Daily Brew: October 7, 2025
Welcome to the Tuesday, Oct. 7, Brew.
By: Briana Ryan
Here’s what’s in store for you as you start your day:
- Adelita Grijalva was elected to the U.S. House 14 days ago—here's how that length of time compares to past special election winners
- The Trump administration has filed more emergency applications with the U.S. Supreme Court than the last three administrations
- Ballotpedia's founder and CEO, Leslie Graves, joins On the Ballot to discuss our local election coverage
Adelita Grijalva was elected to the U.S. House 14 days ago—here's how that length of time compares to past special election winners
On Oct. 3, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-La.) announced that the U.S. House of Representatives would not return to regular session this week—leaving the swearing in of Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva (D-Ariz.) up in the air.
On Sept. 23, voters elected Grijalva in a special election to succeed her father, former 7th Congressional District Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who died on March 13. In the special election, Grijalva defeated Daniel Butierez (R) 69% to 29%. Once she's sworn in, Republicans' majority in the chamber will decrease to 219 to 214 with two vacancies.
On Oct. 2, 180 House Democrats sent a letter to Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-La.) asking him to swear in Grijalva during an Oct. 3 pro forma session. The letter said, "Continuing to delay Representative-elect Grijalva's ceremony has left her constituents without representation during the government shutdown. Just like her many colleagues before her, Representative-elect Grijalva deserves to be sworn in as soon as possible."
At the time, Johnson said he could not swear in Grijalva during a pro forma session: "The House is not on the floor doing business this week, but we will do it immediately early next week as soon as everyone returns to town. We have to have everybody here and we'll swear her in."
According to C-SPAN, pro forma sessions "are meetings of the House or Senate during which no legislative business is conducted and no roll call votes are held. They are held to fulfill the requirement in the U.S. Constitution which prohibits Congress from adjourning for longer than three days without the consent of the other chamber."
Not including the special election in Arizona's 7th Congressional District, there have been three other special elections this year to fill vacancies in the 119th Congress (2025-2027). Johnson swore in the three winners—Randy Fine (R-Fla.), Jimmy Patronis (R-Fla.), and James Walkinshaw (D-Va.)—of those special elections the day after their respective elections. Both Fine and Patronis were sworn in during a pro forma session.
During the 113th (2013-2015) through the 118th (2023-2025) Congresses, voters decided 66 special elections. During that period, the median length of time it took the special election winners to be sworn in was seven days.
- During that period, two special election winners—Reps. Jason Smith (R-Mo.) and Curt Clawson (R-Fla.)—were sworn in the day after their respective special election victories. Both of those special elections were to fill vacancies in the 113th Congress.
- Since the 113th Congress, Rep. Jimmy Gomez's (D-Calif.) swearing-in in the 115th Congress (2017-20219) took the longest length of time—35 days. At the time, Politico's Kyle Cheney wrote that his swearing-in after winning the special election for California's 34th Congressional District was "postponed for weeks in what Gomez and allies have described as a 'family conflict.'"
During the 113th through the 118th Congresses, three other special election winners—Reps. Tom Tiffany (R-Wisc.), Mike Garcia (R-Calif.), and Kweisi Mfume (D-Md.)—were sworn in during pro forma sessions. All three of those special elections were to fill vacancies in the 116th Congress (2019-2021).
Click here to read more about special elections to the 119th Congress.
The Trump administration has filed more emergency applications with the U.S. Supreme Court than the last three administrations
As of Oct. 6, the second Trump administration has filed 28 emergency applications with the U.S. Supreme Court. That’s more than the Bush, Obama, and Biden administrations combined (27). The first Trump administration filed 41 emergency applications with the Court.
The emergency docket, also referred to as the shadow docket or the non-merits docket, is made up of applications for immediate intervention from the Court in cases that have not fully progressed through the ordinary procedures required for the Court to issue a regular opinion in a case. The Court usually resolves applications with unsigned orders and no oral argument.
Excluding withdrawn applications, most of these applications deal with immigration and citizenship, with 10 cases. The second largest group is termination of federal employees, with seven.
As of Oct. 6, the Court has fully granted 20 of the Trump administration’s 24 decided emergency applications, or 83%. The Court granted in part and denied in part two applications, denied one application, and denied one other application as moot.
In addition to the decided applications above, two other applications are currently pending before the Court, and two were withdrawn.
Click here to read more about U.S. Supreme Court orders related to the Trump administration.
Ballotpedia's founder and CEO, Leslie Graves, joins On the Ballot to discuss our local election coverage
In the latest installment of On the Ballot's Office Hours series, Ballotpedia's founder and CEO, Leslie Graves, joins host Norm Leahy to discuss our work gathering robust information on the country's more than 500,000 local elected officials.
The two discuss the five main sources we look at to build robust profiles:
- Candidate connection Survey
- Endorsements
- Pledges
- Scorecards
- Campaign themes
They also talked about the challenges Ballotpedia faces in gathering this information for local candidates and the ways we plan to meet these challenges.
To listen to this episode and more, click here. Also, don't forget to subscribe to On the Ballot on YouTube or wherever you get your podcast. To hear more from Leslie, check out this page featuring a full list of her weekly Brew columns.
