South American pipeline. Chevron said it will greatly expand its oil-producing operations in Venezuela, days after Mr. Trump announced plans for joint U.S. control of 65 million barrels of oil in the South American country.

Chevron plans to spend more than $7 billion in Venezuela over the next five years, more than doubling its current production to about 600,000 barrels per day.

The action follows Mr. Trump’s decision to arrest and extradite Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro to the U.S. on drug charges. The January raid led to partial U.S. control of Venezuela’s vast oil riches under the interim government in Caracas.

The administration’s venture, which is separate from the Chevron deal, would allow a Barbados-based entity operating in Venezuela, North American Blue Energy Partners, to gain rights over multiple oil fields and large reserve deposits.

Mr. Trump said the transactions will benefit both countries. Gas prices in the U.S. have risen more than 30% since American and Israeli forces attacked Iran on Feb. 28, leading to the disruption of oil shipments from the Middle East.

The IRS could strip private schools of their tax exemptions if they use race-based preferences in their admissions or financial assistance, according to a new proposed regulation.

Schools that seek to forge diversity through the use of “discriminatory practices” would lose their special tax status.

“Schools rebranding race-based preferences as equitable, inclusive or diversity-enhancing does not change their discriminatory nature,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said.

The rule would apply to all levels, from primary schools to universities, and would also cover professional and trade schools. The IRS figured more than 18,000 private institutions, with 750,000 students, may be affected.

Mr. Trump’s immigration crackdown has reduced the U.S. migrant population by about 3 million, according to a new analysis.

States that take federal money for their cash welfare programs must report illegal immigrants to the Department of Homeland Security — a move that could defang states’ sanctuary policies.

The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel said the federal government can now condition states’ receipt of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families — the main cash welfare program — on whether all of their agencies share information on illegal immigrants.

Previously, the state agencies that handled the programs were required to report illegal immigrants, but other state agencies were exempt.

The move could force states to choose between their existing sanctuary laws and access to federal money. TANF’s block grants to states total about $16.5 billion a year.

Mr. Trump’s longtime teleprompter operator has been suspended from the prediction market Kalshi for using insider information about the president’s speeches to gain more than $100,000.

Kalshi said it has reasonable cause to believe that Gabriel Perez, a teleprompter operator since Mr. Trump’s first term in office, bet on Kalshi’s “Mentions” market, where users can wager on whether specific words, phrases or topics are said during a public speech.

As someone who produced televised White House content, he loaded remarks into a teleprompter and had “advanced access to material non-public information regarding the content of Politician A’s remarks,” Kalshi said.

Federal investigators found that Mr. Perez wagered on the president’s State of the Union address in February, according to multiple reports. The White House suspended Mr. Perez in July after the prediction market platform flagged suspicious trades.

The move came as Kalshi banned or suspended several other political figures for similar actions, including former Rep. George Santos of New York.

Kicking the can. House Republicans and Democrats joined forces to clear a Senate-passed stopgap appropriations bill, ensuring the government will remain open through Dec. 11 and punting a potential shutdown fight until after the midterm elections.

The bill temporarily extends current spending levels and policies, with some adjustments for priority programs, such as those focused on national defense, wildfire prevention and food assistance. The White House has said Mr. Trump will sign the bill.

Congress is far from an agreement on full-year fiscal 2027 appropriations bills, but the stopgap provides lawmakers with an additional 10 weeks of negotiating time.

The House censured North Carolina Rep. Chuck Edwards over sexual harassment allegations in a rare public rebuke of a member.

The measure passed by an overwhelming 413-2 vote, with only Mr. Edwards himself and Rep. Ralph Norman, a South Carolina Republican, in opposition.

The bipartisan Ethics Committee said it found “substantial reason” to believe he “violated House Rules related to sexual harassment and hostile workplaces.”

Its report said Mr. Edwards “engaged in persistent unprofessional and inappropriate conduct towards two young female staffers,” citing repeated gifts, comments on their appearance, and invitations to “intimate dinners and vacations.”

The battle over socialism’s future in America moved into the House, when Republican lawmakers voted to condemn socialism and the increasingly powerful Democratic Socialists of America. The resolution passed with support from just eight Democrats.

When the House voted on a resolution condemning socialism in November, 86 Democrats supported the measure. That was before socialists won multiple Democratic House primaries this year, in some cases unseating incumbents endorsed by party leaders.

House Oversight and Government Reform Chair James Comer is investigating allegations that the Biden administration’s Drug Enforcement Administration knowingly allowed large quantities of fentanyl to reach New Mexico communities as agents pursued larger trafficking cases.

In a letter to Attorney General Todd Blanche, the Kentucky Republican accused the former administration of relaxing policies against fentanyl trafficking that allegedly “disallowed interdictions by law enforcement and permitted deadly street drugs to flow into U.S. communities.”

The request refers to an enforcement strategy where federal agents deliberately monitored but did not seize shipments of illegal fentanyl.

In some investigations, federal prosecutors and DEA agents tracked large fentanyl shipments rather than immediately seizing the drugs, allowing transactions to proceed as they gathered intelligence and built cases against higher-level traffickers.

The tactic gained intense public attention following a June Associated Press investigation exposing a whistleblower complaint against the DEA in Albuquerque.

New Mexico’s fentanyl poisoning deaths rose nearly 21% during the period, while deaths nationwide fell 14%, according to AP’s analysis.

Data center air wars. The fight over data centers is suddenly dominating the midterm campaign airwaves.

Campaign ads link data center construction to rising energy costs, environmental strain and local economic fallout.

With artificial intelligence driving unprecedented demand for power, campaigns say voters are quick to connect tech‑grid expansion to their own spiking utility bills.

Democrats account for roughly 73% of the spending, mostly using the issue to hit Republicans over grid stress and higher bills. GOP candidates have started firing back with their own data‑center‑focused attacks.

Mr. Trump will personally campaign across roughly 35 competitive House and Senate races in the final 30 days before the 2026 midterm elections, vowing to help Republican candidates hold their majorities.

Mr. Trump said he plans to focus his efforts in the final 30 days before the elections, saying campaigning too early causes voters to forget.

Bolstering the effort, erstwhile presidential pal Elon Musk plans to spend nearly $1 billion on GOP midterm campaigns. The billionaire’s largesse is especially benefiting the Senate campaigns of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, and Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Jon Husted of Ohio.

Going to trial. A Utah judge ruled that Tyler Robinson must stand trial for aggravated murder and face the death penalty in the Charlie Kirk assassination.

Judge Tony Graf rejected arguments by the defense team that the mountain of evidence put forward by prosecutors did not sufficiently tie Mr. Robinson to the conservative influencer’s death, including Mr. Robinson’s own admissions that he fatally shot Kirk with his grandfather’s rifle.

Mr. Robinson quickly entered a plea of not guilty.

The ruling paved the way for Mr. Robinson’s murder trial to begin and was issued nearly a year after Kirk was gunned down on the campus of Utah Valley University.

Mr. Robinson, 23, will face the death penalty after Judge Graf rejected the defense’s efforts to have him strike the aggravating factors cited by prosecutors justifying capital punishment.

No trial date was immediately set, though, and it may not happen quickly.

Mr. Trump’s second attempt at an executive order limiting birthright citizenship was blocked by a federal judge, who said the president was trying to eat away at citizenship for some of the people the Supreme Court just ruled were entitled to it.

Judge Deborah Boardman, a Biden appointee to the court in Maryland, issued a preliminary injunction forbidding the government from refusing to recognize citizenship based on Mr. Trump’s order.

The order, issued last month, said children born to members of terrorist organizations and those born to parents who work for foreign governments should not be granted automatic citizenship.

Mr. Trump’s FCC threat against NBC journalist Kristen Welker is a direct result of the media and its predecessors creating an expansive and intrusive federal government, Michael McKenna writes.

A 21-year-old created fake polls that were lapped up by candidates and the media. Joseph Curl warns that is a big problem.

Stephen Moore explains why New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s planned city-run grocery stores would fail.