Wednesday, October 14, 2026
Good morning, and welcome to RedState's "Morning Minute" — a brief glimpse at which stories are trending at the moment and a look ahead at what the day may bring. Consider this your one-stop shop for news to kickstart your day.
TOP O' THE MORNIN'
Red-Hot at RedState
Bruce Blakeman Leaves Kathy Hochul 'Short Circuiting' During Contentious NY Gov's Debate
When Blakeman confronted her on her lack of compassion for the victims of illegal alien crime, and whether she would apologize to these parents who lost their children because of it, Hochul did everything but dance the two-step to get around having to admit culpability or say she would apologize.
'I Love Doing This Stuff': Trump Pardons Two Alaska Mechanics Hounded by the Biden Administration
He also said, "What an honor. I love doing this stuff.” One of the mechanics thanked him, saying, "It really did destroy us. It destroyed friendships. It destroyed families."
Undoing Biden’s disastrous legacy one day at a time. This is what I voted for.
Europe Has Been Cashing in on American Tech. Now Trump Could Turn the Tables
Brussels has been happy to collect from American technology firms. Now Washington is being asked to start collecting too.
Trending Across Townhall Media
Bearing Arms — Arizona Gun Shop Owner Gets Creative to Thwart Would-Be Thieves
Petrush may be using his truck as a makeshift barricade, but FFLs shouldn't have to turn their storefronts into fortresses every night just to have a reasonable expectation that they'll still have a business to open the next morning.
HotAir — Does Reality Matter? Not in the 'Mattress Girl' Case and Not in Cornell 7 Case Either
Well, facts do matter. Or at least they should. And the media are supposed to be a truth-finding institution, at least according to their self-description.
Unfortunately, they are advocates, and we should understand them as such. They are Ben Crump in Perry Mason clothes.
PJ Media — Why the Midterm Polling Is Absolutely, Positively, 100% Wrong. (Maybe.)
Because the God’s honest truth is, nobody knows nothin’. We don’t know which demos will show up and vote on Election Day, which ones won’t, and which ones were underrepresented in the polls. Nor do we know which issues will be top-of-mind on November 3, 2026.
The woman, who was white, got confronted, got huffy, dropped the school’s reported 25 percent graduation rate, and now they’re besieged.
Twitchy — Screaming Judge ‘Beyond Furious’ She Wasn’t Informed of Removal of Trees at DC Golf Course
So this is what it takes to make a judge "beyond furious?" Municipal golf course maintenance?
WHAT'S ON TAP?
Today on Capitol Hill...
We're less than three weeks from the midterm elections, and those hotly contested congressional races are where the focus is.
Mike Rogers Smokes El-Sayed After Another Problematic Comment Comes Back to Haunt Him
Talarico Hopes a 'New' Paxton Scandal Will Make the Buzz Around His 13-Day Vanishing Act Disappear
White House What's Up
President Trump’s Wednesday schedule includes:
- 8:00 AM — THE PRESIDENT participates in Executive Time — Las Vegas, Nevada
- 1:00 PM MST — THE PRESIDENT departs Las Vegas, Nevada en route to Bullhead City, Arizona — Las Vegas, Nevada
- — THE PRESIDENT arrives in Bullhead City, Arizona — Bullhead City, Arizona
- — THE PRESIDENT delivers Remarks — Laughlin/Bullhead International Airport
- — THE PRESIDENT departs Bullhead City, Arizona en route to Kalispell, Montana — Bullhead City, Arizona
- 6:15 PM MDT — THE PRESIDENT arrives Kalispell, Montana — Kalispell, Montana
- — THE PRESIDENT delivers Remarks — Majestic Valley Arena
- — THE PRESIDENT departs Kalispell, Montana en route to the White House — Kalispell, Montana
Keeping Up With the Cabinet
Dir. Office of Management and Budget - Russ Vought — Vought recently touted the administration's progress on shipbuilding/reopening shipyards.
Galveston TX, Houma LA, Brownsville TX, and now Sparrows Point MD. Four new or reopened shipyards in America. President Trump is proving it can be done. The momentum continues.
— Russ Vought (@russvought) October 6, 2026
Full Court Press...
We had a few notable decisions on Tuesday, including:
- ❌ In Cable News Network, Inc. v. Trump (WH press access), Judge Timothy Kelly (D.C.) GRANTS a preliminary injunction requiring the Trump administration to maintain White House press credentials for reporters from CNN, MS NOW, and POLITICO, finding that their exclusion likely violated Fifth Amendment due process protections and constituted First Amendment retaliation and viewpoint discrimination.
- ❌ In D.C. Preservation League v. Department of the Interior (East Potomac Golf Course), Judge Ana Reyes (D.C.) GRANTS a temporary restraining order blocking further tree removal through October 26 and requiring three business days' advance notice of other irreversible modifications, finding that the National Park Service likely failed to comply with federal environmental-review requirements before removing approximately 430 trees. The court did not rule on the legality of Trump's broader golf-course redevelopment plan.
- ❌ In American Federation of Government Employees v. USDA (reorganization of USDA), Judge Vince Chhabria (Northern District of California) GRANTS a stay blocking USDA office closures and mandatory employee relocations across eight agency components.
The Supreme Court hears oral argument on Wednesday in one case:
- Salazar v. Paramount Global — whether the phrase “goods or services from a video tape service provider,” as used in the VPPA’s definition of “consumer,” refers to all of a video tape service provider’s goods or services or only to its audiovisual goods or services.
COMING ATTRACTIONS
President Trump is heading to Dalton, Georgia, and Highland Heights, Kentucky, later this week. He's set to travel to the Philippines and China in mid-November.
MORNING MUSING
I'm old enough that I remember the days of both "Battle of the Network Stars" and "Challenge of the Sexes," though not quite old enough to truly remember the "Battle of the Sexes" match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs. I definitely came of age in the era of women's empowerment. I was even a bit of a feminist myself — aiming to be both the first woman pro-football player and the first woman president. Don't think either of those is in the cards for me, but...
I share that to get to the larger point, and that is that at no point along the way — even in my fiercest feminist days — did I hate (or even dislike) men/boys. I love guys. I think they're awesome.
Which is why it bothers me to open social media these days (particularly X) and see this non-stop "battles of the sexes" being waged. I highly doubt most of it's even organic. I think we're being conditioned to be at war with one another — whether it's over politics or race or gender, you name it. Any way that the outrage machine can be powered up, that's where the algorithm chutes plunk us.
It's exhausting, and it's unhealthy. Guys are great. Gals are great. Individual people and clique-y affinity/demographic groups can behave monstrously. But we've got to find a way to quit buying into and reinforcing the stereotypes.
Anyway, to all the male folk out there: I mean you no harm.
LIGHTER FARE
Snuggle puppy!
Perfect spot..🐕🐾☺️ https://t.co/2ihlhPXkW0
— 𝕐o̴g̴ (@Yoda4ever) October 14, 2026
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