The launch of \u2018Project Freedom\u2019 in the strait of Hormuz has brought the region back to the brink of full-scale war. Plus: The electoral battle for Congress<\/p>\n
Good morning.<\/p>\n
Donald Trump has again raised the stakes in the Gulf region with the Monday launch of \u201cProject Freedom\u201d<\/a> to open a route through the strait of Hormuz. More than 800 ships and roughly 20,000 crew members remain stranded in the region.<\/p>\n Have any vessels made it out of the strait? <\/strong>US Central Command (Centcom) said two US-flagged merchant vessels had \u201csuccessfully transited\u201d the strait, but Iran has denied this claim. Late on Monday, the container shipping company Maersk said the Alliance Fairfax \u2013 a US-flagged vehicle carrier \u2013 exited the Gulf. Shipping industry experts remain skeptical<\/a> about whether vessels will be able to travel safely to and from the Gulf under Trump\u2019s plan.<\/p>\n This is a developing story.<\/strong> Follow the liveblog here.<\/a><\/p>\n How will this play into the overall battle for Congress? <\/strong>Red states, including Alabama and Tennessee, are rushing to revise their congressional maps after the original supreme court decision. On Monday, Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, signed a gerrymandered congressional district map <\/a>into law that gives Republicans an electoral advantage in four additional races in November\u2019s midterm elections.<\/p>\n How are Democrats fighting back?<\/strong> Eight candidates<\/a> have been added to their slate of top contenders vying to reclaim a Democratic House majority in November\u2019s midterm elections.<\/p>\n When do voters head to the polls?<\/strong> Ohio voters will today select candidates<\/a> before November\u2019s midterm elections, including the candidates for Ohio\u2019s Senate special election. Indiana voters also go to the polls today<\/a>, with seven Republican state senators battling for re-election against candidates backed by Trump.<\/p>\n Continue reading…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The launch of \u2018Project Freedom\u2019 in the strait of Hormuz has brought the region back to the brink of full-scale war. Plus: The electoral battle for Congress Good morning. Donald Trump has again raised the stakes in the Gulf region with the Monday launch of \u201cProject Freedom\u201d to open a route through the strait of … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73071"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73071\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}