Democratic Momentum in Ohio

No longer so red: For years, Ohio stood as a bellwether state, voting for Donald Trump in 2016, again in 2020, and once more in 2024. With midterm voting drawing near, projections suggest a shift toward the Democrats, and early signs indicate that Republicans have struggled to win over Ohio’s working-class electorate in particular.

“After the initial days of early voting in Ohio, a pivotal state that could decide control of the Senate, there are clear indications that Democrats are more motivated to participate,” CNN reports. “So far, Democrats affiliated voters account for a larger share of the pre-election electorate than they did two years ago, even in the most Republican regions of the state. In 2024, Republicans led Democrats by about 30 percentage points in counties that cast a Trump vote by at least 20 points; this year, the margin has narrowed to roughly five points.”

Take this data with caution: it reflects only early-vote behavior so far.

Still, the stakes are high because Republicans are defending a Senate seat as well as the governorship. Two House races in the state are deemed competitive. The conventional wisdom has long held that Ohio leans solidly red, supported by three cycles of presidential results. Yet there is a possibility that Trump’s appeal has diminished enough to push Ohio back toward swing-state status.

“God knows we didn’t vote for this,” one voter, a pastor who supported Trump, then Biden, then Trump again, told Reuters, citing inflation. Other voters question the drop in manufacturing employment and note that the president has talked about these issues without delivering tangible improvements for ordinary people.

On Monday, Trump campaigned for Sen. Jon Husted, who seeks to keep his seat. In the Mahoning Valley, the president announced a few new incentives for voters: a Defense Department facility in Cleveland, and a pledge that a heat provider for Youngstown would remain open. “The Youngstown area used to vote Democratic for decades, and then you ran for office in 2016 and flipped it red forever,” Husted said from the stage. “Is that right, folks?”

OpenAI arrest: The FBI detained a Saudi national who worked at OpenAI on charges of installing a concealed audio-recording device in an executive conference room, per the Department of Justice. Abdulrahman Alfozan had been employed as an engineer at OpenAI since July 2025 in the San Francisco office. The company found the recording gadget “plugged into a USB port on the back of a television in an executive conference room,” according to Reuters. The device reportedly contained a microphone and allegedly connected to a camera; the captured data were encrypted.

“As of now, there is no evidence that this individual accessed or removed model weights, source code, or customer data improperly. The employee has been terminated,” OpenAI stated. It remains unclear who Alfozan may have worked for or with; he has held U.S. permanent residency since 2020, with prior stints at Meta and Microsoft.

“If convicted, Alfozan faces up to five years in prison, a $250,000 fine, and three years of supervised release,” Reuters notes.

Scenes from New York: Mayor Zohran Mamdani is reportedly finalizing a deal with the City Council to ban horse-drawn carriages in the metropolis, according to Politico. I’ll admit I’m not deeply invested in the issue, but what fascinates me is that the delay stemmed from the carriage-driver union’s effectiveness in advocating for its members’ interests.

QUICK HITS

• The Vatican announced that Pope Leo XIV has been diagnosed with lung cancer. He underwent a successful operation, and there is currently no available prognosis.
• Daniel Cox’s new work, Generation Uncoupled, argues that difficulties in dating and forming romantic partnerships arise from the long-term erosion of American social and civic life. In a revealing interview with Derek Thompson—worth a read—Cox suggests a cultural layer to all of this: social media’s self-optimization mindset pushes youths to prize personal advancement and autonomy above relational commitments. It’s why many worry about marriage and parenting, rather than the benefits they bring. Prenuptial agreements are increasingly common, and many young people believe divorces should be easier to obtain. This trend, he notes, is shaping not only decisions about coupling and parenting but also the broader social fabric. These ideas are themes I plan to explore further in my forthcoming book, City Without Children.
• According to The Wall Street Journal, bond-market turbulence last month fed into bank results, with several lenders reporting weaker-than-expected earnings from their client-bond trading, and dealmaking slowing more than anticipated. In a notable turn, JPMorgan Chase missed analysts’ forecasts.
• The White House reportedly asked Kimberly Guilfoyle, the U.S. ambassador to Greece, to resign. White House press secretary Katie Zachary disclosed this on Tuesday, one day after President Trump floated the possibility of firing Guilfoyle following allegations that she asked a donor to cover a personal American Express bill for $100,000, as reported by The Washington Post.
• Followers of the FIRE (financial independence, retire early) movement are now openly admitting that living on canned lentils into their 40s feels nearly like imprisonment.

This is the greatest post in the history of FIRE Reddit. Perfection. pic.twitter.com/dh1tesicfi

— Conservative Dividend Investing (@CDInewsletter) October 13, 2026

• Not wrong:

“Blessed” is a useful religious concept that has no adequate secular equivalent

“I was lucky” almost wholly fails to convey the weight and sentiment of providence that comes when things go better than you had any right to hope

— Jack (@tracewoodgrains) October 13, 2026