John Light
Where Things Stand: Major Roadblock For Trump’s Census Scheme 
We have a new, exclusive story up right now.
TPM’s Tierney Sneed has learned that the Census Bureau identified routine issues in data from the 2020 decennial census, and will need time to fix them. This seemingly small wrinkle could have significant implications for how political power is distributed through apportionment.
Where Things Stand: Behold The Spectacle
President Trump warned us before the election that, as early and mail-in ballots were tabulated and key states shifted blue, he was going to falsely claim that his victory was being stolen. And he warned us he would send his lawyers in to prevent that supposed theft.
But we didn’t know it was going to look like this.
The Growing Power Imbalance
Last spring, TPM published a series of essays on structural reforms to American democracy that Democrats could consider should they win the Senate and the White House in November. Now, with weeks to go until Election Day, the fight over the future of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Supreme Court seat has thrust conversations about such reforms back to the fore. With the Senate and Supreme Court tilted to the right, and Republicans willing to toss aside norms and precedent to further strengthen their position, there’s too much at stake, the argument goes, for Democrats to declare any particular lever of power off limits.
Earlier this year, the Supreme Court knocked down the idea, advanced by President Trump’s lawyers, that their client was immune from criminal investigations. Today, that case came back before the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, where lawyers for the President advanced new arguments for why Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance cannot subpoena Trump’s financial records.
Except, not really.
Among the various ways the Trump administration is seeking to bend and rework the rules of government this year is a policy, announced by the President in July, to exclude undocumented immigrants from the apportionment count.
This has been a long-time goal for some on the political right. But what would the policy mean in practice?
Our design team has a snazzy new graphic explaining the Trump policy and its potential impact:
Where Things Stand: A Swing And A Miss
Allies of the president have been murmuring ominously about potential October surprises all year. There’s the Durham investigation, Giuliani’s conspiracy theories, and Senator Ron Johnson’s (R-WI) investigation into Ukraine-related Biden allegations, to name a few.
We got the results of that last one this morning. But, alas! There is no surprise.
Today, we learn that the GOP is done with the whole party platform thing. The party and Trump are one and the same, like Louis XIV and France.
Back in June, Steve Benen wrote for TPM Cafe on how the GOP came to be a post-policy party, with an exclusive focus on winning.