President Donald Trump spent Sunday, Oct. 25, on Michigan’s Senate race: a morning post, two gaggles and a rally of 1 hour 47 minutes in Port Huron, all aimed at Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed. He also told Fox News he weighs a deal against force with Iran, re-endorsed Netanyahu and answered Libya’s protest with a conciliatory statement. This entry in the series Every 24 Hours What the President Says covers 7:06 a.m. PT Sunday to 7:06 a.m. PT Monday, lists highlights first, ranks topics by likely policy impact and then coverage, and closes with video and photos he shared.

Highlights. In his post, a gaggle and the rally he called El-Sayed, a former Detroit health official, a “jihadist” and a “Muslim Brotherhood member”; an El-Sayed spokesperson called these “desperate, bad faith attacks” (AP via Michigan Public). Asked at Marine One whether to expect strikes on Iran that day, he said, “would I tell you that? But, uh, the answer is no. There will not be a strike today” (transcript). And after Libya’s foreign ministry protested his rally remark grouping Libya among “Shithouse countries,” he wrote that Libyans deserve “peace and prosperity… but Libya cannot remain a corridor for illegal migration, and this must end now” ().

1. Iran and Israel. To Larry Kudlow on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures: “That’s my, that’s the only question. Do I make a deal or do I finish them off? Remember, we now control the Hormuz Strait.” He said of Iran’s nuclear sites, “We know exactly what’s going on at Pickaxe Mountain. We know the other three are obliterated,” and added, “Getting a big decision time, Larry” (transcript). At Joint Base Andrews he cited “two very different sets of intelligence reports. I have them both,” and “Some has been declassified and some hasn’t” (transcript); on Oct. 23 Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton sent Secretary of State Marco Rubio a memo saying Iran had “substantially increased” efforts to target U.S. personnel (CBS News). At 3:58 p.m. PT he re-posted his Oct. 18 Netanyahu endorsement: “Vote for Bibi Netanyahu for Prime Minister, we have to finish the job that we started!” (). Netanyahu challenger Gadi Eisenkot called Trump “a true friend of Israel,” while accusing Netanyahu of a “scare campaign,” and President Isaac Herzog said, “I don’t think the president of the United States or anybody else can intervene in my discretion” (both via JNS, a pro-Israel outlet). At 7:28 p.m. PT he shared a headline on Iran’s oil minister resigning, from an Oct. 5 report (; Open Magazine). No named Iranian response to the strike remark surfaced by 7 a.m. PT.

2. Russia, Ukraine and a freed American. On trilateral talks: “We’re going to be having some pretty soon, and I think they both want to make a deal” (transcript). Of Stephen Hubbard, whom Russia freed on Oct. 21: “I got him back by asking Vladimir Putin to have him back. And I gave nothing in return because Putin thought it was a reasonable request” (transcript). Of the Alaska gas and Lukoil deals: “Those are deals that’ll happen at some point, but we’re not gonna be hostage with the oil industry,” then, “The election was rigged and stolen”; the pool notes he appeared to mean 2020 (pool report), and he offered no evidence.

3. Libya, Norway, Greenland and other foreign remarks. At Saturday’s rally in Perry, Georgia, he had called Libya “terror-infested”; Libya’s ministry called the remarks “offensive,” and its rival eastern and western administrations rejected attempts to draw Libya into what they called “electoral debates” (Reuters via Al-Monitor). His 4:26 p.m. PT statement backed “the long-awaited unification of Libya and Libya’s institutions” (; full text via Anadolu, a Turkish state agency). At the rally: “Frankly, Norway sucks. Norway has become a shithouse country, actually,” tied to the Nobel Peace Prize; Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide told NRK, “He knows very well that the Nobel Committee is independent,” and AFP notes “no official indication of a new US policy on Norwegian immigrants” (AFP). He also said, “We own Greenland. We work it with Denmark,” though the Sept. 22 defense agreement “acknowledges and respects the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Kingdom of Denmark” and awaits a Danish vote on Nov. 19 (Danish PM’s Office, Copenhagen Post). Of María Corina Machado: “she gave me a Nobel Prize, so how can I say anything else? I hope she’s safe.” On Brazil’s runoff: “I don’t want to get into that, but we are watching, yeah” (transcript).

4. Energy, prices and the $5,000 pledge. A White House statement carried in the pool, “President Trump Secures Major Deals to Unleash American Energy and Cut Gas Prices at the Pump,” cites Defense Production Act refining steps, 130 million barrels of diesel and a $54 billion Alaska gas pipeline deal; those figures come from the White House and the desk has not verified them (pool report). On Fox: “the gasoline will drop like a rock.” At the rally: “If Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, I am going to give all adult citizens in the United States $5,000,” and “The $5,000 Trump dividend is approximately $1 trillion,” on condition that “you will only spend that money in the United States of America” (transcript). Any such payment would need an act of Congress, and the desk found no bill text. His “$22.2 trillion of new investment” and “$80 billion profit” on the Intel stake went unverified here.

5. Other races and voting. Of a second Dan Sullivan on Alaska’s ballot: “That’s just outright cheating,” and, asked how it breaks the law, “I think it’s illegal because it’s unfair” (transcript). Of Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, the Democratic nominee for governor: “She cheated more, in my opinion, than anybody else.” Benson answered via mlive: “Michigan citizens will have the final say on November 3rd” (mlive). He said Rep. Ilhan Omar’s name “is not Ilhan Omar” and “she has to resign from Congress”; Omar has said, “My name has always been Ilhan Omar,” and the Star Tribune notes a DOJ filing used that other name but “does not prove that Omar has used a false name” (Star Tribune). On Fox he credited his rallies for Ohio’s Jon Husted (“He went up 14 points or something”) and said of Nebraska’s Pete Ricketts, “He’s gone through the roof” (transcript). At the rally he repeated a remark about Husted’s body and told Rogers, “I’d say that about your ass too, Mike, if it gets you a guaranteed victory” (transcript).

6. The press, Fox News and Bill Maher. At 9:49 a.m. PT: “FoxNews is spending far too much time putting on the OPPONENTS of Republican Party Candidates… Fox is doing little to help” (); Mediaite, a left-leaning site, notes the post came hours after his Fox interview (Mediaite). At 5:00 p.m. PT came his longest post ever by CNN’s count, 1,323 words: “Let’s talk about this COMPLETE AND TOTAL LOSER, Bill Maher,” disputing the length of their Oct. 15 dinner and ending, “Bill: Don’t call anymore” (). In it he wrote, “I am not building a swimming pool in the White House Briefing Room… I am thinking about moving the Press,” and that CNN showed “98 and 99% support within the Republican Party”; CNN replies that its latest poll had 74% approval among Republicans and that the higher figures came from a clip about self-identified MAGA Republicans (CNN). No public reply from Maher surfaced by 7 a.m. PT.

7. Parks, the South Lawn and more. At 4:58 p.m. PT: “I am proud to announce the NEWEST FLAGSHIP NATIONAL PARK in the Country, CHIRICAHUA NATIONAL PARK in ARIZONA!” (); the NPS says he signed the Chiricahua National Park Act on Oct. 20 (NPS). He posted three uncaptioned aerial photos of the South Lawn helipad, shared an Oct. 19 New York Post report on New York easing part of its ban on Native American school imagery (; New York Post), and linked a memes-group post with a graphic attributed to actor Kevin Sorbo; the desk could not confirm that Sorbo wrote it or the claim itself ().

Coming up. Monday, Oct. 26: a 1:30 p.m. ET meeting with the U.S. ambassador to France and Monaco, then remarks in Corinth, Mississippi, at 6 p.m. CDT (pool report). Thursday, Oct. 29: Halloween at the White House, with the president and first lady taking part at 5:30 p.m. ET (pool report).

Deep dive: the El-Sayed attacks, in his words and theirs. His 10:29 a.m. PT post opened, “Heading to Michigan to fight a Jihadist Member of the Muslim Brotherhood,” and ended, “If it ever does, he should be the first that’s tried!” (). Leaving Andrews he said, “We don’t want to see a jihadist senator,” and, asked about El-Sayed appearing in a white coat, “I think he’s practicing illegally from what I’ve been told” (transcript). At the rally: “I’m here to keep a jihadist Muslim Brotherhood member from becoming a United States senator,” and “Michigan needs to stand up and fight just like Todd did to stop a jihadist from walking into the Capitol,” invoking Flight 93. Todd Beamer’s father, David Beamer, then said of El-Sayed, “He has a birth certificate, but he’s not an American.” Trump also called El-Sayed “a fake doctor” who “runs what is considered to be the worst clinic in the entire country,” giving no source (transcript).

What the record shows. AP: “There is no evidence that El-Sayed has any affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood,” and he has “repeatedly denied any ties to extremist groups” (AP via Michigan Public). The question at Andrews noted that El-Sayed did not complete licensing after medical school; the desk found no report of him treating patients.

Responses. El-Sayed, at a Grand Rapids rally: “I don’t even care that he remembers my whole name because he can just go on and call me ‘senator’ after November… I will be Senator Muhammad to you, bro” (AP via NPR). Campaign spokesperson Cole Wozniak: “While they lie and resort to desperate, bad faith attacks, Abdul remains laser focused on his plans to bring down costs.” Bishara Bahbah, a founder of Arab Americans for Trump, since renamed Arab Americans for Peace: “They are crossing a red line. They are racist.” Republican nominee Mike Rogers told the rally crowd, “The Muslim Brotherhood celebrated exactly one victory in the United States in the primary this year” (all via AP). On NBC’s Meet the Press, Rogers said of Trump’s “terrorist” label, “I’ve never called him a terrorist” (NBC News). Travel pooler David Sanger of The New York Times called the lines “Islamaphobic” in a pool report; that wording belongs to the pooler (pool report). AP calls the race “among a handful of contests that could determine control of the chamber” on Nov. 3.