Good morning. Forty-seven days out.

Opposing an unpopular president can be more than enough when it comes to a midterm election. But, eventually, the Democrats will have to reach a broad consensus that goes beyond agreement about the Trump Administration’s failures and talks about what the party, if it won power, would do instead. 

Today’s stories are about Democrats trying to answer that question for three of the most important issues in U.S. politics: health care, immigration, and AI.

Below, you’ll find James Talarico’s plan to break up big health care companies, why Democrats have struggled to answer Trump on immigration, and what former President Barack Obama thinks Democrats should do about AI.

— Elias Isquith

Here’s a strange fact of 2026 politics. 

President Trump’s brutal policy of mass deportation has filled detention centers to record levels, and only 39 percent of Americans approve of how he’s handling immigration, down from 49 percent early in his second term. 

Yet plenty of Democrats, especially in tough races, still seem to flinch whenever the subject comes up.

Immigrant advocates are tired of waiting. “They’ve ceded the whole debate to Republicans,” Ohio-based advocate Lynn Tramonte told The Caucus’s Nathalie Baptiste.

So what should Democrats say instead? Nathalie asked the people who’ve been working on the issue for decades. To hear their answer, read the full story at The Caucus.

When former President Barack Obama joined House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries for a Democratic fundraiser last Thursday, he had a clear message for the party.

It’s time Democrats made “a very clean plan” about how to handle AI. 

That’s an increasingly widespread belief, but it puts him at odds with President Trump, who this week called warnings about AI a “hoax,” and has said that communities that oppose data centers will be “backwards and poor.”

To learn what Obama says he’d do about AI if he were running in 2028, read Kim Lyons’ full story at The Caucus.

— Senate Democrats, joined by four Republicans, blocked the Trump-backed crypto bill, 49 to 50, arguing its ethics rules wouldn’t stop the president from profiting off crypto. (NPR)

— Candidates backed by the Working Families Party beat five Democratic state legislators in Delaware’s primaries, while Senator Chris Coons easily won his own. (Spotlight Delaware)

— In a single day, the Senate GOP leadership’s Texas super PAC reported $53.9 million in spending against James Talarico. Across all the outside spending filed that day, 98 percent favored Republicans. (Inside Political Money)

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