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Democratic attorneys general are bracing for President Donald Trump to interfere in the midterm elections — and war-gaming how to stop him.

The party’s top prosecutors have been strategizing for months about how to counter a series of increasingly extreme scenarios they fear could play out this fall. They have huddled in hotel conference rooms and over Zoom meetings to run tabletop exercises anticipating the president’s moves and choreographing responses.

They’re preparing for the administration to potentially confiscate ballots and voting machines, strip resources from the postal service to disrupt the delivery of mail ballots, and send military members and immigration agents to polling locations to intimidate voters. They’re readying motions for temporary restraining orders to preserve election materials and remove armed forces from voting sites.

And, as the president attempts to assert federal control over elections, seize voter data and relitigate false claims of fraud from 2020, they’re monitoring Trump and his allies’ every word about elections for clues about what his administration could do next.

“[Trump] wants to continue to have his party prevail, seemingly by whatever means necessary,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said. “So we have to be ready for that, sad and tragic as it is.”

The Democratic attorneys general, some of whom battled Trump’s election-subversion tactics in the courts in 2020, have already challenged the president’s efforts to overhaul election administration and access sensitive voter data ahead of a midterm contest that could turn him into a lame duck.

Nineteen of them banded together to sue the administration last spring over Trump’s sweeping executive order targeting voting rules, most of which has since been blocked by courts. When the Department of Justice dispatched election monitors to polling locations in New Jersey and California last November, Bonta deployed his own observers in his state in response.

But the president’s more recent moves have prosecutors ratcheting up their preparations for November, five Democratic attorneys general said in interviews.

Earlier this month, Trump called on Republicans to “nationalize” voting and suggested the federal government should intervene in election operations in swing-states’ predominantly blue cities like Atlanta, Detroit and Philadelphia — places that have been central to his election conspiracy theories for years. House Republicans passed one set of voting restrictions and are teeing up another, though the measures are unlikely to clear the Senate. And Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem raised alarms among Democrats when she said her department is working to ensure “that we have the right people voting, electing the right leaders.”

Trump and his allies’ rhetoric is the type of “red-alarm fire that people need to take very seriously,” said Washington Attorney General Nick Brown, who leads the Democratic Attorneys General Association’s election protection working group.

“He will try anything,” Brown said, so “we have to just sort of think creatively about: If you were the president and you were trying to invalidate an election or undermine an election, what are the oddball, ludicrous, unconstitutional theories that you might advance?”

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson fired back in a statement accusing Democrats of “plotting to undermine commonsense election integrity efforts supported by a vast majority of Americans” and arguing existing law gives the Department of Justice “full authority to ensure states comply with federal election laws, which mandate accurate state voter rolls.”

“President Trump is committed to ensuring that Americans have full confidence in the administration of elections, and that includes totally accurate and up-to-date voter rolls free of errors and unlawfully registered non-citizen voters,” Jackson said. “The President has also urged Congress to pass the SAVE Act and other legislative proposals that would establish a uniform standard of photo ID for voting, prohibit no-excuse mail-in voting, and end the practice of ballot harvesting to ensure the safety and security of our elections.”

Democratic attorneys general have panned the SAVE Act as an attack on the right to vote and urged Congress not to pass it and other measures Trump is pushing.

They also fear the Trump administration could aim to intimidate legal voters by sending Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to polling locations.

ICE chief Todd Lyons said in a congressional hearing earlier this month that there’s “no reason” for ICE officials to be deployed to polling facilities. But MAGA influencer Steve Bannon, a former White House strategist, is encouraging the president to take that step to prevent noncitizens from voting, despite its rare occurrence. He’s also urging Trump to send in troops, further stoking Democrats’ concerns.

When asked about Bannon’s comments during a briefing earlier this month, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said while she “can’t guarantee that an ICE agent won’t be around a polling location in November” she hadn’t “heard the president discuss any formal plans to put ICE outside of polling locations,” calling the question “disingenuous.”

Democrats aren’t reassured.

“If the president said, ‘Look, I want my ICE people to protect American elections … go to all these polling places and stand out in front with guns,’ I think they would do it,” said Attorney General Keith Ellison of Minnesota, where an immigration enforcement surge earlier this year resulted in two deaths. “And I think we all need to be prepared to deal with that problem.”

Several Democratic attorneys general said they’re particularly alarmed after the FBI seized voting records in Fulton County, Georgia, based on a referral from Kurt Olsen, an attorney who worked with Trump to undermine the 2020 election results. They’re now bracing for similar seizures in other places Trump has previously targeted over debunked claims of voter fraud.

Those concerns are heightened in battleground states with contests that could decide control of Congress.

“We recognize that what happened in Fulton County could happen in Detroit. Not because there’s any merit to claims that anything wrong happened in Detroit, but because we know that those claims will be made again,” said Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel of swing-state Michigan.

“The president and his administration know and understand that Democrats don’t win statewide in Michigan without counting the Detroit vote,” she added. “So of course Trump wants to undermine in people’s minds the integrity of Detroit elections, even though that’s not borne fruit whenever that has been investigated.”

Democrats in states that rely heavily on mail-in ballots are also girding for an assault on the voting system that Trump is trying to eliminate, but that GOP operatives and even some Republicans in Congress support as a way to keep voters engaged in non-presidential years.

They are worried about Trump weaponizing the postal service, either by again blocking funding for the agency or installing allies to slow operations. And they cautioned that his push to discount ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but arrive afterward could disenfranchise voters in states with grace periods. The Supreme Court is due to consider a case on ballot deadlines next month.

Democratic attorneys general, meanwhile, will argue in a lower court next week in a multistate lawsuit seeking to permanently block portions of Trump’s executive order — which includes cutting off mail ballots and requiring documentary proof of citizenship for the national voter registration form — from taking effect.

Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford, who is co-leading the lawsuit alongside Bonta, urged his counterparts to “stay nimble.”

Trump “likes to sow chaos because he thinks it’s going to throw people off their game,” Ford said. “But he has met his match when it comes to the Nevada attorney general’s office; he’s met his match when it comes to the Democratic attorneys general.”

Elena Schneider contributed to this report.

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Bakers, home cooks, and fans of tarted-up porridge, rejoice: rhubarb season is finally upon us.

There’s a reason celebrity chefs like Nigella Lawson, Mary Berry, Jamie Oliver, and Gordon Ramsay are such fans of the tart, vibrant vegetable. As new Great British Bake-Off host Nigella explained, “there is nothing quite like a crumble made with the early, tender stuff”; her predecessor, Mary, simply dubbed it “delicious”.

But that doesn’t mean it’s failsafe. All too often, I’ve begun stewing the purple stems with glossy purple perfection in mind, only to end up with flavourless browinsh-yellow mush.

So, I tried a trick both Gordon and Jamie swear by to prevent the sog – and I’m never going back.

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Roasting rhubarb prevents it from going mushy

Normally, I cook rhubarb on the hob (ideally with some butter, ginger, cornflour, and citrus juice). But this can be a delicate process: as Nigella notes, much longer than five minutes in the pan risks a watery mess.

Jamie and Gordon have an answer, though. Both roast theirs in the oven – Gordon adds prosecco and strawberries to his, and Jamie bakes his with spices, blood orange, and vanilla.

Neither chef mentioned the BBC-recommended trick I like for pies, crumbles, and tarts, though. Strain the rhubarb over a large bowl until cooled to both remove the need for cornflour and to save the delicious syrup as a delicious bonus.

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I poured mine all over their almond rhubarb pie, which involves roasting rhubarb with orange juice and sugar in a pan.

And because there was some left after the dessert was finished, I’ve learned it’s a great addition to cocktails too (somehow, the removal of this orange-y, rhubarb-y syrup doesn’t detract from the tangy flavour of the veg in the pie).

The stalks keep their shape much more easily with this method, too.

How to roast the perfect rhubarb

Set your oven to about 180°C, trim and slice the rhubarb, and add it to a roasting tray with whatever combination of spices and liquid you like. For a stickier, slightly thicker syrup, I like a dessertspoon of sugar for roughly 600g rhubarb.

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Prosecco, fresh fruit juice, and (my favourite) crystallised ginger will all infuse the flavour further, though water will do too.

It’s important to cover the top of your roasting tray with tinfoil to prevent both dryness and mushiness.

Place the rhubarb in the oven for about half an hour. This is the sweet spot; rhubarb keeps its shape but tastes tender.

Once it’s out, you can either place it in a colander over a large bowl (to catch that delicious juice) or leave it as-is to cool. Either way, you won’t regret it.

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Nicki Minaj spent the past year transforming herself from a polarizing rap superstar into a high-profile conservative provocateur, lobbing viral attacks at Democratic leaders, boosting MAGA talking points and earning public praise from President Donald Trump and his allies.

On social media, Minaj’s pugnacious persona and sharp-edged posts — including repeated broadsides against California Gov. Gavin Newsom — have made her a darling of the Trump administration and the conservative movement, drawing millions of views and steady amplification from far-right influencers.

But quietly, humming in the background of her varied social media blitzes, a sophisticated army of bots was unconditionally praising and amplifying Minaj’s content, according to a new report shared exclusively with POLITICO.

The report, compiled by the disinformation detection company Cyabra, identifies a coordinated network of bots — more than 18,000 of them — that drove algorithms to spread Minaj’s posts on X.

The analysis, which looked at social media activity from Nov. 11 to Dec. 28, provides a window into how the rapper was able to capture millions of views online and position herself as a celebrity the White House found value in partnering with. Last month, Minaj joined the president at the Trump Accounts Summit — where Trump invited her on stage, showered her with praise and recorded a chummy TikTok video with her afterward.

“We don’t really see a lot of high volume, high impact orchestration of bad and fake actors within that intersection of the geopolitically driven and music culture,” said Dan Brahmy, the CEO and founder of Cyabra. “It is scarce in our field to see the combination of the bad and the fake online world with the entertainment world.”

The report found inauthentic accounts repeatedly amplified Minaj’s posts with praise that used “highly similar language,” particularly in response to posts where authentic accounts were criticizing Minaj.

“Supportive comments generated by fake profiles were predominantly brief, repetitive, and low in semantic complexity, consisting largely of praising keywords and positive hashtags rather than original or substantive engagement,” the report found.

Other inauthentic activity surrounding Minaj included “longer, more detailed comments designed to appear organic.”

“Nicki you are brave for living your truth, people might not always agree with what’s being played out, but as an artist and watching your growth as a person is inspiring,” read one comment from a purported Minaj fan, @LAX76283656, that was deemed fake by Cyabra.

“This pattern suggests a deliberate attempt to integrate into genuine conversations, increasing the credibility and visibility of the amplified content,” the report read.

Cyabra identified one day, Dec. 26, when fake profiles made up 56 percent of all comments on political posts made by Minaj.

Bot networks have become a familiar feature of modern politics since revelations of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, when coordinated inauthentic accounts were used to inflame divisions and manipulate online discourse. Such campaigns are now routinely detected around wars, elections and geopolitical flashpoints — but far less often around celebrities or the music industry.

That backdrop helps explain why Cyabra’s findings seem so peculiar. Rather than a short-lived spike tied to a single event or appearance, the company found sustained and coordinated amplification of Minaj’s posts across a range of political and cultural topics over time.

When Minaj posted about her support for Trump, her concern over the persecution of Christians in Nigeria and Newsom’s perceived alignment with the transgender community, the bots were there to back her up, Cyabra’s report shows. They also amplified her posts related to the music industry.

Representatives for Minaj did not respond to requests for comment.

Alex Bruesewitz, a media and political adviser to Trump who considers Minaj a “very close friend,” told POLITICO he is confident there are no bots involved with the rapper’s social media presence.

“Nicki has never used bot activity to promote herself on social media, because she doesn’t need to,” Bruesewitz said. “She has one of the largest fan bases of any musician that’s alive today.”

The Cyabra report was commissioned by a person who was granted anonymity because they fear public retaliation.

Cyabra is about 85 percent confident the more than 18,000 profiles identified are fake. But if the company were to narrow that scope to profiles that exhibit even stronger signs of inauthenticity, the confidence level could easily rise into the 90s, Brahmy said.

“We always have to make sure that we play at a confidence level that’s strong enough for people to rely on it, and doesn’t really change the narrative,” he said.

And when accounts boosting Minaj posted content that researchers identified as “toxic,” the algorithm drove her posts even further. Companies like Cyabra determine toxicity by assessing not just the “positive” or “negative” words used in a post, but the apparent intent behind them, Brahmy said. Personal attacks, slurs, threats or comments that seem designed to deter a reasonable person from engaging in conversation are typically considered toxic.

“When the conversation is limited to toxic content, a substantially stronger amplification effect emerges,” the report found. “These accounts predominantly amplify content produced by Nicki Minaj and Turning Point USA, indicating a notable overlap between the two within this discourse. Several of the accounts involved had previously been identified as exhibiting fake campaign-like behavior in the context of Minaj’s online activity within and relating to the music industry.”

Turning Point USA didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The analysis also shows how foreign and domestic political narratives can be manipulated by bot networks without broad public awareness — and how influential figures in the hip-hop world are making inroads into the conservative political conversation in America.

Minaj’s online activity was not only amplified by inauthentic accounts — but also a string of authentic accounts, including those of popular conservative influencers Dom Lucre and Matt Wallace, Cyabra found. The way those accounts parroted Minaj’s talking points suggest strategic coordination behind the scenes, Brahmy said.

“Real human beings are behaving the exact same way, utilizing the exact same behavioral patterns, as you would expect from a well coordinated campaign,” Brahmy said. “They amplify each other. They are riding the same, similar wave of narrative.”

Lucre responded with a statement saying, “This is one of the most absurd conspiracy theories I have ever seen in my entire life brother.”

He then uploaded videos to his X and YouTube accounts reacting to POLITICO’s questions about whether he was coordinating his posts about Minaj with others or being paid for posts related to the rapper.

“Nicki Minaj is now pulling so many liberals to the right that they now have to push out a theory that these aren’t real organic people, and that she’s now manipulating the system with bots,” Lucre said. “If Nicki Minaj was manipulating systems with bots on Instagram, TikTok, X, do you not think there would be a conclusive data that they would have to present this instead of asking influencers to say yes?”

Wallace did not respond to a request for comment.

Minaj’s foray into politics comes after Trump made inroads with Black and Hispanic voters in the 2024 election. He and his allies have been eager to propel a political realignment around a multiracial, working-class, right-populist coalition, but polls show that that 2024 coalition has frayed badly over the last year.

Minaj has moved toward embracing the MAGA movement since July of last year. Her rightward shift was cemented in December during her appearance with Erika Kirk, the widow of slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk, at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest convention. In late 2025, before Trump embraced her at last month’s summit, her political views also drew praise from the likes of Vice President JD Vance and Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz.

On social media, her barrage of GOP-friendly posts garner millions of views, including those taking aim at Newsom.

“Career politician at the brink of his moment realigns to become nothing more than a Nicki Minaj ANTI. OOF,” Minaj wrote in December, with a photo depicting Newsom behind bars in a jail cell. “So now he’s the guy running on ‘wanting to see trans kids’ AND willing to lower himself to becoming just another FEMALE RAPPER to get obliterated by NICKI MINAJ.”

“Let’s wait…I think Gavvy’s still transitioning,” she said in another post on the same day, which generated over 1 million views.

A spokesperson for Newsom — who is named multiple times in the report and was a frequent target of Minaj during Cyabra’s analysis period — sent a statement ridiculing Minaj when asked for comment on the report’s findings.

“Like most MAGA mouthpieces, we are not surprised Nicki Minaj needs bots to stay relevant,” Newsom spokesperson Izzy Gardon said.

Cyabra’s report identifies 18,784 fake profiles that were at the ready to boost Minaj’s content.

Those accounts represented 33 percent of the total profiles evaluated by Cyabra — a ratio of inauthentic activity similar to those seen during wars and presidential elections, Brahmy said. Inauthentic accounts typically represent between 7 and 10 percent of organic social media discourse, the company said.

Cyabra works with corporations to identify online bot activity and misinformation campaigns, with the goal of helping them protect their reputation and understand malicious actors online. It uses software to analyze social media activity — and provides its services to PR firms, legal practices, multinational corporations and governments.

Cyabra gleaned the bot activity by examining the accounts’ temporal synchronization, their linguistic and stylistic uniformity and the similar demographics shared by the fake identities. The company developed a machine learning algorithm to identify fake accounts.

Jen Golbeck, a computer science professor at the University of Maryland who studies artificial intelligence and social media, told POLITICO the purpose of a “botnet” can go beyond manipulating the narrative in a single comment section. The bots’ interactions signal to social media algorithms that a post draws high-engagement, which drives the algorithm to spread the content further.

“You can really expand your reach beyond your follower base if you get high levels of interaction, and these interaction bots do that,” said Golbeck, who also writes the MAGAReport substack.

Joel Penney, a professor at Montclair State University who studies popular culture and politics, said Trump’s adoption of Minaj into his political project is likely part of a larger strategy to reach younger, more diverse audiences.

“They’ve made a lot of efforts to include celebrities who are supportive, including hip-hop figures; Nicki Minaj is probably the biggest name to kind of become a pretty public advocate,” Penney said. “They don’t have the power to wave a wand and make all their followers or fans of their music support their political advocacy. But it matters. It contributes to this kind of war for public opinion that we see play out on social media.”

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FBI Director Kash Patel is facing a backlash for reportedly using an FBI jet to head to Italy where he spent the final days of the Winter Olympics watching hockey and, later, celebrating Team USA’s gold medal win over Canada on Sunday.

Patel, a hockey fan since his childhood, was spotted at the US men’s semifinal game against Slovakia, and later at the final, where he was seen celebrating with Team USA centre Dylan Larkin in the locker room after America’s overtime win.

“Congratulations Team USA,” Patel appeared to say while making a shaka sign with his hand during Larkin’s post-game Instagram Live feed, per a clip shared by MS NOW’s Ken Dilanian.

On Sunday, he took to social media to remark on Team USA’s golden accomplishment. The conspiracy-pushing FBI director also shared snaps from the post-game celebration, including one that shows him cracking a smile alongside coach Mike Sullivan.

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Unity, Sacrifice, Attitude- what it takes to be the best in the world. These men live and breathe it. Now Team USA are gold medal champions, legends standing on the shoulders of giants. Thank you for representing the greatest country on earth, in the greatest game ever created.… pic.twitter.com/hBG987pxM2

— Kash Patel (@Kash_Patel) February 22, 2026

Social media users swiftly slammed Patel over the trip, with a number particularly pointing to the Justice Department’s controversial, slow drip release of the Jeffrey Epstein files.

“Are the Epstein files there?” X user Gerald Celente questioned.

Another user, Hannah Cox, reacted to Patel’s Instagram Live selfie with Larkin, simply writing, “Meanwhile, solving no sex crimes mind you.”

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“Why is Kash Patel in the locker room?” asked @AmanitaFugax on X. “They don’t even try to hide their corruption and self enrichment anymore. This guy is a podcasting grifter. He should not be anywhere near public service.”

On Thursday, Patel headed to the Milan Cortina Games on the FBI’s Gulfstream jet, sources told MS NOW’s Dilanian and Carol Leonnig. The report estimated that Patel’s trip to Milan cost taxpayers as much as $75,000.

FBI spokesperson Ben Williamson confirmed the trip but argued it was “personal” in nature, claiming it was planned months in advance, and Patel was there to meet with Italian officials for meetings and briefings related to government duties.

Williamson went on to defend the trip by claiming that the FBI plays a “major role” in security for the Games as well as the World Cup, which is set to go down this summer in the States.

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“So we have a U.S. consulate briefing on Olympic security and current FBI posture, as well as thanking FBI personnel on the ground,” he wrote.

Patel has previously come under fire for using an FBI jet to go see his girlfriend, country singer Alexis Wilkins, perform at a wrestling event in Pennsylvania last year.

He later defended the move, arguing that he’s not allowed to fly commercial and declaring that his partner is “a rock-solid conservative and a country music sensation who has done more for this nation than most will in ten lifetimes.”

Patel is the first known active FBI director to make an Olympic-related trip since Robert Mueller did so in 2003, although that trip occurred several months prior to the start of the 2004 Athens Games, MSNBC noted.

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