Elections

Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota and the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy tied for the top choice to be former President Donald J. Trump’s running mate in a straw poll on Saturday at a prominent gathering of conservative activists.The straw poll, at the Conservative Political Action Conference, was the first time in years that a question about whom Republicans should pick for vice president had overshadowed one about the presidential nominee in the survey of attendees.That was partly because Mr. Trump won the presidential poll, as expected, in a landslide over Nikki Haley, beating her by 94 percent to 5 percent. The last time Mr. Trump was not the top choice for the White House among CPAC attendees was in 2016, when Senator Ted Cruz of Texas finished first.The straw poll, which provides one measure of enthusiasm on the far right and is not intended to be predictive, was announced at the end of the four-day CPAC gathering outside Washington. The attention on the vice-presidential question was notable because Mr. Trump is still fending off a challenge for the Republican presidential nomination by Ms. Haley, the former governor of South Carolina. He has won the party’s first several nominating contests and easily defeated Ms. Haley on Saturday in her home state.Several Republicans viewed as contenders to be Mr. Trump’s running mate gave speeches at the event. They included Representative Byron Donalds of Florida on Thursday; Ms. Noem, Senator J.D. Vance of Ohio and Representative Elise Stefanik of New York on Friday; and Kari Lake, an Arizona Senate candidate, on Saturday. Mr. Ramaswamy spoke on both Friday and Saturday.Ms. Noem and Mr. Ramaswamy each garnered 15 percent of the vote in the straw poll. Former Representative Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who ran for president as a Democrat in 2020 but has since left the party to become an independent, was third with 9 percent, followed by Ms. Stefanik and Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina with 8 percent each.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

A veteran Republican National Committee member has initiated a long-shot effort to prevent Donald J. Trump from taking over the party committee before he has enough delegates to become the presumptive presidential nominee in an effort to prevent the R.N.C. from paying his legal bills.Henry Barbour, a committee member from Mississippi, has sponsored two resolutions, one that would require the committee to remain neutral in the primary and another that would assure it does not spend committee funds to assist Mr. Trump in his legal battles. The proposals, which would not be binding even if passed, come as Mr. Trump seeks to install new leadership in the organization, including Lara Trump, his daughter-in-law, who has said she would be open to the committee paying his legal bills.The resolutions, which were first reported by The Dispatch, have come under fire from the Trump campaign.“The primary is over, and it is the RNC’s sole responsibility to defeat Joe Biden and win back the White House,” said Chris LaCivita, a top Trump adviser who is expected to move into a top role at the R.N.C. “Efforts to delay that assist Joe Biden in the destruction of our nation. Republicans cannot stand on the sidelines and allow this to happen.”The neutrality proposal is directly related to the primary: After the South Carolina primary, only four early states will have held contests. Mr. Trump has a fraction of the delegates he needs, and Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, is still running, although she has yet to win a state.The other resolution has been more in the forefront of some R.N.C. members’ minds: It seeks to bar the committee from paying Mr. Trump’s legal fees as he faces four criminal indictments and two enormous civil lawsuits.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

The conglomerate saw major gains in its insurance operations and in investment income. But revenues at its railroad and utility businesses declined from 2022.Berkshire Hathaway, the conglomerate run for decades by Warren E. Buffett, recorded its highest-ever annual profit last year. But its chief executive found reason to blame government regulation for hurting the results of some of its biggest businesses.In his letter to investors that traditionally accompanies the annual report, Mr. Buffett also paid tribute to Charlie Munger, his longtime lieutenant and Berkshire’s vice chairman until his death in November at age 99.The company — whose divisions include insurance, the BNSF railroad, an expansive power utility, Brooks running shoes, Dairy Queen and See’s candy — disclosed $97.1 billion in net earnings last year, a sharp swing from its $22 billion loss in 2022 because of investment declines.Berkshire also reported $37.4 billion in operating earnings, the financial metric that Mr. Buffett prefers because it excludes paper investment gains and losses, for the year, up 21 percent from 2022. (Investors often see Berkshire as a bellwether of the American economy, given the breadth of its business.)Those gains arose from the powerful engine at the heart of Berkshire, its vast insurance operations that include Geico car insurance and reinsurance. The division reported $5.3 billion in after-tax earnings for 2023, reversing from a loss in the previous year thanks to fewer significant catastrophic events, rate increases and fewer claims at Geico.The business that Berkshire is best known for, stock investments using the enormous cash that the insurance business throws off, also performed well last year. Investment income jumped nearly 48 percent amid rising market valuations. (About 79 percent of the conglomerate’s investment income comes from just five companies: Apple, Bank of America, American Express, Coca-Cola and Chevron.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

The forecasts are anything but optimistic: The best Ukraine can hope for in 2024, many Western officials and analysts say, is to simply hold the line.Only a year ago, Ukraine was brimming with confidence. It had defied expectations, staving off Russia’s attempt to take over the country. Western nations, buoyed by Ukraine’s success, promised aid to help Ukrainians break through Russian lines.But the flow of much-needed weapons from allies into the country was unpredictable, and slow. Ukraine’s own domestic arms production was mired in bureaucracy, top military officials have said. And the command structure of the army was not changing quickly enough to manage a force that had expanded from 200,000 troops to nearly a million in a matter of months.Those weaknesses, and some strategic battlefield missteps, stymied Ukraine’s widely telegraphed counteroffensive, which resulted in only marginal territorial gains. At the same time, Russia was fortifying its defensive lines, converting its economy to war production, conscripting hundreds of thousands of fighters and adjusting its strategy for renewed offensives this winter.Now, as the war enters its third year, leaders in Kyiv are trying to find a new path forward amid ferocious Russian assaults, while facing a series of daunting unknowns.Missiles hit apartments outside Kharkiv this month, killing five civilians.Lynsey Addario for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

At the annual show where the French countryside comes to the capital, President Emmanuel Macron’s efforts to calm a monthlong confrontation were met with anger.France’s farmers vented their fury at President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday as he arrived at the annual agricultural show in Paris, a giant fair long seen as a test of presidents’ relationship with the countryside.A large crowd that had camped outside the night before broke in and scuffled with police officers in riot gear while Mr. Macron entered through a side door to meet with unions demanding an end to hardships in the industry.During an hourlong closed-door meeting before the fair opened, with top cabinet members at Mr. Macron’s side, farmers sang the French national anthem, “La Marseillaise,” at the top of their lungs, blew whistles, raised fists and shouted for the president to resign, as skittish prize cows and pigs brought to the capital from farms around the country looked on nervously from their display pens.The rowdy confrontation was the latest in a monthlong showdown that has seen farmers blockade roads around France and in Paris — a movement that has spread to other countries, including Greece, Poland, Belgium and Germany.At issue are what farmers say are sharply rising costs, unfair competition from imports allowed into Europe from other countries able to produce food more cheaply, and especially European Union regulations intended to contain or reverse climate change.Agriculture accounts for about 30 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and the European Union says drastic change is required. Farmers say European targets are imposing suffocating administrative and financial burdens.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

An overbearing mother; a vanished sister.Haiyun Jiang for The New York TimesDear readers,Every time I lose my bearings — and my soul — in a department store, I wonder: Is this how nonreaders feel at Barnes & Noble?No, I don’t want to try a new fragrance. Yes, I’d like a fitting room, but I don’t understand why the curtain is always one inch short of full privacy. Or why the escalator is too fast/too slow/surrounded by unavoidable mirrors that make me look like Danny DeVito’s mom in “Throw Momma From the Train.” Also, why are they pushing macramé bikini “resort wear” in February?You understand why I do most of my clothes-shopping online.Where I live in New Jersey, it’s so cold and relentlessly gray these days, it’s hard to believe we share a planet with white sand beaches. To this end, I’d like to recommend two sun-splashed books for those of us who are not in the market for a straw visor or a colorful caftan. These novels will make you feel better about bypassing resort wear for what companies, for some reason, insist on calling a “base layer,” but you and I can still think of as long underwear.Warmly,Liz“Here Comes the Sun,” by Nicole Dennis-BennFiction, 2016We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

As voters in South Carolina head to the polls in what is only the fifth nominating contest in the Republican presidential race, former President Donald J. Trump will give a speech on Saturday afternoon near Washington, where he is expected to focus largely on his anticipated general-election contest against President Biden.According to senior campaign officials, Mr. Trump will use his remarks at the Conservative Political Action Conference, known as CPAC, to expand on a vision that he has evoked since 2020: that the United States is destined for a bleak future under President Biden and other Democrats.But while Mr. Trump has largely cast his vision of the United States in dark terms during his third run for office, his CPAC speech will present a brighter vision for the country brought about by a second Trump term, said the officials, who requested anonymity to discuss campaign strategy freely.“If we can break out of this Biden nightmare, we have it in our grasp to make America richer, safer, stronger, prouder and more beautiful than ever before,” Mr. Trump is expected to say, according to prepared remarks shared with The New York Times. “To lift millions from poverty. To give young people hope for the future again. To forge peace out of conflict, strength out of hardship and new industries on the ruins of hollowed-out towns.”Such language is considerably more optimistic than Mr. Trump’s recent rhetoric on the campaign trail, where he has argued that his political opponents are a pernicious “threat from within” determined to destroy foundational American values.Throughout his 2024 bid, Mr. Trump has portrayed the United States under the Biden administration as a nation in steep decline. Much of his stump speech focuses on denouncing Mr. Biden’s policies and insisting that he will halt them full-stop if he wins re-election.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Without much survey data, there’s little information about what issues matter to Asian Americans.This article is also a weekly newsletter. Sign up for Race/Related here.When Dr. Michelle Au ran for State Senate in Georgia in 2020, an experienced political operative told her: “Don’t waste too much time talking to Asian voters. They don’t vote.”That same year in Georgia, turnout among Asian American voters, who as a group rarely receive dedicated attention from politicians, nearly doubled, according to data from Georgia’s secretary of state. Dr. Au, a Democrat, became the first Asian American woman to be elected to the State Senate. Joe Biden became the first Democratic presidential candidate to win the state since Bill Clinton, in 1992.“People really started to realize that there is a large and growing and quite powerful Asian electorate in Georgia, but one that people have, up until now, not been paying attention to at all because of this sensibility that the Asian population is too small to make a difference,” said Dr. Au, who is now serving in the state’s House of Representatives.Dr. Michelle Au at a campaign event in Johns Creek, Ga., in 2022.Lynsey Weatherspoon for The New York TimesPollsters face a population problem when gathering public opinion research on Asian Americans: They are the fastest-growing racial group in the country but still make up a relatively small share of the population, so it is rare for pollsters to reach enough respondents in a typical poll to warrant breaking the group’s responses out as a distinct category. More