From redrawing electoral maps to installing a sense of uncertainty around the electoral process ahead of the midterms elections on 3 November, Republicans have deployed several tactics to try and skew the vote in their favor. As the president's popularity continues to drop, it is crucial for him and his administration to retain a majority in Congress or they could face investigations and even impeachment. Guardian political reporter Shrai Popat looks at the ways the Republicans have tried and are still trying to influence the election

• The US midterm races that will decide control of Congress – mapped

• US midterms: what are they and why do presidents dread them? – explainer

US health secretary falsely claims at Mike Rogers rally that Arabs have never won major prizes in science or literature

Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US health secretary, faced backlash on Wednesday for a “wildly racist tirade” during a campaign stop in Michigan in which he falsely asserted that Arabs never won major awards in science or literature.

Kennedy was speaking at the Monday night event in Grand Rapids in support of Mike Rogers, the Republican US Senate candidate who is trailing his Democratic midterms opponent Abdul El-Sayed, a Muslim, in polling.

Increase will add strain on healthcare system already struggling amid cuts by Trump administration, experts say

The number of people with dementia in the United States is projected to increase dramatically over the next 25 years, which will place increasing strain on a healthcare system already struggling to help them amid cuts by the Trump administration, experts say.

According to a new study in Jama Neurology, the annual incidence of new dementia cases globally will more than double, from 11.4m in 2023 to 24.7m in 2050. In the United States, the number of adults diagnosed with dementia each year will increase from 514,000 in 2020 to 1m by 2060, according to a Jama study published in 2024.

Department of Justice says it intends to appeal as administration tries to keep president’s ally Bill Essayli in office

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Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of jailed former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro who recently lost the race for his father’s former office, has landed in Miami, apparently taking shelter under the aegis of the Trump administration after fleeing his home country.

The younger Bolsonaro had been ordered to turn over his passport following his election defeat in connection with a criminal investigation over money laundering. Instead, Reuters and other outlets have reported that the defeated candidate and his family fled to Argentina overland before flying to the US via Ecaudor.

US central bank last month raised rates for first time since 2023, in move that infuriated Donald Trump

The US Federal Reserve is expected to leave interest rates unchanged on Wednesday during its last rate-setting meeting before the midterm elections, keeping rates at one of the highest pre-election levels seen in over 20 years.

Last month, Fed officials raised rates for the first time since 2023, citing rising inflation. Inflation has hovered for years above the Fed’s target rate of 2%, and for most of this year, the annualized inflation rate has remained above 3%.

Psychopatriarchy is jet fuel to racism, colonialism, imperialism and capitalism

For those of us who have spent our lives trying to dismantle this endlessly destructive paradigm of patriarchy, it has become increasingly clear in recent months that something more terrifying is afoot.

The wheels are off the cart. We are in the midst of a chaotic, demented acceleration of the most violent and cruel aspects of this system which has evolved into what I am calling Psychopatriarchy.

V (formerly Eve Ensler) is a playwright and activist and the founder of V-Day, a global movement to end violence against women and girls

Bill Essayli, a former GOP lawmaker and ally of president, has not been confirmed by the Senate in his role

A US judge ruled on Tuesday that Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in southern California, was “unlawfully serving” as the head of the US attorney’s office and was disqualified from overseeing two criminal prosecutions.

The order, however, will not immediately go into effect, and the Department of Justice (DoJ) has said it intends to appeal.

Susan and Michael Pretti say they have been ‘ignored and misled’ in quest for justice over son’s killing by US agents

The parents of Alex Pretti, the 37-year-old nurse killed by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis earlier this year, accused federal officials of stonewalling them and shielding their son’s killers.

During a press conference on Tuesday, Michael and Susan Pretti made their first public remarks since their son’s death in January, calling for the Department of Justice to hold those involved in their son’s death accountable. The federal government has not provided them with meaningful information about the case, they said.

President at Texas campaign rally hails deal struck with post-Maduro government as ‘greatest oil victory in history’

Donald Trump suggested Venezuela would become the 51st state of the United States on Tuesday as the president showed off a tanker he claimed had “one million barrels of oil on it” from the country, nine months after deposing its president.

At a campaign rally in Corpus Christ, Texas, Trump touted a US oil deal with Venezuela, which the US attacked in January, capturing its long-serving leader Nicolás Maduro.

Cassidy Hutchinson had implicated Donald Trump in US Capitol attack during testimony before House committee

The justice department on Tuesday failed to secure a grand jury indictment against a former White House staffer who provided dramatic but disputed testimony against Donald Trump before a House committee investigating the 6 January 2021 US Capitol insurrection, according to two people familiar with the matter.

A grand jury in Washington rejected prosecutors’ request to return an indictment charging Cassidy Hutchinson, said the people, who spoke to the Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the case. It’s the latest setback in the justice department’s efforts to charge perceived adversaries of the Republican president.

Vice-president tries to link El-Sayed to Paris protests and claims he would lead rioters in ‘burning down’ Detroit

JD Vance has escalated his inflammatory attacks on Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic candidate for US Senate in Michigan who has faced an onslaught of Islamophobia, claiming he would lead rioters in “burning down” Detroit.

El-Sayed, who would become the country’s first Muslim senator if he wins next week’s election, has been branded a “jihadist” by Donald Trump, the US president.

US military says it carried out an airstrike on an alleged drug-trafficking boat in latest attack in region

The US ⁠military ⁠said on ​Tuesday ⁠it killed ⁠five ​people ‌after ‌an airstrike on a ‌suspected drug-trafficking vessel in ​the ⁠eastern Pacific.

Tuesday’s strike was among more than 70 such attacks since the beginning of Donald Trump’s second presidency, according to media tallies. Collectively, they have killed more than 240 people.

Home of wealthy developer Stephen Cloobeck searched in connection to sexual misconduct inquiry into Swalwell

Federal law enforcement agents searched a home in suburban Los Angeles early on Tuesday as part of an investigation into Eric Swalwell, who resigned from Congress amid a wave of sexual misconduct allegations, a law enforcement official and two people familiar with the investigation told the Associated Press.

Agents searched the Beverly Hills home of the wealthy developer and Swalwell donor Stephen Cloobeck, where the Democratic ex-congressman spent time before resigning from office in April, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the investigation.

Voters have a chance to break America’s two-tiered system of justice and hold powerful people accountable

Welcome back to How We Win, a Guardian opinion series with leading thinkers, offering bold ideas for America’s political future. Last week, Guardian US columnist Rebecca Solnit wrote about the GOP’s alignment with the tech overlords. Today’s edition was written by Katie Phang, an independent journalist, trial lawyer and political analyst. Sign up for future editions here.

When Americans go to the polls a week from now, accountability will be front and center.

Instead of enforcing the law, the attorney general of the United States has been busy subverting it

Jennifer Shuford is expected to leave her post after midterm elections ‘to spend more time with my family’

The deputy director and chief medical officer of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will resign after six months on the job, according to an agency email obtained by the Guardian.

Dr Jennifer Shuford was appointed by Donald Trump in April as part of a four-person senior leadership team.

We want to hear from gen Z voters about the issues that will decide your vote in the midterm elections

The US midterm elections that will decide control of the House of Representatives and Senate, as well as the governorships in 36 states, are just one week away. The results could have a huge impact on Donald Trump’s final two years in office.

Nearly 50 million people aged 18 to 29 are eligible to vote in the midterms but nearly half are either not registered or civically engaged, according to US Census Bureau data.

Matthew Unglesbee admitted to sending the letters to four unidentified politicians, officials say

An Illinois man accused of sending letters containing suspicious white powder to four members of Congress has been arrested after he allegedly wrote his own name and return address on the envelopes, according to authorities.

Matthew Unglesbee, 36, of Quincy, remained in the custody of US marshals on Tuesday on federal charges of perpetrating a hoax and sending threatening communications through the mail.

Twenty-two states and Washington DC let voters register on election day. Why aren’t politicians doing more to reach young people?

With election day just a week away, candidates are ignoring millions of young Americans who could still cast a decisive ballot but have not yet registered to vote.

By contrast, my mailbox has been full of political flyers: the various campaigns gleaned my name from the voter file, recognized that I am a regular voter who hadn’t cast a ballot yet, and assessed through their targeted analysis that it’s worth spending on printing and postage to get their message to me.

Last year, the state’s board of elections removed several polling sites from local colleges – and students have taken it upon themselves to organize voting

• Gen Z voters: tell us what is guiding your vote in the US midterm elections

On 15 October, the first day of early voting in North Carolina, mostly Black students from North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University (NC A&T), Bennett College and the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) marched from their college campuses to their nearest polling sites for the first day of early voting.

Previously, students were able to vote on their respective campuses; however, late last year, with Republicans at the helm, the North Carolina board of elections removed several polling sites from local colleges: UNCG, NC A&T, Western Carolina University (WCU) and Elon University. As a result, students have taken it upon themselves to organize voting. The marches – two, so far – took about two hours round trip, but protecting their right to vote, the students say, is worth it.

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• US voters: tell us what issues will decide your vote?

Speaking to reporters on the tarmac before departing for a campaign event in Michigan, JD Vance responded to a question about President Trump’s remarks branding Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed as a “jihadist.”

Vance, who has sparred with the progressive El-Sayed repeatedly on the campaign trail, took a somewhat softer tone. But he didn’t walk away from Trump’s remarks.

It is essential not just to fund the public goods the nation needs, it is indispensable to restore a sense of fairness

Money doesn’t buy happiness, we’re told. Even some economists agree. The Nobel prize-winning economists Daniel Kahneman and Angus Deaton once proposed that rising income increased people’s emotional wellbeing only up to a ceiling of about $115,000 in today’s money.

They probably hadn’t met many billionaires. The ultra-rich may not pursue happiness in the joyful sense of the word. But they will try every trick in the book to hang on to their stash and woe betide the tax authority that tries to lay a finger on their treasure.

Benjamin Netanyahu is in the fight of his political life. Voters in Israel are heading to the polls on Tuesday to decide an election that could determine whether Netanyahu will remain the country's prime minister (and affect the outcome of the corruption charges against him). But the Israeli election also arrives at a time when voters around the world seem to be rejecting authoritarianism. A student-run movement stunned the world on Sunday when its candidates routed Serbia's long-serving leader, Aleksandar Vučić. That same day, Brazilians beat back a campaign by Flávio Bolsonaro – the son of Jair Bolsonaro, the disgraced former president – in a historic upset. Carter Sherman speaks to Julian Borger, the Guardian’s senior international correspondent, about how these four elections could reshape the political world order in just 10 days, and why the upcoming US midterm elections are the biggest test for global democracy.

• Julian Borger on 10 days that could shake the world

Social media companies including Meta have pulled back on efforts to protect voters from election-meddling lies

Social media feeds are awash with an unprecedented flood of AI-driven disinformation ahead of November’s US midterm elections, according to experts, who warn many posts are probably “slipping through the cracks”.

As tens of millions of Americans prepare to cast their vote, social media companies have scaled back their efforts to protect voters from lies meant to manipulate elections.

Republican attacks on the candidate for governor are contradictory and hinge on a warped understanding of sexual abuse

I’ve heard people say that the Ramaswamy team must have been scared.

Last week, the campaign of Vivek Ramaswamy, the tech billionaire and onetime Republican presidential candidate who is currently the Republican nominee to be the governor of Ohio, ran an ad featuring the long-estranged mother of his Democratic opponent, the physician and former public health official Amy Acton.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

No private individual should have the power to determine US foreign policy, as Musk has attempted to do in Ukraine

He’s Exhibit A on why billionaire wealth should be taxed, why we must get big money out of politics, why billionaires shouldn’t be allowed to buy up major media, and why our government shouldn’t give them huge military contracts.

I’m talking about Elon Musk, of course.

Rubio’s decision not to meet Narendra Modi last week was seen by some as a snub – but by focusing on business leaders and oil, the secretary of state made American priorities clear. Plus: the artist bringing a female perspective to men’s clothing

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When the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, visited India for the second time this year, headlines concentrated on who he met and where he went.

The fact that Rubio bypassed New Delhi and did not meet the prime minister, Narendra Modi, during his trip last week, and instead traveled to the financial capital, Mumbai, where he met India’s foreign minister, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar (pictured top with Rubio), and business leaders, did not go unnoticed. Nor did his decision to travel to Jamnagar, the small Gujarati town that is home to Reliance Industries’ colossal oil refinery complex.

Move is latest attempt to challenge states with competitive midterm races that could determine control of Congress

The Trump administration on Monday asked Washington state to set aside any ballots received from more than 400 people it alleges are registered to vote without US citizenship, less than two weeks after making a similar demand in California.

The announcement is the latest sign of the administration’s attempts to sow doubts about the election or its outcome in states with races that will help determine control of the US Senate and House.

Newsom accuses Trump of ‘assault on democracy’ as DoJ claims 20,000 registered voters in state are non-citizens

A US federal appeals court rejected the Trump administration’s move to block California from counting the ballots of 20,000 registered voters that the justice department claims are non-citizens.

The court on Monday ruled 2-1 against Donald ⁠Trump’s ​justice department in the dispute, denying the administration’s demand that election officials segregate the thousands of ballots until people on the list could verify their citizenship. The justice department had given the California secretary of state 48 hours to carry out the order, which state election officials refused – leading to the lawsuit.

President’s comments come ahead of November midterm elections and follow his claims of widespread voter fraud

Donald Trump has announced a $1m reward for reports of voter fraud in past elections and the upcoming midterm elections, with payment contingent on the arrest and conviction of those responsible.

In a Truth Social post on Monday, the president wrote: “Anybody reporting Voter Fraud in the past Elections, or the upcoming 2026 Midterm Election, will be paid $1,000,000 upon the arrest and conviction of those that created the Fraud! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”