Principals

1. GOP spending in Nebraska
2. Reality check on climate
3. A future Republican power player
4. Blinken in Israel
5. Arab American poll
6. Trump’s Social Security math problem
7. Tight race outside Detroit

PDB: Paul Whelan speaks about his detention in Russia

NBC and Telemundo to interview Harris … Trump in North Carolina … WSJ: GOP eats into Democrats’ advantage on early vote

Republicans move to shore up Nebraska Senate race

A “mess.” A “disaster.” These are a few of the words used to describe the GOP’s situation in Nebraska, where Sen. Deb Fischer is trying to fend off independent Senate candidate Dan Osborn. Now, after being pummeled by left-leaning outside groups, Republicans are doing something about it, Semafor’s Burgess Everett reports. The Senate Leadership Fund super PAC is pouring in $3 million to the state, joining other GOP groups on the airwaves and cutting into Osborn supporters’ advantage. Sen. Chuck Grassley’s Hawkeye PAC is also running radio ads (listen here) across the state seeking to get his midwestern neighbors to vote for Fischer — or at least against Osborn, whom Grassley insists would caucus with the Democrats (Osborn hasn’t said which party he will caucus with). Combine that with Rep. Don Bacon’s tough reelection campaign, and Nebraska is getting interesting.

What to expect on climate, depending on who wins

In the two weeks before the US election on Nov. 5, our Reality Check series explains the clear Washington policy implications — which are often a long way from campaign rhetoric.

Kamala Harris hasn’t said a lot about her climate change plans, but she’s likely to continue in the vein of the Biden administration — which passed the largest-ever US clean energy law. Donald Trump, on the other hand, is prepared to return to the pro-fossil fuel agenda of his first term if he wins. Look for Trump’s administration to pull out of the UN’s Paris climate pact and focus on unwinding the Biden team’s executive actions on climate. Congressional Republicans also might try to reverse part or all of that clean energy law if Trump wins. That reflects a lopsided role for Congress in action on climate. A President Harris would try to do more with her rulemaking power, given Republicans’ longtime resistance to climate legislation, while a President Trump would look to the Hill for oil and gas-friendly proposals, particularly if the GOP takes full control of Congress.

— Elana Schor

A future Republican power player

If congressional candidates had superlatives, this year Brian Jack might win Favorite for GOP Freshman Class President. The Peachtree City native is expected to win the open seat in Georgia’s 3rd Congressional District next month, and Republican luminaries are coming out in force for Donald Trump’s former White House political director: House Majority Whip Steve Scalise stumped for him last week and Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan is scheduled to visit the district for the second time today.

Jack is already seen as a potentially pivotal liaison between Trump and House Republicans should the former president win this year, having also advised former Speaker Kevin McCarthy. “He swims pretty frequently in the Donald Trump pool, which makes him such a perfect rising star in Congress,” former Trump aide Hogan Gidley told Semafor. Remember Trump’s stopover at that Georgia Chick-fil-A last April? Jack was there.

— Kadia Goba

Blinken pushes elusive ceasefires in Israel

Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel to advance US efforts to calm high tensions in the Middle East. The Biden administration is hoping for progress on ceasefires in Gaza as well as Lebanon, where a top Biden adviser warned the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah had “escalated out of control.” Hezbollah fired missiles at an Israeli base near Tel Aviv hours before Blinken touched down in the country while Israel launched a strike near a Beirut hospital, underscoring the difficulty of brokering a deal to end the conflict. Blinken is meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top officials, and will also discuss Israel’s plans for retaliating against Iran. It’s the top US diplomat’s 11th trip to the Middle East since last Oct. 7, when Hamas waged its attack on Israel.

Trump holds edge with Arab Americans

Donald Trump holds a razor-thin edge over Kamala Harris among Arab American voters even as they view him as more supportive of Israel’s government, Semafor’s Morgan Chalfant reports. Forty-five percent of respondents in a new Arab News/YouGov poll said they are most likely to vote for Trump, while 43% said they would likely cast ballots for Harris. Even so, Trump is seen as more supportive of the Israeli government, while Harris is seen as more sensitive to the national needs and problems of Arab Americans in the US. Harris campaigned Monday with Republican former congresswoman Liz Cheney in Michigan, which boasts a significant Arab-American population, while Trump warned on Truth Social that the Middle East would “spend the next four decades going up in flames” if Harris is elected.

Trump plans would speed up Social Security insolvency

Donald Trump has boasted in recent ads that he’ll cut seniors’ taxes, but he could speed up a funding crisis for Social Security by doing so, according to a new report. The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimated that Trump’s proposals to exempt Social Security checks, tips, and overtime from payroll taxes; deport migrant workers; and enact blanket tariffs would raise program costs and lower revenue, making Social Security insolvent by 2031 instead of current projections of 2034. Trump’s campaign blasted the “so-called experts” in response, while the Harris campaign argued Trump posed “an imminent threat to Social Security.” Retirement programs are a mainstay of closing election messages, and both campaigns are currently running misleading ads accusing the other side of threatening seniors’ benefits. It’s worth keeping an eye out on whether newer headlines generated by the CRFB report start popping up in TV spots.

— Benjy Sarlin

Sergio Ermotti, Group CEO, UBS; Vincent Van Peteghem, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, Belgium; Ali Zaidi, White House Climate Advisor; Lael Brainard, Director, White House National Economic Council; and Amos Hochstein, Senior Advisor to the President for Energy and Investments, White House, will join the Fall Edition of Semafor’s World Economy Summit. Hosted in the Gallup Great Hall and spanning four sessions over two days — Oct. 24 and 25 — Semafor will feature on-the-record interviews on the state of global finance, the future of technology, digital payment infrastructure, and sustainability.

RSVP for the World Economy Summit here.

Polling shows tight House race in suburban Detroit

Public and private polling found a tight House race outside Detroit, where GOP Rep. John James is seeking reelection after a closer-than-expected 2022 win. In data first provided to Semafor, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee found a 47-47 race between James and former Judge Carl Marlinga — a rematch of a race national Democrats largely abandoned. (It also found Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin in a close Senate race with ex-Rep. Mike Rogers.) Michigan’s 10th District covers the sort of suburbs where Democrats have been competitive since 2016, but Republicans think the party is reaching for a new target to make up for a potential loss in Slotkin’s open seat. “Liberal lawyer Carl Marlinga defended child abusers and pedophiles at the expense of their victims,” said NRCC Spokesman Mike Marinella, predicting that voters “will reject his campaign of lies and deflection again.”

— David Weigel

Beltway Newsletters

Punchbowl News: Republicans are privately raising concerns about 91-year-old Sen. Chuck Grassley’s ability to lead the Senate Judiciary Committee next year if Republicans retake the Senate. “Chuck is extremely sharp. A lot of it is just his disposition — he’s not a knife fighter. He’s just too genteel for that,” one Republican senator on the panel said.

Playbook: Brooke Rollins, Kevin McCarthy, and Susie Wiles are the names most talked about to serve as White House chief of staff in a second Donald Trump administration.

WaPo: Some of Washington’s lobbying firms saw strong revenue in the third quarter as companies gear up for a looming tax fight.

Axios: Corporate America has moved to the left.

White House

• President Biden is headed to New Hampshire today for an event with Sen. Bernie Sanders focused on cutting health care costs.

Economy

• BlackRock’s Larry Fink said the US election outcome “really doesn’t matter” for financial markets.
• Colorado Gov. Jared Polis asserted that Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs would be a “complete disaster for the United States,” arguing that universal tariffs would damage US advanced manufacturing because of the retaliatory levies they would inspire.

Business

• Disney plans to name Bob Iger’s successor in 2026.

Courts

• The Supreme Court rejected Michael Cohen’s appeal to revive his lawsuit against Donald Trump, which claimed he was jailed for publishing a memoir that criticized the former president.
• The Black and Latino men known as the Central Park Five, who were wrongly convicted and later exonerated in the 1989 rape and assault of a jogger in New York City’s Central Park, sued Trump for defamation.

Polls

• Roughly half of US adults rate both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris positively when asked to score them on a 10-point favorability scale, according to a new report from Gallup, which says that puts them on the lower end of that scale when compared to nominees scored dating back to 1956.

On the Trail

• The Cook Political Report shifted the Pennsylvania Senate race to a “toss up” and the Nebraska Senate race to “lean Republican.”
• Cannabis reform is emerging as a bipartisan issue this election. — WSJ
• A video attacking Tim Walz that was posted to X featured someone impersonating one of his former students. — WaPo
• Donald Trump is now pushing for easier voting access in North Carolina following Hurricane Helene.

National Security

• The Commerce Department added companies from China, the UAE, Egypt, and Pakistan to its trade restrictions list in a bid to crack down on entities aiding China and Iran’s weapons programs.

Foreign Policy

• Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced $400 million in additional security aid for Ukraine.
• China and India reached an agreement to resolve their border tensions.
• Moldova narrowly backed a referendum to join the European Union.

Technology

• The Biden administration awarded $325 million to Hemlock Semiconductor for an expansion of its facility in Michigan.

Media

• Olivia Nuzzi is out at New York magazine.
• News Corp’s Dow Jones, the parent of The Wall Street Journal, and the New York Post are suing generative AI search engine Perplexity for copyright infringement.

Big Read

• Paul Whelan thought his arrest in Russia for espionage in December 2018 was a prank, he told The New York Times. While being held at Moscow’s infamous Lefortovo Prison, he survived emergency hernia surgery where half the lights didn’t work and doctors dropped instruments on the floor, picked them up, and kept going. At a labor camp after being convicted, his diet was better suited for cats and he did sewing work on winter uniforms for government workers. He said he was devastated by being left behind in the 2022 transfer involving basketball player Brittney Griner and arms dealer Viktor Bout. “I was obviously not as important as others.”

Blindspot

Stories that are being largely ignored by either left-leaning or right-leaning outlets, curated with help from our partners at Ground News.

What the Left isn’t reading: Finance expert Dave Ramsey explained why he’s supporting Donald Trump.

What the Right isn’t reading: Infant death rates rose in the US after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

Principals Team

Editors: Benjy Sarlin, Elana Schor, Morgan Chalfant

Reporters: Burgess Everett, Kadia Goba, Joseph Zeballos-Roig, Shelby Talcott, David Weigel

Mohammed Sergie is the editor of Semafor Gulf, which is hosting a launch event in DC today.