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Rep. Maxine Waters fears what's going on in Portland could be a sign of trouble to come in November ... IF President Trump loses the election, and refuses to give up power.

The Congresswoman, who was on Capitol Hill, was super concerned over AG William Barr's testimony, in which he supported the aggressive federal response to the protests.

Even more ominous than Barr ... Trump refusing to say he'd accept the results of the election, win or lose, and even more ominous ... whether he'd hand over the reigns of power.

Rep. Waters makes it clear ... she's worried her fears could become a reality, especially since neither Trump nor Barr will squarely say the President will accept the election results.

Waters says there's evidence Trump won't go willingly if he loses ... as she puts it, he's a wanna-be dictator whose methods follow a long line of dictators. And, she thinks the federal presence in Portland may be a dry run for things to come in November.

Kanye West's bid to appear in the NJ ballot for president is full steam ahead ... TMZ's learned he's filed the necessary paperwork to do just that.

We've learned Ye submitted petitions Monday with 1,327 signatures in his quest for a presidential run. In the Garden State, the requirement for Independent candidates to file for president is 800 signatures. Ye clearly surpassed that ... but from now until July 31 at 5 PM, there's an objection period where someone can challenge the validity of individual signatures submitted. If there are no objections, Kanye gets a place on the ballot.

This, of course, all sounds too familiar. TMZ broke the story ... he's facing a huge hurdle in his home state of Illinois after several objections over the validity of signatures gathered to get on that state's ballot. As we reported ... one of the objectors says he reviewed roughly 3,200 signatures but claims to have found less than 1,000 valid signatures in Kanye's docs. A hearing is set for next week on that issue.

As we've reported ... Kanye's already submitted paperwork to get on the ballot in Illinois, Missouri and Oklahoma.

Kanye West's bid to get on the Illinois ballot for President has just hit a bump in the road -- as in, serious objections about the petition signatures he's submitted.

TMZ's learned there have been 3 objections filed with the Illinois Board of Elections ... which means it will now evaluate the validity of the signatures on his petition, and then hold a special meeting to decide whether Kanye's name gets printed on the state's ballots.

Here's how it works ... officials tell us anyone can request to take a closer look at Kanye's 412 petition papers he submitted last week and every single signature can be objected to for various reasons -- including possible duplicates and/or use of fake names.

As for the objectors themselves ... we spoke to one, Sean Tenner, who says after reviewing roughly 3,200 signatures, he claims to have found less than 1,000 valid signatures in Kanye's docs. Sean believes the rest are invalid, but wouldn't specifically say why.

BTW, Kanye needs 2,500 valid signatures to remain on the state's presidential ballot.

Sean says he was motivated to investigate the petition signatures because he was fuming after Kanye's controversial Harriet Tubman comments.

We're told the board will now hold the special board meeting next week, and assign an officer to review evidence and decide Ye's fate on his home state's ballot.

LeAnn Rimes says people shouldn't have to choose between risking COVID-19 exposure or not taking care of their teeth ... and she's ripping a proposed dental care law as "unfair."

The singer fired off a letter, obtained by TMZ, informing California State Senator Steve Glazer why she strongly opposes a bill known as the Dental Practice Act -- which would require patients to get an oral x-ray before using telehealth. For example, if patients want direct-to-consumer services -- like teeth whitening or aligners -- they would first need an x-ray.

LeAnn says the bill would unfairly block dental health access to low-income families, particularly those in Black and Latino communities where it's harder to find a local dentist.

Kerry Washington opposes the bill too, and her letter to Glazer helped get the bill amended to remove the in-person visit requirement ... but LeAnn points out that's just been replaced by the requirement for an oral x-ray, which still forces folks to go into a dentist office.

LeAnn says people shouldn't be forced to go into their dentist's office for an x-ray and risk potential exposure to COVID-19, and she fears the bill could spur some families to forgo dental care altogether.

John Lewis is a much bigger man than President Trump ... so says U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson.

We got the powerful congressman Monday on Capitol Hill after a ceremony for the late civil rights icon, and our camera guy asked if John would even want the Prez to pay tribute at the Capitol Rotunda, where Lewis is laying in state.

Johnson tells us John would welcome Trump if he chose to come by and pay respects -- POTUS said "I won't be going." Johnson says Lewis would still pray for 45.

Congressman Lewis died earlier this month at 80 after battling pancreatic cancer, which never slowed him down.

Vice President Mike Pence and second lady Karen Pence are set to visit Lewis' casket in the Rotunda in Trump's stead.

John's still being remembered by folks all over the country ... and U.S. reps Stacey Plaskett and Dwight Evans are reminding people to remember Lewis' famous words and to get in some good trouble. And finally, Stacy noted John just couldn't stand still when he heard the song "Happy!"

Kanye West is scratching and clawing to keep himself viable for the presidential race, 'cause he just made another last-ditch effort to get on another ballot ... this time in Missouri.

The rep for the Secretary of State there says Ye's camp submitted signatures before the 5 PM deadline Monday -- just in time to be considered for an appearance on the November 3 election. Whether he has enough legit signatures to make the cut though ... still TBD.

Missouri election officials still gotta tally 'em up -- he needs 10,000 signatures from registered voters in the state.

Of course, he just squeaked onto the ballot in his home state of Illinois last week -- something that cost him a pretty penny to do ... upwards of $30k, as we first reported.

Remember, he missed the deadline in South Carolina about a week or so ago -- this after his off-the-rails campaign rally down there, which left him in tears ... and eventually on a Twitter tirade aimed at his family. Ye didn't bother submitting any signatures that time around.

Senator Tom Cotton has just out-Trumped Trump, calling slavery "a necessary evil" that allowed America to develop, and he wants to retaliate against schools that teach the real history of slavery.

The Republican Senator from Arkansas put it this way ... “As the Founding Fathers said, it was the necessary evil upon which the union was built, but the union was built in a way, as Lincoln said, to put slavery on the course to its ultimate extinction."

So, in essence, what he's saying is that slavery was needed because it served a purpose but the plan was to eventually end it.

It gets even more outrageous. Cotton wants to withhold federal funds from public schools that promote an initiative by the New York Times called the 1619 Project. It was established in 2019 to mark the 400th anniversary of enslaved Africans coming to America. The point of the project is to tell the real story of slavery and the contributions of African Americans ... something public schools don't do at all.

Cotton says he rejects the notion systemic racism in America is engrained in America from the beginning to the present ... something that otherwise seems firmly established.

The final goodbye to John Lewis, the civil rights icon who helped change America, just took an emotional turn as his casket was taken over the Edmund Pettus Bridge.

After a short memorial outside the Brown Chapel AME Church in Selma, the processional traversed downtown Selma and then reached the famed bridge, where 25-year-old Lewis and others were championing voting rights back in 1965. They were brutalized by cops and Lewis sustained serious injuries, including a fractured skull.

Lewis frequently returned to the bridge, marking each anniversary of the confrontation.

Lewis said later in his life, "I gave a little blood on that bridge. I thought I was going to die.  I thought I saw death."

The bridge has become a symbol of the civil rights movement. President Obama marched on the bridge at the 50th anniversary of the brutality.

The crossing is part of a memorial spanning 5 cities that mark the life of the man his colleagues called the conscience of the Congress. The tributes began in Troy, Alabama Saturday, where Lewis was born.

Kanye West's last-ditch effort to make the presidential ballot in his home state worked ... but it cost him a nice chunk of change.

Sources with direct knowledge tell TMZ ... Kanye's campaign team hired a third-party vendor called Let The Voters Decide to collect the 2,500 signatures to make the ballot in Illinois.

Thing is ... Kanye did it with only a little more than a day to spare ... before the 5 PM Monday deadline.

We're told the group got to work right away, deploying 45 people who hit the streets in various parts of the state and racked up enough signatures ... all in 24 hours.

Our sources say they were paid handsomely for their efforts ... Kanye dished out $10-12 per signature, and they produced 3,178 signatures. Do the math -- well over $30k.

One of the signature collectors, Kenny Mister, tells us he got hit up Sunday to petition for Kanye. He says he was in Detroit, but dropped everything to get to Springfield, IL by Monday, worked for 3 hours ... and got 56 signatures at 10 bucks a pop.

Kenny says he went door to door, asking folks if they'd support Kanye getting on the ballot, but adding it didn't mean they had to vote for him.

BTW, if you're wondering if $10 per signature is a lot ... it is. Rickey Hendon -- a former Illinois State Senator who now works as a campaign consultant -- tells us the standard rate is closer to $1-3 per signature.

Rickey also says Kanye's team reached out to him a couple days before Let the Voters Decide ... but he declined.

It all might be a moot point ... Kanye missed the deadline to file in other states, and he seems like he's focused on other matters at the moment anyway ... many other matters.

One of the final goodbyes to Rep. John Lewis -- one of the great civil rights icons in American history -- just wrapped up in Selma, Alabama ... and it was incredibly powerful to watch.

The Celebration of Life ceremony Saturday evening -- which went down the historic Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church -- was the second of several that are taking place this weekend and next week. The 'Selma Salutes Congressman John Lewis' memorial helped kick off a 6-day, 5 city tribute, began in Troy, Alabama, the city where Lewis was born in 1940 to parents who worked on a cotton farm.

The service featured several different speakers -- including local and state elected officials, as well as fellow marchers who stood with John Lewis and others during the Bloody Sunday march  1965, and they all had remarkable things to say about the late Civil Rights leader.

Lewis was right there with Martin Luther King, Jr., marching, protesting and getting brutalized by cops ... sometimes so horribly he could have died. But, a cracked skull would not stop Lewis, who sometimes smiled when his mug shot was taken after being arrested ... saying he smiled because he knew he was on the right side of history.

Speaking of MLK Jr., his son -- Martin Luther King III -- gave one of the more powerful eulogies of the night ... as he reminisced on what John stood for, and how he truly lived his own father's legacy through action and civil service. MLK III also stressed the need to vote and to end voter suppression -- something Rep. Lewis long fought for in his career.

After the ceremony, his body was set to lie in repose for some hours for the public.

Other ceremonies happening this weekend and early next week include some in Montgomery, Washington, D.C., and Atlanta.

Lewis died earlier this month from pancreatic cancer. He fought the disease for 7 months but never slowed down. The man served Georgia's 5th Congressional District for 17 terms. He was often referred to as the "conscience of the Congress."

Once again ... rest in peace to an American hero.

Kerry Washington says access to online dental care should be a basic human right ... which is why she's going to bat for minorities by lobbying California officials.

The actress fired off a letter, obtained by TMZ, telling California State Senator Steve Glazer why she opposes a bill known as the Dental Practice Act -- which would require dentists to conduct in-person visits with patients before using telehealth. For example, if someone wants direct-to-consumer services -- like aligners or teeth whitening -- they would first need an in-person trip to the dentist.

Kerry says the bill would adversely affect minority groups that often don't have access to healthcare, especially dental care. Kerry said, "I believe strongly that all communities and especially those that have been historically marginalized, deserve access to quality and affordable health care — and in this case dental care — for themselves and for their children. This is a basic human right.”

BTW ... Kerry's partnering with the company, Byte ... a teledentistry and orthodontics company. She says, "Companies like Byte expand access to teledentistry and offer the opportunity for all groups, especially low income, Black and Latino communities, to receive the dental and orthodontic care they need and deserve."

NBA star Draymond Green and LeAnn Rimes have also opposed the bill. California NAACP Prez Alice Huffman, says, "Now, more than ever, the African American community needs as many options as possible to close the disparity gap for oral health care. African Americans and other people of color have the right to affordable, quality health care treatment."

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez just ripped into a colleague who allegedly called her a "f***ing b*tch" after a heated debate over a crime bill, saying she is someone's daughter and by not squarely apologizing, he is not a decent man.

AOC took to the House floor Thursday with an impassioned speech on the impact the words of Rep. Ted Yoho (R-Florida) had on her, her family and other women.

The congresswoman choked up when she said she's glad her dad, who is not alive, did not hear Yoho's comments. But, she says, her mom did, and what Yoho said cuts to the core.

Yoho offered an apology -- of sorts -- Wednesday, saying he regretted "the abrupt manner of the conversation," but never apologized for the words attributed to him by others. He had earlier denied saying it, but some people on the floor say they heard it, loud and clear.

AOC offered this ... everyone says things they regret from time to time, but when the words go beyond decency, a decent person apologizes, and Yoho did not.

She also took issue with Yoho's comment that he has 2 daughters. AOC said she's someone's daughter too, although Yoho didn't seem to care.

Kanye West has the proverbial snowball's chance in hell to win the 2020 Presidential election  -- but still, it never hurts to be prepared ... which is why Madame Tussauds already has a presidential bust of the guy.

The famous wax museum has a tradition of making clay head sculptures of our nation's leaders -- they made one for Donald Trump 4 years ago before he won the presidency -- and now they made one for Mr. West.

Hey, you never know -- better to have it on deck and ready to go if the ultimate upset goes down. We've seen it happen before.

Now, bear in mind the sculptures are not the full, colored-in wax statues you might see at any one of its museums around the world. These are different -- we're told they actually place the presidential heads in an Oval Office exhibit.

Here's another thing -- our sources say MT and co. have only done a head-to-head presidential "face-off," if you will, one other time ... and that was for Hillary Clinton and DT. Now, they're running it back -- but oddly enough, they opted for Ye before sculpting Joe Biden.

It's true ... we're told Madame Tussauds' team has not yet completed the Biden bust, but they say should he win, they'll knock it out.

Just goes to show where people's heads are at these days 🤷🏽‍♂️