The Beltway press is giddy over Scott Colom flipping a Mississippi Senate seat blue for the first time since 1982 — Fox News and BBC both note the razor-thin margin, fewer than five thousand votes out of nearly a million cast — but the real story is the GOP governor Tate Reeves rushing to X to pledge collaboration with the new Democrat, while Bill Clinton, Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders queue up to claim a civil-rights milestone. Over in Denver, the Democrats' own "What's Next" conference accidentally told the truth: a Majority Democrats adviser admitted to Fox News the midterm sweep was a repudiation of Trump, not a mandate for their agenda, and the party still has no 2028 frontrunner as progressives and moderates circle each other. Before they even hold the gavel, House Democrats have already blown two votes in one week — the Washington Examiner reports eleven of them missed the Hegseth impeachment tally, letting Republicans kill it in committee, then let a veterans' benefits bill they opposed sail through because no one bothered to demand a roll call; Katherine Clark cries foul, but Jason Crow, Maxwell Frost and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are privately panicking about vote operations with barely fifty days until a 250-seat majority.

At the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on Veterans Day, an Army sentinel did his job — shouting down Pete Hegseth, his wife and senior aides for laughing and posing — and the Pentagon's chief spokesman backed the guard, not the Secretary of War, per BBC. Trump, meanwhile, laid a wreath, praised Hegseth's performance and declared victory in the Iran war; a congressional impeachment push over unauthorized war-making collapsed Tuesday, which Hegseth dismissed as a farce. The White House isn't waiting for the new Congress: Katie Bailey, the new legislative-affairs director, is already "built for" the fight according to the Washington Examiner — she helped sink the Hegseth impeachment, muscled a bipartisan permitting bill through, and secured nominee confirmations in her first week. John Thune may stretch the legislative calendar to ram through priorities before January, and House Republicans just chose Jim Jordan over Steve Scalise by a 106-73 vote — the conference picked pugnaciousness over polish, exactly what a minority facing a hostile majority needs.

ICE just posted the highest deportation and arrest totals in agency history for fiscal year 2026, CBS News confirms, blowing past Obama and Biden numbers — but the corporate media's preferred experts at Syracuse and the Migration Policy Institute immediately rushed to parse the data, emphasizing voluntary departures and non-criminal arrests to blunt the headline. Exit polling showed a majority of voters thought enforcement had gone too far, and the president himself told 60 Minutes the crackdown was too tough — right before elevating the architect of those same policies to chief of staff. Down in Florida, Attorney General James Uthmeier isn't buying the progressive pose: he subpoenaed the Democratic Socialists of America for records on delegations to China and Cuba, including a convoy to a state sponsor of terrorism and meetings at Chinese Communist Party institutions, the Washington Examiner reports. And Senator-elect Abdul el Sayed is trying to bait Trump into endorsing Medicare for All by offering him the credit — a trap the Washington Examiner's strategists see coming, since a full government takeover still hits a wall of GOP resistance, insurer opposition and unanswered funding questions, while the real crisis remains rising costs that no slogan fixes.

Sources

GOP governor and prominent Dems congratulate senator-elect on flipping Mississippi seat blue — Fox News

Pentagon backs war memorial guard who reprimanded Hegseth's group — BBC News

Dems admit uncomfortable election sweep truth as party descend on Denver to shape 2028 without a frontrunner — Fox News

ICE deportations and arrests hit record high — CBS News

Meet the top Trump aide ‘built for’ besting the Democratic majorities — Washington Examiner

Democrats’ midterm honeymoon over as they suffer quick-fire double voting blunder — Washington Examiner

Senate Republicans fear 'brutal' 2028 map could keep Dems in power for years to come — Fox News

Democrat Scott Colom makes history as Mississippi's first black senator since 19th Century — BBC News

Ro Khanna rejects warnings that Trump admin investigations could derail Democrats' affordability agenda — Fox News

‘China is not our enemy’: Inside the DSA’s foreign travel now in Florida’s crosshairs — Washington Examiner

Jim Jordan fits the fight ahead — Washington Examiner

El Sayed makes unusual legacy play in bid to get ‘brand manager’ Trump to embrace ‘Medicare for all’ — Washington Examiner