President Donald Trump touched down at an unprecedented midterm Republican convention, aiming to energize the GOP’s fight to hold Congress in November by sharpening the party’s case against Democrats.

The opening night began in unmistakably Trump-style fashion: the president emerged as Lee Greenwood performed “God Bless the USA,” setting the stage for his first address at the Dallas gathering. Trump is slated to speak on both nights of the convention.

Still, the lineup of attendees offers a revealing glimpse at the political headwinds surrounding him.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune is not scheduled to speak, a notable omission after Trump’s public irritation with the South Dakota Republican over stalled parts of his agenda. Other leaders from the House and Senate, however, were given speaking slots.

A number of Republicans running in some of the nation’s most closely watched contests are also avoiding the main stage. That group includes Maine Senator Susan Collins, Iowa Congresswoman Ashley Hinson, who is seeking a US Senate seat, and John E Sununu, the GOP nominee hoping to turn New Hampshire’s Senate seat red.

Most prognosticators expect Democrats to win back the US House of Representatives, but the Senate will be tougher with battleground races in Maine, Ohio, Michigan and Alaska set to determine control. 

Trump’s own trip to Texas was delayed Wednesday after his new Qatari-gifted Air Force One deployed its emergency evacuation slide.

His keynote has competition too. The NFL season kicks off the same night with the New England Patriots at the Seattle Seahawks, a rematch of February’s Super Bowl.

20,000 convention attendees descended upon Dallas to take part in the historic midterm gathering. 

Yet, not all of the party faithful were excited about the event.

One GOP lobbyist told Politico Playbook, ‘the vibes are very bad,’ while two others remarked that Trump will be competing for attention with the start of the NFL season.

House lawmakers including Anna Paulina Luna of Florida and Derrick Van Orden of Wisconsin were early speakers on Wednesday’s slate.

Luna attacked Democrats for their history of self-serving stock trading, and Van Orden boosted Trump’s Rural Healthcare plan.

US Senate nominees including Ken Paxton of Texas, Michael Whatley of North Carolina, and Mike Collins of Georgia are expected to speak, as is incumbent Ohio Senator Jon Husted.

Trump’s cabinet secretaries including Brooke Rollins, Scott Bessent, Dr. Mehmet Oz, and even Attorney General Todd Blanche are on the agenda as well.

The two day event will also include a tribute to conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated while speaking on the campus of Utah Valley University last September. The 25th anniversary of 9-11, taking place on Friday, will also be commemorated during Thursday’s programming at the convention. 

David Bailey’s attention is locked on one player this week: Titans quarterback Cam Ward.

Bailey, selected No. 2 overall in the 2026 NFL Draft, said Wednesday on The Post’s “Gang’s All Here” podcast that he is not yet concerned with future AFC East matchups against quarterbacks such as Josh Allen or Drake Maye, both of whom the Jets will see twice later in his rookie season. For now, his full focus is on Sunday’s opener in Tennessee, where his priority will be containing — and, if possible, taking down — Ward in his NFL debut.

“I’m not really thinking about [divisional teams] right now, honestly. I’m thinking about it week by week,” the 23-year-old Bailey said during his conversation with hosts Brian Costello and Ryan Sampson. “I mean, we’re going [against] a good-ass quarterback right now. Obviously going against Cam Ward, he’s extremely elusive. He’s a good quarterback.

Bailey said the Jets have spent the week building a defensive approach designed to keep Ward from extending plays with his legs and creativity. “So we’ve put together a plan to try and contain him…It’s going to be a group effort,” he said, noting that every quarterback presents a different challenge. While Ward’s mobility demands extra awareness, Bailey added that his personal approach does not swing wildly from opponent to opponent. His goal remains the same: impact the game and help the Jets defense win its matchups.

Ward, who went first overall in the 2025 NFL Draft, endured plenty of pressure during his rookie year with the Titans. He was sacked 55 times, matching returning Jets quarterback Geno Smith — then with the Raiders — for the most in the NFL.

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Bailey registered one sack during the preseason against the Steelers after totaling 14.5 last season at Texas Tech.

The 6-foot-3 edge rusher has cited eight-time Pro Bowler Von Miller — now with the Cowboys — as an outside linebacker he emulates.

“Von is, man, just the way he plays, man. When it’s all said and done, I want my highlight tape to look just like his, man,” Bailey said. But man, just the ways he gets after the quarterback, elite, it just seems like he always knows what to do. When his first move doesn’t work, he always has a counter ready.

“So, man, yeah, he’s just like the first that I really studied, for real.”

Chinese authorities have arrested two Chinese citizens accused of helping fuel a synthetic drug pipeline that U.S. prosecutors say reached American prisons, where the substances were ultimately distributed to inmates in federal and state facilities across the country.

Lisa Xing, 36, and Zhanwen Song, 38, are named in a superseding federal indictment filed in the Eastern District of Texas. The charges include drug trafficking and money laundering allegations connected to an alleged operation that sourced synthetic opioids, cannabinoids and other narcotics from China for delivery into U.S. correctional institutions.

FBI Director Kash Patel highlighted the arrests in a post on X, saying the pair were accused of moving “dangerous synthetic drugs from China into the United States,” including efforts to smuggle them into prison systems.

“This FBI and our Homeland Security Task Force partners will keep finding and disrupting these networks wherever they operate,” Patel wrote, praising the work of @FBIDallas and other law enforcement partners involved in the investigation.

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According to prosecutors, Xing and Song shipped synthetic drugs to co-defendants Adell Willis of Texas and Judy Ly of Michigan, who allegedly dissolved the drugs into liquid, soaked sheets of paper in the mixture and mailed them to inmates in federal and state prisons across the country.

Willis and Ly were indicted in May on charges, including conspiracy to distribute controlled substances and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

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“The indictment alleges that a China-based supplier and a domestic distributor worked together to bring deadly synthetic drugs into the United States for distribution across the country,” U.S. Attorney Jay R. Combs said.

The Justice Department said China’s Ministry of Public Security arrested Xing, Song and 19 additional alleged co-conspirators, seized 475 kilograms of synthetic cannabinoids and shut down four illicit manufacturing sites. Officials said the investigation was coordinated through an FBI-Chinese Ministry of Public Security counternarcotics working group established earlier this year.

If convicted, each defendant faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and up to life behind bars.

Melania Trump’s office has now weighed in on the chatter surrounding presidential aide Natalie Harp, as public curiosity grows over her highly visible role alongside Donald Trump.

Marc Beckman, the first lady’s chief spokesperson, pushed back forcefully against speculation about Trump and Harp’s close day-to-day working dynamic.

Speaking with host Stella Escobedo in a Wednesday interview, Beckman dismissed the coverage, saying, “The liberal media is ridiculous.”

He added that critics and commentators have little insight into Melania Trump’s private world, arguing, “They don’t know anything about the first lady’s personal and private life. They don’t even take the time to put us on air to cover these incredible achievements that our first lady has accomplished.”

Harp, 35, has earned the nickname “human printer” because she is often seen traveling with a portable printer, reportedly handing the president hard copies of news stories and social media posts throughout the day.

‘What they need to do is look in the mirror because they’re all attacking this hardworking, very talented, very intelligent person in Natalie Harp,’ added Beckman.

‘And they’re obsessed with the gossip with the first family. And I can tell you firsthand that it’s time for them to become journalists and stop looking at the gossip.’

 Trump and Harp’s bond became the center of national media attention in August when Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff told a rally that Trump would rather ‘build his ballroom and travel with Natalie’ than do his job.

Ossoff was referring to when Harp was among a tiny handful of aides Trump kept beside him as he slipped off Air Force One in Turkey and onto a decoy jet over an Iranian assassination threat. Top cabinet officials, including Marco Rubio and Scott Bessent, were left behind on the larger plane while Harp stayed with the President.

‘The media doesn’t know about the first lady’s private life. Period. The media doesn’t know about the first family’s life. Period,’ said the first lady’s advisor.  

‘And what they do is they harp on the issues of gossip rather than going ahead and covering the substantial achievements that this first lady and the president also have conducted during this past year and a half.’

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Escobedo highlighted Melania’s efforts to support children in foster care and those who have aged out of the system.

Aside from her initiatives, the first lady has been seen out in public less than 50 times this year, according to the Daily Beast. 

However, Harp has remained glued to the Trump’s side to the point that it raised concerns within the Secret Service and the president’s inner circle.

The aide wrote Trump a series of personal letters in 2023, telling him in one: ‘You are all that matters to me.’

She also called him her ‘Guardian and Protector in this Life,’ according to letters reviewed by the New York Times.

Trump told people that same year that Harp was the only person on his team who cared about him: ‘All of you will go off and make money … she’ll never leave me.’

It was revealed on Wednesday that the human printer was gifted $45,000, along with two other female aides.

Harp, Chamberlain Harris, 26, and Margo Martin, 31, received $135,000 between them, each identifying Trump as the source of a ‘cash gift for the holidays,’ according to Politico.

The money came on top of their $150,000 salaries paid by taxpayers, giving each woman a gift worth 30 percent of her annual government pay.

The Daily Mail has contacted the White House, Harp, Harris and Martin.

‘The President has a longstanding practice of giving Christmas gifts to people in his orbit, including at times employees and aides, both in government and in his time in the private sector,’ a White House spokesman told Politico.

‘The gifts at issue here have nothing to do with any of these individuals’ official government duties, and, therefore, are entirely permissible under relevant legal and ethical standards.’

Los Angeles commuters faced a worsening rush-hour nightmare Wednesday after a brush fire broke out in the hills near the Getty Center, pushing heavy smoke across the 405 Freeway and drawing a large emergency response.

The fire, identified as the Getty Fire, started around 4:15 p.m. above the northbound side of Interstate 405 near Getty Center Drive in Brentwood. Firefighters reported roughly five acres of brush burning intensely in the area.

Video obtained by The California Post captured thick plumes of smoke rising and drifting over the freeway as traffic moved below.

Aerial footage showed flames moving through dense vegetation while crews worked to slow the fire’s spread.

Several firefighting aircraft were also sent in to make drops from above.

Ten additional engines were requested by an arriving unit as the Los Angeles Fire Department called in hand crews and air resources.

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Evacuation warnings have been issued for zones:

LAFD Air Operations reported that no structures were threatened at the time.

The fire’s cause was unknown.

No injuries had been reported, but the blaze erupted during the afternoon rush, with smoke hanging over one of Los Angeles’ major freeway corridors.

This is a developing story.

A surrogate who refused a California couple’s request to terminate a pregnancy following a severe heart diagnosis for the baby is now asking the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene, saying a lower court decision has stripped her of any ability to speak up for the medically fragile infant.

Lawyers for McKenna West, an Alaska cardiac nurse, filed an emergency application Wednesday seeking to have Justice Elena Kagan temporarily halt a Los Angeles court order that recognized the California couple as the newborn’s legal parents.

Kagan oversees emergency requests from the 9th Circuit, which covers California. She has not yet issued a ruling on West’s application.

West gave birth under a surrogacy agreement with California couple Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed, who refer to the baby as Rumi. West calls him Gabriel.

The baby was born in Texas Aug. 12 with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, or HLHS, a rare condition in which the left side of the heart is severely underdeveloped.

The legal war began after the condition was detected during a 20-week ultrasound. West alleges Gilkar and Ahmed asked her to terminate the pregnancy under a provision in their surrogacy agreement covering serious fetal abnormalities.

West refused, telling the surrogacy agency she could not abort “this precious baby” after feeling him move and learning treatment was available, according to the filing.

She offered to raise the child herself or arrange an adoption if the couple no longer wanted him, while allowing them to walk away from any further financial obligations.

Her attorneys allege West was then warned that continuing the pregnancy could expose her to more than $250,000 in financial penalties.

Gilkar and Ahmed later turned to a California court to establish their legal rights as the baby’s parents. West argued the case belonged in Alaska under the surrogacy agreement and said she appeared in California solely to challenge the court’s jurisdiction.

The Los Angeles Superior Court determined that West had effectively consented to its authority by submitting a 147-page filing that addressed the “substance of the issues,” according to the application.

West’s lawyers said most of those pages were exhibits supporting her jurisdictional challenge and that she had repeatedly refused to argue the underlying case.

“Any reasonable view of consent would recognize that ‘no’ does not mean ‘yes,’” they wrote.

West also claims she was never properly served. Her filing says a FedEx package containing the court papers was delivered to her babysitter, who allegedly was not told what was inside.

The California court declared Gilkar and Ahmed the baby’s legal parents June 22, and West failed to persuade three state courts to put the ruling on hold.

The judge acknowledged during the California proceedings that the dispute “[m]ay be a question of life and death” for the unborn child, according to West’s application.

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The fight then moved to Texas, where West traveled so the baby could be delivered at a hospital equipped to treat his condition.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton secured an emergency order before the birth, directing the hospital to provide life-saving care and preventing the child from being removed from the state.

West previously said she had only about one minute with the newborn while his umbilical cord was still attached before he was taken from her. A court order later barred her from seeing or holding him.

The baby underwent the first of three anticipated open-heart surgeries Aug. 17. He was later returned to a breathing tube after his condition declined, according to court filings previously reviewed by News Media.

Gilkar said during a hearing last month in Dallas that the couple had remained at their son’s bedside and accused West of trying to take him.

“He’s our child,” Gilkar said, according to The Associated Press. “He’s the love of our lives.”

She also told the court the newborn was “suffering a lot” as he struggled to breathe, choked on tubes and required a blood transfusion following surgery, according to the AP.

West has said she would abandon her custody effort if a court determined the intended parents were committed to providing the child with life-saving care.

But on Sept. 2, a Texas judge upheld the California ruling and removed West from the case. Paxton has also stepped away from the legal fight.

West’s attorneys argue she is now barred from receiving information about the baby or defending the order requiring his continued treatment. They allege Gilkar and Ahmed are challenging that medical care order.

The couple previously agreed to the baby’s first surgery and said they would approve life-saving care if doctors determined he was a candidate.

West is now asking the Supreme Court to temporarily block the California ruling, which could give her a path back into the Texas case. Her attorneys argue the dispute raises a broader constitutional question over whether challenging a court’s authority can itself be treated as accepting that authority.

Her lawyers stressed that temporarily blocking the ruling would not decide who the baby’s legal parents are or direct doctors to provide a particular course of treatment. Instead, it could allow West to ask the Texas court to bring her back into the case.

Without Supreme Court intervention, her attorneys warned, West will remain shut out of decisions and updates about the baby’s condition as the appeals process plays out.

“Unless this Court provides relief from that judgment, M.W. will have no access to information about Baby G.’s condition,” West’s attorneys wrote.

They argued that a victory later could come too late to protect the child.

“Relief later in Texas proceedings may only restore her right to protect a child that has already passed,” the filing states.