Politics & World Affairs — October 22, 2026

Taiwan indicts five over attack. Taiwanese prosecutors charged five men accused of taking payment from a person in China to ram a car into a comedian who mocked Xi Jinping on stage.

The Epoch Times · Read more →

Brown leads Ohio Senate race. A Fox News poll shows Democrat Sherrod Brown leading Republican Jon Husted 52%-47% in Ohio's Senate race, driven by a wide gender gap and economic concerns.

The Fox News survey suggests the Ohio matchup is not occurring in isolation: the outlet reports several Senate contests are tightening nationwide, making the state one measure of the broader fight for the chamber. According to the poll, pocketbook pressures and a divide between men and women voters are the main forces shaping preferences there, indicating economic conditions could remain central to the contest as the campaign continues.

Fox News Politics · Read more →

Putin open to peace talks. Russian President Vladimir Putin told U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff he agrees in principle to resuming trilateral Russia-Ukraine-U.S. talks. Russia also released American detainee Stephen Hubbard, 74.

The diplomatic signals came even as both Moscow and Kyiv faced fresh strikes, according to Axios, underscoring that fighting continued while the Kremlin voiced conditional openness to negotiations. The freeing of Hubbard, a 74-year-old American held in Russia, accompanied the message delivered through the White House envoy, pairing a detainee handover with the stated willingness to return to three-way talks aimed at ending the war.

Axios · Read more →

Democrats sue over voter rolls. Democratic leaders and election groups filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block Justice Department pressure on states to remove voters from rolls ahead of the Nov. 3 midterms.

The complaint, filed Tuesday, names President Trump as a defendant alongside the Justice Department and accuses the administration of threats and intimidation directed at states, according to The Hill. The plaintiffs, a coalition of Democratic leaders and election organizations, are asking a federal court to halt the federal campaign before voters cast ballots in the November contests.

The Hill · Read more →