2022 midterm elections: Republicans, Democrats vie for control of the House and Senate

Democratic House candidate says defining a woman is 'tough,' defends controversial school policy

Liz Mathis, a Democrat who is seeking to represent the Iowa's 2nd Congressional District, said this week that defining a woman is a "tough question" and suggested that the only way to change controversial policies in a particular school district in the state is to vote for different board members.

The remarks from Mathis came Monday during a meet and greet at the Waterloo, Iowa, Rotary Club, where she took questions from those in attendance on a number of subjects, including gender and education.

Asked about the instance when then Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson was asked to define a woman and could not because she is "not a biologist," Mathis said: "The Supreme Court confirmation process is very thorough, so they had to ask questions like that to a Supreme Court justice."

"I'm glad that she answered that question," she added. "That's a tough question."

Mathis also provided her thoughts on the current education system in America and insisted that policies at the Linn-Mar Community School District in Iowa — which allow the school to assist students as young as seventh grade with a "gender support plan" and aid with the student’s gender transition — can only be changed by electing new board members to represent parental voices in the district.

"Parents can always go to teachers and ask questions. They can always go to the principal and the superintendent of schools to ask questions," Mathis claimed, proceeding to defend the current policies in the district. "We know the policy of Linn-Mar schools… that the school board passed is aligned with the code in Iowa law. It's about reducing discrimination, or eliminating discrimination and harassment for children."

Posted by Kyle Morris

Dem candidate in key House race uses doctored photo to make female opponent look aggressive in ad

A recent ad focusing on school safety and gun control from Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez's re-election campaign features an edited, unappealing photo of Rep. Mayra Flores, his Republican challenger in the race to represent Texas' 34th Congressional District.

The ad, which was amplified on social media from Gonzalez's campaign, targeted Flores for her vote against the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act in the wake of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, and featured an edited photo of Flores holding a firearm.

The photo used in the ad, which was originally shared to Flores' Instagram account in January, appears to have been edited to give Flores' eyebrows a more aggressive look.

"Republican Mayra Flores' first vote in Congress was against the Bipartisan Safe Communities Act," the ad's narrator stated as the edited image of Flores flashed on the screen. "She voted against keeping our children safe in schools, against keeping weapons out of the hands of Mexican cartels, and against keeping guns out of the hands of criminals with a prior history of domestic violence."

Gonzalez, who currently represents the state's 15th Congressional District in the House, promoted the doctored photo through his campaign's Twitter account, writing: "After the tragic shooting at Uvalde, Mayra Flores' first vote in Congress was AGAINST a bipartisan school safety bill. We need a representative that works to protect our children and families; not someone who puts them in danger."

Responding to the Gonzalez campaign's use of the edited image for the ad, Flores told Fox News Digital in a statement that she believes voters in her district will not fall for the "scare tactics."

"First, Vicente Gonzalez hired a racist blogger to attack me for my heritage. Now Vicente is doing the dirty work himself with this shameless and pathetic photoshopping," Flores said. "The people in the [Rio Grande Valley] are smarter than this and will see right through Vicente’s scare tactics and constant lies."

Read more from Fox News' Kyle Morris here.

Posted by Kyle Morris

Abrams says election comments taken 'out of context,' suggests potential limitations on abortion

ATLANTA – Democratic Georgia gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams is pushing back on the recent criticism she's faced on the campaign trail regarding her stance on abortion, as well as previous comments surrounding the results of the 2018 gubernatorial election that she lost to incumbent Republican Gov. Brian Kemp.

In an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital following a rally with supporters in Gwinnett County, Georgia, Abrams objected to what she referred to as "artificial time constraints" when it came to putting limits on abortion, but suggested she might support some limitations on later-term abortion when she reiterated previous statements that she supports women having the ability to make a decision regarding pregnancy alongside their doctor "up until the point of viability."

She also argued that her comments about the 2018 results, specifically that it was "rigged" and "stolen," were taken "out of context."

"I accepted the results in 2018. And the premise of the question always presumes that I did not accept the results," Abrams said when asked about the criticism she'd received over her election comments. "Despite the cherry-picking and the decontextualization of what I've said, at the top of my speech I said that I acknowledged that Governor Kemp was the governor of Georgia."

Read the full story here.

Posted by Brandon Gillespie

House GOP crush Democrats in donations ahead of midterms, raking in $73M

House Republicans' super PAC raked in $73 million in donations in the third quarter of 2022, beating out donations to Democrats by $18 million.

The Congressional Leadership Fund is the primary political PAC for House Republicans and a key war chest for Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. McCarthy now has $114 million on hand for the final weeks before the midterm elections, Punchbowl News reported.

Democrats' House Majority PAC gathered just $55 million in the third quarter. Democrats have struggled to keep up with Republican donations throughout the year, with the PAC bringing in $86 million less than the CLF throughout the whole election cycle.

The cash will allow Republicans to push candidates across the finish line in November with extensive ad buys and other election tools.

Read more from Fox News' Anders Hagstrom here.

Posted by Sophia Slacik

Herschel Walker pushes back, says Democrats have 'woken the grizzly bear'

With four weeks to go until Election Day and Herschel Walker facing the biggest controversy of his Senate campaign, the Republican nominee in Georgia argued that Democrats have "woken a grizzly bear."

Walker, in an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital aboard his campaign bus ahead of a campaign event in this northwestern Georgia city, pointed to his appearance with Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee and Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, and emphasized that "this party is behind me."

Walker, who’s challenging first-term Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia in a race that’s among a handful across the country that will likely determine if the GOP wins back the Senate majority in November’s midterm elections, for over a week has been continuing to deny a bombshell report that he paid for a girlfriend’s abortion 13 years ago, and urged her to get a second.

And he once again charged that with so much on the line in the Senate race, Democrats are "coming up with anything they can come up with."

"They don’t realize that they’ve woken a grizzly bear," he insisted. "Now they got a fight on their hand. Before I was just going to beat them by a little bit. Now I’m going to beat them by a lot."

Read more from Fox News' Paul Steinhauser here.

Posted by Paul Steinhauser