Elections

Susan D. Anderson talks about the forgotten history of California’s earliest Black residents.The California African American Museum in Los Angeles.Albert L. Ortega/Getty ImagesBlack residents make up a relatively small share of California’s population. But the state is so big that it’s still a significant number of people: Roughly one in 20 Black Americans lives in the state, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.Since February is Black History Month, I reached out to Susan D. Anderson, the history curator at the California African American Museum in Los Angeles, to learn a bit more about Black history in the state, which stretches back to colonial times.“What I find is that every phase of Black history in California is misunderstood or not well-represented,” Anderson told me. “It doesn’t matter if it’s the 18th century or the 20th century — Black history in California just doesn’t get its due.”Here’s our conversation, lightly edited.Why do you think Black history in California has been overlooked?People assume that because California was a free state, there were no enslaved people and slaveholders didn’t bring enslaved people into the state. So there’s just assumptions that are wrong.But the other piece of it is that academic historians still haven’t really shifted their attention to the West as deeply or as broadly as they have paid attention to things like the 13 colonies or the South. If the West is an underdog in our historical understanding, then certainly Black history in the West, and in California, has been overlooked for a long time.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

Reunited with her son after half a century, a reader feels slighted by her seat at a family wedding, where her son’s wife had already made her feel less than welcome.I am a birth mother whose son found me seven years ago, when I was 70 and he was 49. I gave him up for adoption as an infant; his adoptive mother is deceased. He called me Mom from Day 1, and we felt an immediate heart connection. It has been a roller coaster of intense emotions. Unfortunately, his wife wrote me a letter saying she does not recognize me as his mother and wants nothing to do with me. Still, my son and I have developed a loving relationship over texts and phone calls. (We live 3,000 miles apart.) So, I was thrilled to be invited to his stepson’s wedding — though also nervous, given his wife’s letter. My son assured me I would be seated with his siblings, but I was placed at a distant table with his friend. I was also excluded from a family outing and the photos posted on Facebook. It felt like a punch to the heart. But my son doesn’t acknowledge any responsibility for my hurt. Did he gaslight me?BIRTH MOMI feel compassion for you and your birth son as you try to navigate a delicate reunion across 3,000 miles and five decades. I have no doubt that this wedding episode was painful for you (and possibly for him, too, if he had to haggle with his disapproving wife over your place at her son’s wedding). Still, I suspect that seating is not the central issue here.From my vantage — at a safe distance from the emotional roller coaster, as you call it — I see productive takeaways for both of you: Work on your relationship one on one, for now, and avoid engaging with people in each other’s lives who don’t support your reunion. I can’t imagine why his wife has taken such an unkind position toward you, but she has, and she is a major figure in his life.Adoption often brings up powerful feelings of abandonment and guilt. It may be helpful to arrange for some therapy for you and your son on video calls. I don’t minimize the “heart connection” you feel, but there may be other strong emotions at play, too. You should air all of them in the safety of your private relationship — or with the help of a counselor, if you like the idea.Miguel PorlanFuming That Her Treat Was Not Their TreatToday, my sister-in-law sent me a Venmo request for $19.18 for frozen yogurt that she and my brother offered to pick up for us when they picked up their own orders. They are wealthy, with expensive habits like designer sneakers, and they never offer to pay for anything when they come home because our parents are so generous. My partner and I routinely buy them presents when we visit them. This year, they didn’t even thank us for our holiday gifts. Am I unreasonable for being incensed about this Venmo request?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 year after the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, investors are fearing for regional lenders saddled with a mountain of souring commercial mortgages.Concerns about New York Community Bancorp deepened on Wednesday after the lender was hit by a credit downgrade, and its stock fell further.Bing Guan/BloombergBanking crisis déjà vu? The sell-off in regional bank stocks looks set to worsen on Wednesday, after Moody’s cut New York Community Bancorp’s credit rating to junk status.Fears are now rising among investors over the United States’ distressed commercial real estate sector. This comes as a crucial lifeline created during last year’s banking crisis is set to expire.N.Y.C.B.’s shares plunged as much as 15 percent in premarket trading after the downgrade, before rebounding. The stock has plummeted roughly 60 percent in the past week after the lender reported dismal results, especially stemming from its exposure to souring commercial real estate loans.Last year, N.Y.C.B. won the bidding for assets tied to Signature Bank, which failed shortly after the demise of Silicon Valley Bank. That pushed its assets above $100 billion, putting it into a new regulatory category, and subjecting it to more stringent capital requirements.Bank jitters are spreading. The KBW Nasdaq Regional Banking Index, a collection of midsize bank stocks, has fallen nearly 12 percent in the past week as investors worry about lenders’ exposure to commercial real estate loan portfolios.Plunging office occupancy rates and high interest rates are a big reason. The shift in working practices after the height of the coronavirus pandemic has roiled the commercial real estate market and lenders could face a “maturity wall” of as much as $1.5 trillion in commercial real estate loans set to come this year and next. (U.S. regional banks provide the bulk of such loans, putting them at particular risk.)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 US supreme court will hear oral argument on Thursday in one of the most high-stakes cases in American politics this century, thrusting a beleaguered court to the center of the 2024 election.The court is considering whether Donald Trump is eligible to run for president. The novel legal question at the heart of the case, Donald J Trump v Norma Anderson et al, is whether the 14th amendment to the constitution prohibits Trump from holding office because of his conduct on 6 January 2021. Section 3 of the amendment says that any member of Congress or officer of the United States who takes an oath to protect the constitution and then subsequently engages in insurrection cannot hold office. That ban, the amendment says, can only be overridden by a two-thirds vote of each house of Congress.There is no precedent for the case. The 14th amendment, enacted after the civil war, has never been used to challenge the eligibility of a presidential candidate, but the idea began picking up steam after two conservative legal scholars published a 126-page law review article last summer arguing the amendment clearly disqualified Trump.A group of Colorado voters sued under the law last year, relying on the theory to try to disqualify Trump from the ballot. After a five-day trial, a Colorado district court judge said Trump had committed insurrection, but was not disqualified because he was not an officer of the United States. The Colorado supreme court reversed that ruling in December, removing Trump from the ballot in a 4-3 decision. While lawsuits have been filed in dozens of other states seeking to remove Trump from the ballot, only Colorado and Maine have done so thus far.The justices accepted a request from Trump to hear the case and expedited its review because of Colorado’s fast approaching 5 March primary. The compressed schedule and likely quick turnaround of the case means that oral argument – currently set for 80 minutes on Thursday – could offer an unusual level of insight into how the justices are weighing the arguments.“I feel more at sea than I usually do,” said Richard Hasen, an election law professor at the University of California Los Angeles, who co-authored an amicus brief urging the court to rule definitively on the case now. “There are a million ways the court can go. The court has given no signal, at all, as to which of those directions it wants to go in. And so, more than usual, I’m going to be very closely listening to the oral arguments to see which arguments are resonating with which justices.”The case also arrives at a perilous moment for the court itself. Public confidence in the court has been declining, exacerbated by a series of ethics scandals and controversial decisions that came down along ideological lines. The court is essentially now seen as a political body and as a result, the betting money seems to be that they will find a way to keep him on the ballot. Trump appointed three of the six justices in the supermajority on the body.“I don’t think it wants to be involved in these disputes. I think, on a bipartisan basis, there’s an interest on staying as far away from these issues as possible,” said Derek Muller, a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, who wrote an amicus brief in the case that wasn’t in support of either party.Trump’s lawyers offer five reasons to the court for why he should not be disqualified from the ballot. First, they argue that the word “officer” in the 14th amendment does not apply to the presidency. His lawyers also argue that his conduct on 6 January did not amount to insurrection and that the 14th amendment cannot be enforced absent implementing legislation from Congress. Last, they say, the Colorado supreme court cannot invent its own criteria for running for president nor can it interfere with the method the legislature has chosen for selecting presidential electors.The idea that the president isn’t an officer is nonsensical, lawyers for the six Colorado voters – four Republicans and two independents – who filed the case wrote in their own brief. “Section 3 does not give a free pass to insurrectionist former Presidents. The Constitution says the Presidency is a federal ‘office’. The natural meaning of ‘officer of the United States’ is anyone who holds a federal ‘office’,” they write.Trump’s arguments to the court essentially amount to the idea that “somehow there’s a Donald Trump specific loophole”, said Donald Sherman, a lawyer with Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which represents the Colorado voters.“Donald Trump’s arguments are not about January 6. They’re not about the fundamental goal of Reconstruction, the Reconstruction amendments, or the 14th amendment. Or section 3. They’re basically about creating an exception that allows Donald Trump to wriggle out of accountability.”They also point out that Trump’s conduct on 6 January would have clearly been understood to amount to insurrection by the framers of the 14th amendment. “The original public meaning of “engag[ing] in” insurrection extends to those who organize and incite it,” they wrote.The brief also notes that the federal constitution gives states the power to only allow candidates who are qualified to appear on the ballot – no federal legislation is necessary to enforce that.“The more I spend time on this case, the harder it seems for Trump,” Muller said. “I don’t think the court is interested in one-offs. The notion that the Colorado supreme court got Colorado law wrong is not gonna interest the court.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe challengers in the case have been bolstered by amicus briefs from historians who argue that the public would have understood the 14th amendment to apply to the president and to cover the kind of conduct Trump engaged in. Those kinds of arguments could hold sway with the court’s conservative justices who are professed adherents of originalism – understanding the constitution through its original public meaning.Hasen predicted the court would try to resolve the case without addressing of whether Trump engaged in insurrection – the most politically charged issue in the case.“I was thinking what are ways the court can side with Trump without weighing in on the merits of whether he committed insurrection,” he said. “One of them is Congress has to pass a statute [to enforce the disqualification provision]. If I had to lay down money on how Trump would win if he wins, I guess I’d put a few dollars down on that, but I’m not betting the farm.”A ruling upholding the Colorado supreme court’s decision would not mean that Trump would be automatically kicked off the ballot in every US state. Instead, each state would probably have to have its own legal proceedings to determine whether or not he should appear. Some states have already rejected such efforts ahead of the primary, setting up a potentially confusing and chaotic legal sprint to the general election.“I think people think if they say he’s ineligible it’s gonna end it, but it’s not,” Muller said. “It would be a state-by-state basis in the primary. He could still win the primary so there’s this whole separate layer of what the RNC would do at a convention if its candidate would be kept off the ballot in some states.”At the core of the case are two competing ideas of democracy. Trump and his attorneys argue that any effort to kick him off the ballot would be anti-democratic since it would prevent voters from choosing their preferred candidate for the presidency.“The court should put a swift and decisive end to these ballot-disqualification efforts, which threaten to disenfranchise tens of millions of Americans and which promise to unleash chaos and bedlam if other state courts and state officials follow Colorado’s lead and exclude the likely Republican presidential nominee from their ballots,” Trump’s lawyers wrote.The challengers and their supporters argue that protecting democracy requires banning those who attempt to subvert democracy from holding higher office. “Our democracy is not a chaotic free-for-all in which anyone can be elected. The voters are entitled to decide within the framework of the applicable rules,” the good government group Common Cause wrote in an amicus brief supporting the challengers.“If Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment (“Section 3”) is not enforced in this case, there is a genuine risk that our system of government will not survive,” they wrote. More

The chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel, has told former President Donald J. Trump she is planning to step down shortly after the South Carolina primary on Feb. 24, according to two people familiar with the plans.Mr. Trump is then likely to promote the chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party, Michael Whatley, as her replacement, according to several people familiar with the discussions. Under the arcana of the committee’s rules, however, Mr. Trump cannot simply install someone. A new election must take place, and Mr. Whatley could face internal party dissent.Ms. McDaniel has faced months of pressure, a campaign from Trump-allied forces to unseat her and growing dissatisfaction and anxiety in the Trump camp about the strained finances of the R.N.C. as the general election cycle begins early.Mr. Trump likes Mr. Whatley for one overwhelming reason, according to people who have discussed him with the former president: He is “a stop the steal guy,” as one of the people described him. He endorses Mr. Trump’s false claims about mass voter fraud and Mr. Trump believes he did a good job delivering North Carolina, a 2020 swing state, to him.Mr. Whatley has baselessly claimed that election security efforts from Republicans in North Carolina stopped Democrats from cheating. He is also currently the general counsel at the Republican National Committee and has endorsed efforts to develop new voting laws.Mr. Trump and his associates have made focusing on election security a signature point they plan to push in a general election. There has been no evidence of widespread fraud related to the 2020 voting, and Mr. Trump’s allies lost dozens of court challenges. Mr. Trump has told associates that he thinks the R.N.C. needs to spend more money on “election integrity” in the 2024 race. Mr. Trump’s team is also focused on hiring teams of poll watchers, which the North Carolina G.O.P. did during the midterms in 2022.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

Make some noise for Daniel Mauer’s musical crossword.Jump to: Today’s Theme | Tricky CluesWEDNESDAY PUZZLE — If you have only recently begun solving the New York Times Crossword and reading the accompanying Wordplay column, you may be flummoxed by some of the terms that get tossed around here. Why is everyone always bringing up emus, for example? (It’s an apocryphal reference to our comment moderators.) And what the heck are veiled capitals? (They are hidden proper nouns in clues; read more about them in our solver’s guide.)One bit of crossword slang I’m still getting used to myself is the “revealer,” which is a clue that cracks the rest of the theme by pointing out its pattern. Some themed puzzles have them, while others — like today’s grid, constructed by Daniel Mauer — leave us to discover the pattern for ourselves.Shall we cross the threshold of revelation together?Today’s ThemeThe entries at 18-, 28-, 47- and 64-Across make up today’s theme set, and all of them deal in “refrain(s)” of hit songs. But repetition concerns more than just the choral hook. In the case of these particular songs, it comes down to the syllables themselves.What’s the “Refrain in a 1971 hit by David Bowie” (28A), for example? It’s CH-CH-CH-CH-CHANGES, as written. (Yes, he drops one CH- in the second line of the chorus.) And the “Refrain in a 1965 hit by the Who” might have come easily to you as MY G-G-G-GENERATION — depending on your generation, indeed.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 guilty verdict in Michigan against the mother of a school shooter will reverberate in prosecutors’ offices around the country. But don’t expect a flood of similar cases, experts say.The guilty verdict on Tuesday against the mother of a Michigan teenager who murdered four students in 2021 in the state’s deadliest school shooting is likely to ripple across the country’s legal landscape as prosecutors find themselves weighing a new way to seek justice in mass shootings.But, legal experts say, don’t expect a rush of similar cases.“I have heard many people say they think a guilty verdict in this case will open the floodgates to these kinds of prosecutions going forward,” said Eve Brensike Primus, a law professor at the University of Michigan. “To be honest, I’m not convinced that’s true.”That’s because prosecutors in Michigan had notably compelling evidence against the mother, Jennifer Crumbley — including text messages and the accounts of a meeting with school officials just hours before the shooting at Oxford High School on Nov. 30, 2021 — that jurors felt proved she should have known the mental state of her son, Ethan Crumbley, who was 15 at the time.Ethan pleaded guilty in 2022 and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Ms. Crumbley was convicted on four counts of involuntary manslaughter, one for each student her son killed. She faces a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison, and sentencing is scheduled for April 9.Ms. Crumbley’s husband, James Crumbley, 47, will be tried separately in March.“Could more prosecutors file charges emboldened by this kind of ruling and the verdict?” Professor Primus said. “Sure. Do I think they will be successful around the country getting charges to stick if they don’t have the requisite facts that can demonstrate real knowledge? No.”Still, Professor Primus and other legal experts who have followed the case say the successful prosecution of Ms. Crumbley, 45, provides a template for prosecutors around the country to pursue similar cases.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 worker fell from a catwalk at Radford Studios early Tuesday, officials said.A crew member working on the set of Marvel Studios’ “Wonder Man” TV series at Radford Studios in Los Angeles died on Tuesday after falling from a catwalk, officials said.The man who died worked as a rigger, Deadline reported, and he died on set. A Marvel spokesperson confirmed those details in a statement, adding that “our thoughts and deepest condolences are with his family and friends, and our support is behind the investigation into the circumstances of this accident.”Members of the Los Angeles Police Department responded to Radford Street for a death investigation at about 6:55 a.m., said Officer Tony Im, a police spokesman.The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees said in a statement posted on social media that the organization was “shocked and deeply saddened by this tragic loss.”“We are working to support our member’s family and his fellow members and colleagues,” the union said.“Wonder Man,” a Disney+ series that is set to star Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, was not filming at the time of the incident. More