Former US President Barack Obama criticised Donald Trump's response to a mocking remark about the Cheesecake Factory in Georgia, asserting that Republicans had mobilised the entire government over a joke rather than inflation. "They mobilised the entire government's response to that joke, not to inflation, but to that joke!" Obama said at a rally in the state.
Obama spoke at a rally in Georgia alongside Jon Ossoff and Keisha Lance Bottoms, while Trump was campaigning in Ohio at the same time. Both rallies took place in the final days before the US midterms, with both parties targeting control of Congress. Trump headed to Ohio, and Vance to North Carolina, with less than a week until the midterms.
At Trump's rally in Ohio, someone shouted: "Trump was on Jeffrey Epstein's plane!" Trump boasted about the war with Iran in Ohio, while Ossoff mocked his claims in Georgia. Obama stated: "We need to keep reality TV on Bravo. We don't need it in the White House." Trump again defended Ramaswamy's ad, which features mother Amy Acton, who sided with her husband accused of raping her minor daughter.
In Alaska, Mary Peltola is running for a Senate seat, and her campaign has denied for months any connection to a separate campaign launched by a man who shares the same name as Peltola's Republican opponent, Dan Sullivan. The New York Times reported, based on interviews, obtained text messages and legal filings, that Peltola's campaign not only recruited Mr Sullivan (who is not a Republican) but also sought numerous Dan Sullivans across the state for a potential candidacy. Peltola's campaign also sought others who could divert votes from her main opponent, and Alaskan Democrats deliberately sought a candidate with the same name as the Senate candidate, the NYT reported.
In other political news, the fiancé of Democratic congresswoman Haley Stevens said he is voting for Republican Mike Rogers, not Abdul El-Sayed, in the Senate race in Michigan. Vance contacted the Iranian security chief to continue peace negotiations. The Federal Reserve kept interest rates unchanged, and US costs of the war with Iran have risen to more than 47 billion dollars, the Pentagon estimates. Mark Kelly said of a possible 2028 candidacy: "I am considering it."
Dolores Huerta, a prominent labour and civil rights leader, died at the age of 96. The Senate race in deeply Republican South Carolina could go either way, a poll shows. Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski supports a Democrat in the Alaska governor's race. Trump's prosecutor is trying to stop vote counting in California, and a federal judge ruled on Trump's appointed US attorney. RFK Jr. faces sharp criticism over anti-Arab statements in the campaign. Flavio Bolsonaro landed in Miami, after fleeing to the US following his defeat in the Brazilian elections; the defeated right-wing Brazilian presidential candidate is expected to arrive in Miami.
