FBI Director Kash Patel earlier this month fired an FBI agent overseeing the Critical Incident Response Group (CIRG), which in turn oversees the Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) that deployed the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) note advising against releasing ‘vintage tokens’ after lawsuit filed over manifesto left by transgender killer Audrey Hale, who killed six at Covenant School on March 27, 2023.

The first was the firing of former FBI agent Steven Palmer reported By Bloomberg’s Law on Nov. 1, when the outlet alleged that the 27-year-old FBI employee had incurred the director’s ire because of his additional role overseeing the agency’s aviation units.

At the time of Palmer’s firing, Patel had recently made headlines after flying on an FBI plane for personal reasons.

White House policy, potentially casting doubt on whether this is the reason for Palmer’s firing adopted during the Obama administration requires the head of the FBI to fly on government jets and Bloomberg reported that her sources were “amazed” that the director would blame Palmer for the negative headlines.

The website also revealed that Palmer is the third person to lead CIRG to leave his position during Patel’s tenure.

Others include former FBI agent Wes Wheeler, who Bloomberg was reportedly asked to resign as head of CIRG earlier this year, and former senior official Brian Driscoll, who oversaw CIRG’s operations before is fired in August for allegedly trying to protect agents who were involved in the network of Biden-era Republicans who took part in protests in Washington, D.C. on January 6, 2021.

Driscoll held the position for only about five months after Wheeler’s departure when he was fired.

While Wheeler led CIRG through the transition from former President Joe Biden to the Trump administration, it was led by former FBI agent Paul Haertel in May 2023, when the note has been sent by BAU-1 for MNPD under CIRG supervision.

Haertel was promoted lead CIRG in February 2021, and left FBI in May 2024

Star News Digital Media, Inc. (SNDM)which owns and operates Tennessee Starand editor-in-chief Michael Patrick Leahy, defendant Metro Nashville will receive a manifesto in May 2023.

While the lawsuit remains in progressthis was in the same month of 2023 when BAU-1 sent its unsigned note to MNPD Chief John Drake, warning that releasing “legacy tokens” left behind by mass murderers could lead to “unintended consequences,” including the spread of conspiracy theories and disinformation.

There was a copy of the note legally obtained By Star in June 2024, when he also received a number of police investigative documents related to the Covenant case and the killer’s last diary, in which Star published in full last year.

The memo “expresses the opinion that responsible authorities must take all possible measures to limit the opportunities of future criminals who contemplate” a mass shooting, and “strongly” discourages “public dissemination of any legacy tokens,” which the FBI defines as any “communication prepared by a criminal to claim credit for an attack and convey the motives behind a shooting.”

After insisting that MNPD not release “legacy tokens,” the memo set a precedent for their destruction, noting that a number of videotapes recovered after the 1999 attack on Columbine High School had been permanently destroyed to prevent future release.

Leahy i SNDM he additionally sued the FBI to force the agency to release the memo, but under Patel’s leadership the matter was settledand the FBI agreed to publish redacted versions of the killer’s writings. About half the killer’s writings have been released so far.

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Blank paper is the lead reporter Tennessee Staras well as reports for Pennsylvania’s Daily Star AND The Arizona Sun Times.. Follow Tomek X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].

by Jarrett Stepman

Election day is already behind us. While we’re still a year away from the essential 2026 congressional elections, there are still plenty of races that are gaining national attention for one reason or another.

Will President Donald Trump’s redshift in blue states in 2024 continue? Will the Democratic Party move further to the left?

Here’s a quick preview of the races to watch on Tuesday.

Minneapolis mayoral race

Two mayoral races dominate this election cycle. While Minneapolis may not reach New York’s level of interest, it does have its own version of Zohran Mamdani, who wants to push the Democratic Party even further to the left.
The city’s ranked-choice voting system ensures the top two candidates are Democrats. The first is incumbent Mayor Jacob Frey, a man who had already veered far left and was an enthusiastic supporter of the Black Lives Matter movement when the city erupted in riots in summer 2020.

He is challenged by democratic socialist Omar Fateh, the son of Somali immigrants who became the first Muslim to serve in the Minnesota Senate after winning the 2020 election.

My colleague Tyler O’Neil wrote about Fateh in his announcement of the mayoral race: :

Fateh, a self-described democratic socialist and member of the Democratic Socialists of America, favors raising taxes “so that the rich pay their fair share.” He is an advocate for “environmental justice.” …

The state senator appears to be taking advantage of the petite but influential Somali Muslim community in Minneapolis. A Minnesota insider described the Somali community as a “very important voting bloc” that is not a “majority” of the city but is extremely influential. According to reports, members of this community went to training with Al Shabaab terrorist group in Somalia and the Islamic State, but law enforcement has engaged with the community to counter radicalism.

New York mayoral race

It’s infrequent for a mayoral race to attract so much attention across the country, but in the Big Apple, this one is really gigantic.

In one corner is 34-year-old New York National Assembly member Zohran Mamdani, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America who ran a successful insurrectionary campaign in the Democratic primary. He has been the leader since the June victory.

In the other corners are Andrew Cuomo, the former New York governor who was defeated in the Democratic primary and is now running an independent campaign, and Curtis Śliwa, a Republican. Śliwa is the founder of Guardian Angels, an anti-crime organization established in the tardy 1970s.

Mamdani presented a position of resistance to President Donald Trump and federal immigration enforcement. His platform spearheads the message about overpriced housing and offers mostly government solutions to a problem that comes down to taxing the wealthy and tax whites in a city considered the financial capital of the United States. Not only that, but he was also self-made close to radical Islamists and refused to condemn the phrase “globalize the Intifada.”

Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York State, who has apparently entered the 2026 race for New York governor, commented on Mamdani’s inappropriate connections.

This is America’s worst governor @KathyHochul proudly supports:

“He looks quite happy to be there. Zohran Mamdani wants to be the next mayor of New York… Who is he with? He’s with the imam who once called for jihad in the Big Apple and he’s smiling. That’s… pic.twitter.com/7WxPJmAl3K

— Elise Stefanik (@EliseStefanik) October 26, 2025

Cuomo took the stance of an experienced voter who knows how to govern and condemned Mamdani’s radicalism.

Sliva maintains that he is Mamdani’s true opponent and is the only candidate who is consistently earnest about stopping and preventing crime in the city.

Recent polls show that the race is on may become more severealthough many polls also showed Cuomo winning the primary. Anyway, here’s what’s happening in the New York mayoral race will have consequences not only for the city, but also for the country.

New Jersey Governor’s Race

Few states have moved further to the right in 2024 than New Jersey. While the Garden State still cast its electoral college votes for former Vice President Kamala Harris, there was a noticeable dramatic shift in the vote. Or New Jersey now the purple state? Or is it even tilted red?

These are the questions that need answers in the New Jersey governor’s race, which pits Democrat Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli against each other to replace Gov. Phil Murphy, who is out of office for a term. Ciattarelli came close to defeating Murphy in the last election.

Most polls show Sherrill leading Ciattarelli, but the race has tightened significantly since the beginning. By RealClearPollingSherrill started with a 21-point lead in June, but current polling averages show a difference of less than four points between the candidates.

The race was close enough even former president Barack Obama hit the campaign trail to lend a hand Sherrill get to the finish line.

Republican candidate for Ohio governor, Vivek Ramaswamy, came to Ciattarelli’s aid.

https://t.co/QFSzyYSrKC

— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRAmaswamy) October 16, 2025

“New Jersey is a state where there are a lot of Republicans who just don’t know yet that they’re actually Republicans,” Ramaswamy said during a mid-October visit.

Virginia AG Race

The Virginia attorney general’s race has become a race of national importance not only because Virginia is a key electoral battleground, but because of a particular issue that changed the race.

Democrat Jay Jones, who is challenging incumbent Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares, has come under scrutiny after National Review published a series of his op-eds in which he said he wanted the former Republican Speaker of the Virginia House and his children to be shot.

The texts were from 2022, but came to lithe shortly after the murder Charlie Kirk. Despite calls for Jones to leave the race, he apologized and decided to continue his campaign. Virginia Democrats have refused to call on Jones to drop out of the race.

According to polls, Miyares opened a a significant advantage over Jones after the texts came to lithe and claims they lead to Election Day.

There are two main questions surrounding this race heading into Election Day. What can you expect from an elected official who, upon taking office, wished his opponents a violent death? The fact that Jones is performing poorly in the race may resolve that issue, but another question is whether his comments will drag down the rest of the Democratic ticket.

Virginia Governor’s Race

The Virginia governor’s race appears to be a potential decider in the 2026 midterm elections, which is why it is attracting a lot of attention.

Republican Gov. Glenn Younkin was ineligible to run due to Virginia’s unique ban on serving as governor. He will be replaced by his governor, Winsome Earle-Sears, or Democratic candidate Abigail Spanberger.

Spanberger is a congresswoman and former CIA agent. She was leading in the polls throughout the race, but her lead has narrowed in recent days. This is likely due in part to the attorney general race mentioned earlier.

Spanberger has acted as an advocate for federal workers, an especially salient issue in the Washington suburbs of northern Virginia. But she refused to address the core issues around which Earle-Sears is campaigning. The first is the issue of transgender ideology, which partially put Youngkin in office in 2021. Spanberger essentially addressed this issue and I don’t want to deal with it.

The second issue is Jones’ comments. Not only did she continue to support Jones, but she also refused to engage Earle-Sears on the issue when it came up during the October debate.

Virginia @WinsomeSears he asks @SpanbergerForVA why doesn’t she condemn Dem AG candidate Jay Jones for calling for the death of a political opponent’s children when Spanberger refuses to even look at her during the debate. This is powerful. pic.twitter.com/KTGsNAd67L

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) October 10, 2025

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Jarrett Stepman is a columnist for The Daily Signal. He is also the author of “The War on History: The Plot to Rewrite America’s Past“
Photo “People Vote” by Ben Schumin. CC BY-SA 2.0.

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by Natalia Mittelstadt

Several polling places in New Jersey were moved Tuesday because of the threats, according to the state’s attorney general.

New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin (no) – wrote in the statement“Early this morning, law enforcement responded to threats received via email regarding certain polling places in Bergen, Essex, Mercer, Middlesex, Monmouth, Ocean and Passaic counties.

“Law enforcement officers responded to each affected polling place and worked quickly to secure those polling places and ensure the safety of each voter. Some of these polling places have already reopened to the public. In others, voters will be directed to a nearby polling place to cast their ballot.”

On Tuesday, New Jersey voters will cast ballots in the gubernatorial election between Democrat Mikie Sherrill and former Republican Jack Ciattarelli.

New Jersey Democratic Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of State Tahesha Way published on X on Tuesday regarding a bomb threat, saying, “We are aware of threats against several polling places in New Jersey. Law enforcement has determined that there are no credible threats at this time.”

“We are doing everything we can to protect voters and poll workers, and we are working closely with state, local and federal partners to ensure a smooth and safe election. We encourage every eligible voter to exercise their right to vote today before 8 p.m..”

Quinnipiac vote last week showed Sherrill beating Ciattarelli by 8 points: 51 to 43. This poll showed the Democrat increasing her advantage over the Republican candidate.

“Will another Democrat take over from Gov. Phil Murphy? In the final days of a very tight race, Mikie Sherrill’s 20-point lead over the women increases her overall lead to 8 points over Jack Ciattarelli,” said Tim Malloy, a Quinnipiac University polling analyst.

On Monday, New Jersey’s former Republican governor, Gov. Thomas Kean, endorsed Ciattarelli, saying “the state needs change,” according to Only News.

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Natalia Mittelstadt is a reporter for Just the News. Zachary Schmidt is a digital editor Star News Network and contributed to this story.
Photo “People in Line to Vote” by liz west. CC BY 2.0.

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by Manzanita Miller

The Democratic Party is in crisis as Democrats in Congress struggle to gain credibility amid the illegal immigration crisis, unchecked crime and political violence, and a controversial government shutdown that has Democrats demanding a indefinite expansion of Obamacare and a repeal of Sec. one substantial lovely act that stop taxpayers from subsidizing Medicare for illegal people. Conservative priorities such as rooting out government waste, fighting rising crime and securing the border, are enjoying an outpouring of support from the American people, with two-thirds of Americans identifying as either conservative or moderatewhile just 28 percent say they are liberal today.

The Democratic Party is rapidly losing membership and lagging behind the GOP in recent voter registrations. AND New York Times report sent a shockwave by the Democratic establishment in August, which revealed that as of 2020, Republicans significantly outnumber Democrats in registered voters. The report shows Democrats lag behind Republicans in every state that maintains partisan voter ID registries from 2020 to 2024. Republicans added a full 2.4 million voters, while Democrats lost 2.1 million, according to the report.

While that loss contributed to President Donald Trump’s landslide victory in 2024, since the report was released, Democrats have continued to trail Republicans in voter registration, even in blue states. Voter registration data shows red states are getting redder, but there is forceful evidence that even blue states are registering Republicans at an accelerated rate while Democratic numbers are plateauing or degenerating.

In the red state of Kentucky, Republicans are growing their numbers at an accelerated pace, as reported by Secretary of State Michael Adams Republicans registered the most recent voters in September compared to Democrats or independents.

“After six months of growth in registered independent voters, Republicans are now showing increased interest in registering ahead of the May 2026 primary elections.” Adams said.

Kentucky voter data shows Republicans added 4,636 recent voters in September and now make up 48 percent of the electorate. The number of registered Democrats dropped by 3,354 in September, and Democrats now make up 41 percent of the electorate.

North Carolina is another state worth watching. While Republicans continue to trail Democrats in a contested battleground, the GOP has fewer than 10,000 votes statewide as of September Data from the National Electoral Commission. Since January, Democrats have lost a total of more than 6,000 registered voters, while Republicans have gained 28,657 voters since the beginning of the year.

Democrats’ vote share increased in North Carolina he was on the decline for more than three and a half decades, falling from 65 percent of the vote in 1988 to just 31 percent in 2025, a decline of 34 points. While much of this decline in Democratic affiliation can be attributed to the augment in third-party or unaffiliated voters, the decline in Democratic affiliation should be very concerning for Democrats.

In New Jersey, some analysts speculate could become a “purple state” following forceful shifts toward the right in 2024, Republicans and unaffiliated voters dominate recent voter registration numbers. Data from the New Jersey Secretary of State show that while Democrats maintain a significant lead in voter registration, Democrats lost more than 4,000 voters in September, while Republicans added 2,385 voters during the same period. The majority of recent voters – more than 13,000 people – registered as unaffiliated voters.

Even in the blue state of California, Democrats are seeing degenerating voter registration numbers. Democrats still make up nearly half of the state’s registered voters, while Republicans make up 25% and nonpartisans make up 22%. However, since February 10, 82,700 recent nonpartisan voters have registered and 48,000 recent Republican voters have registered, while Democrats have registered only 190 recent voters, according to data analyzed by California Politics 360.

In Tennessee, the crisis isn’t theoretical – it’s happening in real time. In the recent TN-7 special primary, early voting in Davidson County (a key Democratic area) included just 3,343 in-person and mail-in ballots, of which 2,873 were from Democrats. Lisa Quigley, longtime Democratic Party activist, publicly criticized the turnoutcalling it “a complete breakdown of voter engagement in Nashville.” Her rebuke highlights that in a state already drifting toward Republicans, even major Democratic strongholds are failing to find their base.

In Nevada, registered Republicans outperformed Democrats in the election for the first time in about two decades, Related press reported in February.

In New Jersey, despite the Democrats’ enormous overall advantage, the Republicans won adding voters at a faster clip in recent months, as reflected in statewide tallies summarized by local coverage.

Across the country, multiple analyzes of state voter records show the same macro trend: between 2020 and 2024 Democrats fired about 2.1 million registrants while Republicans added about 2.4 million, reducing Democrats’ registration advantage to its lowest level in years.

On Thursday, President Donald Trump touted state-by-state registration growth for Republicans in a series of TruthSocial posts. In nine separate graphics, Trump outlined the number of recent Republican registrations since the 2024 election and, if possible, 2025. presented graphics both time-honored Democratic strongholds like California, New Mexico and New Jersey, and key battlegrounds like North Carolina, Iowa, Florida, Pennsylvania and Arizona – showing a total of almost 800,000 recent GOP voters.

Democrats continue to struggle to add recent members and appear to have reached their threshold even in blue states where the party’s strength is waning. The number of unaffiliated voters is growing and is responsible for much of the decline in Democratic voters, but Republicans are steadily gaining ground in red, blue and purple states leading into the midterm election cycle in 2026. The latest overall congressional voting data continues to show Democrats holding a historically modest three percentage point advantage. The Democratic Party has spent the last ten years vilifying President Donald Trump and conservatives instead of offering solutions to globalism, trade imbalances, the border crisis and escalating crime, and the left is slowly driving away moderate and independent voters.

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Manzanita Miller is a senior policy analyst at the Americans for Limited Government Foundation. Christina Botteri, editor-in-chief State of Tennesseeri Star News Networkcontributed to this article.
“2024 Electoral College Map” painting by 270toWin.com.

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Jason Hopkins

On Thursday, Trump’s administration sued six different states for allegedly not to grant the registration data of voters on demand.

The Department of Justice (Doj) filed lawsuits against California, Minnesota, Michigan, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and New York for the alleged failure to transfer the registration list of voters throughout the state, in accordance with press release from the agency. Court lawsuits mean the latest means of Trump’s administration to boost the integrity of elections throughout the country.

“Pure fate of voters is the basis for free and honest choices,” said prosecutor Pam Bondi in a public statement.

“Each country is required to make sure that the registration documentation of voters is accurate, available and secure – states that do not fulfill this obligation in court the Department of Justice,” Bondi continued.

The lawsuits are largely focused on democratic officials, such as secretaries of the state in California, Minnesota, Michigan and members of the New York election council. Republican secretaries of the state in New Hampshire and Pennsylvania were also clicked to court disputes.

In accordance with the law, states are authorized to effective voter registration programs and voter’s maintenance programs, according to Doj. While the details of each process differ, the general issue revolves around the National Act on the registration of voters, the Help America Voise Act and the Civic Rights Act of 1960 – all of which refer to voting regulations.

Six countries refuse to provide a registration letter of voters with full information and do not answer the questions about the funds that they take in order to maintain the electoral kick, in accordance with the lawsuits.

“States are obliged to protect American elections by observing our federal elections,” said in a public statement the deputy prosecutor general Harmeeta Dhillon from the Department of Civil Rights. “Pure fate of voters protect American citizens from voting and abuse and restore their certainty that their states are carried out properly, with honesty and in accordance with the law.”

These are far from the first processes that the Trump administration led in relation to the integrity of elections.

At the beginning of this month, Oregon and Maine sued too allegedly fallen Transfer the registration fate of voters, and the federal prosecutors conduct Another lawsuit against Orange County in California. Trump administration this month he dropped the lawsuit against the Electoral Council in North Carolina after satisfaction with the progress of the Council in removing names from the registration lists of voters who do not have sufficient information.

In March, President Donald Trump signed “the behavior and protection of the integrity of American elections”, and proclamation This is to maintain elections in accordance with federal regulations, which protect against illegal vote, discrimination and other forms of fraud. In May, the Trump administration began novel function In the case of civic and immigration services in the US, which allow state and local officials to introduce social insurance numbers to verify the US citizenship, helping to prevent foreigners from participating in federal elections.

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Jason Hopkins is a reporter at the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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by Charlotte Hazard

President Donald Trump announced on Monday through Truth Social that he would lead a traffic to get rid of post and voting machines due to fraud and corruption, but the matter will probably take place at the state level.

“I will lead a traffic to get rid of the voting cards, and also when we are at the same time, very” wrong “, very expensive and seriously controversial voting machines, which cost ten times more than accurate and sophisticated water paper, which is faster and leaves doubts, at the end of the evening, which won, and who lost, elections”, tube tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube, tube tube tube, tube tube, tube tube, tube tube, tube tube tube he wrote in a long social post.

Experts Interview with Newsweek The News Outlet said that Trump’s executive ordinance will not change federal elections, and Congress is not able to change the way countries run the elections.

In the past, Republicans criticized voting machines and post voting, as in 2022, intra -fifteenth, countries like Arizona had problems with machines that did not work. American agency of the Senior Global Advisor of the Media and former candidate for Governor Arizona Kari Lake in 2022 performed In at least 60% of voice centers in Maricopa.

Current Congressmen Abe Hamadeh, R-Ariz., He ran to the Prosecutor General in 2022 I Narrowly lost to the democratic prosecutor Kris Mayes. He filed a lawsuit and claimed that he was unlawfully because of all votes that were not counted and manipulation of elections.

“Lies and conspiracies”

Mayes really reacted to Trump to social media platform, xOn Monday, writing: “Arizonanie safely and safely voted by post for decades, since the legislator led by Republicans approved him in the 1990s. Donald Trump wants to tear this right based on lies and conspiracies. But he has no right to interfere in elections in Arizona.”

Hamadeh He answered to post Mayes “The only reason you take the office is the manipulation of the election – you are illegal and you have not been chosen, but rather chosen by corrupt Kabbal. President Trump will fix our broken election system, and I will be there to help.”

States throughout the United States have different rights when it comes to post voting cards, and many of them have been changed at local level.

Just a few days before the presidential election in 2024. The Supreme Court in Pennsylvania ruled that voting cards without a handwritten date You can’t count In the 2024 election.

The Supreme Court of State Keystone was on the side of Pennsylvania GOP in the ruling, refuting the earlier decision of the Court of the Community of Nations, which states that the requirement of a handwritten date was unconstitutional.

Demes are pressing at early postal voting

Last year, Republicans from New York questioned the state law signed by the Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul expanded Early voting by post. This law allows voters in New York to ask for post voting up to ten days before the election. They do not have to give a reason why they could not vote personally.

In August, the Court of Appeal in New York maintained the right of votingrejecting the challenge from the Republicans.

Trump said he would sign an executive order to get rid of voting cards and voting machines before the election in the middle of the period in 2026.

“We will start this effort, which Democrats will definitely oppose, because they have been cheating on levels before, signing the executive order that will help bring honesty in the intracerexiacs in 2026.” – he continued his truth. “Remember that countries are only an” agent “for the federal government in counting and comparing votes.”

Historically, one election stands out in this regard, because it is the presidential race in 2000 between Al Gore and George W. Bush. Florida was a key “obligatory” state for both candidates. The Secretary of State in Florida Katherine Harris certified that Bush won the 537 votes elections. According to National Constitutional CenterOn December 8, 2000, the Supreme Court in Florida on the Gore side, ordering that all “insufficient” voting cards or card cards that were staffed, but not registered because of the problem called “hanging chad”, they should be told.

. US Supreme Court decision On December 12, he was against the Supreme Court in Florida, canceling the case back for further actions. But since the term of the safe and sound passed to nominate members of the Elektors College, Bush emerged as a certified winner in Florida, and Gore lost the next day.

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Charlotte Hazard is only a news reporter.
Photo “Mail in Khatyals” by Cindy Shebley. CC at 2.0.