The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Foundation for Defense of Democracies filed an amicus brief on Friday urging a federal judge to allow the Department of Education to proceed with the disclosure of data on foreign funding to college campuses, which is currently being blocked by a temporary restraining order.

The Association of American Universities, which filed the lawsuit to block the report, has argued that the release of such information would compromise donors’ expectation of anonymity and potentially compromise their safety in their home countries, a concern that District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan cited in granting the temporary restraining order.

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro launched a federal political action committee, New Path PAC, a major potential signal that he’s considering plans for a 2028 presidential campaign.

Shapiro has downplayed any presidential ambitions, but declined to commit, during a debate in early October, to serving out a full second term through 2030.

Brett McGurk, the former Biden administration Middle East coordinator, has strongly disputed claims that Israel caused a delay in securing a hostage deal due to its insistence on maintaining a military presence in key locations in the Gaza Strip. Instead, McGurk argues, it was Hamas that held up the agreement with its maximalist positions, until its position ultimately weakened. 

Speaking Thursday at an Atlantic Council event alongside Washington Post columnist David Ignatius about his new book, Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7th Hostages, McGurk took aim at recent narratives from some of his former Biden administration colleagues surrounding the agreement.

A day after New York City Comptroller Mark Levine sparked criticism by backing off a campaign promise to reinvest the city’s pension dollars in State of Israel bonds, mainstream Jewish groups rallied around the historically pro-Israel Democrat — though sources said they expect a change in his investment policy in the months ahead.

Levine, who ran on a vow to reverse his predecessor Brad Lander’s termination of the city’s half-century of investment in Israeli bonds, posted an extended statement to X on Thursday affirming his personal support for Israel and the city’s long-standing economic ties to the Jewish state. He noted that some $285 million in city pension funds, most of them outside of his direct management, remain invested in Israeli equities and firms.

Maine Democratic Senate candidate Troy Jackson said at a Thursday debate with Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) that Congress should shut down funding for the Iran war in order to force the war to an end.

Several Senate Democrats have endorsed a similar approach, while others have floated other potential ways that a Democratic congressional majority could leverage its spending power and authority to end the war.

Brett McGurk, a veteran national security official who has served in Republican and Democratic administrations, pushed back on Thursday against arguments from his Biden administration colleagues that former President Joe Biden should have applied more pressure on Israel to end the war in Gaza and secure the release of the hostages sooner. 

Debate in Democratic foreign policy circles over the Biden administration’s handling of the war in Gaza has intensified following the release earlier this month of McGurk’s new book, Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7th Hostages, in which he argues that Biden’s efforts to pressure Israel during hostage negotiations emboldened Hamas and complicated efforts to reach a ceasefire agreement.

Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and Ed Markey (D-MA) introduced a joint resolution of disapproval on Thursday that aims to block the U.S.-Saudi nuclear deal, allowing the Democrats to force a vote on the deal when the chamber returns from recess.

It appears unlikely at this point that the GOP-controlled Congress will vote to block the deal, with most Republicans expressing support for it, but some GOP holdouts have voiced their concerns. The agreement would tee up the possibility of nuclear enrichment inside Saudi Arabia and lacks the safeguards applied to deals with the United Arab Emirates and some other U.S. allies.

In a combative interview with NBC News’ Tom Llamas on Wednesday, Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed dismissed his half-sister’s past comments about his family’s ties to the Muslim Brotherhood as “hearsay.”

El-Sayed had, in a previous NBC interview, denied that his family has any ties to the Muslim Brotherhood after ignoring attacks from his GOP opponent Mike Rogers on the subject at a debate last week. But newly resurfaced tweets by his half-sister — largely written in 2012 and 2013 — drew those denials into question, as his sister had repeatedly said that family members of theirs had long been Muslim Brotherhood members, including their mother.