Trump Pushes GOP Midterms Amid Ethics, Security Scrutiny

Voters head to the polls in five weeks for the 2026 midterms, with foreign disinformation campaigns and questions over federal support for election administration now intersecting with separate disputes about the use of public resources to promote the president. U.S. intelligence agencies assess that Russia remains the most active foreign actor seeking to undermine confidence in results through digital means, while China focuses on specific races tied to policy toward Beijing; no evidence has emerged of attempts to alter vote counts or machines. State election officials in multiple states, including Republicans, report that briefings, trainings and systems testing from federal agencies have largely stopped since early 2025 staffing reductions at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. CISA laid off nearly one-third of its staff that year, has operated under three acting directors, and only recently released an updated election infrastructure security plan that includes new threat briefings and vulnerability scanning. Federal funding for state election security fell from $55 million in 2024 to $15 million in 2025 before rising to $45 million this year. Separately, the White House has directed taxpayer-funded television advertisements that feature the president and resemble campaign material at a time when early voting has begun. President Trump’s private business filed a trademark application for “Trump TV” three days after the White House launched a livestream service under that name on its website. The same business reported at least $2.2 billion in revenue last year from ventures that overlap with policy areas, including a stablecoin product introduced months before legislation promoting such instruments. In December the administration plans to host the G20 summit at Trump National Doral Miami, a site the president owns; the same location was rejected for a G7 meeting in 2019 after objections from some Republicans. Current Republican lawmakers have offered little public criticism of the venue choice. Polls from Gallup and Economist/YouGov released last month recorded 89 percent of Americans viewing corruption as widespread in government and 53 percent applying the term “corrupt” directly to the president. Administration officials have not provided detailed cost comparisons for the G20 site or explanations for the CISA reductions in the reporting examined here.