A look ahead at the key events leading the news agenda next week, from the team at Foresight News. Delivered to your inbox on Fridays.
Leading the week
With the announcement of Tim Walz as Kamala Harris’s running mate dominating much of the coverage of the presidential campaign this week, Donald Trump had already announced plans to sit down for an interview with Elon Musk on Monday (August 12) before confirming yesterday that he will in fact take part in ABC’s September 10 debate with Harris as he seeks to slow her recent momentum. Musk has been embroiled in a high-profile row with new British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in recent days amid far-right riots in the UK, and his piping hot take on the inevitability of civil war may come up during Monday’s discussion after President Joe Biden questioned whether Trump would peacefully accept a defeat in November. Biden’s comments came in a preview for a CBS interview with the outgoing president; the full version airs Sunday morning.
Next Friday (August 16) was supposed to see the first hearing in Trump’s federal election case since July’s controversial ruling by the Supreme Court over his claim to presidential immunity, but that’s now likely to be postponed until next month. Special Counsel Jack Smith has asked for today’s deadline to submit a proposed timeline for proceedings to be extended until August 30 as his team continues to work through the implications of the SCOTUS ruling.
Down ballot, there are some interesting races shaping up as primaries take place in Wisconsin and Minnesota on Tuesday (August 13).
In Wisconsin, where Democrat Tammy Baldwin is facing reelection this year, multimillionaire Madison businessman Eric Hovde is all but certain to win the GOP nomination to challenge Baldwin for her Senate seat in November, with the pair already having agreed to a debate on October 18. In the 3rd Congressional District, viewed as the Democrats’ best chance of flipping a seat, state Rep. Katrina Shankland and nonprofit leader Rebecca Cooke are the leading candidates to take on freshman GOP Rep. Derrick Van Orden in the swing seat. There’s interest too in the Republican primary in the open race for the solidly-red 8th Congressional District following Mike Gallagher’s resignation earlier this year. Three Republicans are vying for the party’s nomination, including Trump-endorsed political newcomer and businessman Tony Wied.
In Minnesota, the Republican race to challenge Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar features former NBA player and Steve Bannon ally Royce White, who has been endorsed by the state Republican Party despite controversial views on a host of topics. He faces Navy veteran and businessman Joe Fraser in Tuesday’s primary.
Following primary defeats for Squad members Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush, there will be interest in the outcome of the primary in the solidly-Democratic 5th Congressional District, where Ilhan Omar is facing her 2022 opponent Don Samuels, though an upset appears unlikely. In the 2nd Congressional District, considered the GOP’s best shot at flipping a seat in the Gopher State come November, former Marine and federal prosecutor Joe Teirab is set to win his party’s nomination after his opponent Tayler Rahm dropped out of the race to take a role with the Trump campaign.
Looking abroad
The Russian defense ministry-hosted Moscow Conference on International Security (MCIS) takes place on Tuesday (August 13), with new Defense Minister Andrei Belousov expected to address the annual event.
This year’s gathering is once again expected to be dominated by the conflict in Ukraine and follows this week’s incursion by Ukrainian forces into Kursk, which prompted President Vladimir Putin to call an emergency meeting of his security council to discuss the ‘major provocation’. Putin delivered a virtual address to participants at last year’s conference and may well speak again this year, though he is also slated to host talks on Tuesday with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Abbas is visiting Russia next week before heading to Turkey, where he meets with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday (August 14) before addressing the country’s national assembly on Thursday (August 15). Erdogan expressed outrage following the assassination last week of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, which has prompted a flurry of diplomatic efforts to avert a wider regional conflict. Thursday is also slated to see the resumption of negotiations on a hostage release/ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas – the first since Yahya Sinwar was confirmed as Haniyeh’s successor – after the US, Egypt and Qatar issued an unusual joint statement calling for talks to continue.
Despite its enormous toll on Sudan’s population, the civil war raging in the country has received scant coverage amid the focus on the situation in the Middle East and the war in Ukraine. That may change on Wednesday (August 14), when talks are planned in Switzerland aimed at negotiating a ceasefire agreement between the warring parties. Abdel-Fattah al-Burhan, who commands the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), threatened to pull out of the negotiations following the recent attempt on his life, with many pointing the finger at the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Given the mistrust between the parties, just getting them to the table for the first meaningful talks since the Saudi-hosted effort last year might be considered a success of sorts, though that will be of little comfort to those who have been suffering in Sudan over the past 16 months.