Georgia Election Board Employee Allegedly Goes Rogue, Requests Federal Intervention

Last week, a letter surfaced from the Georgia Election Board, signed by board executive director James Mills, requesting that the federal government intervene in his state’s election. Addressed to attorney general Todd Blanche and cc-ing Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon and Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin, the letter asked that the agencies get involved with and oversee numerous aspects of Georgia’s 2026 election.

Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office denounced the letter. “People who are serious about election security don’t inject chaos in the eleventh hour,” a Raffensperger spokesperson told MS NOW.

Then, over the weekend, the story got weirder: Members of the state election board alleged that Mills never was authorized by the board to send the letter, and was essentially using his position to freelance ahead of the election.

“We have no control over our executive director, and he does whatever the hell he wants to,” the chair of the board, John Fervier, told reporter Jessica Huseman, who broke that aspect of the story for Votebeat.

The five-member Georgia Election Board, readers may remember, was restructured in 2023 to provide Republicans with a significant majority. President Trump has praised various members of that majority, who have entertained conspiracy theories about the way in which the state conducts its elections. A year before the DOJ launched its own investigation of the 2020 election in Fulton County, the Georgia Election Board ordered one.

Fervier, the chair who accused Mills of freelancing, is a Republican but has frequently clashed with his three Republican colleagues on the board and instead voted with its sole Democrat. He’s also clashed — sometimes very publicly — with Mills, who was hired by the board but is not on the board.

Another Republican member of the board also expressed displeasure with Mills to Votebeat’s Huseman, saying that, though this letter may have been inspired by a resolution the board voted on that urged Raffensperger’s office to begin software updates for voting machines and empowered Mills to seek federal help around those updates, Mills’ requests to the DOJ and DHS went far beyond that. That member, Salleigh Grubbs, also said board members were not given a chance to review Mills’ letter.

“In private enterprise, if I told an employee I wanted to see something before it goes and he did this, we’d be having a very different conversation,” Grubbs said. “I thought we were all on the same team.”

This mess is kind of funny, but also very serious. More broadly, this is the kind of thing we should expect heading into the midterms — an official, and perhaps not even an important official, acting on their own to encourage the Trump administration to get involved in an election and take sweeping action. The DOJ and DHS have not yet responded in any public way to Mills, but the administration has valorized similar figures who have gone rogue, such as former Mesa County, Colorado Clerk Tina Peters. Requests like Mills’ give the DOJ material to spin into whatever narrative it wants.

Bolsonaro’s Son Is on the Cusp of Becoming Brazil’s President

Flavio Bolsonaro, son of Brazil’s former President Jair Bolsonaro, came in first place in the country’s presidential election Sunday with 47% of the vote, beating President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who had 45%. Because neither candidate cleared 50%, the race will now go to a runoff on Oct. 25.

• Jair Bolsonaro, of course, was at the center of a Jan. 6-like auto-coup attempt after Lula beat him in 2022. The younger Bolsonaro has framed his campaign around revenge for his father and his associates, who were handed jail sentences.
• The right has been ascendant in Latin America, with reactionary candidates winning several elections in a row. Many explicitly align themselves with Donald Trump.
• Runoff systems, such as the one in Brazil, have sometimes blunted the rise of far-right factions. I’ll be watching to see if that happens here.
• Brazil is often compared to America in that it more successfully addressed a very similar auto-coup, prosecuting the former president behind it. Should Flavio Bolsonaro win election, that contrast will become less clear cut.

Sen. John Kennedy criticized President Donald Trump on Sunday for publicly sharing what appeared to be Sen. Tom Cotton‘s cellphone number, saying the president can go from “zero to a-hole in three seconds.”

The Louisiana Republican was asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” whether Trump’s attack on a fellow Republican over daylight saving time helps the party just one month before the midterm elections.

“Every now and then there are disputes in Congress that have existential significance for Western civilization,” Kennedy said. “Daylight saving time is not one of them.”

In his typical folksy ramble, Kennedy defended Cotton, R-Ark., who has opposed legislation that would make daylight saving time permanent. “Tom is a rock star senator,” Kennedy said. “If you get between him and what’s best for Arkansas, he’ll devour you like a light snack.”

Kennedy also called Trump a friend before searching for a way to describe the president. “The president, as we know, can be sometimes — um — he exists loudly,” Kennedy said. “He can be tempestuous. He can go from zero to a-hole in three seconds.”

“I don’t think he should have given out Tom’s cell phone number,” Kennedy added. “I don’t think that’s going to help convince Tom.”

Trump spent much of Saturday attacking Cotton for opposing the Sunshine Protection Act, publishing what he said was the senator’s cellphone number and urging Arkansas voters to call him. The president demanded that Republicans “LOCK THE CLOCK” and argued that permanent daylight saving time would provide more afternoon sunlight.

The exchange came after Kennedy offered a blunt assessment of Republicans’ position heading into November. He called cost of living the election’s biggest issue and warned his party against dismissing voters’ economic concerns.

“Telling them not to believe their own lying checkbooks is not going to work,” Kennedy said. “Some of that is our fault,” he added. “We should have done more.”

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Kennedy may also be looking beyond this year’s elections. Asked directly whether he was considering running for president in 2028, Kennedy answered, “Yeah.”

The 74-year-old senator said he currently plans to seek reelection to the Senate but would consider a White House bid if he became dissatisfied with the Republican field.

“If a bunch of goobers run, and I think they’re goobers and one of the goobers might win, and I think I can do a better job,” Kennedy said, “I would consider running.”

The post Sen. Kennedy: Trump goes from “Zero to a-hole in 3 seconds” appeared first on Salon.com.

President Donald Trump has found his latest political opponents: Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, the nation’s clocks and, apparently, darkness itself.

Trump unleashed a series of Truth Social posts Saturday demanding that Cotton stop opposing legislation that would make daylight saving time permanent, arguing Americans deserve more “SUN” in the afternoon.

“If Tom Cotton were putting Arkansas first, he would give them an extra hour of daylight,” Trump wrote.

The Sunshine Protection Act, originally co-sponsored in 2023 by Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM) and former Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), would eliminate the twice-yearly clock change by making daylight saving time permanent. It would not actually increase the amount of daylight, but shift an hour of it from the morning to the evening by the clock.

Trump escalated the dispute by posting what he said was Cotton’s cellphone number and urging Arkansans to call him. Cotton has remained opposed, arguing that permanent daylight saving time would force children to travel to school before sunrise during winter.

No one likes changing the clock, me included, but Congress has enacted permanent Daylight Savings Time multiple times before and repealed it each time once Americans experienced absurdly late sunrises in the winter. Arkansans don’t want their kids going to school in the pitch…

— Tom Cotton (@SenTomCotton) October 3, 2026

Other Senate Republicans, including Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana, have also opposed the measure.

Trump offered several arguments for permanent daylight saving time, including that “CRIMINALS DON’T LIKE WORKING IN THE LIGHT” and that changing clocks in church steeples and municipal buildings is difficult.

He also posted an Oct. 1 letter from PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp supporting permanent daylight saving time. Rolapp cited an industry estimate that additional evening daylight could produce 23 million more rounds of golf and $1 billion in annual revenue.

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Trump claimed a previous U.S. experiment with permanent daylight saving time ended because lawmakers used it as a “negotiating chip” for other legislation.

That’s not what happened.

Congress enacted year-round daylight saving time during the 1970s energy crisis, but public support plummeted amid dark winter mornings and concerns about children traveling to school before sunrise. Congress reversed course before the experiment was scheduled to end.

By Saturday afternoon, Trump had discovered another problem with darkness.

“A table full of very distinguished people just told me that they HATE, immediately after a mandatory time change, going home at night – and it’s DARK,” Trump wrote. “It’s depressing!”

As of publication, the clocks are still scheduled to fall back for most of the country on Nov. 1.

The post “It’s Dark! It’s Depressing!”: Trump demands Tom Cotton release the sun appeared first on Salon.com.

By now, I assume you’ve read about what happened. Maybe you’ve seen the video. But yesterday was one of those rare days we used to have often maybe 15 years ago, when the political media world, and social media sites — even the site formerly known as Twitter — were all having fun with the same thing. That thing, in this case, was the way in which Missouri Senator Eric Schmitt (R) totally and thoroughly beclowned himself.

So, before we return to our reality of third-country removals and executive branch power grabs and billionaires spouting race science, let’s hang out with Schmitt a little longer.

Let’s start with a recap of what happened.

Schmitt, during a Tuesday Senate hearing set up by Senate Judiciary Republicans so they could yell at Jack Smith, lobbed an accusation of perjury at the former special counsel. Schmitt accused Smith of attending an Atlanta Hawks game, where, he suggested, Smith met with Fulton County DA Fani Willis, who was pursuing her own investigation into Trump. This, for Schmitt, would be evidence of … something.

Smith was bemused. He had never seen the Atlanta Hawks play, he said. Schmitt accused him of committing perjury and called him a “dirtbag.” But after Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) intervened, it gradually became clear what might be going on. Smith had gone to an Iowa Hawkeyes game to see Caitlin Clark play. He had not gone to any sporting event in Atlanta.

And indeed that seemed to be the explanation. Schmitt had as evidence shown texts from Smith’s colleagues saying the special counsel would be sitting in seat “109 Row 1.” TPM’s Hunter Walker noticed that the venue where the Hawks played did not have such a seat, but the venue where the Hawkeyes played did. Soon, a video surfaced of a man that appeared to be Smith at the Hawkeyes game.

Here's footage of Jack Smith at the Iowa vs. Maryland game on February 3rd, 2024 btw pic.twitter.com/yItxkEbbTz

— MeidasTouch (@MeidasTouch) September 29, 2026

Was this all part of a coordinated media moment for Schmitt?

Immediately after Schmitt exited the hearing, Benny Johnson, an omnipresent right-wing poster who is part of the Turning Point USA world, wrote on X that Schmitt had “CAUGHT Jack Smith perjuring himself on the stand in his testimony.” Sean Hannity, the Fox News host, posted on X celebrating how Schmitt had put Smith “on the spot.” Neither man apparently caught what happened moments later, when those claims began to fall apart.

As Hunter noted, Schmitt was soon on a Turning Point USA broadcast where the host declared, “Jack Smith is a total dirtbag and you caught him out on this NBA game … in Atlanta … It was a great moment. Good for you on that.”

Schmitt, for his part, seemed to be aware by this point that things had not gone to plan.

“I don’t — you know here’s the thing — my job is to ask the questions. He’s already — and if that’s what his answer is — then that’s what his answer is,” he said. Hard to argue with that.

Schmitt’s icarus moment also came on the same day Axios ran a piece headlined “Sen. Eric Schmitt is drawing buzz as a possible Vance VP in 2028,” written by the site’s co-founder and CEO Jim VandeHei.

Schmitt’s staff may have set their boss up for a big day around his big moment. But, to echo another famous conspiracy theorist, the intel on this wasn’t 100%.

Republicans tried to capitalize on our siloed media ecosystem.

Johnson and Hannity eventually deleted their tweets about Schmitt’s failed effort to do a gotcha, but only after they garnered many thousands of impressions. Their feeds remain full of other, similar posts about the hearing. Many pivoted to posting about questioning of Smith by Schmitt’s Missouri colleague, Senator Josh Hawley (R). Hawley, for his part, found his own reasons to accuse Smith of perjury.

I'd charge Jack Smith with perjury.

He should certainly be disbarred.

This must never happen again in the United States of America pic.twitter.com/TINIcH2Bdv

— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) September 29, 2026

There’s something very of this moment — and of the right-wing media in particular — in how these figures swung into action to celebrate Schmitt’s new conspiracy theory, without noticing or caring that it had fallen apart within minutes of it being floated.

As we know from years of experience, if a claim doesn’t implode quite as spectacularly as this one did, it’s easy enough for these influencers to brazen it out for audiences who may never make contact with reality. Initially, that seemed to be the plan.

Did Schmitt just forget women’s sports exist?

One provocative question I saw raised: was this whole thing the product of Schmitt totally overlooking a topic about which the GOP professes to care quite a bit, women’s sports? “It was the only NBA or NCAA men’s game going on at that time in Atlanta,” Schmitt confusedly told the Turning Point broadcast. The possibility of WNBA or NCAA women’s games went unmentioned.

Relatedly, enjoy Sen. Katie Britt’s (R-AL) stunned expression as Smith explained he attended a Hawkeyes, not Hawks’, game.

The moment Sen. Katie Britt realized Schmitt’s mistake.

pic.twitter.com/9Fb1CHyBE8 pic.twitter.com/4DVJBhS2lz

— Adam Wren (@adamwren) September 29, 2026

Don’t miss Schmitt’s attempt to laugh the whole thing off last night

Who knew Jack Smith was a Caitlin Clark fan?

— Eric Schmitt (@Eric_Schmitt) September 29, 2026

Tabs

• You heard it here first: The Government Accountability Office, an independent watchdog agency within the legislative branch, has found Russ Vought’s latest “pocket rescissions” scheme to be illegal.
• The U.S. has joined Russia and Belarus, the only three countries to withdraw from Group of States against Corruption, a European anti-corruption body, the AP reports.
• As AI bosses beg government to make them stop doing what they’re doing, Trump has responded with a rebranding exercise, changing government descriptions of “artificial intelligence” to refer to “super intelligence,” a shift that I am not sure does anything for anyone. The executives also committed to self-regulating, which wasn’t what they had asked for. Mike Johnson, meanwhile, will support some regulations on these companies, he said, but only if they are voluntary.

Man of the Hour

It’s Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), seen here on the right with a sly grin as he assists Schmitt in floating his conspiracy theory by gripping the corner of this posterboard Schmitt’s staff seems to have made.