Welcome to Ground Game's first Friday edition, where we will be rounding up some of the week's political news and looking ahead toward what's on the horizon. This week, we take at look at the UFC fight coming to the White House this weekend, new polling on President Donald Trump's standing among independents, Washington bureau chief Anna Johnson's weekly picks and what's on my reading list. |
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Lights! Camera! Cage match! UFC comes to the White House |
The arena for the UFC Freedom 250 fights on the South Lawn of the White House is photographed Thursday, June 11, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon) |
AP reporters and photographers have been chronicling the setup of a temporary arena on the White House's South Lawn. That's where 4,000-plus people are expected to gather on Sunday for the seven UFC fights being staged to celebrate the 80th birthday of President Donald Trump and the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence’s signing. There's the contours of the eight-sided cage, 30 feet (9 meters) in diameter and shaped, with careful precision, like the MMA league’s signature Octagon.
And looming above it all is The Claw, a four-sided mass that arcs more than 90 feet (27 meters) into the air and features lights, speakers, thick snakes of wiring and four large screens.
Read more from Will Weissert, who got to tour the site this week. |
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AP-NORC: Trump's support among independents has fallen |
An American flag flies in the wind as a voter leaves a polling site after casting a ballot on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024, in Dearborn, Mich. (AP Photo/David Goldman) |
Where Trump has lost support with independents, according to AP-NORC polling — By Linley Sanders
More Americans than ever consider themselves independents, and they are among the groups that shifted toward Trump in the 2024 presidential election. But independents have grown increasingly unhappy with Trump during his second term, a new AP-NORC polling analysis finds, particularly those without a college degree. The analysis from researchers at The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that while about half of independents without a college education had a positive view of Trump around the 2024 election, his approval with that group fell to about one-quarter this spring. That shift has erased the large education gap that existed among independents in the months before Trump took office for his second term, with independents now holding similarly negative views of the president, regardless of their level of education.
The analysis was conducted by aggregating nearly two dozen AP-NORC polls conducted between July 2024 and April 2026, allowing for a deeper look at how support for Trump changed during several distinct periods. Those include the last six months of 2024, the first 100 days of Trump's presidency, the summer of 2025 when the Big Beautiful Bill passed, last fall's government shutdown, and the beginning of the Iran war. The compiled polling shows a steady decline among independents throughout Trump’s second term. His standing has also dropped among several small but important groups that moved toward him in the 2024 presidential election, including Black and Hispanic independents. Read more from Sanders about Trump's standing with independents.
View the AP-NORC Polling tracker. |
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A woman uses a walker as she exits an assisted living building, July 4, 2025, in Boca Raton, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell) |
Too sick to work, but can they prove it? New Medicaid rule worries patients — By Ali Swenson
— Ali talked with people concerned that new federal rules may mean being sick may not be enough to avoid new Medicaid work requirements.
A Trump order asked national park visitors to flag ‘negative’ historical info. They had other ideas — By Jack Dura and Mead Gruver
— Jack and Mead examined 35,000 public comments after the Trump administration asked visitors at national parks to report any exhibits saying “negative” things about Americans. This story looks at what they found: |
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Political book club: What's on Meg Kinnard's reading list? |
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro greets supporters at an election night watch party in Warminster, Pa., Tuesday, May 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke) |
Part of my job as a national political reporter is to get to know the backgrounds of people who either already are, or might be in the future, running for president. I'll be spending time with them along the campaign trail, so the more I learn about them ahead of time, the more I'll familiarize myself with nuggets that will be in the stump speeches they'll be testing out on voters.
This week, I'm checking out “Where We Keep the Light: Stories From a Life of Service,” released earlier this year, by Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro. The Democrat, often been cited as a potential candidate for 2028, was on Kamala Harris' VP shortlist in 2024. Shapiro is up for reelection this year, but he's also testing his political capital by working to elect Democrats in some of his state's competitive congressional races. Read more from Marc Levy on Shapiro's home state operation. |
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President Donald Trump attends an NBA Finals playoff basketball game between the New York Knicks and the San Antonio Spurs at Madison Square Garden in New York, Monday, June 8, 2026, with Kai Trump. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein) |
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