Explosive device found at George Soros’ home: report

An explosive device was found at the Westchester, New York home of Billionaire George Soros on Monday. (AP)

An explosive device was found on Monday at the Westchester, N.Y., home of billionaire George Soros.
The Wall Street Journal, citing local law enforcement, reported that police received a phone call from the residence about a suspicious package.
An employee that works at the home found the package and opened it, revealing what appeared to be an explosive device, according to a press release from the Bedford Police Department. The employee then placed the package in a wooded area until authorities arrived.
The department told Fox News that a suspicious package was found in a mailbox. Police referred Fox News to the F.B.I's New York office, which did not confirm the report.
Soros was not home at the time of the incident, according to the New York Times.
The bomb squad deactivated the device, and authorities have said there is no further threat to the area, according to the Journal.
The investigation has been turned over to the Joint Terrorism Task Force Division of the FBI.
The wealthy liberal donor started his philanthropic efforts in 1979, but his contributions have not always been welcomed.
Campaigns against Soros emerged in Romania, where the billionaire was accused of financing "evil" as well as in Macedonia, Serbia and Slovakia – and have escalated to some extent since President Donald Trump took office.
Soros, who made his fortune in hedge funds, has donated heavily to liberal causes and is vilified on the right.
He is also the subject of many unfounded conspiracy theories. Recently, conservative critics have, without evidence, accused him of secretly financing a caravan of Central American migrants to make their way north toward Mexico and the U.S.
Others have falsely accused him of being a Nazi collaborator during World War II, when he was a child in Hungary.
Activists frequently post the addresses of homes he owns in Westchester County, north of New York City, on social media sometimes accompanied by ill wishes
The 88-year-old has focused his efforts as of late on the midterm elections in the U.S., and has funneled upwards of $15 million to Democrats as they push to regain control of Congress.
Soros told the Times in July that for every Trump supporter "there is more than one Trump enemy who will be more intent, more determined."
In October, Soros was linked to a non-profit group called the Center for Popular Democracy (CPD), which rose to prominence for organizing civil disobedience actions and confronting several Republican lawmakers during the contentious hearings for then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
Soros’ organization has donated to the CPD over the years, giving $1.5 million to the non-profit in 2016 and 2017 through his Open Society Foundations, the records show. He also donated in the past two years another $1.2 million to the nonprofit’s sister organization Center for Popular Democracy Action.

2018 Blue Wave Cartoons

DeSantis wins tense Florida gubernatorial debate against Gillum, Trump claims

President Trump late Sunday took to Twitter to congratulate Ron DeSantis, the GOP candidate for Florida governor, for a "great debate victory" against his Democratic challenger Andrew Gillum.
Gillum likely cares little about Trump's analysis and spent most of the debate working to connect DeSantis with the president. At one point he called DeSantis Trump’s acolyte.
DeSantis said the state’s governor’s relationship with the president – whether he or she agrees with the office or not—is important for the state.
"You need to be able to work with the president," DeSantis said. "Andrew can't do that. He wants to impeach Trump, he's always saying bad things about him ... I think I will be better positioned to advance Florida’s priorities because I have a productive relationship with the administration."
CNN’s Jake Tapper, the debate’s moderator, asked DeSantis about his now-famous "monkey this up" comment and DeSantis used his time serving as a Navy officer in Iraq to talk about his feelings on race.
"When we're downrange in Iraq, it didn't matter your race," he said. "We all wore the same uniform, we all had that American flag patch on our arm and that was end of story," he said. "I'll be a governor for all Floridians."
Gillum implied that DeSantis has aligned himself with racists through social media and speeches he's made.
"The monkey up comment said it all and he has only continued in the course of his campaign to draw all the attention he can to the color of my skin," Gillum said. "And the truth is, you know what? I'm black. I've been black I'll my life and as far as I know, I'll die black."
Trump tweeted that Tallahassee – the city where Gillum serves as mayor – is one of the "worst run, and most corrupt" cities in the state. He said "Gillum will make Florida the next Venezuela."

Warren took DNA test to rebuild ‘trust in government’

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., on Sunday said that she took the DNA test that showed a relative six to 10 generations ago was Native American in an effort to rebuild "trust in the government" through transparency.
Warren said the comment during a tense debate with her Republican challenger for Senate in Massachusetts, state Rep. Geoff Diehl. Warren, 69, is running for her second six-year term in the Senate and is a potential 2020 candidate for president.
She said that trust in the government is at an all-time low and changed her mind about the test after saying no to being tested in March.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1052387851088867330
Warren shared the results last week with The Boston Globe. The results reveal “strong evidence” that Warren—who is called “Pocahontas” by President Trump -- had a Native American ancestor dating back six to 10 generations.
Warren’s decision to release the results was seen by some as counterproductive and self-serving during a tense mid-term election just days away.
Diehl appeared to try and use some of the backlash to try and chip away at her lead in the state.
"I don't care what percentage she claims to be Native American; I just care that I'm 100 percent for Massachusetts and will be working for the people of this state,” he said.

Ellison forced to fend off assault allegations in tense debate with GOP rival

Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., left, and former state Rep. Representative Doug Wardlow are competing in a close race for Minnesota Attorney General.   (AP)

Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., on Sunday evening squared off against his GOP rival for state attorney general in a debate that largely revolved around allegations of domestic abuse against the representative, KSTP-TV reported.
Ellison, who represents Minnesota's 5th congressional district and is the deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee, vehemently denied allegations leveled by his former girlfriend, Karen Monahan. She claimed that he once dragged her off a bed by her feet while screaming obscenities. He maintained that investigations have cleared him and accused his Republican attackers of remaining silent about allegations against President Trump.
DEMOCRATIC REP. ELLISON TO ASK HOUSE ETHICS COMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE ABUSE ALLEGATIONS
His Republican opponent, Doug Wardlow, called Ellison a "cheerleader for cop killers." Ellison denied those claims, pointing to his support of police reform groups like Moms Demand Action, a grassroots movement that "seeks to address our nation's culture of gun violence," according to its website.
Wardlow also blasted Ellison for his association with Louis Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam leader, who has drawn controversy for his repeated anti-Semitic comments. Ellison said he has rejected Farrakhan's incendiary comments but qualified that he thought Farrakhan had some things "to offer" in the 1990s as a Civil Rights leader.
LOUIS FARRAKHAN WON’T BE SUSPENDED BY TWITTER DESPITE ANTI-SEMITIC TWEET
"(Farrakhan) made it absolutely clear in the early 1990s that his views and mine were absolutely incompatible, and I've been saying that ever since," Ellison said.
Wardlow said Ellison's denial of his association with Farrakhan was given "Four Pinocchios" by The Washington Post.
Ellison will face off against Wardlow in the November midterm elections.
Fox News' Frank Miles and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

If Dems win the House after midterm elections, blame ‘red tide’ out to sea, not a ‘blue wave’ crashing in

Four things jump off the page when one conducts a deep examination of this autumn’s midterm House elections:

• The historic norms favor the opposition party of the President by a lot in House races. The President’s party loses an average of 29 House seats in most midterms.
• The sheer number of open seats which House Republicans must defend this fall is off the chart. More than 40 Republican seats are wide open.
• Dismiss out the paradigmatic norms. We operate now in the age of President Trump. Mr. Trump rode an inside straight to the White House two years ago. The rules have changed. Mr. Trump is a special phenomenon in American politics. Most midterm elections are a referendum on the first two years of a new President. Study what happened to President Clinton in 1994 and President Obama in 2010. Voters repudiated both chief executives with historic pickups, flipping control of the House. It’s unknown if supporters of President Trump show up just to cast a ballot for someone not named President Trump. That’s why it’s nearly impossible to determine how this election will go down.
• It’s likely to be close when it comes down to House control. Democrats must marshal a net gain of 23 seats to win the House. It could boil down to the outcome of three to five seats in either direction. Thus, it’s entirely possible we might not know which party has the House until a few days later.

Party insiders and analysts believe 15-18 Republican seats are gone, no matter what happens. Some seats are more “gone” than others. A good example of this is a seat held by former Rep. Patrick Meehan, R-Pa. The redistricted seat heavily favors Democrats by close to 30 points. Similar circumstances prevail in the district held by retiring Rep. Ryan Costello, R-Pa. One can locate other examples in New Jersey where Reps. Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-N.J. and Frank LoBiondo, R-N.J., are quitting, too.
If Democrats win the House, it will be because of a “red tide” out to sea, not a “blue wave” crashing in. It’s hard for Republicans to defend so many vacant seats. If Democrats win the House, the GOP “open seat” dynamic may emerge as the most important factor in this midterm election.
Democrats have their Achilles Heel in these midterms, too.
It’s conceivable that Democratic candidates could rattle off lots of wins in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Virginia, California, Michigan, Illinois and Texas. But those Democratic “flips” could be offset by potential Republican pick-ups elsewhere.
Consider the seat currently held by Rep. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev. A House freshman, Rosen is abandoning that seat to challenge Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev. Rosen narrowly won election to the House two years ago as Republican Danny Tarkanian - son of legendary UNLV basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian - held her below 50 percent. Democrats didn’t fare very well in many states in 2016. But Democrats excelled in Nevada. Still, President Trump carried Rosen’s district by a solitary percentage point. Tarkanian initially intended to challenge Heller. But Mr. Trump personally convinced Tarkanian to again run for the House, this time against Democrat Susie Lee. Tarkanian has run for the Senate and House without success over the years. That’s remarkable considering the credibility of his surname in Nevada. As we said earlier, just a handful of seats could determine control of the House. If Tarkanian finally wins and Republicans maintain control of the House by a whisker, experts will laud Mr. Trump’s decision to persuade Tarkanian to again run for the House versus the Senate. It could prove to be the shrewdest move of the entire campaign cycle.
Democrats must defend an open seat along the Iron Range of Minnesota. Rep. Rick Nolan (D-MN) is retiring after barely keeping the seat in Democratic hands the past several cycles. Republican Pete Stauber is running against Democrat Joe Radinovich. Hillary Clinton secured a scant 38 percent of the vote in this rural district two years ago.
Then there is New Hampshire’s First Congressional District. This district is the most volatile in the nation. Rep. Carol Shea-Porter, D-N.H., switched it to Democratic control in 2006 and held it in 2008. But the seat has gone Republican in every midterm since – with Shea-Porter rallying to return to Washington in each presidential election. President Trump won this district by two percentage points even as Shea-Porter reclaimed the seat in 2016. Shea-Porter is retiring at the end of this term. Republican Eddie Edwards is up against Democrat Chris Pappas this fall.
In short, Democrats may make great gains elsewhere. But Democrats will fail to secure the majority if they lose seats like these.
There’s also another problem for Democrats in Florida.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., is retiring. She’s one of the most moderate Republicans in the House. Hillary Clinton won Ros-Lehtinen’s district by a staggering 19 points. Former Clinton Administration Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala is the Democratic nominee and faces Republican Maria Salazar. Here’s the issue for Democrats: Democratic insiders have long expressed concern about Shalala’s performance in the district. At 77-years-old, a Shalala victory would make her the second-oldest House freshman in history. Democrats have also struggled to earn traction in that district among Latino voters. This is a district which should be a lock for Democrats on paper. However, it’s anything but.
There’s danger for Republicans, too.
GOPers who represent urban and suburban areas could find themselves on the wrong end of an anti-Trump backlash. This is why Reps. Andy Barr, R-Ken., Kevin Yoder, R-Kan, John Culberson, R-Texas, Pete Roskam, R-Ill., Mike Coffman, R-Colo., and French Hill, R-Ark., might struggle. Democratic victories in seats like these could propel Democrats to the majority.
That said, rural Republicans could benefit from a targeted bump after the bruising fight to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. The Kavanaugh imbroglio ignited passions on both sides. An anti-Kavanaugh boost may help Democrat Jennifer Wexton defeat Rep. Barbara Comstock, R-Va., in the Washington, DC suburbs. But a pro-Kavanaugh spike could bolster Reps. Bruce Poliquin , R-Maine, and Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., in districts where the President remains popular.
There are several districts which bear watching in this matrix:
Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, is in a race against Democrat Aftab Pureval in southwestern Ohio. Rep. Steve Pearce, R-N.M., is running for governor of New Mexico. Vying for Pearce’s seat in southern New Mexico are Democrat Xochitl Torres Small and Republican Yvette Herrell. Also, consider the contest between the aforementioned French Hill against Democrat Clarke Tucker. Note two Washington state races. House Republican Conference Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., is up against Democrat Lisa Brown. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash., faces Democrat Carolyn Long.
If Democrats win even one of those races, that’s a signal Democrats will likely win the House.
Democrats don’t have to win all of these races. And there are plenty of pathways for Democrats to earn control of the House without winning any of those seats mentioned above. However, these seats are bellwethers. Turning any of them from red to blue could provide a clue as to which party will be in charge of the House next year.

Obama 2018 Cartoons

Trump rallies in Clinton-won districts ahead of midterms

President Trump is in his happy place – the campaign trail.
With the crucial midterm elections just over two weeks away, he’s headlining up to four rallies a week – and staging many of them in toss-up districts that voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016.
It may be a sign he believes his own hype, that the Democrats’ chances of a big win on Nov. 6 have receded and the GOP could buck trends. The party controlling the White House historically loses seats in Congress in the first midterm after a presidential election.
“You know, I think that blue wave is being rapidly shattered,” Trump told a boisterous crowd in Elko, Nev. on Saturday.
“All the Democrats want is power, and they’ve got this blue wave deal going,” he said. “Not looking like a blue wave.”

“You know, I think that blue wave is being rapidly shattered. All the Democrats want is power, and they’ve got this blue wave deal going. Not looking like a blue wave.”
— President Trump

Trump was in remote Elko, a town of less than 20,000 in northeast Nevada, on the first day of early voting in the state to push the re-election bid of Sen. Dean Heller, the GOP’s most endangered senator.
The two were once bitter enemies. Heller opposed Trump throughout the 2016 primaries and, ahead of the election, said he was “99 percent against him.”
What a difference a midterm makes.
“Mr. President, you know a little bit about gold,” Heller said Saturday. “In fact, I think everything you touch turns to gold.”
Their fence-mending reflects a remarkable shift within a Republican Party whose leaders were once almost completely hostile to the outsider president.
“Today there is zero daylight between Trump and the Republicans,” said Minneapolis political blogger John Hinderaker. “If you want to see where the Republican Party is at, go to a Trump rally.”
While Trump’s nationwide approval rating stands around 44 percent, he is hugely popular in many areas between the coasts.
His campaign travels so far in October have concentrated almost exclusively on the American heartland – places like Arizona, Kansas and Ohio. And he’s not just trying to protect vulnerable GOP incumbents.
In blue and purple cities like Rochester, Minn., and Missoula, Mont., Trump’s one-man show seemed to be aimed at encouraging his under-the-radar supporters to come out of hiding.
“Rochester, Minn., is a very moderate place,” Hinderaker said.
The city went for Clinton in 2016 by a 1 percent margin, and both Senate seats are in Democrats’ hands.
“He turned out a huge, enthusiastic crowd for a rally that was happy, upbeat and inspirational” on Oct. 2, Hinderaker said. “Afterward, people were tweeting out, ‘I love America.’ I think that feeling carries over even to people who didn’t attend.”
“Enthusiasm & Spirit is through the roof,” Trump tweeted after his Oct. 13 rally in Richmond, Ky. “SOMETHING BIG IS HAPPENING – WATCH!”

Obama visits Coachella just days after tweeting that more people attend music festival than voted in key states

Former President Barack Obama made a visit to California's Coachella Valley on Saturday, just days after tweeting that the turnout for the area's annual music festival surpasses the combined number of votes in three states that turned the 2016 presidential election.
The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, about 130 miles east of Los Angeles, typically attracts a few hundred thousand people over two consecutive three-day weekends each April.
It wasn't clear why Obama was in the area, but his remarks came in the midst of a multi-state speaking tour to shore up support for Democratic candidates ahead of the midterm elections and encouraging people to register to vote, the Desert Sun reported.
Since 2013, Obama has visited the area every Presidents Day weekend and had three summits with world leaders at Sunnylands, known as the "Camp David of the West."
He's also been spotted in Rancho Mirage hitting the gym and local golf courses.
In August, Obama endorsed 81 Democratic candidates.
On Monday, he is scheduled to appear at a rally on the University of Nevada, Las Vegas campus.
Last month Obama campaigned in Pennsylvania on behalf of U.S. Sen. Bob Casey and Gov. Tom Wolf, two Democrats seeking re-election.
Earlier this month, New York magazine reported that the Obama administration had a bipartisan plan in place to validate the 2016 presidential election in the event that Republican nominee Donald Trump protested a win by Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
But Trump's victory made the plan unnecessary.

Trump's 'very dangerous' decision to abandon nuclear accord has 'mankind facing full chaos,' Russia says

Following the downing of a Russian warplane by Syrian forces during an Israeli strike, Moscow promises to supply the S-300 missile system to its ally; senior foreign affairs correspondent Greg Palkot reports from London.

Hours after President Trump announced that the U.S. will pull out of a decades-old bilateral nuclear agreement that he said Russia had been "violating for many years," top Russian officials lined up to hit back in no uncertain terms, calling the president's move a "very dangerous" provocation that would lead to "full chaos."
"We condemn the ongoing attempts by blackmail to achieve concessions from Russia," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told a state news agency. "This would be a very dangerous step."
Konstatin Kosachev, who chairs the foreign affairs committee in the Federation Council, Russia's upper house of parliament, wrote on Facebook that Trump's decision meant "mankind is facing full chaos in the nuclear weapons sphere."
And prominent Russian senator Aleksey Pushkov charged that Trump's move meant "United States is bringing the world back to the Cold War," saying the U.S.' withdrawal from the treaty would be a  "massive blow to the entire system of strategic stability in the world." Pushkov had previously criticized claims that Russia meddled in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, arguing those suggestions are part of a plan to continue a "new Cold War."
RUSSIAN NATIONAL CHARGED WITH INTERFERING IN 2018 US ELECTIONS
The 1987 Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty ostensibly prevents both the United States and Russia from possessing, producing or test-flying any ground-launched cruise missile with a range of 300 to 3,400 miles. President Ronald Reagan and General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev inked the deal because of an unfolding crisis.

"We’re not going to let them violate a nuclear agreement."
— President Trump

But the Trump administration has said Russia broke the deal by deploying Novator 9M729 land-based cruise missiles, which can exceed that range and strike NATO countries quickly. The U.S. has previously acknowledged that Russia was violating the treaty in 2012 under the Obama administration, and for their part, Russian officials have also suggested the U.S. hasn't complied with the treaty by placing missiles in European bases.
After speaking at a campaign rally in Elko, Nevada, on Saturday, Trump said the agreement did little more than interfere with U.S. military development.
"We’re going to terminate the agreement, and we’re going to pull out,”  Trump told reporters. "They have been violating it for many years. I don't know why President [Barack] Obama didn't negotiate or pull out. ... We’re not going to let them violate a nuclear agreement and go out and do weapons, and we’re not allowed to."
ANALYSIS: PUTIN ATE TRUMP'S LUNCH AT PREVIOUS SUMMIT IN HELSINKI
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg concurred with Trump's assessment earlier this month. (The Defense Department concluded in February that Russia was actively violating its arms treaty agreements, as well.)
"This treaty abolishes a whole category of weapons and is a crucial element of our security. Now this treaty is in danger because of Russia's actions," Stoltenberg said. "After years of denials, Russia recently acknowledged the existence of a new missile system, called 9M729. Russia has not provided any credible answers on this new missile. All allies agree that the most plausible assessment would be that Russia is in violation of the treaty. It is therefore urgent that Russia addresses these concerns in a substantial and transparent manner."
On Saturday, Trump went on to say he would be open to a new, similar agreement only if Russia and China signed on and demonstrated a sincere commitment.
“We'll have to develop those weapons, unless Russia comes to us, and China comes to us, and they all come to us and they say ‘let's really get smart and let's none of us develop those weapons," Trump said.
UK Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson forcefully backed the U.S. in an interview with The Financial Times, saying that Russia had made a "mockery" of the agreement.
“Our close and long-term ally, of course, is the United States and we will be absolutely resolute with the United States in hammering home a clear message that Russia needs to respect the treaty obligation that it signed," Williamson said.
GORBACHEV: TRUMP, PUTIN SHOULD FOCUS ON ARMS CONTROL
But Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called Trump's pullout a "big, big mistake" on "Fox News Sunday," echoing comments he made Saturday on Twitter.
Trump's announcement comes as National Security Adviser John Bolton makes his way to Moscow on Monday and Tuesday, before a trip to countries elsewhere in the region. Bolton is expected to discuss a range of issues with his Russian counterparts, including Russia's deployment of a S-300 missile defense system in Syria, the recent poisoning of a former Russian spy in Britian, and the nuclear accord.
Also expected to headline discussions are renegotiations of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which is slated to expire in 2021. Signed by Obama and former Russian president Dmitri Medvedev, the deal limits the number of strategic warheads both countries are allowed to deploy.
Trump and Putin are expected to attend another high-level summit, following their widely-criticized meeting in Helsinki, Finland in July. Critics charged Trump was too ready to accept Putin's denials of any meddling in U.S. elections.
"This is the most severe crisis in nuclear arms control since the 1980s,” Malcolm Chalmers, the deputy director general of the Royal United Services Institute, said in an interview. “If the INF treaty collapses, and with the New Start treaty on strategic arms due to expire in 2021, the world could be left without any limits on the nuclear arsenals of nuclear states for the first time since 1972.”