Baptists

Early in-person voting opened in Grand Rapids, Michigan, giving residents 13 days to cast ballots before the Nov. 3 general election—beyond the nine days required by state law. Voters can cast ballots at any of four sites—St. Peter and Paul School, GRPS University, Ottawa Hills High School, and New Hope Baptist Church—rather than being limited to a home precinct, as on Election Day. The city is also offering live wait-time tracking online. City Clerk Joel Hondorp said absentee voting remains the most popular early option, and voters can bring absentee ballots to any early voting site or their precinct to run through the tabulator in person. The early voting window closes the Sunday before Election Day.

Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock drew on his history as senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church during an Oct. 13 stop in Columbia, South Carolina, telling Democrats and clergy they could not afford to lose the "fight between hope and despair." He criticized Republican cuts to food stamps and Medicaid eligibility, invoked civil rights history, and urged support for Senate candidate Annie Andrews.

Warnock plans to return to South Carolina this weekend to campaign with Andrews and gubernatorial nominee Jermaine Johnson ahead of the Nov. 3 midterms and early voting. His visits to South Carolina, along with earlier stops in New Hampshire and Nevada — the early presidential primary states — have renewed speculation about a 2028 presidential bid. Warnock downplayed the talk, saying he is focused on 2026 and retaking a Senate majority. Other Democrats eyeing national profiles, including Rahm Emanuel, Andy Beshear, Mark Kelly, Ro Khanna, Gavin Newsom and Pete Buttigieg, have also recently visited the early-voting state.

Early voting opens Oct. 15 and runs through Oct. 31 in North Carolina, a key battleground in the 2025 midterms. The marquee race is the open U.S. Senate seat left by retiring Republican Thom Tillis, pitting Democrat and former Gov. Roy Cooper against Republican Michael Whatley, the Trump-backed former RNC chair, with Green and Libertarian candidates also on the ballot. Democrats are targeting the seat as part of a broader push to flip the four seats needed for Senate control.

The ballot also includes competitive U.S. House races, including Charlotte-area districts held by Reps. Alma Adams, Tim Moore and Mark Harris, plus down-ballot contests for the N.C. Supreme Court, Court of Appeals, state legislature, and Mecklenburg County offices. Voters will also weigh in on constitutional amendments covering voter ID, income tax caps and property tax limits, along with Charlotte bond measures for transportation, housing and neighborhood improvements. Election Day is Nov. 3, with North Carolina's results seen as a bellwether for national party control in Washington.

A Florida appeals court sharply criticized a Tallahassee grand jury's report on the Hope Florida charity, ordering it expunged and finding that jurors improperly accused individuals of criminal conduct while violating confidentiality rules. Gov. Ron DeSantis responded by calling for prosecutions of whoever leaked the report, while Democrats continue pressing for investigations into his administration. The ruling has elevated Hope Florida as a campaign issue ahead of next month's election, with gubernatorial candidates Byron Donalds (R) and David Jolly (D) both campaigning amid Hurricane Isaias recovery efforts that have left thousands without power.

Separately, Florida's attorney general race is drawing national attention after Democratic candidate José Javier Rodríguez received a $5 million injection from a national party group, the largest such donation to a statewide Florida candidate this cycle, aimed at unseating appointed Republican AG James Uthmeier. Uthmeier is also pushing for added restrictions on Meta after rejecting a multi-state settlement. Meanwhile, documents tied to a 2021 "ghost candidate" scandal are resurfacing in Florida Power & Light's merger talks with Dominion Energy.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine and first lady Fran DeWine attended the funeral of Pierre Damas Bel, a young Haitian man in Springfield who died by suicide in August after his family said he was bullied for wearing an immigration ankle monitor. DeWine, who lost his own daughter in a 1993 car crash, met privately with Bel's family and praised Bel as hard-working and emblematic of the American dream, saying "we needed him."

Bel arrived in Ohio in 2023 under Temporary Protected Status, graduated from Springfield High School, and was preparing to attend Wright State University when fitted with the monitor, which he said drew bullying and accusations of criminality. Pastor Carl Ruby compared his death to Emmett Till's, and Haitian Bridge Alliance co-founder Guerline Jozef said Bel "was killed by the system."

The funeral coincided with a Trump campaign rally nearby. The Trump administration ended TPS for Haitians this summer following a Supreme Court ruling, affecting roughly 340,000 Haitians nationally, including about 15,000 in Springfield.
Ohio Gov. DeWine mourned Haitian immigrant Pierre Damas Bel, whose death spotlighted bullying tied to ankle monitors and TPS policy.

The Virginia Department of Historic Resources has approved 11 new historical highway markers, with five located in Central Virginia, following a Sept. 17 vote by the Virginia Board of Historic Resources in Orange County. The markers span sites in Hanover, James City, Fauquier, Lancaster, Louisa and Northumberland counties, as well as Alexandria, Leesburg, Lynchburg, Richmond and Virginia Beach.

Central Virginia's markers honor Dr. Rebecca Lee Crumpler, the first Black female physician in the U.S., in Richmond; the 1740 Hanover Courthouse, tied to Patrick Henry and a landmark Supreme Court press-access ruling; Old St. John's Baptist Church and Cemetery in Lancaster County, the county's first Black church; Bright Hope Baptist Church in Louisa County, founded by formerly enslaved landowner and legislator Fountain M. Perkins; and a Northumberland County marker commemorating the 1917 lynching of William Oscar Page, part of a statewide initiative marking lynching sites.

New markers typically take over eight months to install. Virginia's highway marker program, started in 1927, is the oldest of its kind in the nation.

President Trump is set to hold a campaign rally in Vandalia, Ohio, on Oct. 3, the same day a funeral will be held about 25 miles away in Springfield for Pierre Damas Bel, a 20-year-old Haitian Wright State University student whose death has become a flashpoint in the debate over immigration enforcement.

Bel was killed Aug. 31 after being struck by a semitrailer on Interstate 70; his family says he took his own life, citing shame after being made to wear an ICE-mandated ankle monitor following a July 29 check-in. His death has galvanized Springfield's large Haitian community, with friends and advocates calling on authorities to ease immigration enforcement. ICE has maintained that immigrants without legal status, including Haitians who lost temporary protected status in July, should self-deport. The funeral, expected to draw up to 1,000 attendees, comes as Trump campaigns for Ohio Republicans in Senate and gubernatorial races, underscoring the political tension surrounding immigration policy in the state.