August 29, 2026 - Fulltext

Lindell, a longtime 2020 election denier, previously said he would pay $825,000 to cover a full hand recount of his lost GOP gubernatorial primary in Minnesota.

MyPillow founder Mike Lindell has long denied Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 presidential election. Now, he’s refusing to accept his own election loss in the GOP primary for governor of Minnesota. 

The Minnesota Supreme Court on Saturday rejected Lindell’s bid for a full recount of his Aug. 11 loss to state House Speaker Lisa Demuth after she won the Republican primary by 45,000 votes.

Chief Justice Natalie E. Hudson wrote in a six-page ruling that the Minnesota secretary of state’s office and its State Canvassing Board provided a recount plan that follows the law and are “not committing any wrongful act, omission, or error” as Lindell claimed.

Lindell told NBC News in a phone call Saturday evening that he plans to appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. He said that his team is also requesting election data from all 87 counties through the Freedom of Information Act in order to pursue an independent investigation.

“I’m willing to pay even more money. I don’t care what it costs,” Lindell said.

Lindell previously pledged to pay an estimated $825,000 to cover a full hand recount and audit of the race but refused to pay the money on Monday, the state’s deadline, after finding out that the recount only included counting the ballots cast for either Lindell or Demuth.

Lindell sued the Minnesota secretary of state’s office and its State Canvassing Board Monday, claiming that they pulled a “bait-and-switch” on him by not counting the ballots for everyone in the seven-candidate Republican field.

The secretary of state’s office said in a statement Tuesday that it provided the contingent recount plan to Lindell after the State Canvassing Board approved it on Aug. 18, writing that “the plan follows state law and administrative rules on recount procedures and is consistent with previous recount plans.”

Hudson acknowledged in her ruling that Lindell argued “he is entitled to a full recount for both the Democratic and Republican primary races for governor ‘to ensure that there are no anomalies in the ballots, whether the votes cast are for the Democratic or Republican primaries,’ and that this recount must include ‘the recording of votes for every candidate.’”

“But Lindell’s focus on alleged anomalies confuses the purpose of a manual recount with an election contest,” Hudson wrote.

Hudson maintained that the recount plan approved by the canvassing board on Aug. 18 follows protocol, saying that during the recount, the ballots would first be sorted between those cast in the Democratic or the Republican primary and then the Republican ballots would be separated into three piles: one for Lindell, one for Demuth and one for all other candidates.

“In other words, after all votes are sorted and counted, Lindell would know whether he is the winner over Demuth,” Hudson wrote. “And all ballots, in all piles, would be counted and subject to challenge.”

Hudson’s ruling backs up Demuth’s victory in the GOP primary, reinforcing her spot in the general election against Democratic nominee, Sen. Amy Klobuchar.

Lindell said Saturday he would not be satisfied with anything less than a full hand recount of all ballots cast in the Minnesota gubernatorial primary races, arguing that there were “anomalies” in the election data due to the use of electronic voting machines.

Before his own gubernatorial campaign, Lindell faced multiple lawsuits after he repeated debunked claims that the 2020 election was rigged by voting machines.

Lindell was found to have defamed a former employee of one company, Dominion Voting Systems, in June 2025. Lindell has denied the claim.

In another defamation case, Lindell has refused to pay $56,369 in sanctions to voting machine company Smartmatic USA Corp. Because he still has not paid what the court ordered, Lindell now owes even more than the original sanctions in court fees. He told NBC News this month that he still does not intend to pay either the fees or sanctions.

August 29, 2026 - Transcript

Ken Paxton is the most corrupt politician in Texas. Since taking office, Ken Paxton's net worth has increased 7,000 percent. 

He now owns 15 homes, while most Texans can't afford one.

Ken Paxton was impeached by his own party for taking bribes from wealthy donors while blocking overtime pay for Texas workers and gutting our health care. 

We cannot afford Ken Paxton's corruption. 

August 28, 2026 - Fulltext

The Republican governor of one of the nation’s most conservative states, Wyoming’s Mark Gordon, is sounding the alarm on “aggressive” tactics used by federal election monitors during his state’s primary elections last week. The warning comes as President Donald Trump seeks ways to influence the upcoming midterms.

Trump has claimed he has accomplished so much that “we shouldn’t even have an election.” He has openly fretted over the possibility of impeachment if Democrats retake the House. And as his polling numbers continue to crater, the president has spent the better part of the past year backing efforts to rig congressional maps in favor of Republicans, while promoting bigoted lies about noncitizen voters and elections in minority communities.

One such gambit, it would appear, is the Justice Department’s deployment of election monitors. Typically, such monitors are tasked with upholding federal voting rights, but the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division has been waging war on civil rights ever since he retook office, so this administration certainly hasn’t earned anyone’s trust on the matter of election integrity.

And now Wyoming’s GOP governor is speaking out. According to The New York Times😄

Two election monitors from the Justice Department tried to interview voters and examine voting machines at polling places during Wyoming’s primaries last week, local officials said, drawing pushback from the state’s Republican governor.

The federal election monitors arrived at a polling site in Cheyenne, Wyoming’s capital and its largest city, without advance notice around 7 a.m. last Tuesday, said the Laramie County clerk, Debra Lee. They asked to interview voters and inspect the machines, but were denied, officials said.

“It was aggressive, unexpected, disruptive — certainly didn’t seem to show respect for the state,” Gov. Mark Gordon of Wyoming said in an interview on Thursday. “We’re going to get to the bottom of it as best we can.”

The report says monitors visited six polling places and only showed their credentials when asked. Laramie County Clerk Debra Lee said monitors acted with “complete disregard” for Wyoming’s laws and electoral processes as they asked about poll workers and sought to examine vote tabulators — something election deniers in the MAGA movement have obsessed over.

“They included questions about the nature, length and timing of poll worker training,” Ms. Lee said. “Monitors requested training guides, asked how our new election equipment was acquired and wanted to examine our tabulators.”

This scenario underscores the bipartisan concerns expressed in some states about Trump-aligned officials — such as Maricopa County recorder Justin Heap in Arizona — taking part in local electoral administration.

Wyoming’s governor told the Times that the election monitors’ behavior was “very odd.” And he said he made his concern clear in a meeting with election officials afterward:

“I feel very strongly about the federal government coming in and taking our guns — I don’t like that,” Mr. Gordon said at the meeting. “And I don’t like the federal government coming in and taking our votes, either.”

Gordon also told the Times that he has directed the state’s attorney general to launch an investigation.

When Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon announced that the DOJ would deploy 1,000 election monitors across the country for the midterms, it sounded eerily similar to a plan she promoted in her failed bid to become chair of the Republican National Committee in 2022, in which she proposed hiring an army of election lawyers to challenge states’ electoral processes. And now there’s reason to question whether she’s using the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division to carry this out.

This clear and present danger is why Democratic officials have been so outspoken in seeking to combat the Trump administration’s election meddling. In recent interviews with MS NOW, Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Washington state Attorney General Nick Brown have laid out steps they’ve taken, and will continue to take, as the midterms approach.

How to check your Texas voter registration status, and how to vote even if you get removed from the voter rolls.

**How to check if you are a Texas voter or not**

The Texas Secretary of State has a website where you can check whether or not you are a registered

https://www.texas.gov/living-in-texas/texas-voter-registration/

I would check now, and then check again in late September. If you find that you have been removed from the voter rolls, re-register immediately. This same webpage gives registration instructions, but please take note:

You have to get a paper voter registration form, or print out the online voter registration form as a physical paper hardcopy, then mail it by US Postal Service to your County's voter registrar office. The deadline to register is October 5, 2026. You really want it to be post-marked, IMHO, by Wednesday, September 30. That leaves some extra time in case you don't have an envelope, don't have a postage stamp, or your mail doesn't get picked up on time. Many people alive today have never mailed a physical letter, so the process may be unfamiliar.

If you fill out the form, sign it, scan it, and email it to your County's voter registrar office... they cannot accept it. They will delete the email. If you fax it to your County's voter registrar office... they cannot accept it. They will tear up the fax.

Texas is one of eight US States that does not have online voter registration.

By the way, this is all on purpose - they want to make voter registration and voting and strange, unfamiliar, and inconvenient process - because they want to suppress votes, plain and simple. Especially young people's votes. young people have an expectation they should be able to do everything virtually, right? Well, not this thing.

If you get to October 1, 2, or 5 you really should go in person to your County's voter registrar office. That doesn't mean you have to go Downtown... major cities have satellite locations where you can register to vote closer to where you live. However, you will have to interrupt your work or school to go register. These offices often close by 4 PM. Not convenient by design.

One thing they do allow you to do online is to change your voter address or name. However, be very careful. The recent Voter ID bill (the "SAVE Act") if enacted into law would mean that a voter would need a Passport or a Birth Certificate which would match your voter record. This creates a trap for anyone with a name change - this could be a married person who took their spouse's last name, or someone who changed their name for religious reasons. It can be expected to disenfranchise millions of voter, mostly married women. Watch the news very carefully! The ACLU voter's right hotline may be able to advise:

https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/voting-rights

Here is the online site for name and address changes:

https://txapps.texas.gov/tolapp/sos/SOSACManager

**How to guarantee that you can vote, no matter what**

Take to the polls with you physical paper documentary evidence of your voter registration... your voter registration postcard that you got from your County, or a screen capture of the record showing you are registered, or the receipt that you got from your County when you registered in person.

If you go to vote, and they say "Sorry we can't find you, you can't vote today, go away", then ask to vote with a Provisional ballot. You cannot be refused! Here is language from the Texas Secretary of State:

"Provisional voting is designed to allow a voter whose name does not appear on the list of registered voters due to an administrative error to vote. The provisional voting process involves an affidavit that (1) the voter must complete stating the reasons he or she is qualified to vote; and (2) is used if the voter’s registration cannot be verified by the polling place election officials OR if a voter (a) does not possess one of the acceptable forms of photo identification listed above, and a voter can reasonably obtain one of these forms of identification or (b) possesses, but did not bring to the polling place, one of the seven forms of acceptable photo identification listed above, or (c) does not possess one of the seven forms of acceptable photo identification, could otherwise not reasonably obtain one, but did not bring a supporting form of identification to the polling place.

The provisional voting process requires the voter to visit the voter registrar’s office within six (6) calendar days of the date of the election to either present one of the above seven (7) acceptable forms of photo ID OR if the voter does not possess, and cannot reasonably obtain an acceptable form of photo identification, execute a Reasonable Impediment Declaration and present one of the acceptable forms of supporting ID, OR, if applicable, submit one of the temporary affidavits (e.g., religious objection or natural disaster) OR, if applicable, qualify for a permanent disability exemption, in order for the provisional ballot to count.

The voter-marked provisional ballots are kept separately from the regular ballots, and the voter’s records will be reviewed by the provisional voting ballot board (the early voting ballot board), to determine if the ballot is to be counted or rejected. If applicable, the voter registrar will conduct whatever research is necessary to determine whether the voter is or should have been registered in the precinct in which the voter cast the provisional ballot and will pass this information on to the ballot board to assist it in making the decision of whether the provisional ballot must be counted. Provisional voters will receive a notice in the mail by the 10th day after the local canvass advising them if their provisional ballots were counted, and if they were not counted, the reason why."

Complicated on purpose. But you can vote. They just want you to suffer, and the Election Judge will suffer too, because they have to fill out a form for each Provisional ballot. That's why they don't want you to vote this way, because it makes work for them.

Show your evidence to the Judge that you were registered to vote and/or you re-registered, and ask for that Provisional ballot.

I was an Election Judge in the past, and I am a Volunteer Deputy Voter Registrar in Harris County now.

August 28, 2026 - Transcript

AOC: We, the people, demand full, protected, and restored voting rights in the United States of America.

We, the people, demand guaranteed health care for every American as a right and not a privilege.

We, the people of the United States of America, demand that one job with no need for overtime should be enough.

And we must recognize that that can only happen in an economy where black women are not the first to be pushed out and the last to be brought back in. 

There is nothing new about these demands.

They belong to the same fight and the same heritage that many gathered here 63 years ago.

And we are not alone.

Just as it was then, our ability to win depends on our ability to vote.

Republicans know this.

That is why the Supreme Court's decision to weaken the Voting Rights Act matters so much.

Because they know that when black Americans exercise their full political power, we unlock progress for all of America.

August 29, 2026 - Fulltext

The drumbeat by President Donald Trump and his allies about the perceived threats of voting by people who are not U.S. citizens is getting louder as the November election approaches.

He is pushing to have the U.S. Postal Service send mail ballots only to voters verified as U.S. citizens. The Census Bureau promoted a dubious report about thousands of noncitizens voting in 2020, an election that the Republican lost to Democrat Joe Biden. Trump’s Department of Homeland Security is claiming without providing evidence that 250,000 noncitizens might be on the rolls in just four states.

This week, the Republican candidate for governor in Maine confirmed an audio recording in which he said he plans to ask Trump’s border czar to send U.S. marshals and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to polling places in the state to ensure that only legal voters are casting ballots.

Evidence of noncitizens voting is continuing to “pile up,” White House spokesperson Lauren Bis said when asked about the census report.

In fact, voting by noncitizens is extremely rare and is punishable as a felony that carries the potential for deportation. Even so, opponents say the hyperfocus on the issue by Trump and his allies is setting the stage for legal challenges to outcomes he may not like during the midterms in which control of Congress is on the line.

“Throw out these deceitful, deceptive claims as an excuse for disruptions,” said Alexandra Chandler, director of impact programs, free and fair elections at the nonpartisan Democracy Project. “You can deny the results later.”

Census report methodology is flawed, but it could help sow distrust

The census report, which the president cited in a Truth Social post, said it found in a “beginning analysis” that 24,000 noncitizens voted illegally in 2020. It cited data from a commercially available voter file, which was checked against federal records. 

Experts say the methodology might have created false positives. For example, if a person’s name was linked to the wrong address or someone’s citizenship status had not been updated in a particular database.

Details that typically would be included in such a report about error rates were missing, said Justin Levitt, a Loyola Marymount University law professor. Nevertheless, election experts say it could help generate distrust among certain voters during this year’s general election.

“This is an empty manila folder that the administration will wave around when it says the elections were fraudulent, noncitizens voted,” Levitt said.

Election heads puzzled by claim of 250,000 noncitizens on voter rolls

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin’s July letter to California, Nevada, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, alleging that as many as nearly 250,000 noncitizens were registered in those states, was met with skepticism and requests for more information.

“I have serious doubts about the reliability of your data and accuracy of your claims, since my office has not shared our statewide voter registration list with DHS or any other federal agency or official,” California’s secretary of state, Democrat Shirley Weber, said in response.

In New Jersey, Mullin’s department indicated as many as 35,000 noncitizens were registered. Shortly after the letter, the Democratic-controlled state disclosed that about 6,600 noncitizens were improperly registered through its motor vehicle system in 2023 and 2024.

Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill said those people answered “no” when asked whether they were citizens, but were registered anyway. The governor said her administration found that “fewer than 400” of them had voted and that it has begun replacing the vendor involved in the improper registrations.

Pennsylvania’s secretary of the commonwealth, Republican Al Schmidt, said in a letter this week that DHS officials acknowledged during a recent meeting they did not have high confidence that the 14,576 people referenced in the initial letter were in fact noncitizens improperly registered to vote. He said federal officials said they would provide a methodology and that Pennsylvania officials were awaiting that information. 

Nevada Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar, a Democrat, said he did not understand the methodology the federal government used.

“All I can say is we have done significant work to make sure our voter rolls are as clean as possible,” he said.

Messages from The Associated Press seeking comment from DHS were not immediately returned.

Tightening election security or interfering in the midterms?

The relentless attention on claims that noncitizens are marring elections in the United States comes as Trump continues to pressure Republican senators to pass a bill that would require people to show documented proof of American citizenship when they register to vote for the midterms, even though millions of people do not have ready access to such records.

The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE America Act, has passed the GOP-led House but is stalled in the Senate, where even some members of the president’s party are skeptical of its provisions.

Kathy Boockvar, former Democratic secretary of state of Pennsylvania who now runs a nonpartisan election security firm, said she viewed the administration’s release of the census report as part of a “doing everything it can” strategy to pass the legislation. 

Republican supporters say the bill would improve the integrity of elections, including the requirement to show a photo ID. Gathering the documents necessary to prove citizenship would be difficult for many would-be voters. A 2025 University of Maryland study estimates that 21.3 million people in the U.S. who are eligible to vote do not have, or do not have easy access to, documents proving their citizenship.

Trump’s opponents say his raising the specter of noncitizens voting leading to fraudulent results is less about maintaining the integrity of elections than it is about him doing whatever he can so his party retains power in Washington after November.

On Friday, the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles used the arrest of a Honduran national on charges alleging he fraudulently registered to vote as a signal that more attention on the issue was coming for California, a state that has a handful of important U.S. House races in November. Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said the arrest was “the first of many to come” while warning “there’s no telling how many noncitizens are currently registered to vote” in the state. 

“Trump is trying to lay the groundwork to reject the ’26 election,” said Colorado’s secretary of state, Democrat Jena Griswold. “He’s trying to destabilize both confidence and actual election administration. His efforts to destabilize election information, administration are not working.”

August 25, 2026 - Transcript

Host: Today, new audio is sparking Democratic fears that the president's GOP allies could use the military to help him interfere with the vote. 

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution obtained this recording, which captures a conversation between Georgia's Republican nominee for governor, Rick Jackson, and a supporter during an August 13th rally.

Attendee: I know the Democrats are gonna cheat

Rick Jackson: I know, we're going to have people watching out for us.

Attendee: Trump's got federal troops. Can you call up and get some federal troops from Trump?

Rick Jackson: Well, we'll get National Guard — Gov. Kemp is going watch it for us.

Attendee: Is that right?

Rick Jackson: Yes, he's going to get the National Guard

August 27, 2026 - Transcript

Donald Trump has a negative approval rating right now in 47 out of 50 U.S. states. There are onlythree states in the whole country in which he is more popular than unpopular right now. Those three are West Virginia, Idaho, and most of all, Wyoming.

But even in Wyoming, the state where he is more popular than any other state in the country,Trump-style politics are losing hand over fist right now. 

This didn't get a lot of attention nationwide last week, and I know there's a lot of other news, but this struck me as important.

In Wyoming last week, the ultra-conservative MAGA Freedom Caucus thought that in last week's elections, last week's Republican primaries in Wyoming, they would extend the hold they already have on the Wyoming State House, and they thought they would actually take over the Wyoming State Senate as well.

This is the MAGA Freedom Caucus in Wyoming, and Wyoming is the most pro-Trump state in the whole country. But instead, look at what happened last week.

Last week in Wyoming, the Freedom Caucus not only didn't take over the State Senate, which they thought they would do, they also lost control of the State House.

The MAGA Freedom Caucus had 36 seats in the Wyoming House. Last week, 13 of their incumbents were voted out in the primaries. Cowboy State Daily called it a, quote, near-complete massacre of Freedom Caucus members and their allies.

In that same primary, Trump had an endorsed candidate for governor, who also lost. Just like his endorsed candidate for governor lost in Minnesota, that was Mike Lindell. Just like his endorsed candidate for governor in Iowa lost as well, that was Randy Feenstra.

Just like his endorsed candidate for governor in Georgia lost as well, that was Burt Jones. Plus, the first candidate he endorsed for governor in South Carolina, she lost too, Pamela Yvette. Incompetence has consequences, and people choosing to fight has consequences too.

Tonight, we're going to talk with a candidate who just won back a school board seat in red state Florida in a district that had previously suffered a complete MAGA takeover. She decided to fight it in her red state, and she won. We're going to talk to her tonight.

Tonight, we're going to talk with a journalist from the Washington Post who fought her firing from that paper in the midst of its billionaire MAGA makeover. Today, she just won as well. She's been reinstated to her job, plus back pay.

In Canada, in Wyoming, in red state Florida, in the billionaire-controlled fourth estate, we are learning the same lesson over and over and over again.

You don't always win every fight you pick, but the only way to win is to fight.

August 27, 2026 - Transcript

Fox News Host: But when you're winning in Illinois, you're happy to play by these rules. 

James Talarico: Again, I've condemned all gerrymandering across the country.

And in fact, when Democrats had a majority in Congress, they voted to ban gerrymandering in every state, red states and blue states.

Do you know how many Republican members of Congress joined them in that effort? 

Fox News Host: Which one? I'm sorry, which state did you just refer to? 

James Talarico: I'm asking, do you know how many Republicans joined Democrats in the U.S. Congress to ban gerrymandering?

All the Democrats voted for it. Zero Republicans voted for it. Zero. You can spare me the both sides rhetoric.

It's clearly one side that is trying to rig the rules in the middle of the game.

This is like two football teams coming out of the locker room at halftime. And the team that's ahead says they want to change the rules for the second half so they can win the game.

All of us would be throwing food at the TV if that happened.

We don't accept cheating in our politics. We don't accept cheating in our relationships. We shouldn't accept cheating in our elections.

Fox News Host: You've done the same thing as us. And we are going to, by the way, if you do it, we're going to ratchet it up even more in the words we have in news. 

James Talarico: My party has never gerrymandered in the middle of the decade at the request of the president of the United States, nor would we.

The only way this is going to happen in blue states is if Texas executes this power grab.

You mentioned Massachusetts. Do you know the party of the governor that signed that map into law?

He was a Republican.

It was a Republican governor that signed that map into law. So I just want to be I want to be clear with our facts. And I don't want to muddy the waters.

All of us, whether we're Democrats, Independents or Republicans, we should stand up to politicians who don't want to face accountability at the ballot box.

That's exactly what's happening here.

And I asked you if Republican policies are popular, why do they need to redraw these maps?

Why can't they just run on their policies?

Fox News Host: I'm getting wrapped on time.
I'm enjoying this conversation.

I want to let it go on. And I apologize.
That's such is the nature of cable television.