Midterm primaries 2026 live: results and reaction as six states including California and Iowa cast ballots 32%

By Cecilia Nowell0%

6/3/2026, 1:01:44 AM

BS Summary: This article contains 33 faulty reasoning types, including Framing Effect, Biased Writer Voice, and Appeal to Emotion, with Negativity Bias as the most egregious example at 17.8% saturation with 295 hits. Analysis detected 2,539 faulty-reasoning hits from 1,653 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 41.1% and a BS Rank of 32% (14,917 of 21,887 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 68.20% of the article peer group.

Polls have closed in Iowa, New Mexico and all of South Dakota. 
In Iowa, Democrats are considering a comeback, with Trump’s approval ratings deep underwater, gas prices high and historical political trends favoring the party out of power. 
That effort for a “once-in-a-generation” breakthrough in the GOP-dominated state is being led by pro-hunting Democrat Rob Sand, who is running for governor. 
Democrats also believe they have a shot at winning three of the state’s US House seats and a competitive chance at securing a US Senate seat, where the GOP frontrunner recently called Trump’s war on Iran a “political liability”. 
Meanwhile, in New Mexico, voters will nominate candidates for congressional seats and a US senate seat, but the governor’s race is the main event. 
Deb Haaland, who was Joe Biden’s interior secretary, is running for the Democratic nomination. 
If she wins in November, Haaland would become the first Native American female governor in the country. 
And, in South Dakota, we’re watching the race for state governor, Sioux Falls mayor, a US Senate and House seat, a Republican primary for local lawmakers. 
The incumbent GOP governor Larry Rhoden faces three primary challengers in his first run for a full term. 
He stepped up into the role from the lieutenant governorship when the former governor, the since-ousted Kristi Noem, left to lead the Department of Homeland Security. 
Rebecca Bennett has won the Democratic nomination in her bid to unseat Republican congressman Tom Kean Jr. 
A former Navy helicopter pilot, Bennett will face off in the general election against Kean, who’s been absent from Congress, citing a health issue, since March. 
The Associated Press has began calling the first races of the evening, with Analilia Mejia winning the Democratic nomination for New Jersey’s 11th congressional district, Rob Menendez winning the party’s nomination in the state’s 8th congressional district and LaMonica McIve winning the Democratic nomination in the state’s 10th congressional district. 
Polls have closed in New Jersey and parts of South Dakota. 
South Dakota spans two time zones and results are not released until the final polls have closed at 9 pm ET. 
In New Jersey, we’re paying close attention to the House race where now-infamous Republican Tom Kean Jr, who has drawn public scrutiny and concern after missing more than 100 House votes due to an undisclosed illness, is vying for his party’s nomination while veteran army trauma surgeon and political newcomer Adam Hamawy competes for the Democratic nomination. 
The Guardian follows the Associated Press in calling an election. 
We’ll bring you the results from all of tonight’s primary elections as the AP calls the races. 
In my home state of New Mexico, voters from both parties will nominate candidates to become the next governor, as Michelle Lujan Grisham is set to step down from the seat she’s filled since 2019. 
Increasingly recognized as a solidly blue state, the Democratic nominee is likely to win the general election. 
Democratic voters will choose to nominate either Deb Haaland, who served as Joe Biden’s interior secretary, or Sam Bregman, the Bernalillo County district attorney. 
Haaland has polled safely in the lead in the run-up to the election. 
Her win would be a victory for Native American advocates across the country and a rebuke of the Trump administration. 
A single, working mother, Haaland came on the national scene in 2018 when she was elected to Congress alongside a wave of freshman, female lawmakers known as “The Squad” who’d run in reaction to Donald Trump’s election in 2016. 
Haaland resigned from the House of Representatives in 2021 when Joe Biden chose her to lead his interior department, making her the first Native American to serve in the roll, which includes overseeing much of the nation’s public lands and the Bureau of Indian Affairs. 
During her time in congress, Haaland  who is from Laguna Pueblo - introduced legislation to stem the crisis of Missing and Murdered Indigenous People, and as interior secretary she oversaw the formation of a new Missing & Murdered Unit (MMU) within the Bureau of Indian Affairs. 
Last year, New Mexico became the fourth state in the country to create its own law enforcement alert system for missing Indigenous people. 
Haaland also launched a historic effort to investigate the legacy of Native American boarding schools. 
If elected in the November general election, Haaland would become the first Native American woman governor elected in the country. 
Haaland has campaigned as a fierce critic of Donald Trump, saying in campaign ads that, “Governors are the first line of defense against the horrific policies of the Trump administration.” 
Since Trump returned to office, New Mexico has been one of few Democratic strongholds in the south-west  with the state working to shore up protections for abortion patients, transgender people and SNAP and Medicaid recipients. 
<strong>Californians casting their vote for governor today may see a surprisingly familiar name on their ballot: Barack Obama.</strong> 
The former president is not running for California governor, despite what some Democrats might wish. 
Barack D Obama Shaw, of Alameda, California, however, is running  one of 61 candidates vying to lead the nation’s most populous state. 
Born Cecil Shaw III, the musician-turned-gubernatorial hopeful said he changed his name in 2013 in honor of the 44th president. 
In an interview on Tuesday, the 56-year-old candidate likened his name change to a newly elected Pope selecting a papal name. 
“Instead of people asking, ‘what are you about?’ 
 the name told them,” he said. 
“It gave them an idea of the kind of leader people could expect, and that’s in essence what I was creating.” 
“As far as I’m concerned he brought hope into the world,” Shaw said of his presidential namesake. 
“That’s the space I want to stand in - not necessarily the presidency, but I want people to start believing in our country again. 
That’s what I’m about.” 
Obama’s historic election in 2008 was “one of the proudest moments of my life,’ Shaw recalled, and inspired him as a US Army reservist. 
“When I was in the military, he was my commander in chief, and he was the reason why a musician like myself would get into the military,” the candidate said. 
The D in his middle name stands for Denzel, a reference to the actor Denzel Washington, whom his friends used to compare him to. 
“I never used [the name] to make money for profit or gain in any kind of way,” he said. 
“But when it came to politics, I was like Frodo Baggins, I gotta take this ring  this name  back to where it belongs  and it belongs in the political arena.” 
While the name is familiar, the candidate is less so. 
No poll of the race has ever included Shaw, or the dozens of other candidates whose names appear alongside his on the ballot. 
Even more prominent political figures - like San Jose mayor Matt Mahan and former congresswoman Katie Porter  are considered long shots in the race to succeed Gavin Newsom. 
But Shaw is undaunted. 
He ran for mayor of Alameda in 2022 to make a difference in his city. 
No matter what happens on Tuesday, he insists this won’t be the last time Californians see his name. 
“My family is known for music,” Shaw said, “but I also wanted to be known for hope.” 
As Americans head to the polls in six states today, Donald Trump is congratulating his preferred candidates across the country  and abroad. 
Yesterday, voters in Colombia cast their ballots for president, in a race to determine who will replace outgoing president Gustavo Petro. 
Right-wing candidate Abelardo de la Espriella and leftist senator Iván Cepeda will advance to a runoff election later this month. 
In a post on Truth Social today, Trump congratulated de la Espriella: “As President, Abelardo would be tremendously successful in leading Colombia to Grow the Economy, Create Jobs, Promote Trade, Stop Illegal Immigration, Crack Down on Crime and Drugs, and Restore LAW AND ORDER! 
Abelardo will face off against a Radical Left Marxist in the Runoff on June 21st  The results of this Election are very important to the future of Colombia and its relationship to the United States.” 
Our South America correspondent Tiago Rogero has more on Colombia’s election: 
California’s primary elections, including its fiercely fought gubernatorial contest, will be at the mercy of a notoriously slow vote-counting system after the polls close on Tuesday, and it could be days or even weeks before the outcomes of the tightest races become clear. 
Voting experts expect the state’s 58 county elections offices to be deluged with last-minute absentee ballots, as they have been in the last few election cycles, and spend weeks undertaking a painstaking ballot-by-ballot verification process. 
That presents a procedural problem whenever races are close, as they tend to be in the state’s most competitive congressional districts, and the whole country is left waiting  as it was in 2020, 2022 and 2024  to find out which party controls the House of Representatives. 
Knocking on strangers’ doors on a warm May afternoon in Trenton, New Jersey, Adam Hamawy did not seem fazed when more than a few went unanswered. 
It’s his first time running for office, but this is an area where he has experience. 
After returning from a medical mission in Gaza in 2024, Hamawy went to Washington to describe the crisis  which he viewed as a US-funded genocide  to lawmakers, only to encounter “too many doors that were closed, that didn’t even want to listen”. 
“I could only define it as a genocide, because I saw the bodies of the people that came in,” the veteran army trauma surgeon and political newcomer reflected, while walking between houses. 
“And it wasn’t an accident. 
You can’t have an accident, every single day for three years. 
Article reasoning-pattern comparisonThis article: 3.3%Cecilia Nowell: 1.4%the Guardian: 3.7%Confirmation Bias3.3%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.3%the Guardian: 0.6%Anchoring Bias0.0%This article: 8.5%Cecilia Nowell: 1.2%the Guardian: 3.1%Availability Heuristic8.5%This article: 8.6%Cecilia Nowell: 1.1%the Guardian: 1.2%Representativeness Heuristic8.6%This article: 2.9%Cecilia Nowell: 0.8%the Guardian: 1.0%Hindsight Bias2.9%This article: 2.2%Cecilia Nowell: 1.2%the Guardian: 1.6%Overconfidence Bias2.2%This article: 15.8%Cecilia Nowell: 9.6%the Guardian: 6.1%Framing Effect15.8%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.2%the Guardian: 0.6%Loss Aversion0.0%This article: 1.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.1%the Guardian: 0.6%Status Quo Bias1.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.2%Sunk Cost Effect0.0%This article: 4.8%Cecilia Nowell: 1.2%the Guardian: 2.5%Optimism Bias4.8%This article: 1.6%Cecilia Nowell: 0.4%the Guardian: 2.1%Pessimism Bias1.6%This article: 17.8%Cecilia Nowell: 4.9%the Guardian: 10.4%Negativity Bias17.8%This article: 2.1%Cecilia Nowell: 0.4%the Guardian: 1.6%Self-Serving Bias2.1%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 1.4%Fundamental Attribution Error0.0%This article: 1.6%Cecilia Nowell: 0.2%the Guardian: 0.3%Actor-Observer Bias1.6%This article: 5.6%Cecilia Nowell: 0.8%the Guardian: 1.3%In-Group Bias5.6%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 1.0%the Guardian: 0.7%Out-Group Homogeneity Bias0.0%This article: 7.0%Cecilia Nowell: 1.9%the Guardian: 3.2%Halo Effect7.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.3%Horn Effect0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.0%Dunning-Kruger Effect0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.4%the Guardian: 1.2%Recency Bias0.0%This article: 2.9%Cecilia Nowell: 0.4%the Guardian: 0.4%Primacy Effect2.9%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.1%Blind-Spot Bias0.0%This article: 3.4%Cecilia Nowell: 1.1%the Guardian: 2.0%Ad Hominem3.4%This article: 2.2%Cecilia Nowell: 0.3%the Guardian: 0.6%Straw Man2.2%This article: 7.0%Cecilia Nowell: 1.9%the Guardian: 3.8%Appeal to Authority7.0%This article: 1.8%Cecilia Nowell: 0.2%the Guardian: 1.7%False Dilemma1.8%This article: 0.7%Cecilia Nowell: 0.3%the Guardian: 1.1%Slippery Slope0.7%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.1%Circular Reasoning0.0%This article: 1.7%Cecilia Nowell: 3.4%the Guardian: 6.3%Hasty Generalization1.7%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.2%Red Herring0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.7%Bandwagon0.0%This article: 10.6%Cecilia Nowell: 5.8%the Guardian: 5.6%Appeal to Emotion10.6%This article: 0.2%Cecilia Nowell: 0.3%the Guardian: 0.9%Begging the Question0.2%This article: 5.7%Cecilia Nowell: 1.1%the Guardian: 2.9%Post Hoc (False Cause)5.7%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.1%Tu Quoque0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.2%the Guardian: 0.4%Burden of Proof0.0%This article: 2.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.3%the Guardian: 0.2%Appeal to Nature2.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.4%Composition/Division0.0%This article: 1.9%Cecilia Nowell: 1.1%the Guardian: 3.1%Anecdotal1.9%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.1%No True Scotsman0.0%This article: 1.9%Cecilia Nowell: 0.2%the Guardian: 1.6%Ambiguity (Equivocation)1.9%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.0%Gambler’s Fallacy0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.1%Middle Ground0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.3%the Guardian: 0.1%Personal Incredulity0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.1%Special Pleading0.0%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 0.3%Genetic Fallacy0.0%This article: 0.5%Cecilia Nowell: 0.1%the Guardian: 1.6%Unattributed Quote0.5%This article: 4.8%Cecilia Nowell: 1.4%the Guardian: 1.1%Quote-first Misdirection4.8%This article: 13.9%Cecilia Nowell: 5.2%the Guardian: 10.4%Biased Writer Voice13.9%This article: 2.7%Cecilia Nowell: 0.3%the Guardian: 1.8%Indoctrination2.7%This article: 3.4%Cecilia Nowell: 4.0%the Guardian: 3.1%Politically Left Leaning Bias3.4%This article: 3.6%Cecilia Nowell: 0.7%the Guardian: 0.3%Politically Right Leaning Bias3.6%This article: 0.0%Cecilia Nowell: 0.0%the Guardian: 1.0%Attempt to Sell a Product or S…0.0%

1653 words analyzed.

Speakers

6speakers26%attributed speech1,231writer words
Voice mapSelect a segment to jump to its words
Writer's voice • 16 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 12 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 26 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 23 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 39 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 24 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 14 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 17 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 26 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 18 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 26 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 17 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 26 words • 0.0% coverageAssociated Press • 50 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 11 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 21 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 57 words • 100.0% coverageThe Guardian • 10 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 17 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 35 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 17 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 24 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 13 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 20 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 39 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 45 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 47 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 23 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 15 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 20 words • 0.0% coverageDeb Haaland • 30 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 36 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 18 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 15 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 23 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 20 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 21 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 8 words • 100.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 7 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 21 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 17 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 24 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 4 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 24 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 30 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 24 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 19 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 33 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 10 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 23 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 29 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 4 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 15 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 18 words • 0.0% coverageBarack D Obama Shaw • 17 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 23 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 21 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 20 words • 0.0% coverageDonald Trump • 44 words • 100.0% coverageDonald Trump • 36 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 11 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 43 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 35 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 48 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 26 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 16 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 44 words • 0.0% coverageAdam Hamawy • 32 words • 100.0% coverageAdam Hamawy • 5 words • 0.0% coverageAdam Hamawy • 11 words • 0.0% coverage
Selected voice

Deb Haaland

100%flagged-word coverage
30 attributed words7.1% of attributed speech70% writer coverage
0%50.0%100.0%Quote-first Misdirection+98.5 ptsWriter: 1.5%Deb Haaland: 100.0%100.0%Biased Writer Voice-18.6 ptsWriter: 18.6%Deb Haaland: 0.0%0.0%Politically Left Leaning B-4.5 ptsWriter: 4.5%Deb Haaland: 0.0%0.0%Politically Right Leaning -1.9 ptsWriter: 1.9%Deb Haaland: 0.0%0.0%

Attribution is sentence-level. Pattern percentages are calculated only from words assigned to that voice.

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Analysis

Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.