What to know about the 2022 midterms
- Control of the Senate is likely to come down to a handful of tight contests in states such as Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania.
- All 435 House seats are up for election in the midterms — but just 33 seats are rated as “toss-ups,” according to the nonpartisan Cook Political Report.
- Candidates who have denied or questioned the results of the 2020 election are running for governor, secretary of state and attorney general — positions that play important roles in elections — in a number of states.
- As of Sunday, 22,325,793 ballots had been cast nationwide. NBC News is tracking the early vote here. Plan your vote here. Election Day is Nov. 8.
Analysis: The six types of races that will decide House control
Republicans need to pick up at least five seats to take back the House in the midterm elections, and three structural advantages have made them favorites all along: redistricting, Democratic retirements and candidate recruitment.
As the abortion issue and a renewed focus on former President Donald Trump have awakened and energized Democratic voters, the fight for the House has become increasingly competitive.
Those structural factors once looked like a small component of potential big gains for the GOP in a “red wave” scenario. Now, they look like a valuable insurance policy for Republicans in a fluid political environment, without which House control might be a toss-up.
Liz Cheney takes out ads hitting election deniers in Arizona
PHOENIX — Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., hit the TV airwaves in Arizona on Friday, putting up a $500,000 ad buy targeting Kari Lake and Mark Finchem, the Republican candidates for governor and secretary of state, respectively, who have repeatedly said they would not have certified Joe Biden’s 2020 win in the state.
The 30-second ad, shared first with NBC News, includes Cheney’s remarks in Tempe this month when she spoke to a group gathered by the McCain Institute.
“I don’t know that I have ever voted for a Democrat, but if I lived in Arizona, I absolutely would,” Cheney says.
Read the full report on the Meet the Press blog.
Law enforcement warns of conspiracy-driven violence ahead of midterms
U.S. law enforcement has circulated bulletins warning that conspiracy theorists could become violent around the midterm elections on Nov. 8.
The bulletins, obtained by NBC News, are unclassified but intended only for law enforcement.
One of the bulletins, issued Friday by the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the National Counterterrorism Center and marked “for official use only,” warned about domestic violent extremism, or DVE in law enforcement circles.
“We assess that election-related perceptions of fraud and DVE reactions to divisive topics will likely drive sporadic DVE plotting of violence and broader efforts to justify violence in the lead up to and following the 2022 midterm election cycle,” the bulletin said.
Text messages with misleading election info hit voters in two states
Voters in at least two states have received false information about how to vote through text messages in recent days, with little idea who’s behind them.
The secretaries of state in Kansas and New Jersey warned Monday that voters had been sent incorrect instructions about where to find their polling places. It wasn’t immediately clear how many people received the text messages.
The messages appeared to have been personally tailored, with voters getting similar texts identifying names and addresses for the voters and purported polling locations, signed by a group called “Voting Futures.”
Both states recommended that voters visit their official elections websites for authoritative voting locations: vote.nj.gov for New Jersey and VoterView for Kansas.
Unfounded conspiracy theories fuel drop box patrol in Arizona
Pro-Trump volunteers are circling at an Arizona ballot drop box, inspired at least in part by months of conspiracy-driven online discussion.
Read the full exclusive report here.
On Friday, a federal judge rejected a request for a restraining order against the group organizing the patrols.
Biden criticizes record profits at U.S. oil companies as a 'windfall of war'
President Joe Biden on Monday criticized oil companies earning record profits over the past six months for not using the money to invest more in U.S. oil production to help lower the cost of gas for consumers.
“Enough is enough,” Biden said in brief remarks at the White House.
“Oil companies’ record profits today are not because they are doing something new or innovative. Their profits are a windfall of war,” Biden said, referring to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February. “At a time of war, any company receiving historic windfall profits like this has a responsibility to act beyond their narrow self-interest of its executive shareholders.”
The high cost of gas has been a major issue for voters heading into the midterm elections and a sticking point for the White House as it has tried to boost Biden’s approval ratings.
Biden said he would have more to say about the subject when Congress returns after Election Day.
Democrats pour money into deep blue seat in New York
Monday brought another example of Democrats desperately trying to shore up candidates in some deep blue House districts in the campaign's homestretch, a sign that the GOP is wading further into Democratic terrain in its quest to retake the majority.
House Majority PAC, the super PAC aligned with Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., booked $275,000 in TV ads starting Tuesday to give air cover to two-term Rep. Joe Morelle, D-N.Y., according to ad-tracking firm AdImpact.
Morelle's 25th District in upstate New York favored Joe Biden over Donald Trump by nearly 20 points in 2020.
Morelle is squaring off against La’Ron Singletary, the former Rochester police chief, who’s made rising crime a central issue in the campaign.
Democrats are also spending big to defend seats in California, Oregon, Connecticut, Rhode Island and other blue states.
Democrats have launched a mission to save their campaign chief
For the second time in as many election cycles, Democrats are launching an eleventh-hour rescue mission to save the very House campaign chief responsible for protecting vulnerable incumbents and preserving their fragile House majority.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee decided to spend more than $600,000 on TV ads to bolster its chairman, Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney of New York, as cash-rich Republicans dumped millions into the once-sleepy race and Democrats retreated in other battleground districts around the country.
The fresh spending is on top of another $110,000 from Our Hudson, a super PAC backing Maloney as he runs in a new district based in the lower Hudson Valley that President Joe Biden won by 10 points just two years ago.
Stefanik, Zeldin to hold upstate New York rally for GOP candidates
Lee Zeldin, New York's Republican nominee for governor, is set to hold a joint rally Thursday with Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., the chair of the House Republican Conference.
The "Save Our State Rally" will be Thursday evening in Castleton-on-Hudson, a village south of Albany that's part of Stefanik's 21st Congressional District, which remains a safe Republican seat. The rest of the district covers much of upstate New York, bordering Canada and Vermont.
Other Republican candidates running in statewide races will also be featured.
Zeldin, a House member from New York's 1st District, is running to unseat Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates their race as tilting likely Democratic, but recent polls have shown it tightening.
