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RNC takes steps toward a 2026 GOP midterm convention
Are they actually going to vote on something real?

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Republicans are one step closer to finalizing plans for a midterm convention later this year.

The Republican National Committee approved a rule change during its winter meeting on Friday that would allow the party to hold a convention during a midterm election year.

"I'm incredibly excited about the possibility of hosting midterm convention to highlight what President Trump and Republicans have been able to accomplish this year," RNC Chairman Joe Gruters said after the rule change was adopted. "If the president wants us to host a convention to highlight the great work this administration has done for the American people, we are doing the work now and will be ready to act when that time comes."

The amendment was approved at the RNC’s winter meeting with no objections. An unusually high number of RNC members had already left the meeting to catch early flights ahead of winter storms bearing down on much of the country by the time the vote was brought up.

The rule authorizes the RNC to “conduct a special ceremonial convention between presidential conventions, such as a midterm convention,” said Bill O’Brien, the national committeeman from New Hampshire.

National party conventions have typically been held only during presidential elections in the modern era. But President Donald Trump announced in September that the party would be holding a “Midterm Convention,” leaving the party scrambling to execute.

The event would give Republicans an opportunity to message the administration’s wins and platform candidates in battleground races across the country as they fight to hold onto congressional control.

Democrats, who held a series of midterm-year national conventions in the 1970s, are also flirting with the possibility. At the Democratic National Committee’s winter meetings in Los Angeles last month, officials from Nebraska and Utah were among those jockeying to host the potential event.

Republicans have not yet announced where their convention will be held or when, though Nevada GOP leaders are pushing for Las Vegas to host.

Could Republicans Turn Redistricting in Virginia on the Democrats?
This is performative politics again.

The Daily Signal’s Virginia Correspondent Joe Thomas is out with a new podcast breaking down Virginia Democrats’ effort to redistrict the commonwealth. 

Now that Democrats are fully in control of the commonwealth, they are moving forward with a plan that could add four Democrat seats and ultimately determine the balance of power in Washington after the 2026 midterms. 

Thomas called the move, which could change the Virginia congressional delegation from six Democrats and five Republicans to 10 Democrats and just one Republican, “reactionary.” 

The Democrat redistricting proposal would allow the Democrat-controlled government to redraw their districts if a red state decides to redistrict. “If another state changed their districts, Virginia could invoke this constitutional amendment to recreate theirs.” 

“Now, what’s happened in Virginia is that they’ve pulled some rabbits out of the hat,” Thomas said. 

“In Virginia, the law says that in order to amend the Virginia Constitution, you have to pass the amendment through both the House and Senate,” Thomas explained. The governor is not involved in that process, though Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger has said she backs the effort. 

But, to amend the state constitution, the Virginia Legislature has to wait until after an election cycle, and the amendment “has to pass another general assembly session and then be brought to the voters,” Thomas continued. 

In a special session late last year, however, “Virginia budget Speaker Don Scott used the parliamentary procedure to convene another meeting of that same special session in December to pass the constitutional amendment for a second time, just days before the culmination of Virginia’s 2025 election cycle.” 

If voters approve of the proposed amendment to the constitution, it would “overturn an election that went down 65% in favor of a nonpartisan redistricting commission that each 10 years would redraw Virginia’s districts based on population shifts,” Thomas said.  

The Democrats’ proposed 10-1 map looks to stretch districts such as VA-1, VA-10, and VA-11. 

“They’re all along what is called the Blue Crescent in Virginia, that [go] from the Washington, D.C., suburbs all the way down to the Hampton Roads,” Thomas said of these districts. 

But stretching these districts to the west and south is not without risk, Thomas claimed. 

“What they’re going to do with these districts is they’re going to take these 20% and 40% Democrat districts by election results, stretch them to the point of breaking,” Thomas said. The 10-1 map would “stretch them to the point where they’re going to be right at the edge of being maybe 52%, maybe 53% Democrats by election results, historically.” 

“And that’s the peril in this,” Thomas added. “They’re putting themselves in a position of taking all of those safe districts along the Blue Crescent from Northern Virginia” and “stretching them to the point of them being perilously close to a 50-50 split.” 

A Republican with a good ground game in these new districts could prove redistricting was more trouble than Virginia Democrats bargained for. 

The post Could Republicans Turn Redistricting in Virginia on the Democrats? …

Newslinks for Friday 23rd January 2026
Transparency shouldn't be controversial.

4.5m to be denied vote as more polls axed

“Labour announced plans on Thursday to deny 4.5 million people a vote, with two of Britain’s biggest councils allowed to delay elections. Tory-controlled Suffolk and Norfolk were among 29 authorities given permission to cancel May’s ballot. The Conservative-led Essex council is also said to have privately discussed the possibility of a cancellation with ministers, which would deny a further 1.1 million people a vote. The delays mean that millions of people will have been left with no say over who controls their local services and council tax for up to seven years. The Telegraph has launched a Campaign for Democracy, calling for ministers to be stripped of their legal powers to cancel local elections. MPs across the political divide reacted angrily to the announcement by Steve Reed, the Communities Secretary, that elections would be postponed in 29 areas, including 15 Labour-run councils.” – Daily Telegraph

How Tory councils stripped 1.4m people of their right to vote – Daily Telegraph

Labour scraps more local elections … after pleas from Tories – The Times

Minsters pushed to cancel local elections in dozens of mostly Labour areas despite warning the move is ‘almost certainly illegal’ – Daily Mail

Twenty-nine English councils to delay elections, minister confirms – BBC News

Comment:

Farage’s excuses are unfitting for a man who would be PM – Jawad Iqbal, The Times

Cancelling elections is hardly anti-fascist – Telegraph View

Nigel Farage was right on his old by-election principles – Sebastian Payne, The Times

> Today: 

Shadow Cabinet League Table: Badenoch beats Jenrick in pre-defection poll

George Trefgarne: Time for critics to stop tilting at Tory windmills – Badenoch understands conservatism

> Yesterday:

Will Calverley: Cancelling elections does not make difficult issues disappear

Starmer’s allies to bar the return of Burnham

“Keir Starmer’s allies have launched a “Stop Andy Burnham” campaign to prevent the Labour mayor from returning to parliament after the resignation of a Manchester MP triggered a byelection. Multiple members of the party’s ruling national executive committee (NEC) predicted it would be impossible for Burnham to make it through the selection process given the number of Starmer loyalists on the body desperate to avoid a leadership challenge. The Labour party machine sprang into action after the Guardian revealed on Thursday that Andrew Gwynne was planning to quit due to ill health, with officials and MPs warning about the financial cost and political risk of a subsequent mayoral race. However, allies of the Greater Manchester mayor suggested there would be significant disquiet among MPs, the unions and party members should the leadership try to block him from returning to …

At Davos, the World Watched the Rantings of a Despot
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Authoritarian Watch

/ January 23, 2026

At Davos, the World Watched the Rantings of a Despot

President Donald Trump has turned his back on the liberal world order—and Europe is unlikely to follow.

Sasha Abramsky

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President Donald Trump walks toward Marine One after arriving at Zurich Airport before attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, on January 21, 2026, in Zurich, Switzerland.
(Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images)

One year into Trump 2.0, a predatory, imperialist, and increasingly deranged President Trump, has, with his demands that Denmark cede Greenland to the United States, precipitated the most serious rupture of the Western Alliance since the Suez crisis in 1956, when the United States squared off against the United Kingdom, France, and Israel over the future of the canal.

Late last week, Trump began ratcheting up the pressure on Denmark to cede Greenland to the United States. He announced a 10 percent tariff on eight European countries that had sent troops to Greenland for a military exercise. On Sunday afternoon, he composed a poorly punctuated, paranoiac note to the Norwegian prime minister in which he blamed the Norwegian government for not being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, said the rejection had liberated him to stop thinking about peace, and claimed that it had set him on the path to conquer Greenland to protect the United States. The note was distributed by the National Security Council to all of Europe’s ambassadors to the United States, giving it something of the imprimatur of a formal policy statement. There were days over the past week where it seemed possible that US military personnel would be ordered into a firefight against NATO allies to fulfill Trump’s fever dream of hemispheric ownership.

This isn’t simply an outrageous case of schoolyard petulance; it is, in full public view, the ranting of a nuclear-armed lunatic. And it is part of a pattern of increasingly bizarre public performances, including his Tuesday afternoon press briefing at the White House, in which he veered from topic to topic, often failed to put coherent sentences together, and mused about his absolute powers.

Current Issue

February 2026 Issue

On Wednesday, Trump journeyed to Davos seemingly intent on lobbing insults at every European leader who came his way, as well as the many immigrants in his crosshairs. He bemoaned “low-IQ” Somali immigrants in the United States, attacked Europe for being open to large-scale migration, and repeatedly declared how ungrateful the continent was for the United States’ preeminent role in NATO over the decades. He wondered aloud about raising tariffs again …

Jack Smith Forced to Explain ‘Enemies List’ of Congressional Phone Records
Ask who never gets charged.

Lawmakers grilled former special counsel Jack Smith on Thursday for scooping up phone records of members of Congress while concealing his targets from a judge.

Smith testified publicly before the House Judiciary Committee after giving a private deposition last month regarding his nearly two-year probe of then-former President Donald Trump. Smith’s investigation focused on alleged possession of classified documents after leaving office, and Trump’s alleged lying about the 2020 election. He secured indictments in both investigations.

As part of the probe, Smith approved subpoenas for phone communications of members of Congress. His team subpoenaed the phone records of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.; House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio; and eight Republican senators. 

Smith said his staff prosecutors didn’t tell judges signing the subpoenas that the special counsel’s office was seeking records from members of Congress.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., the committee’s senior member, said Smith violated the separation of powers in acting as a member of the executive branch to obtain phone records from the legislative branch while withholding information from the judicial branch.

“You, like the president’s men for Richard Nixon, went after your political enemies,” Issa said to Smith. Issa had a board behind him listing the members of Congress whose records were subpoenaed that read, “Biden’s enemies list.” 

“They’re not your political enemies, but they sure as hell were Joe Biden’s political enemies, weren’t they? They were Harris’ political enemies. They were the enemies of the president, and you were their arm.”

Ranking member Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., interrupted Issa. After a heated exchange, Smith acknowledged not revealing the members’ names to the judge, but added that he was not required to do so.

“We did not provide that information to the judge when we requested a non-disclosure order consistent with the law and consistent with department,” Smith replied. 

Smith’s targets also included eight Republican senators: Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Bill Hagerty and Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Josh Hawley of Missouri, Dan Sullivan of Alaska, Tommy Tuberville of Alabama, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming.

Raskin pushed back on GOP criticism of Smith’s subpoena of congressional phone records.

“So, it’s perfectly lawful what you did. Explain why you wanted those toll records?” Raskin asked Smith. 

“We wanted to conduct a thorough investigation of the matters that were assigned to me, including the attempts to interfere with the lawful transfer of power,” Smith said. “For the conspiracy that we were investigating, it was relevant to get full records to understand the scope of that conspiracy.”

Raskin followed, “That’s normal investigative practice, right?”

Smith said, “In conducting a criminal investigation, securing non-content toll records, as you described, is a common practice in almost any complex concern.”

Smith was named special counsel in November 2022 to conduct the Justice Department’s investigation of Trump’s challenge to the outcome of the 2020 election, as well as …

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: Why Fed Forecasters — and a Big Shot Princeton Prof — May Soon Deserve “Fs”
This is performative politics again.

Members of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors are supposed to know a lot about the U.S. economy, so presumably their record of forecasting future developments should be pretty good.  You could say the same for distinguished economist Alan S. Blinder, who served as the Fed’s vice chair from 1994-1996 and has taught economics for many years at Princeton University (Full disclosure:  my alma mater, though I never took any of his classes.)   

Why then, do their predictions for U.S. economic growth for 2025 seem so seriously and even increasingly off-base?

The Fed’s crystal ball results – which strongly influence its decisions on interest rates – include the collective judgments of all 19 Governors (including the partly rotating membership of the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee).  And they come out quarterly in the form of a document called the Summary of Economic Projections (SEP).  

Their last forecast was issued in December, and their median prediction for 2025 yearly growth in inflation-adjusted terms was 1.7 percent.  And some Governors believed it would hit only 1.5 percent.  (More optimistic Fed chiefs wrote in two percent.)

In a January 21 op-ed piece, Blinder foresaw a better 2025 – writing that its real growth would be “around 2.5 percent.”  But in this assessment of President Trump’s first year in office, dismissed it as “pretty much the same as in 2024.”

Why do these assessments seem to be complete bunk?  First, as of the third quarter of last year, the price adjusted growth rate for the gross domestic product (GDP – the most widely used measure of the U.S. economy’s size and change thereof) was already running a bit north of 2.3 percent.  

In other words, at that point, the Fed’s prognostications already seemed considerably wide of the mark.  The official figures, moreover, were accelerating since the small (0.6 percent) drop in the first quarter that stemmed almost entirely from tariff front-running.  And the second and third quarter expansions (3.8 percent and 4.4 percent, respectively) were both very strong.  For some reason, however, the Fed Governors were apparently discounting this as of last December 10.

As a result, Blinder’s expectation of 2.5 percent real U.S. growth for 2025 looks closer to the mark.  Yet subsequent evidence indicates that it, too, is almost certainly much too bleak.  

After all, the widely followed GDP tracker issued by the Atlanta branch of the Federal Reserve since early January (before Blinder’s article appeared) has been estimating fourth quarter GDP growth at more than five percent.  The latest edition pegs the figure at 5.4 percent.

The math reveals that if the Atlanta Fed’s judgments are accurate, inflation-adjusted 2025 growth will reach a shade over 3.2 percent.  

To put that into perspective, if the Atlanta Fed projection holds, such annual expansion would be the strongest since 2005’s 3.5 percent.  (There’s an exception – 2021’s 6.2 percent.  But that pop came from the rapid recovery from the sharp Covid-induced downturn of 2020.)  Clearly, on that basis alone, 3.2 percent ain’t bean bag.  And it would be much better than what Blinder thinks. 

And it’s entirely …

These Gen-Z Trump voters don’t want JD Vance in 2028
What's the administration thinking here?

Vice President JD Vance is the Trump administration’s unofficial envoy to Gen Z. But young Trump supporters may not be all that enamored with him as they weigh their 2028 options.

In a focus group of nine young men who supported Trump in 2024, conducted Monday by Longwell Partners and shared with POLITICO, they showed tepid enthusiasm about the vice president and suggested he is too bridled by the baggage of Trump's second term.

“I feel like it's just time for someone new, especially for the Republican Party,” said Alexandre M., a voter in Maryland, who raised concerns about Trumps’s handling of the Epstein files, “because JD Vance was also pushing that as well.”

When the 18- to 24-year-olds were asked who else they would like to see as potential candidates in 2028, they named Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Ohio gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Florida gubernatorial candidate James Fishback. When the moderator asked who wants to see Vance as the GOP nominee, just one of the nine raised their hand — and even he later signaled he is still unsure of his support.

Others in the group raised concerns about electability as well as Vance’s changing views.

“I don’t think Vance can win, because I think he's too connected to the current political establishment in Washington, which I think has a very negative approval rating right now,” said Sam Z., a voter in Minnesota. “If you look at what he was about in 2018, 2019, 2020, and you look at what he's about now, it's very, very different. … Somebody younger running in office would be awesome. So that's the one thing I wouldn't mind for Vance. But overall, I just don't think [he] can win. I think he's kind of flip-flopped on a lot of issues.”

The one voter who said he’d be open to Vance in 2028 said he liked Vance’s experience. “I think because he already is a VP, like he has more experience than most people will, which puts him at an advantage,” said Ruben T., a voter in Georgia.

Vance wasn’t the only topic where these voters split from the traditional party line.

Asked about U.S. support for Israel, five said they felt the U.S. supports Israel too much and four said the right amount. None said too little.

Some mentioned conspiracy theories — like Candace Owens’ assertion that Charlie Kirk was assassinated by the Israeli government — for steering their belief that the U.S. should support Israel less.

“I don't know how factual some of this stuff is, but after seeing a lot of things after Charlie Kirk's death and with Candace Owens’ private investigation, I kind of started to notice of, like, Israel was kind of always a big talking point with the Republicans,” said Richard B., a voter in Pennsylvania. “I personally have an issue with it.” …

California Lawmaker Files Emergency Injunction With SCOTUS Over Redistricting Map
Why resist verification?

Republican California Assemblyman David Tangipa told The Daily Signal he has filed an emergency injunction with the United States Supreme Court to challenge the Golden State’s new congressional map.

Tangipa’s motion comes after The Daily Signal reported that Tangipa had the desire to bring the case before the Supreme Court after a federal district court refused to hear the case.

“The Supreme Court should pick up this case as soon as possible,” Tangipa told The Daily Signal. “It is very clear that race was a predominant factor, and the violations of the 14th Amendment cannot continue.”

Tangipa alleges that the map violates the 14th and 15th amendments of the U.S. Constitution by redrawing five congressional districts, currently held by Republicans, on the basis of race.

If the court decides by Feb. 9 to take the assemblyman’s case, the court will pause the state’s new congressional map and conduct a review of the map’s constitutionality.

? Officially taking Governor Newsom to the Supreme Court over Prop 50 redistricting. Emergency injunction filed.

You’re going to hear a lot of: “If Texas could do it, why can’t California?”
Here’s the key difference.

California’s mapmaker openly admitted race was a driving…
— David Tangipa (@DavidTangipa) January 20, 2026

The Golden State’s new map was enabled by California voters’ approval of Proposition 50 in November, a ballot measure that handed redistricting control from the state’s independent commission to state elected officials.

Proposition 50 and the new map have been supported by major California Democrats, including Gov. Gavin Newsom and Secretary of State Shirley Weber.

Tangipa recently stated that the map’s author, Paul Mitchell, “openly admitted” to racially gerrymandering the new congressional map to give Democratic voters an advantage.

“California’s mapmaker openly admitted that race was a driving factor,” Tangipa wrote on X. “He said the number one thing he focused on was creating a Latino majority/minority district.”

Tangipa remains optimistic that the court will agree to review the case.

“We believe the court will take this case since the split decision was very clear,” Tangipa told The Daily Signal. “We have asked the courts to issue a temporary pause while this is being debated over.”

“Hopefully, this is wrapped up by the second week of February,” Tangipa added.

The post California Lawmaker Files Emergency Injunction With SCOTUS Over Redistricting Map appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Menendez miasma stayed
This affects the entire country.

(Scott Johnson) An administrative panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit has stayed the preliminary injunction on “covered officers” of Operation Metro Surge by Minnesota federal district judge Kate Menendez. As Andrew McCarthy and I have observed, there may be a problem or two with it.

The terms of the Menendez preliminary injunction are on appeal to the Eighth Circuit. The Eighth Circuit’s administrative stay will remain in effect pending the Court’s consideration of the government’s motion for a stay pending appeal. I take it that plaintiffs have yet to be heard from.

The propriety of a stay pending appeal will have to be determined separately and then the propriety of the preliminary injunction itself. However, the Eighth Circuit administrative stay reflects a desire to maintain the status quo ante Judge Menendez’s injuntion while the Eighth Circuit sorts out the issues.

In the meantime, Judge Menendez may continue to work her mischief in the MCLU case and perhaps in Keith Ellison’s even more ludicrous case brought on behalf of state and local authorities. However, Judge Menendez has now been reminded that the Court of Appeals is looking over her shoulder and is perhaps unamused so far.

JUST IN: The 8th Circuit has temporarily lifted the restrictions on ICE's use of force against protesters, imposed last week by Judge Menendez. Earlier:

— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) January 21, 2026

Serious question: Has Pam Bondi accomplished anything??
This isn't complicated—it's willpower.

I was listening to news and all I ever hear about Pam Bondi is that her office is looking into it. Thus, besides looking into events worth investigating; has Pam Bondi done anything?