaign-style ads, some of which have aired on TV networks including CBS, CNN, MS NOW, Fox News and Fox. Watchdog groups, including the nonprofit, nonpartisan Common Cause, have said the ads mark a clear violation of appropriations law restricting the use of federal funding for propaganda or partisan communications. Common Cause and the Democratic National Committee separately sued the Trump administration over the ads.

In a response to the Common Cause lawsuit, the Justice Department said in a filing late Saturday that an effort to halt the spending should be denied because the ads “will not continue past tomorrow.”

CNN previously reported that Trump has personally driven the video ads, including helping select the imagery and videos used, according to a source familiar with the matter. Two Trump advisers familiar with the ads said they were being created in-house by the White House video team — which is part of the communications team, responsible for the administration’s public messaging — though at least one of them was produced by a pro-Trump meme group.

Video Ad Feedback

What we know about Trump’s latest taxpayer-funded ad campaign

1:54 • Source: CNN

What we know about Trump’s latest taxpayer-funded ad campaign

1:54

Mehringer, in the court filing, described the ads as “depicting the President of the United States and his administration’s various efforts related to protecting America’s borders, including enhancements of border security by combating drug trafficking,” though that is not the exact substance of many of the ads obtained by CNN.

And while the Justice Department conceded the ads “(attack) a generic list of ‘villains,’” it emphasized they did not “address any specific race, electoral candidate, or party.”

A White House spokesperson said Monday that Trump did not plan to reimburse the government for the money already spent on the ad buys, and Mehringer and other officials did not indicate any plans for a refund.

The White House Office of Management and Budget last month allocated $20 million in taxpayer money from CBP for what it called “OBBBA commemorative events.” (OBBBA is an abbreviation for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which Trump signed into law in 2025.)

Mehringer emphasized in her declaration that that money “did not fund the creation or production of any videos or media” and “only funded the airing of preexisting media.”

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin was pressed during an appearance Sunday on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” on whether the taxpayer dollars would be refunded.

“Anytime we can do a public service announcement and brag about America, I’m all about it,” Mullin said, taking aim at negative coverage of the Trump administration as he pointed to success in securing the border and lowering fentanyl-related deaths.

“We should be bragging about what’s happening inside America,” he said, adding, “I commend the opportunity of President Trump to give us the opportunity to brag about America.”

Trump really wants to make ‘super intelligence’ happen. Is it going to happen?

2026-10-11T16:00:44.935Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/11/politics/super-intelligence-trump-ai

A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.

Unable to convince Americans to embrace the AI data centers they hate, President Donald Trump is instead exercising the one power he believes is absolute in the presidency: a rebrand.

But unlike Lake America, the Gulf of America, military bases or a mountain, this change is about altering public opinion rather than scoring political points.

Trump first told fellow world leaders at the United Nations last month that “use of the word artificial makes intelligence fake, it makes it sound fake.”

After Trump signed an executive order in late September, the US government has been changing official documents and websites. Cabinet secretaries and other aides immediately used the new term.

Elon Musk said on X that he would change the name of his company from SpaceXAI to SpaceXSI, although that particular change has not yet occurred.

Trump has refused to answer questions that use the old term. He told supporters at a campaign rally in Nebraska that he would henceforth repurpose “artificial” — an “ugly” word, he said — for the news media.

On Thursday, the president said on social media that anyone who uses the term artificial intelligence instead of super intelligence will be viewed by his White House as “THE ENEMY!”

All of this might feel very much like Trump’s “weave” — the mental meanderings of Trump’s public statements — but it has also been fascinating to watch the infrastructure of the federal government respond to what many Americans might write off as a semantic distinction.

There are things that are out of Trump’s power — passing spending bills, renaming the Kennedy Center, ending his war against Iran — but he has shown that presidents have power to change names.

It’s also evidence he knows the unpopularity of data centers and concerns about AI in general at a time when he is a major booster of AI.

Will a rebrand be effective?

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has long pushed to view AI as superintelligence. In August, he published a 6,000-word treatise about how Meta would approach AI. In rose assessments of the future, he referred to the promise of superintelligence. When he referred to AI, it was usually in reference to what he argued were unfounded worries. Zuckerberg said Meta will be committed to an open source model that provides for superintelligent agents working on behalf of every individuals.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told Politico’s “Decoded” podcast there are no plans to change the name of his company to OpenSI. But he did say that people in the industry have been using the term superintelligence for a while.

It might be a better term, ultimately, than artificial intelligence, but “still sort of understates the magnitude of what I think is happening,” Altman said.

Altman predicted people would still use the term AI and questioned whether Trump’s rebrand would accomplish its goal of changing people’s opinions of AI.

“Does superintelligence sound obviously less scary to people than artificial intelligence?” Altman wondered. Time will tell.

What is definitely true is that the concept of superintelligence, while it sounds better in Trump’s view, is arguably distinct from AI and should be no less intimidating to Americans.

The term artificial intelligence has its roots in the 1950s, when a group of Dartmouth professors held a summertime conference “on the basis of the conjecture that every aspect of learning or any other feature of intelligence can in principle be so precisely described that a machine can be made to simulate it.”

Superintelligence, at least academically, seems more like the next step of artificial intelligence, or artificial generative intelligence. That happens when the machines learn.

The Oxford philosopher Nick Bostrom has written extensively about superintelligence, including in the 2014 book “Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies.”

Here’s how Bostrum first defined superintelligence in a 1997 essay:

Asked how he views Trump’s rebrand, Bostrum said that from a technical perspective AI has traditionally “been this wide umbrella term that refers to every form of intelligent information processing in machines.”

We’re talking everything from the Google searches and email spam filters, the current crop of AIs and “hypothetical future more powerful ones.”

“If the idea is to use the new word superintelligence to cover all of that, it’s a little bit of a stretch, maybe, to call my spam filter a superintelligence,” Bostrum told CNN.

In the theoretical evolution of AI, what comes next, he said is AGI, or artificial general intelligence, which refers to a system that has the same kind of learning and reasoning as humans, something Atman says might already have occurred.

“Superintelligence was reserved for this sort of hypothetical future form of artificial intelligence that not only matched but radically exceeded humans across all cognitive domain,” according to Bostrum.

That is exactly the thing that frightens the AI “doomers.” But it is incomprehensible to Trump that the machines could outwit him.

“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!” Trump wrote in September, arguing against any sort of AI regulation.

Bostrum has written both about potential pitfalls of superintelligence as well as the enormous potential to improve and extend human life. But by changing the name, Trump seems to just want to control the narrative.

Bostrum doesn’t necessarily think it’s a bad idea.

“It’s not up to me to decide how English language should be used,” he said. “I mean, it’s good for my book sales, I guess.”

He does see the rhetorical argument for a new term: It’s harder to argue against super intelligence than artificial intelligence.

“If you define superintelligence as we already have superintelligence and it hasn’t caused any catastrophe yet, then what’s the big deal? And you then would need to introduce some new term to refer to this like hypothetical future capability that’s even more powerful.”

Trump knows a thing or two about saying things so much that they take hold in the public. He rarely speaks in public without repeating the same talking points about “fake” news, the “radical left” Democrats, or about how wonderful his own leadership has been, regardless of what the facts are.

At the UN, Trump compared his rebrand to the evolution of “global warming,” which he said was “reborn to climate change because the planet was cooling, not warming, and nobody was dead.”

That’s not exactly what happened, as anyone paying attention to the warming climate in recent years can pretty easily confirm.