BUFFALO, N.Y. — Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's flirtation with a 2028 Senate bid is getting real — more real than the presidential buzz around her might suggest.
She's barnstorming through upstate New York, meeting with local officials, and kicking off a voter turnout program that could help her collect valuable data for a possible Senate campaign.
Why it matters: Whether the House member from New York runs for Senate or the White House is one of the biggest questions hanging over the 2028 Democratic presidential primary.
Democrats in some of this year's most critical congressional battlegrounds are sending a clear message to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: We don't want you to campaign for us.
Why it matters: If they continue, the snubs could hurt AOC's standing as a potential contender in the 2028 Democratic presidential primary, when many voters will prioritize electability.
Two highly anticipated giant pandas from China have finally arrived in Atlanta.
Why it matters: The fuzzy ambassadors have long been one of China's most beloved tools of soft power — and their arrival could signal an attempt to cool tensions with the U.S.
Opponents of Anthropic's Dario Amodei are circulating a highly negative brief about him to the White House ahead of an important dinner with President Trump, per an Axios review of the document.
Why it matters: No company wants to be on Trump's bad side — and a Sunday night dinner between the president and Amodei could be what thaws relations after a year of tension.
British police arrested five men Sunday on suspicion of terrorism near a U.K. air base used for U.S. operations in Iran, as President Trump said the suspects had been under investigation.
The latest: "Working with Britain, it was an amazing job," Trump told reporters Sunday morning. "We had them under investigation. They were looking to do big damage to our fort, and working with the British worked out great and we got them."
President Trump plans to host Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei at a private White House dinner on Sunday evening, sources familiar told Axios.
Why it matters: The dinner —the first one-on-one meeting between the two— is an indication of thawing relations between Anthropic and the administration, whose officials and allies have had longstanding tensions.
One day after he rejected an Iranian proposal to end the war, President Trump told Axios in a phone interview on Sunday that he expects U.S. negotiators to engage in more talks with the country this week.
Why it matters: Qatar and other regional mediators are trying to revive negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, but the two sides are far apart on the key issues.
Data: KFF/AP Rural Voters Survey; Chart: Herb Scribner
Cost of living and health care costs top the list of issues rural voters want 2026 midterm candidates to address, according to a new AP/KFF poll.
The big picture: Ahead of the midterms, rural voters rank pocketbook concerns above immigration, the conflict with Iran and several major domestic policy debates.
The cost of borrowing money is moving unrelentingly higher, with profound implications for savers, borrowers and the U.S. government's fiscal outlook.
The big picture: The bond market moves over the last few weeks have pushed most risk-free interest rates north of 5%.
Barring a rapid reversal, expect pain to come in interest-sensitive sectors like housing, new stress on federal government finances and greater risks of financial disruption.
It is better news for savers, who have taken paper losses on existing bonds in recent weeks but can now deploy cash safely with the best prospective returns seen in decades.
A pollster for Senate Republicans was met with disbelief on Saturday after telling GOP donors and operatives that they could grow their majority in November's midterm elections, sources tell Axios.
Why it matters: "Delusional," one attendee at the National Republican Senatorial Committee's Sea Island retreat in Georgia told Axios after the presentation by the pollster, Erik Iverson. "The mood is not good," said another.
OpenAI, Anthropic and security researchers are investigating tens of thousands of incidents in which their frontier models took steps that outside evaluators would consider problematic, sources told Axios.
Why it matters: The sheer number of incidents, which occurred in recent months in internal testing and the real world, indicates that the problem is orders of magnitude more complex than what is publicly known.
President Trump told voters to pretend he's on the ballot. Apparently they're listening: Republicans coast to coast are getting pulled under by a violent undertow fueled by Trump's unpopularity.
Why it matters: It's looked bad for Republicans all year, but this week felt different — like the political environment was disintegrating in real time, one ominous data point after another.
Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) has spent more taxpayer money on travel than any other senator's office since the fall of 2024 — including $625,000 on private charter companies, according to an analysis of public disclosures provided to Axios.
Why it matters: Senators routinely fly between Washington and their home states on taxpayers' dime. But only a handful regularly rely on private flights.
The U.S. and China have agreed to set up a dialogue on artificial intelligence, with a communications channel to help defuse serious incidents, the White House said overnight.
Why it matters: President Trump has said the main thing that matters in the AI race is beating China — but the pact acknowledges that they're serious competition, too.
