Hurricane season forecast is ‘below normal’ — but it comes with a warning

The 2026 Atlantic hurricane season is expected to be “below normal,” largely due to an El Niño weather pattern, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

NOAA’s hurricane season outlook, released Thursday, forecasts 8 to 14 named storms, including three to six hurricanes and one to three major hurricanes.

Forecasters say there’s a 55% chance of a below-normal season, a 35% chance of a near-normal season, and a 10% chance of an above-normal season. An average season has 14 named storms with seven hurricanes, including three major hurricanes, according to NOAA.

Hurricane season begins June 1 and ends Nov. 30.

Despite the outlook, NOAA administrator Neil Jacobs cautioned people not to let their guard down.

“Even though we’re expecting a below-average season in the Atlantic, it’s very important to understand that it only takes one,” Jacobs said during a news briefing Thursday. He noted that Category 5 hurricanes have made landfall during below-average seasons in the past.

NOAA’s forecast closely aligns with several other leading commercial and academic projections. Last month, forecasters at Colorado State University predicted 13 named storms, including six hurricanes and two major hurricanes with sustained winds of at least 111 mph. In March, AccuWeather predicted between 11 and 16 named storms for the 2026 season.

—Miami Herald

Women’s museum bill defeated in House

WASHINGTON— A once-bipartisan effort broke down Thursday as the House rejected a bill to pave the way for construction of a Smithsonian museum honoring women.

Previously championed by both sides of the aisle, the legislation saw last-minute changes at a House Administration Committee markup in March that led Democrats to withdraw their backing. The new version would prohibit exhibits from including transgender women or girls, as well as give the final say on location to President Donald Trump.

“A museum about women, fought for and supported by women, should not be controlled by one man,” leaders of the Democratic Women’s Caucus said in a statement earlier this week.

The bill would allow the museum to be built within the reserve of the National Mall, an area where construction is tightly controlled. Although the bill names the South Monument site across from the National Museum of African American History and Culture, it would also give the president the ability to “designate an alternative site” at his discretion. Democrats have decried the changes as a “poison pill” that derailed years of work.

The floor vote this week was supposed to be a chance for Republicans to position themselves as defenders of women’s rights and to paint their opponents as unsympathetic to the cause.

“They claim, the other side, to be the party of women — yet it is the Republican Party that introduced the 19th Amendment,” said the bill’s lead sponsor, Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., on the floor earlier Thursday, referring to the change last century that allowed American women to vote. “And yes, there’s a Republican president today that has authorized the women’s history museum, and it will be the Republican majority in Congress that gets this done.”

But Republicans couldn’t stay united to pass the bill on their own, with several of their members breaking away to vote with Democrats to defeat the effort. GOP leaders circulated around the chamber, trying to convince the holdouts.

After roughly an hour, leaders gave up and closed the vote at 204-216.

—CQ-Roll Call

GOP nears $1 billion midterms war chest, more than triple Democrats’ cash

WASHINGTON— President Donald Trump and his Republican allies have amassed a $939 million war chest ahead of November midterms, more than tripling the Democrats’ haul and setting them up to mount a formidable fight in their uphill effort to retain control of Congress.

The latest filings with the Federal Election Commission show Democrats have raised a more meager $267 million, despite the political winds being in their favor. Republicans’ deep well of money will allow them to saturate airways with ads defending their candidates and striking out at the opposition.

However, a sitting president’s party usually loses House seats in midterm elections. Republicans are headed into the vote with a slim House majority and are defending 14 of the 18 districts deemed toss-ups by the Cook Political Report. Adding voter malaise — from stubborn high prices and Trump’s declining approval ratings — to that math has left the party on the back foot.

The money will also be an advantage in Senate races where Democrats are looking to net four seats and take control. The GOP is defending 22 seats there, but only a few are considered to be competitive. The fundraising totals include the latest bank balances reported by Trump’s committees, the Republican party and their allied super PACs as well as their Democratic counterparts.

Individual Democratic candidates are faring better than the party and associated committees, suggesting it is the party that is struggling to draw in big-ticket support. Democratic Senate campaigns have raised $146 million more than GOP rivals, while its House candidates have a $157 million advantage.

—Bloomberg News

US sends aircraft carrier Nimitz to the Caribbean as pressure mounts on Cuba

In what appears to be a carefully calibrated show of force, the United States deployed the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz and its accompanying strike group into Caribbean waters this week, a move that coincided with the unsealing of murder charges against former Cuban leader Raúl Castro on Wednesday and an intensifying pressure campaign by the Trump administration against Havana.

The Doral, Florida-based U.S. Southern Command confirmed Wednesday that the Nimitz Carrier Strike Group had entered the region, describing the deployment as a demonstration of American “readiness and presence, unmatched reach and lethality, and strategic advantage.

“Welcome to the Caribbean, Nimitz Carrier Strike Group!” the command posted on social media.

The strike group is centered around the nuclear-powered Nimitz and includes Carrier Air Wing 17, the guided-missile destroyer USS Gridley and the replenishment oiler USNS Patuxent. Its air wing includes F/A-18 Super Hornets, EA-18G Growlers, E-2D Hawkeyes and MH-60 Seahawk helicopters.

The deployment came the same day the U.S. Justice Department unsealed an indictment charging Castro and several other officials with murder and conspiracy in connection with the 1996 shoot-down of two civilian aircraft operated by the Miami-based humanitarian group Brothers to the Rescue.

The attack, which occurred over international waters, killed four men, including three U.S. citizens.

—Miami Herald