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The polls have closed in South Carolina and a very small number of votes have been counted.

Trump says he is installing unqualified housing official Bill Pulte as acting intelligence director next week

As the rest of us wait for primary election results, Donald Trump is pushing ahead with his widely panned plan to install Bill Pulte, a political loyalist with no intelligence experience at all, acting director of national intelligence.

Writing on social media, Trump announced on Tuesday that Pulte, the head of a federal mortgage agency who has abused his access to private financial information to accuse Trump’s political enemies of mortgage fraud, “is working closely with Tulsi Gabbard, will be taking over as Acting Director of National Intelligence on Friday, June 19th.”

Gabbard, a former congresswoman who served in the military and then on a House subcommittee with oversight of military intelligence, had announced in her resignation letter that she would step down on 30 June.

Trump offered no explanation for Pulte taking over before that date, but the president has suggested in public comments that he expects his political ally to find evidence that the 2020 election was rigged after he gains control of the nation’s intelligence agencies.

Democratic lawmakers immediately said the appointment of Pulte would scuttle a bipartisan agreement to renew section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (Fisa), which is due to expire on Friday.

The powerful intelligence tool has long attracted controversy, since the program targets foreign nationals whose messages may pass through US servers or involve US contacts, meaning a wide array of domestic communications can be swept up without a warrant ever being sought.

The FBI in 2020 was discovered using section 702 to investigate whether protesters involved with Black Lives Matter had any ties to terrorists, according to a declassified memo released by the office of the director of national intelligence in 2023, a seat that would soon be filled by Pulte.

Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic leader, said on Tuesday that if Trump installs Pulte, Democrats will not allow the surveillance law to be reauthorized.

“Bill Pulte is deeply unqualified to serve as acting director of national intelligence and is deeply dangerous”, Jeffries told PBS Newshour. “He’s got no national security experience, no military experience and no law enforcement experience. In fact, the statute explicitly requires that any person occupying this position of great sensitivity have national security experience in their professional background. Bill Pulte has zero of that.”

“He’s also someone who has clearly demonstrated a willingness to weaponize the federal government against Donald Trump’s perceived adversaries,” the Democrat who could be the speaker of the House next year said. “So under no circumstances should we trust the privacy interests or national security interests of the American people with Bill Pulte on top of Donald Trump and Kash Patel.”

“Democrats definitively do not trust this administration to responsibly use surveillance authority, which is the reason why from a policy perspective, we need increased protections related to both privacy and the civil liberties of the American people,” he added.

“There were already sensitive negotiations that were on go ing and then Donald Trump chose to elevate this partisan political hack Bill Pulte into this position of great sensitivity effectively tossing a hand grenade in the midst of these negotiations as we approach the deadline to potentially renew surveillance authority,” Jeffries went on.

“Donald Trump needs to withdraw his decision to elevate Bill Pulte. That’s a starting point, not an ending point, and then we can see if we can responsibly get to a place where there are enough reforms built into the law. to provide guardrails and protect the American people,” Jeffries said.

AOC calls Graham Platner's reported behavior 'hard to stomach', but says he could be a better senator than Susan Collins

As voters went to the polls on Tuesday in Maine’s Democratic primary, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive congresswoman from New York, was asked by CNN about recent allegations that Senate candidate Graham Platner had mistreated former romantic partners and sent sexual messages to other women after his marriage.

“When it comes to the substance of this reporting, obviously there’s a lot in that behavior that’s really challenging; it’s hard to stomach”, Ocasio-Cortez said.

“But, but, at the end of the day, I think that this is a choice”, she continued, between a Democrat and the Republican incumbent Susan Collins, who supported cuts to health care. “If the choice on the ballot is between that and a senator who’s voted to take healthcare away from millions of Americans, that’s the situation that we have to weigh.”

The congresswoman’s comments were quickly clipped and shared on social media by the Republican party, but in a deceptively edited form, to remove her statement that the choie facing Maine voters is between Platner and “a senator who’s voted to take healthcare away from millions of Americans”.

For her part, when Collins was asked by CNN if she believed Platner’s denials of the allegations from a former romantic partner to the New York Times, that he had been physically abusive to her on two occasions, she said: “The allegations against Graham Platner are extremely troubling and serious, and he owes the people of Maine a detailed answer.”

Lyndsey Fifield, who dated Platner between 2013 and 2015, told the New York Times that, during one argument, he had “twisted her arm behind her back, shoved her into a bedroom and held the door closed from the other side”. On another occasion, she told the paper, he “yanked her out of a cab by her wrist after an argument”.

Platner’s campaign told the Times he “strongly disputes” any claims of physical intimidation or altercations, and described Fifield as “a lifelong G.O.P. operative”.

Fifield has worked for the far-right Heritage Foundation and is currently a fellow at a Republican women’s group whose leader boasted in 2020 that the organization had written talking points used by Collins to speak in support of the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the supreme court despite sexual assault allegations.

Updated

Blue Hill, Maine

There are only a few hours until polls close but national figures continue to weigh in on Graham Platner and the Democratic primary race for US Senate in Maine.

Ro Khanna, a Democratic congressman from California, posted a social media video of himself talking with Platner on a floating dock in Sorrento, Maine. “I am supporting @grahamformaine today because of his passion for opposing war,” Khanna wrote. “An honest conversation about the human toll and his journey.”

Senator Tina Smith of Minnesota also threw her weight behind Platner, posting that he would win “because he has connected with Mainers on what they really care about” and “because he’s not part of the Washington establishment.

Other congressional Democrats are digging in to oppose Platner, however. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey told CNN: “What I would suggest is that Graham Platner get off if he wins today, which I assume he will because there’s no one actively campaigning against him, that he get off the ballot and let another Democrat step in, that the main Democratic Party put somebody else in.

“I mean, if this were in Jersey and you had a candidate who abused women, obviously has a Nazi tattoo – that now it’s clear that he knew was a Nazi tattoo – not to mention many of his other lies and his comments and extremist comments, pro-Hamas, a terrorist organization, other things of that nature, he should get off the ballot. In Jersey, we’d throw him off the ballot or bury him under the Meadowlands. I mean, I don’t understand how somebody like this is going to represent our party. And I think the best action would be for him to leave and get somebody else who’s qualified onto the ballot.”

Gottheimer added: “If you’re a woman and looking at what, how can you accept somebody who abused women? That’s going to affect us in other parts of the country and campaigns and I think really be an issue for the party.”

Platner has said he got the tattoo while drinking as a Marine in 2007 and was unaware of its association with the Nazis until it became a campaign issue; he has since had it covered up. He has vehemently denied physically abusing women.

Jeff Cohen, co-founder of the progressive group RootsAction, told the Guardian: “As an antiwar organization, RootsAction has been impressed by the way Graham Platner has brought his antiwar message to the voters of Maine, offering a powerful contrast to Susan Collins who has a long record of supporting disastrous wars in the Middle East.

“Platner has had some personal problems that are concerning, but we are supporting him in hopes that Collins, at long last, is retired from the Senate.”

And Kyle Kulinski, a progressive and host of the Secular Talk show, told the Politico website: “If we’re convinced you walk the walk on policy, we’ll overlook personal issues. The days of weak apologetic Dems are over. Our tea party is here.”

Updated

South Carolina, North Dakota and Nevada hold primary elections

Outside of Maine, three other states are holding primary elections today: South Carolina, North Dakota and Nevada.

Polls close in South Carolina at 7pm ET.

A political confidant and regular golfing partner of Donald Trump, senator Lindsey Graham has fought off primary challengers over the years. And some of this year’s contenders — including Project 2025 chief architect Paul Dans and former liuentant governor André Bauer — dropped out months ago, the Associated Press reported.

But Mark Lynch, a Greenville businessman, is still running. On social media, Trump has said Lynch “would be a DISASTER for the Republican Party” if elected.

In the governor’s race, Trump backed lieutenant governor Pamela Evette over several opponents, including Maga congresswoman Nancy Mace. The primary will determine whether the endorsement can help Evette win outright or if there will be a runoff on June 23.

Polls finish closing in North Dakota at 9pm ET.

North Dakota’s lone US House member, Julie Fedorchak, faces a partial rematch of her 2024 nomination race in a state primary Tuesday, the AP reported. Also on the ballot is a proposed amendment to the state constitution, while residents of Fargo will elect a new mayor.

Polls close in Nevada at 10pm ET.

No Democrat has held the congressional seat that represents Reno and rural northern Nevada, but Democrats aren’t ruling it out this year after longtime Republican representative Mark Amodei announced his retirement, the AP reported.

Democrats are banking on Trump’s growing unpopularity and the district’s large number of nonpartisan voters. In the Republican primary, they’re hoping that Trump-backed candidate David Flippo will defeat James Settelmeyer, a former lawmaker with the backing of governor Joe Lombardo, believing it would be easier to draw a contrast.

Graham Platner looks to advance in Maine Senate race as four states hold primaries

Maine voters are going to the polls for primary elections that include a crucial Senate race involving the scandal-haunted Graham Platner.

The oysterman and Marine veteran’s string of controversies, ranging from alleged “toxic” behavior toward women to a tattoo recognized as a Nazi symbol, have plunged Democrats into debates about double standards, purity tests and not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

There was a final twist came Monday, when Genevieve McDonald, a former political director of Platner’s campaign, published a column denouncing Platner as unfit for office.

“Graham Platner is not someone who would be good for Maine or for the country,” McDonald wrote in the Washington Post. “He exhibits a pattern of dishonest behavior that is impossible to ignore.

“Despite being exposed by a series of scandals beginning last October, he kept assuring voters and the Democratic Party that there were no more skeletons in his closet. Then more emerged – the latest, in recent days, have involved former girlfriends’ serious accusations of physical mistreatment.”

Even so, all the signs on the ground are that most Democratic voters are sticking with Platner. At a campaign event on Sunday, a supporter presented him with a hand-drawn card that included the message “we’ve got your back”.

Polls close in Maine at 8pm ET.