Election Day is Nov. 3, and the forecasters have reached the stage where "toss-up" is a polite way of saying electors will decide. Kind of them to allow public engagement rather than tell us what to do and think, wouldn’t you say? RealClearPolitics (RCP) rates nine Senate races that way: Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Nebraska, Ohio (special), South Carolina and Texas. In the six where we pulled an RCP polling average, the leader is ahead by just 3.2 points or less; in other words, most are inside the polls' margin of error.

The Senate is 53 Republicans (GOP), 45 Democrats and 2 independents, with 35 seats up. On RCP's House map, 227 seats rate Dem, 182 GOP and 26 toss-up, with 218 needed. Its governor map has 8 toss-ups among 36 races. Those are RCP's ratings. Voters still get to choose on Tuesday.

Elsewhere in this edition: the government's last pre-election moves, the votes already counted in Canada and Brazil, pharmacy middlemen get new rules and a host of announcements on energy and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) fair practices.

Teddy Brosevelt
Keeping it 100

Elections and the Justice Department

What's Loud: The Justice Department amended its lawsuit against Alaska on Oct. 29, seeking to block certification of any Senate result "impacted by voter confusion" over a second candidate named Daniel Sullivan, whose votes it says may have been meant for the incumbent, Dan Sullivan. It first sued Oct. 22.

What's Missing: The department also charged 48 noncitizens in five states on Oct. 26 and 18 more in North Carolina on Oct. 29 with illegal voting.

What Matters: Federal prosecutors in Nebraska published an election integrity plan for early voting and Nov. 3, and other U.S. attorney offices posted similar plans with the intention of operating legal elections.

Consumer pricing

What's Loud: On Oct. 29 the FTC and several states sued Toast over alleged hidden fees, including a $5,318.87 early termination fee.

What's Missing: The FTC separately ordered nine companies, including Delta, Uber and Walmart, to explain personalized pricing and algorithmic driver pay; the orders are a study of how companies set prices differently for different consumers.

What Matters: The Justice Department's Live Nation case page lists a proposed settlement, while Music Business Worldwide reports states won an April jury verdict that Live Nation illegally monopolized. In January, Gallup found 37 percent of Americans name big business the biggest future threat, and the action against Toast and the study of other brands reflect skepticism of big business and the need for transparency.

Energy

What's Loud: Regular gasoline averaged $4.269 a gallon the week of Oct. 26, about $1.23 more than a year earlier. A Fox News poll found six in 10 voters name the cost of living as their top economic worry.

What's Missing: Absent from the gas-price debate: federal energy-supply actions. The Energy Department closed a $5.1 billion loan package for Alliant Energy and announced a conditional commitment of up to $5 billion for Constellation's nuclear plants, not yet funded; a wind-turbine proclamation was signed Oct. 22 and published Oct. 28, and 31 states have acted on diesel relief.

What Matters: Gas is one measure of energy costs. The Energy Information Administration projects residential electricity at 18.2 cents per kilowatt-hour in 2026, up from 17.3 cents in 2025. Several of the actions above target electricity supply.

Congress

The Congressional Budget Office estimates the Senate farm bill, S. 5526, would add about $4.4 billion to the deficit over 2027 to 2036. The last general farm-bill extension ran through Sept. 30, a Sept. 2 stopgap extended only narrow agriculture items to Dec. 11, and the bill sits on the Senate calendar. Action in the post-election lame-duck session or a new extension looks likely.

Executive

An Oct. 28 proclamation orders Commerce and the U.S. Trade Representative to negotiate over robotics and industrial machinery imports and report in 180 days.

The Federal Reserve held its rate at 3.75 to 4 percent on Oct. 28 by a 10-2 vote. Lisa Cook and Beth Hammack preferred an increase.

Courts

The Ninth Circuit upheld a preliminary injunction blocking California Senate Bill 399. The law bars employers from punishing workers who skip political or religious meetings, and the court found the challengers likely to win on First Amendment grounds.

The Supreme Court denied a stay in Baltimore v. Texas on Oct. 27, a procedural step rather than a merits ruling, leaving in place a judgment vacating a 2024 rule that let immigration judges administratively close, or pause, cases. Texas sued and the Justice Department agreed to the judgment, and cities that sought to defend the rule asked for the stay; the government says the judgment bars pausing new cases but does not reopen closed ones.

Quebec. Quebec's Parti Québécois, a sovereigntist (Quebec independence) party generally placed center to center-left, won 59 of 127 seats on Oct. 5 and unseated the Coalition Avenir Québec, in power since 2018; Premier Christine Fréchette lost her own seat. Five seats short of a majority, it leads a minority government that needs other parties' votes to pass laws.

Canada's other votes. Alberta voters chose to remain a province in a non-binding question, about 76 percent to 24 in early counts. British Columbia's preliminary count has the Conservatives leading 63 of 93 seats, with David Eby resigning as New Democratic Party leader. Mail-in ballots get a final count Nov. 6 to 10. In municipal races, Toronto's Olivia Chow and Winnipeg's Scott Gillingham won re-election as mayor, according to early counts.

Brazil. Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won the Oct. 25 runoff with about 51.8 percent to Flavio Bolsonaro's 48.2, according to news reports. Bolsonaro told Agence France-Presse he will seek annulment even though his Liberal Party acknowledged the result.

Europe. On Oct. 29 Secretary of State Marco Rubio signed memoranda of understanding with Finland on critical minerals and technology and Hungary on energy and law enforcement, which are statements of intent, not treaties. The U.S. Trade Representative said a record European loan to Airbus adds "substantial uncertainty" to the U.S.-EU duty pause.

Pharmacy middlemen. The Labor Department finalized a rule requiring pharmacy benefit managers, the firms that negotiate drug payments between insurers, employers and pharmacies, to disclose their pay to large employer health plans starting July 1, 2027. Employers could then see what these middlemen earn.

According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis's advance estimate, the economy grew at a 3.4 percent annual rate in the third quarter, up from 2.2 percent in the second.

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