2 – Breaking News & Latest Updates 2026
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Politics Archive

Archives for October 2026

Lauren Feiner
Lauren Feiner
Trump officials reportedly asked staffers to secretly hack a voting machine.

The request from political appointees at the Department of Homeland Security to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency was never fulfilled, ProPublica found, but staffers were shocked at the directive not to report flaws back to the voting machine company. It demonstrates why state officials’ trust in CISA has eroded.

JB Pritzker thinks AI could help us live to 100 — or threaten us like nukes
Play

The Illinois governor on AI, data centers, privacy, and Trump.

Nilay Patel
Democrats think cracking down on AI could give them an edge

At a moment when voters are fearful of AI, Democrats are finding their footing.

Lauren Feiner
Trump says Google kisses his assTrump says Google kisses his ass
Terrence O'Brien
Terrence O'Brien
Terrence O'Brien
No Kings Coalition’s official Instagram briefly went dark.

A spokesperson told MS Now that Meta pulled the organization’s account and locked out its admins during today’s protests. The profile page is back up, but the organization says it still doesn’t have access to the account. Neither Meta nor No Kings immediately responded to a request for comment.

Update October 18th: Meta’s Andy Stone posted on X that the suspension was part of an automated response that sometimes happens when accounts post at “very high frequencies.” He continued to say that the “automated action was clearly taken in error. Everything is now working as it should and we sincerely apologize.”

Terrence O'Brien
Terrence O'Brien
Keep up with the latest No Kings news on the States Newsroom live blog.

The midterms edition of No Kings is underway, primarily focused on boosting early voting turnout rather than flooding the streets. If you want to keep up with all the news about the latest day of action as it’s happening, follow along at the States Newsroom live blog.

Adi Robertson
Adi Robertson
No Kings, midterms edition.

The latest day of action for the protest movement is today, but unlike previous rallies, this one is focused on increasing early voting turnout ahead of the November elections. Thousands of events are planned or already underway; as usual, there’s a map available on the site.

An estimated 30,000 people joined the third No Kings protest in downtown Portland in March.
An estimated 30,000 people joined the third No Kings protest in downtown Portland in March.
Photo by Sarah Jeong / The Verge
Stevie Bonifield
Stevie Bonifield
Tech billionaires have reportedly donated over $340 million to fight a wealth tax in California.

According to The Guardian, the campaign they’re funding is spending over $1 million per day trying to defeat Proposition 40, which would enact a one-time 5 percent tax on California’s billionaires. Google co-founder Sergey Brin is reportedly the biggest donor, contributing at least $102 million, alongside other tech executives:

The donors to the no campaign are a who’s who of Silicon Valley, including the Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, DoorDash CEO Tony Xu, Stripe CEO Patrick Collison, crypto magnate Chris Larsen and several prominent venture capitalists.

Richard Lawler
Richard Lawler
That was quick.

According to the NYT’s sources, White House press secretary Katie Zacharia is out after just five days in the role, or, by our count, less than half of a Scaramucci. Her time in the role included prediction market intrigue and claims she may have misrepresented herself as an attorney despite failing the bar exam.

Robert Hart
Robert Hart
China is weighing export controls on AI.

Beijing is reportedly considering adding 23 AI technologies to its export-control list, including chip designs, agents, model weights, and source code. China has been steadily gaining on the US with recent releases like Kimi K3, and has been the target of Western AI-related export controls amid growing competition to maintain control over the strategic technology.