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DOJ does not have enough evidence to indict Adam Schiff right now, sources say

admin - Latest News - October 23, 2025
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NBC News learns that the criminal probe into Trump rival Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) has stalled after federal prosecutors could not produce enough evidence to bring charges, despite months of investigating. NBC News’ Ryan J. Reilly and Yamiche Alcindor join Meet the Press NOW with this reporting.



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November 4, 2025
Savewith a NBCUniversal ProfileCreate your free profile or log in to save this articleNov. 4, 2025, 5:00 AM EST / Updated Nov. 4, 2025, 10:33 AM ESTBy Steve KornackiThe Donald Trump era has changed American politics for a decade. On Tuesday night, two contentious races for governor will define what the next steps for Republicans and Democrats might look like — not only who will lead Virginia and New Jersey for four years, but how the two parties are appealing to different types of voters and building coalitions for future elections.Republicans have gained ground in those two blue-leaning states since Trump’s heavy losses there in 2020. Tuesday’s elections will show just how durable those advances were, hinging in part on the progress the Republican Party under Trump made with groups that once voted more strongly against the GOP. That especially includes Latino voters, who banked heavily toward Trump in 2024. But Democrats have spent the last year focused on how to reverse those trends, nominating candidates without baggage from the party’s 2024 election loss. And, of course, Trump is now in the White House, which led to voter backlash against him as the incumbent during his first term.Follow live updates on the 2025 electionTune in to live NBC News election night coverage:NBC News NOW, our free streaming service, will be airing an election special beginning at 7 p.m. ET.NBCNews.com and the NBC News app will feature real-time results of all the major races as well as all the latest reporting.NBC News’ podcast, “Here’s the Scoop,” will be livestreaming on YouTube and NBCNews.com beginning around 11 p.m. ET.NBC News’ Chief Data Analyst Steve Kornacki will be at the big board all night, analyzing results and providing minute-by-minute updates exclusively on the NBC News NOW special and the “Here’s the Scoop” livestream.The two states saw similar results in the last presidential election, but the races have gone differently this year. In Virginia, Democrat Abigail Spanberger enters Election Day with a clear polling lead over Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears. And in New Jersey, Democrat Mikie Sherrill holds a smaller advantage in most surveys over Republican Jack Ciattarelli. Here are the places and the trends to watch when the votes get tallied Tuesday night.NEW JERSEYBack in 2020, Joe Biden trounced Trump by 17 points in New Jersey. But Republicans have been seeing steady gains since then.In 2021, Ciattarelli came within just three points of unseating Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy. And last year, Trump lost by less than 6 points, the second-largest improvement he posted anywhere in the country. Both results were better performances — in all of the state’s 21 counties — than Trump in 2020. Crucially, the areas where Trump and Ciattarelli made their biggest strides don’t necessarily overlap. They each tapped into different voters in different places. Ciattarelli made some of his biggest gains in suburban areas with above-average median incomes and higher concentrations of college degrees. Meanwhile, Trump’s largest improvements largely came in areas with heavier Hispanic populations.Where Ciattarelli outperformed TrumpSomerset County is an affluent and historically Republican county filled with New York City bedroom communities. But like many suburban areas around the country, its population has diversified — from 75% white at the turn of the century to barely 50% in the most recent census — and its highly educated voters have reacted with hostility to the Trump-led GOP. George W. Bush carried Somerset in 2004, but Democrats have won it in every presidential election since, with Biden’s 21-point romp in 2020 as their high water mark.In 2021, Ciattarelli came within four points of Murphy — a 17-point improvement over that Trump 2020 performance. Trump didn’t give back all of those gains in 2024, but he did lose significant ground from Ciattarelli’s showing, finishing 14 points behind Kamala Harris. (It helped that Ciattarelli once represented parts of Somerset in the state Legislature.)A key question is whether Ciattarelli can at least replicate that 2021 showing. Four years ago, he benefited from the fact that Biden was in the White House. Many anti-Trump voters were willing to put aside their concerns with the national Republican Party. It turned out they had concerns with the Democrats who were running New Jersey, too, and deemed Ciattarelli an acceptable alternative. But with Trump back in power, will it be different?Within Somerset, Bernards Township (population 27,000) is a great example of these dynamics. It has a median household income that’s nearly twice the statewide average. Two-thirds of its population is white, and more than two-thirds of its white adult population have college degrees, far above the statewide level. As recently as 2012, it was still voting Republican at the presidential level, but Trump’s emergence changed that. He lost it by 14 points in 2020 and only improved a smidge in 2024, when Harris bested him by 11. Ciattarelli, on the other hand, won it by 5. Bernards Township is chock full of exactly the kind of voter Ciattarelli needs to hang on to: the avowedly anti-Trump, affluent suburbanite.Where Trump outperformed CiattarelliPassaic County in North Jersey includes the state’s third-largest city, Paterson, along with a number of densely populated middle-class suburbs and a stretch of rural land and wilderness. It is racially and ethnically diverse: a population that’s about 40% Hispanic and white, just under 10% Black and Asian, and notable Orthodox and Arab American pockets. Bill Clinton broke a string of Republican successes in Passaic when he carried it in his 1996 re-election bid and his party then posted double-digit wins until last year, when Trump flipped it. While Ciattarelli also made sizable strides in 2021, he didn’t make the kinds of inroads Trump did in the county’s largest and least white municipalities: Paterson and Passaic city. In Paterson, which is two-thirds Hispanic and less than 10% white, Ciattarelli lost by 71 points in his 2021 campaign, around what the typical margin of defeat for a Republican in the city had long been. But Trump finished only 28 points behind Harris last year. He did this by demonstrating significant new appeal in heavily Hispanic areas and by posting improvements in heavily Arab American South Paterson, where voters seemed to cast protest votes either for Trump or Green Party candidate Jill Stein. With 70,000 residents, Passaic city is about half the size of Paterson, but it’s also overwhelmingly (75%) Hispanic. In 2024, Trump carried the city by 6 points after Ciattarelli lost it by 40 in 2021.This was a trend seen across the state. Trump’s biggest gains from 2020 — and his biggest overperformances relative to Ciattarelli — tended to come from areas with sizable Hispanic populations. Ciattarelli’s inability to make even remotely similar inroads four years ago casts doubt on whether he can add these voters to his coalition this year. Certainly, his campaign hopes that Trump will serve as a gateway to the broader Republican Party for them. But it also appears that many were first-time voters or voters who don’t normally participate in non-presidential elections. If Ciattarelli can fold in some of these new Trump voters, he’ll be taking a major step toward victory. Short of winning over new votes in Paterson and Passaic city, Ciattarelli will have to hope that turnout is low. This was the case in 2021, when turnout plummeted in many heavily Democratic urban areas around the state. Take Paterson, where turnout in 2021 was just 35% of the level it had been in the 2020 presidential race — compared to the statewide average of 57%. Reasserting their dominance in cities like Paterson while also beefing up turnout is a major priority for Sherrill this year.VIRGINIAIn 2024, Trump lost Virginia by just under 6 points, an improvement from his 10-point defeat in four years earlier. In a way, the result amounted to a tale of two different elections in the same state.In the Washington, D.C., suburbs and exurbs of Northern Virginia, Trump made big strides, particularly in areas with significant Hispanic and Asian American populations. Had these gains extended across the state, he might have actually put Virginia in play, but outside of northern Virginia his progress was spotty at best, and he even backtracked in some areas.The counties and cities that comprise Northern Virginia account for about one-third of all votes statewide. The growing and diversifying populations here are the primary source of Virginia’s evolution into a blue state — but those same places also drove Trump’s Northern Virginia improvement in 2024.Building on 2021 gainsIn reducing his deficit, Trump locked in many — but not all — of the gains that Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin made in these same places in his victorious 2021 gubernatorial campaign. For example, in sprawling Loudoun County, which accounts for 5% of all votes cast statewide, Youngkin lost by 11 points in 2021, and Trump lost by 16 points last year. Both represent big jumps from Trump’s 25-point loss in 2020.Trump did this in part by building support with Latino voters, as he did nationally. Case in point: Sterling has the highest concentration of Latino residents (50%) of any census-designated place in Loudoun County. Trump lost Sterling by 19 points to Harris after getting crushed by 44 against Biden in 2020.Notably, this is one place where Trump outperformed Youngkin, who lost it by 24 in his own campaign. For Earle-Sears, building on this momentum is essential.GOP improvements in Loudoun are also rooted in local politics, especially contentious disputes over education standards and school policies over the last half-decade. In particular, gains by both Youngkin and Trump with Asian American voters seem tied to these battles.Earle-Sears is seeking to capitalize the same way. This makes majority-Asian Loudoun Valley Estates worth watching closely. A development community of about 10,000, its median income and college attainment rate are both far above the state average. In 2020, Loudoun Valley Estates sided with Biden by 43 points. Youngkin cut that to a 28-point Democratic margin a year later, and Trump brought it down five points further last year.It will be a solid barometer of whether Earle-Sears has tapped into the same currents that boosted Youngkin and Trump in Loudoun and across northern Virginia. There are similar dynamics in suburban Prince William County, another population juggernaut that accounts for 5% of all votes statewide. With a white population of around 40%, Prince William is more diverse and slightly more Democratic than Loudoun. Trump lost by 27 points there in 2020, a margin that both he and Youngkin reduced by about 10 points in 2021 and 2024.Then there’s the geographically compact city of Manassas Park, which has just over 16,000 residents, almost half of whom are Hispanic — the highest concentration of any county or independent city in Virginia. Trump cut his deficit there from 33 points in 2020 to 20 points last year.Where to watch beyond Northern VirginiaMoving away from Northern Virginia, two major population centers stand out for their willingness to embrace Youngkin — and their refusal to do the same for Trump last year.One is Chesterfield County, which takes in the suburbs to the south of Richmond. With 365,000 residents, it’s the fourth-largest county in the state, and the biggest outside of Northern Virginia.These were staunchly Republican suburbs from the end of World War II on, but a gradual shift away from the GOP exploded with the emergence of Trump. In 2016, he carried Chesterfield by 2 points, the worst showing for a Republican since Thomas Dewey in 1948. By 2020, it had flipped completely and Trump lost it by 7 points. And last year, it was the rare county in America that actually got bluer, with Harris pushing the margin to 9 points.Chesterfield is racially diverse and has one of the largest Black populations in the state. Notably, though, a precinct-level analysis finds that Trump actually improved his performance in predominantly Black parts of the county; it was in largely white and high-educated precincts that he continued to lose ground:A major reason why Youngkin is governor today is that he managed to roll back these Trump-era Democratic inroads, beating Democrat Terry McAuliffe by 5 points in Chesterfield. His campaign kept Trump at arm’s length and was no doubt helped by the fact that Trump was a former president in 2021, with the White House then occupied instead by an unpopular Democrat in Biden. Now, with polls indicating there’s been no growth in Trump’s popularity over the last year, it figures to be tougher for Earle-Sears to connect with these voters. Democrats are banking on a backlash against Trump, and Chesterfield looms as a test of whether they are right to.The biggest bellwether in the state may be the independent city of Virginia Beach, which has about 460,000 residents. For years, a large Navy presence helped make Virginia Beach one of the most Republican-friendly big cities in the country, but as it has continued to grow and diversify, it has tipped into the Democratic column. In 2020, Biden became the first Democrat since Lyndon B. Johnson to carry Virginia Beach, taking it by 5 points. Flipping it back was a priority for Republicans as they sought to make Virginia a battleground state last year, but Harris managed to hang on to it by 3 points.The story was different in the last governor’s race, though, with Youngkin winning Virginia Beach by 8 points. As with Chesterfield, the question is whether Trump’s return to the White House will make it all but impossible for the GOP to replicate that 2021 roadmap this year.Steve KornackiSteve Kornacki is the chief data analyst for NBC News.
September 22, 2025
Editor’s Note: This story was originally published in April 2023. CNN  —  Slumped on his club, head buried in his arm, Rory McIlroy looked on the verge of tears. The then-21-year-old had just watched his ball sink into the waters of Rae’s Creek at Augusta National and with it, his dream of winning The Masters, a dream that had looked so tantalizingly close mere hours earlier. As a four-time major winner and one of the most decorated names in the sport’s history, few players would turn down the chance to swap places with McIlroy heading into Augusta this week. Yet on Sunday afternoon of April 10, 2011, not a golfer in the world would have wished to be in the Northern Irishman’s shoes. Flying A fresh-faced, mop-headed McIlroy had touched down in Georgia for the first major of the season with a reputation as the leading light of the next generation of stars. An excellent 2010 had marked his best season since turning pro three years earlier, highlighted by a first PGA Tour win at the Quail Hollow Championship and a crucial contribution to Team Europe’s triumph at the Ryder Cup. Yet despite a pair of impressive top-three finishes at the Open and PGA Championship respectively, a disappointing missed cut at The Masters – his first at a major – served as ominous foreshadowing. McIlroy shot 74 and 77 to fall four strokes short of the cut line at seven-over par, a performance that concerned him enough to take a brief sabbatical from competition. McIlroy (L) races England’s Ian Poulter (R) during the Par 3 Contest prior to the 2011 Masters. Harry How / Getty Images But one year on in 2011, any lingering Masters demons looked to have been exorcised as McIlroy flew round the Augusta fairways. Having opened with a bogey-free seven-under 65 – the first time he had ever shot in the 60s at the major – McIlroy pulled ahead from Spanish first round co-leader Alvaro Quirós with a second round 69. It sent him into the weekend holding a two-shot cushion over Australia’s Jason Day, with Tiger Woods a further stroke behind and back in the hunt for a 15th major after a surging second round 66. And yet the 21-year-old leader looked perfectly at ease with having a target on his back. Even after a tentative start to the third round, McIlroy rallied with three birdies across the closing six holes to stretch his lead to four strokes heading into Sunday. McIlroy drives from the 16th tee during his second round. Andrew Redington / Getty Images The youngster was out on his own ahead of a bunched chasing pack comprising Day, Ángel Cabrera, K.J. Choi and Charl Schwartzel. After 54 holes, McIlroy had shot just three bogeys. “It’s a great position to be in … I’m finally feeling comfortable on this golf course,” McIlroy told reporters. “I’m not getting ahead of myself, I know how leads can dwindle away very quickly. I have to go out there, not take anything for granted and go out and play as hard as I’ve played the last three days. If I can do that, hopefully things will go my way. “We’ll see what happens tomorrow because four shots on this golf course isn’t that much.” McIlroy finished his third round with a four shot lead. Timothy A. Clary / AFP via Getty Images Falling The truth can hurt, and McIlroy was about to prove his assessment of Augusta to be true in the most excruciating way imaginable. His fourth bogey of the week arrived immediately. Having admitted to expecting some nerves at the first tee, McIlroy sparked a booming opening drive down the fairway, only to miss his putt from five feet. Three consecutive pars steadied the ship, but Schwartzel had the wind in his sails. A blistering birdie, par, eagle start had seen him draw level at the summit after his third hole. A subsequent bogey from the South African slowed his charge, as McIlroy clung onto a one-shot lead at the turn from Schwartzel, Cabrera, Choi, and a rampaging Woods, who shot five birdies and an eagle across the front nine to send Augusta into a frenzy. Despite his dwindling advantage and the raucous Tiger-mania din ahead of him, McIlroy had responded well to another bogey at the 5th hole, draining a brilliant 20-foot putt at the 7th to restore his lead. The fist pump that followed marked the high-water point of McIlroy’s round, as a sliding start accelerated into full-blown free-fall at the par-four 10th hole. His tee shot went careening into a tree, ricocheting to settle between the white cabins that separate the main course from the adjacent par-three course. It offered viewers a glimpse at a part of Augusta rarely seen on broadcast, followed by pictures of McIlroy anxiously peering out from behind a tree to track his follow-up shot. McIlroy watches his shot after his initial drive from the 10th tee put him close to Augusta’s cabins. Andrew Redington / Getty Images Though his initial escape was successful, yet another collision with a tree and a two-putt on the green saw a stunned McIlroy eventually tap in for a triple bogey. Having led the field one hole and seven shots earlier, he arrived at the 11th tee in seventh. By the time his tee drive at the 13th plopped into the creek, all thoughts of who might be the recipient of the green jacket had long-since switched away from the anguished youngster. It had taken him seven putts to navigate the previous two greens, as a bogey and a double bogey dropped him to five-under – the score he had held after just 11 holes of the tournament. Mercifully, the last five holes passed without major incident. A missed putt for birdie from five feet at the final hole summed up McIlroy’s day, though he was given a rousing reception as he left the green. Sunday at the Masters natpkg_00005015.jpg video Related video Sunday at the Masters Mere minutes earlier, the same crowd had erupted as Schwartzel sunk his fourth consecutive birdie to seal his first major title. After starting the day four shots adrift of McIlroy, the South African finished 10 shots ahead of him, and two ahead of second-placed Australian duo Jason Day and Adam Scott. McIlroy’s eight-over 80 marked the highest score of the round. Having headlined the leaderboard for most of the week, he finished tied-15th. McIroy was applauded off the 18th green by the Augusta crowd after finishing his final round. Robyn Beck / AFP via Getty Images Bounce-back Tears would flow during a phone call with his parents the following morning, but at his press conference, McIlroy was upbeat. “I’m very disappointed at the minute, and I’m sure I will be for the next few days, but I’ll get over it,” he said. “I was leading this golf tournament with nine holes to go, and I just unraveled … It’s a Sunday at a major, what it can do. “This is my first experience at it, and hopefully the next time I’m in this position I’ll be able to handle it a little better. I didn’t handle it particularly well today obviously, but it was a character-building day … I’ll come out stronger for it.” Once again, McIlroy would be proven right. Just eight weeks later in June, McIlroy rampaged to an eight-shot victory at the US Open. Records tumbled in his wake at Congressional, as he shot a tournament record 16-under 268 to become the youngest major winner since Tiger Woods at The Masters in 1997. McIlroy celebrated a historic triumph at the US Open just two months after his Masters nightmare. Jim Watson / AFP via Getty Images The historic victory kickstarted a golden era for McIlroy. After coasting to another eight-shot win at the PGA Championship in 2012, McIlroy became only the third golfer since 1934 to win three majors by the age of 25 with triumph at the 2014 Open Championship. Before the year was out, he would add his fourth major title with another PGA Championship win. And much of it was owed to that fateful afternoon at Augusta. In an interview with the BBC in 2015, McIlroy dubbed it “the most important day” of his career. “If I had not had the whole unravelling, if I had just made a couple of bogeys coming down the stretch and lost by one, I would not have learned as much. “Luckily, it did not take me long to get into a position like that again when I was leading a major and I was able to get over the line quite comfortably. It was a huge learning curve for me and I needed it, and thankfully I have been able to move on to bigger and better things. “Looking back on what happened in 2011, it doesn’t seem as bad when you have four majors on your mantelpiece.” A two-stroke victory at Royal Liverpool saw McIlroy clinch the Open Championship in 2014. Tom Pennington / Getty Images The missing piece McIlroy’s contentment came with a caveat: it would be “unthinkable” if he did not win The Masters in his career. Yet as he prepares for his 15th appearance at Augusta National this week, a green jacket remains an elusive missing item from his wardrobe. Despite seven top-10 finishes in his past 10 Masters outings, the trophy remains the only thing separating McIlroy from joining the ranks of golf immortals to have completed golf’s career grand slam of all four majors in the modern era: Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, and Tiger Woods. The Masters is the only major title to elude McIlroy. Mike Mulholland / Getty Images A runner-up finish to Scottie Scheffler last year marked McIlroy’s best finish at Augusta, yet arguably 2011 remains the closest he has ever been to victory. A slow start in 2022 meant McIlroy had begun Sunday’s deciding round 10 shots adrift of the American, who teed off for his final hole with a five-shot lead despite McIlroy’s brilliant 64 finish. Rory McIlroy: I will win the Masters SPT_00000410.jpg video Related video Rory McIlroy: I will win the Masters At 33 years old, time is still on his side. Though 2022 extended his major drought to eight years, it featured arguably his best golf since that golden season in 2014. And as McIlroy knows better than most, things can change quickly at Augusta National.
October 7, 2025
Oct. 7, 2025, 5:37 PM EDTBy The Politics DeskWelcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, a newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.In today’s edition, Steve Kornacki digs into why a blue wave doesn’t appear to be materializing (yet) for Democrats in next year’s midterm elections. Plus, the government shutdown stretches into a 7th day. Sign up to receive this newsletter in your inbox every weekday here.— Adam WollnerThe signs of a blue wave aren’t there like they were in Trump’s first termAnalysis by Steve KornackiThe blue wave that interrupted President Donald Trump’s first term could be seen coming from far away. This time around, the signs are not so clear.By the fall of 2017, Trump’s first year in office, Democrats had opened a sizable advantage in the generic congressional ballot. On this day in 2017, according to the Real Clear Politics polling average, the Democratic lead was 7.8 points. It’s a margin that would more or less hold over the ensuing year, culminating in a 40-seat gain in the 2018 midterms that gave Democrats control of the House.Today, by contrast, the RCP average has Democrats up by only 3 points in the generic ballot. This comes even as Trump’s overall job approval rating sits in the low- to mid-40s — similar to his first term — and as he continues to accrue negative ratings for his handling of the economy and inflation.Views of Trump’s opposition, though, look very different today than they did eight years ago. In the run-up to the 2018 midterms, Democrats fared consistently — and significantly — better than the Republicans on party image. This time around, it’s a different story.Earlier this year, Democrats registered their lowest positive rating in the history of our NBC News poll, which dates back more than three decades. Similar findings have emerged in other surveys. A significant factor is self-identified Democrats expressing unfavorable views of their own party. This internal frustration — combined with other data that shows these voters want a more confrontational posture from their party’s leaders — helps explain why Democrats in Washington have embraced a government shutdown.This also raises the question of what other new tactical or ideological steps Democratic leaders may take to appease their base — and whether the wider electorate will be receptive to them. In Trump’s first term, independents took a less negative view of Democrats than Republicans. Now, it’s more of a wash.Of course, to win back the House next year, Democrats don’t need a wave; a net gain of just three seats will do the trick. But Republicans may end up effectively raising that number to the high single digits through mid-decade redistricting efforts. Typically, the opposition party can count on a midterm boost by serving as the protest vehicle for whatever dissatisfaction voters want to express with the White House. But in today’s atmosphere of intense polarization, there may be some voters who want to express their displeasure with the opposition party, too.Shutdown, Day 7: Trump dials up the pressure as MTG breaks with her party on ObamacareThe White House raised the stakes of the government shutdown as it entered its seventh day with a draft memo arguing that furloughed federal workers are not entitled to back pay, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told NBC News.The memo, first reported by Axios, comes despite the Office of Personnel Management’s own September guidance, which said federal workers will receive retroactive pay after the shutdown lifts.The memo also clashes with a 2019 law that requires back pay for federal workers. The law, called the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act of 2019, says all federal employees, whether furloughed or deemed essential and working without pay, must receive back pay after a shutdown ends.Asked about the White House’s position on back pay, President Donald Trump told reporters, “I would say it depends on who we’re talking about.” Trump also likened the shutdown to a “kamikaze attack“ by Democrats.The idea of denying back pay prompted some intraparty backlash, with Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., calling it a “horrible message” and a “bad strategy.”Speaking of GOP divisions: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., broke with her party by calling for action on expiring Obamacare subsidies to avoid premium hikes, Sahil Kapur reports. In a long post on X, Greene, the far-right MAGA firebrand, made it clear she was not in Congress when the 2010 law passed.“Let’s just say as nicely as possible, I’m not a fan,” she wrote. “But I’m going to go against everyone on this issue because when the tax credits expire this year my own adult children’s insurance premiums for 2026 are going to DOUBLE, along with all the wonderful families and hard-working people in my district.” “Not a single Republican in leadership talked to us about this or has given us a plan to help Americans deal with their health insurance premiums DOUBLING!!!” Greene added.Asked by our colleague Ryan Nobles about Greene’s comments, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said she doesn’t sit on the committees of jurisdiction and “she’s probably not read in on some of that.” He added that “everybody’s entitled to their opinion,” but “not everyone knows everything.” At the airport: Flight delays across the U.S. stretched into a second day as the Federal Aviation Administration braced for more airport staffing shortages amid the shutdown, Matt Lavietes and Corky Siemaszko write. Maya Rosenberg and Jay Blackman also note that federal funding for air travel in rural areas will run out Sunday if the shutdown continues. In the states: Some governors are drawing on state funds to keep popular national parks open for tourists, Raquel Coronell Uribe reports. 🗞️ Today’s other top stories⚖️ SCOTUS watch: The Supreme Court appeared poised to back a free speech challenge to a Colorado law that bans conversion therapy aimed at young people questioning their sexual orientations or gender identities in a case likely to have national implications. Read more →🪑 On the hot seat: Attorney General Pam Bondi faced questions from senators about National Guard deployments and immigrant arrests in U.S. cities, the indictment of former FBI Director James Comey, and files related to Jeffrey Epstein. Read more →🇨🇦 Oh, Canada: Trump said there’s “mutual love” but “natural conflict” between the U.S. and Canada as he met with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at the White House. Read more →📱 Sprint to November: In the final weeks of the Virginia governor’s race, Republican Winsome Earle-Sears is attempting to tie Democrat Abigail Spanberger to the uproar over the violent texts that surfaced from the Democratic nominee for attorney general in the state. Read more →🗳️ If it’s Tuesday: Voters are heading to the polls for a special primary election to fill former Rep. Mark Green’s seat in Tennessee’s deep-red 7th District. Trump stepped in at the last minute with an endorsement of Matt Van Epps, the former commissioner of the state Department of General Services. Read more →➡️ Explainer: Trump suggested numerous times this week that he could invoke the sweeping presidential powers granted by the Insurrection Act “if necessary.” Here’s what that is →That’s all From the Politics Desk for now. Today’s newsletter was compiled by Adam Wollner.If you have feedback — likes or dislikes — email us at politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.comAnd if you’re a fan, please share with everyone and anyone. They can sign up here. The Politics Desk    
October 26, 2025
Oct. 25, 2025, 6:15 AM EDTBy Liz SzaboJeb Teichman’s phone rang just before midnight. As a pediatrician, he has received many late-night emergency calls.This time, the call was about his 29-year-old son. Brent Teichman had been suffering from the flu for five days. After he began to recover, his symptoms returned with a vengeance, making it difficult to breathe. Teichman, who was out of town, suggested his son visit an urgent care facility. Brent Teichman returned home from the clinic with a prescription for antibiotics and collapsed in bed.When his roommate checked on him a few hours later, Brent Teichman was unconscious. His roommate first called Teichman, then 911. The emergency operator instructed the roommate how to perform CPR. When Teichman called the roommate back, he asked the young man to hold the phone so that he could hear emergency responders trying to save his son. “I could hear the monitors beeping,” Teichman said. Six years after his son’s death, Teichman said, “when I close my eyes at night, I still hear that beeping.”Brent Teichman was 29 when he died in 2019 from flu complications. His father, Dr. Jeb Teichman, said his son’s only risk factor for severe illness was that he didn’t receive a flu shot.Courtesy the subjectAlthough Teichman has retired, he said he is still trying to save lives. He has joined the board of a nonprofit group called Families Fighting Flu, made up of people who have lost loved ones to the illness. As misinformation spreads on social media, Teichman and other health advocates are reminding people of basic facts about the flu.Based on wastewater samples, the current flu season hasn’t taken off yet in the U.S., although once it does, it spreads rapidly across the country, Alexandria Boehm, program director of WastewaterSCAN, a nonprofit monitoring network and a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford University, said. “Once it starts in one state it starts everywhere at the same time,” she said. “It’s not a slow wave.” With flu, wastewater levels match what’s happening in the community, she said. Last year, influenza took off in mid-December and lasted through mid-April. Flu season typically peaks around February, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, although the influenza virus can continue circulating through May.The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends vaccinating children against flu as soon as shots are available in late summer or fall, said Dr. Kristina Bryant, a member of the academy’s committee on infectious diseases and an author of its flu shot recommendations. Most kids only need one flu shot a year. Babies and children between the ages of 6 months and 8 years old getting vaccinated against flu for the first time, or who have only had one lifetime dose before the current flu season, need two shots, four weeks apart. So it’s especially important for infants and children to start the process early, in order to be fully protected by the time flu begins to circulate. In adults, immunity provided by flu vaccines can wane over time. So adults who get their flu shots very early — such as in August or early September — may lose some of that protection toward the end of flu season, said Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease physician and senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. Adalja recommends adults get their flu shots by late October in order to be protected by the beginning of flu season, which can vary depending on where you live. Flu vaccines are safeFlu vaccines and their ingredients are rigorously tested and found to be very safe. Over the past 50 years, hundreds of millions of Americans have safely received flu shots.“Really, these are extremely safe vaccines,” said Dr. Robert Kim-Farley, a professor at the Fielding School of Public Health at the University of California, Los Angeles. “There’s nothing people need to be alarmed about.”The most common side effect of flu shots is a sore arm, Adalja said.Some people worry that flu shots increase the risk of Guillain-Barre syndrome, a serious but rare disorder in which the immune system attacks nerve cells, causing muscle weakness and sometimes paralysis. The actual risk from current flu shots is very low, with one to two additional cases of the syndrome for every million doses of vaccine, according to the CDC.It’s important to note that viruses also can cause the syndrome, Adalja said. In fact, people have a higher risk of developing the syndrome from flu than from the vaccine.Fears of Guillain-Barre syndrome stem from a 1976 outbreak of swine flu, in which 45 million Americans received a new vaccine. That flu shot caused one additional case of Guillain-Barre for every 100,000 people vaccinated.Flu vaccines save livesFlu vaccination prevented 9.8 million illnesses; 4.8 million medical visits; 120,000 hospitalizations; and 7,900 deaths during the 2023-2024 season, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Yet, only 32% of people hospitalized for flu last year had been vaccinated, according to the CDC.Last season’s flu shot reduced the risk of testing positive for flu during an outpatient visit by 56%. Although people who are vaccinated sometimes still get infected with flu, their illness tends to be much milder compared to people who aren’t vaccinated, Adalja said. While they’re not perfect, flu vaccines can reduce the risk of infection and make people less contagious, at least for part of the flu season. Flu shots “do provide some level of protection to close contacts for a period of time,” Adalja said.Flu vaccines tend to be less protective than other vaccines for multiple reasons, Adalja said. First, flu viruses themselves change every year, which means the vaccine needs to change, as well. Because flu shots take several months to produce, vaccine makers need to begin production in the spring, long before flu season begins. Manufacturers in the United States select which viral strain to include in fall vaccines based on the influenza strains circulating in the Southern Hemisphere, Kim-Farley said. This year’s flu shots protect against three strains of influenza, including two types of influenza A and one type of influenza B.Flu shots don’t cause fluInjectable flu shots are made with pieces of the flu virus, Adalja said. These pieces stimulate the immune system to make protective antibodies in order to combat any flu viruses that enter the body.Nasal flu vaccines, which are approved for people 2 through 49, contain live viruses that have been weakened to prevent them from causing the flu, Bryant said.Because the virus is live, it can cause mild symptoms, including a fever over 100 degrees in children ages 2 through 6; a runny nose and nasal congestion in people ages 2 through 49; and a sore throat in adults ages 18 through 49.People can now order the intranasal flu vaccine online and use it at home.Flu vaccines take 2 weeks for full protectionSome people who develop symptoms such as a fever or cough after receiving their flu vaccines assume their flu shot was ineffective. But because it takes the immune system about two weeks to make antibodies against the influenza virus, it can take two weeks for people to be fully protected, Banks said.Meanwhile, there are dozens of viruses and bacteria that can cause flu-like symptoms — such as fever, chills, cough, body aches and headaches — including enterovirus, parainfluenza and more.Flu shots can be safely given with other vaccines“Extensive testing is required for every vaccine, and we have a lot of research showing that getting multiple vaccines at the same time is safe,” Bryant said. “What happens when we delay or we space out vaccines is that we’re really just increasing the amount of time that children remain vulnerable to infection.”Some parents worry that multiple vaccines given in one visit overwhelm a baby’s immune system. But babies and young children are exposed to as many as 6,000 viruses, bacteria and other substances that stimulate the immune system — known as antigens — in a single day. In comparison, the entire pediatric immunization schedule exposes them to 165 antigens, Bryant said.Pediatricians and health officials recommend grouping vaccinations together because it’s more convenient for parents to bring a baby to a clinic once, rather than multiple times, Kim-Farley said. Children are more likely to receive all recommended vaccines if they are given multiple shots in one visit.Some parents fear that giving the flu shot in combination with other vaccines causes their children excess stress. In fact, a study examining stress hormone levels in infants found no difference in stress levels between babies who received one vaccine compared to those who received several. Spacing out vaccines increases a child’s total stress by causing them to receive injections on multiple days.Flu vaccines don’t contain harmful ingredientsContrary to what is shared on social media, flu vaccines do not contain fetal cells, blood products, human DNA, soy, gluten, latex or microchips.Vaccines have five major ingredients: antigens, which are viral proteins or sugars that stimulate the immune system to make protective antibodies; adjuvants, which boost the immune response; stabilizers, which keep the vaccine stable over time; preservatives, which prevent the growth of fungi and bacteria; and residual byproducts.Some flu shots contain dead or weakened viruses as antigens. Others have only viral proteins. Although some flu vaccines grown in eggs have traces of residual egg protein, the amount is so minuscule that most people with egg allergies can still safely be vaccinated.Flu shots do not contain aluminum, used in trace amounts in some shots, such as hepatitis and pneumococcal vaccines, to help generate a strong immune response.Although President Donald Trump has called for removing aluminum from vaccines, studies show that the tiny amounts of aluminum in vaccines do not cause harm. In fact, babies consume more aluminum from breastmilk or formula than vaccines.Some social media influencers have expressed concerns about preservatives in vaccines. A CDC advisory committee in June recommended removing a preservative called thimerosal from vaccines. But that wasn’t a major change; flu vaccines in prefilled syringes are already thimerosal-free. Thimerosal was only used in multidose vials of vaccines — which account for only about 4% of flu shots — as a way to prevent dangerous bacteria and fungi, Adalja said.Although studies show that thimerosal isn’t harmful — and doesn’t cause autism — manufacturers took the preservative out of routine pediatric vaccinations in 1999. Most flu shots don’t contain adjuvants; the one exception is a flu shot designed for people older than 65, whose immune systems need an extra boost, which uses a non-aluminum adjuvant.Dr. Virginia Banks, an infectious disease specialist in Youngstown, Ohio, said she recently opted for a vaccine recommended for people older than 65.“I’m way over 65, but I look in the mirror and I think to myself, ‘You don’t need that,’” she said. “But then I realize, ‘Yeah, yeah you do.’”The flu is not just a bad coldEven during relatively mild flu seasons, thousands of Americans die from the virus.Flu season was particularly brutal last year, sickening at least 47 million Americans, hospitalizing 610,000 and killing 27,000, according to the CDC. Those deaths included 281 children, the largest number of pediatric deaths in 15 years, when the world was hit by the H1N1 pandemic, according to the CDC. Of the children who died from flu last year, 89% were unvaccinated or weren’t full vaccinated, compared to 82% during the 2023-2024 flu season.Last season’s flu also led 109 children to develop a rare, severe neurologic complication called influenza-associated encephalopathy, which can cause altered mental status and seizures. Nineteen percent of affected children died, according to the CDC.Research shows that Black people have the highest flu-related hospitalization rates, followed by Native American people and Hispanic people.Racial and ethnic disparities are greatest among children; rates of severe outcomes, such as hospitalization and death, are up to four times higher among racial and ethnic minority children under age 4 compared to white children. People from racial and ethnic minority communities are also less likely to be completely vaccinated against the flu.How much do flu shots cost without insurance?Children can be vaccinated for free through the federal Vaccines for Children program.The Affordable Care Act requires that commercial insurance plans provide flu shots for free. People can also get free flu shots through Medicare, Medicaid or the Veterans Health Administration. Without insurance, a flu shot can cost $20 to $130 out of pocket. Many adults without insurance can receive free or reduced-cost flu shots at federally qualified health centers or public health departments. Young, healthy adults and children die of the flu every yearAlthough infants, older adults, pregnant women and people with chronic illnesses have the highest risk of hospitalization or death from the flu, the virus can also kill healthy people, often by causing pneumonia. Forty-four percent of children who died from influenza were previously healthy.The CDC recommends flu shots for everyone older than 6 months old. Vaccinating pregnant women against the flu helps protect both prospective mothers, as well as their infants, at least for the first few months of life.Fewer Americans are getting flu shotsFlu vaccination rates have fallen since 2020, caught up in a post-pandemic backlash against vaccines, as well as the mistaken belief that influenza isn’t a serious threat, research suggests.The percentage of American adults who report having received or planning to receive a flu shot dropped from 60% in 2020 to 54% in 2024. Vaccination rates have fallen among children, as well, dropping from 64% in 2019-2020 to 49% in 2024-2025.“People have been told to get Covid shots and RSV shots and flu shots, and people are just a little bit vaccine fatigued,” Banks said.Low vaccination rates may have contributed to the severity of last year’s flu season, in which influenza-related hospitalization rates were the highest since 2010-2011.Teichman said his son’s only risk factor for severe illness was that he hadn’t received a flu shot.Teichman said he and his wife, Grace, a retired nurse, “reminded Brent to get his flu shot a couple of weeks before his passing. He said he had it on to-do list, but he just never got around to it.”Liz SzaboLiz Szabo is an independent health and science journalist. Her work has won multiple national awards. One of her investigations led to a new state law in Virginia.Jane Weaver contributed.
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