Breaking Up with the Democratic Party  —  I changed my voting registration from ‘Democrat’ to ‘Independent’ today.  It was a strangely emotional experience.  —  I registered as a Democrat back in 1995 when I was 20 years old to vote for Bill Clinton's re-election.  It was a no-brainer for me.

McConnell reactivates his connection to Biden — with a sharp debt warning  —  Joe Biden and Mitch McConnell's two-man emergency hotline had gone silent — until now.  —  The Senate minority leader on Monday morning prodded the president to talk his party into raising the debt ceiling without the GOP …

USPS Begins Postal Banking Pilot Program  —  The test allows customers to cash business or payroll checks at the post office and place them onto a gift card.  —  The United States Postal Service (USPS) has taken the most dramatic step in a half-century to re-establish a postal banking system in America.

Trump, talked out of announcing a 2024 bid for now, settles on a wink-and-nod unofficial candidacy  —  As turmoil in Afghanistan reached a crescendo in August, Donald Trump began talking again with advisers about whether he should announce his 2024 campaign for president right away.

Scoop: House Republican says he's facing federal prosecution  —  The top Republican on the House Appropriations Committee's agriculture panel says he's facing federal prosecution, Axios has learned.  —  Driving the news: In a new fundraising page for his legal expense fund, Rep. Jeff Fortenberry …

Florida Gov. DeSantis' wife diagnosed with breast cancer  —  Fox News Flash top headlines for October 4  —  EXCLUSIVE - Casey DeSantis, the wife of Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, has been diagnosed with breast cancer.  —  “I am saddened to report that Florida's esteemed First Lady …

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema makes liberal heads explode.  And that's just fine with the Arizona Democrat  —  When Kyrsten Sinema ran for Senate in 2018, she could not have been more clear.  The Democrat did not call herself a Democrat but rather an “Arizona independent.”

The Facebook Whistleblower, Frances Haugen, Says She Wants to Fix the Company, Not Harm It  —  The former Facebook employee says her goal is to help prompt change at the social-media giant  —  The former Facebook Inc. employee who gathered documents that formed the foundation …

Jan. 6 rioters exploited little-known Capitol weak spots: A handful of unreinforced windows  —  Four major access points that Jan. 6 rioters used to break into and overtake the U.S. Capitol had something unusual in common: They were among a dozen or so ground-floor windows and glass-paned doors that had not been recently reinforced.

Supreme Court declines to hear dispute over DC representation in Congress  —  The Supreme Court on Monday turned away an appeal by Washington, D.C., residents over their lack of voting rights in Congress.  —  The justices' move affirmed a lower court ruling that held that D.C. residents …

U.S. Signals No Thaw in Trade Relations With China  —  The Biden administration said it would not immediately remove the Trump administration's tariffs and would require that Beijing uphold its trade commitments.  —  WASHINGTON — The Biden administration offered its strongest signal yet …

Ex-U.S. Rep. Todd Akin, sunk by ‘legitimate rape’ remark, dies  —  Former U.S. Rep. Todd Akin, a conservative Missouri Republican whose comment that women's bodies have a way of avoiding pregnancies in cases of “legitimate rape” sunk his bid for the U.S. Senate and became a cautionary tale for other GOP candidates, died late Sunday.

Exclusive: Stephanie Grisham says ‘I regret’ enabling culture of dishonesty in Trump White House  —  The former Trump aide spoke exclusively to ABC News' George Stephanopoulos.  —  In an exclusive interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos, Stephanie Grisham, one of former President Donald Trump's …

New: Whitmer vetoes GOP bills part of ‘calculated misinformation’ about the 2020 election  —  Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Sunday vetoed three Republican election bills introduced after former President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election as part of a nationwide right-wing effort to restrict voting and change election rules.

Covid, in Retreat  —  New cases in the U.S. have fallen by more than a third in the past month.  —  Covid-19 is once again in retreat.  —  The reasons remain somewhat unclear, and there is no guarantee that the decline in caseloads will continue.  But the turnaround is now large enough …

One-time presidential candidate Evan McMullin will mount an independent bid to oust Republican Sen. Mike Lee, Robert Gehrke reports  —  A McMullin candidacy challenges the rigid two-party standard, which leaves too many Utahns unrepresented.  —  Independent presidential candidate Evan McMullin speaks …

White Riot In 1992, thousands of furious, drunken cops descended on City Hall — and changed New York history.  —  This story was produced in partnership with The Garrison Project, an independent, nonpartisan organization that will address the crisis of mass incarceration and policing.

Facebook Is Weaker Than We Knew  —  A trove of leaked documents, published by The Wall Street Journal, hints at a company whose best days are behind it.  —  One possible way to read “The Facebook Files,” The Wall Street Journal's excellent series of reports based on leaked internal Facebook research …

Trump's Sprawling Use of NDAs Now Threatens to Humiliate Him  —  For decades, Donald Trump used the same legal language in Non-Disclosure Agreements to prevent associates from saying anything bad about him.  That's bad news for Trump.  —  For decades, Donald Trump has treasured Non-Disclosure …

Foreign money secretly floods U.S. tax havens.  Some of it is tainted.  —  (Washington Post illustration; Photograph by Salwan Georges/The Washington Post)  —  SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — Across from a Holiday Inn, in a red-brick building with a welcome sign that reads “The Heart of America,” …

EXCLUSIVE: Maj Gen Ordered 50+ Evacuees off One of Last Flights out of Kabul to Make Room for Taliban Souvenir  —  In what's been described as a photo that “may become an enduring memory of the end of the U.S. war in Afghanistan,” Maj. Gen. Christopher Donahue walks toward a C-17 transport plane …