👋🏾 HI, HEY, HELLO! Welcome back to Congress Nerd Daily. I hope today was everything for you. The midterms are in 29 days.
FIRST THINGS FIRST
Former House Speaker Dennis Hastert died over the weekend at 84. The Illinois Republican, who served as speaker from 1999 to 2007, was sentenced to 15 months in federal prison in 2016 for illegally structuring bank withdrawals used for hush-money payments that concealed his sexual abuse of teenage boys while he was a high school wrestling coach. Read more from AP News »
In campaign news, Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) will campaign with Rep. Chris Pappas (D-N.H.) in New Hampshire tomorrow, starting with a meet-and-greet in Nashua before helping open a new Organize New Hampshire office in Keene alongside state Democratic leaders. The swing comes after Warnock told me last week that he was fielding “a lot of requests” to campaign around Georgia and across the country during the final month before the midterms.
“I can’t be everywhere. I still pastor my church. I got two little kids,” Warnock said. But he added that he planned to spend October “moving around the state and all over the country” because of what he described as the election’s unusually high stakes. Warnock said Democrats need congressional majorities capable of putting “guardrails” on President Donald Trump and argued Republicans have shown little interest in doing so.
Warnock warned the danger wouldn’t necessarily pass with a Democratic victory: Trump, he said, could emerge from November “like a wounded lion who has lost his roar and his bite—and that can be a very dangerous time.”
VIEW FROM THE HILL
Black voters are poised to play their familiar consequential role in next month’s midterms. But new data suggests Democratic leaders shouldn’t mistake participation for satisfaction.
Black Futures Lab this afternoon invited reporters to an early look at more than 6,000 responses to its 2026 Black Census Project, an ongoing national survey that remains in the field and ultimately aims to collect hundreds of thousands of responses.
The preliminary findings reveal extraordinarily low trust in political institutions alongside practical economic priorities and growing political independence—warning signs for a party that has long relied on Black voters as a foundational constituency.
The findings also track with what a Congressional Black Caucus member and Democratic strategist told me about the party’s relationship with Black voters in the final month before the midterms.
“Black voters are not monolithic and while many are speaking about working class issues, they are not uplifting a Black agenda,” the CBC member said. “In fact, no one is even talking to Black voters while on the trail. We are not in the polling and not in the conversations.”
The member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to candidly assess the party, added that recognizing Black voters does not require candidates to “say ‘Black, Black, Black’ all the time,” but argued the party should acknowledge “the base of voters that have given this party foundation.”
“So maybe Black voters are not as vocal as we have been in the past,” the member said. “It does not mean we are not aware or that we are not keeping receipts.”
The strategist, who was also granted anonymity, offered a similar warning: Opposition to President Donald Trump may motivate Black voters next month, but Democrats “should not conflate that with enthusiasm for their agenda.”
The strategist argued Democrats have yet to articulate a sufficiently specific agenda for Black Americans and need to offer something “real, economical, and tangible,” citing a broader economic agenda and a reparations commission as examples. Symbolic representation still matters, the strategist said, but Democrats cannot assume it alone will sustain Black support.
That tension was central to Black Futures Lab’s presentation.
