Elections

The former president’s appetite for attention has been fundamental to his identity for decades. Where others may focus on the hazards of a criminal case, he raises money, promotes his campaign and works to reduce the case to a cliffhanging spectacle.WASHINGTON — Since long before he entered the White House, former President Donald J. Trump has been an any-publicity-is-good-publicity kind of guy. In fact, he once told advisers, “There’s no bad press unless you’re a pedophile.” Hush money for a porn star? Evidently not an exception to that rule.And so, while no one wants to be indicted, Mr. Trump in one sense finds himself exactly where he loves to be — in the center ring of the circus, with all the spotlights on him. He has spent the days since a grand jury called him a potential criminal milking the moment for all it’s worth, savoring the attention as no one else in modern American politics would.He has blitzed out one fund-raising email after another with the kind of headlines other politicians would dread, like “BREAKING: PRESIDENT TRUMP INDICTED” and “RUMORED DETAILS OF MY ARREST” and “Yes I’ve been indicted, BUT” — the “but” being but you can still give him money. And when it turned out that they did give him money, a total of $4 million by his campaign’s count in the 24 hours following his indictment, he trumpeted that as loudly as he could too.Rather than hide from the indignity of turning himself into authorities this week, Mr. Trump obligingly sent out a schedule as if for a campaign tour, letting everyone know he would fly on Monday from Florida to New York, then on Tuesday surrender for mug shots, fingerprinting and arraignment. In case that were not enough to draw the eye, he plans to then fly back to Florida to make a prime-time evening statement at Mar-a-Lago, surrounded by the cameras and microphones he covets.Secret Service Agents stand outside of Mar-a-Lago last week. Donald Trump will fly on Monday from Florida to New York.Josh Ritchie for The New York TimesNever mind that any defense attorney worth the law degree would prefer he keep quiet; no one who knows Mr. Trump could reasonably expect that. He has already trashed the prosecutor (“degenerate psychopath”) and the judge in the case (“HATES ME”) and absent a court-issued gag order surely will continue to. His public comments could ultimately be used against him in a court of law, but to him that hardly seems like a reason to stay silent.“The trick, of course, is to take up all the air — demand all the attention, all the time, make everything, including his own indictment, into an opportunistic moment,” said Gwenda Blair, author of “The Trumps,” the definitive multigenerational biography of the former president’s family. So far, she added, he has done so “by combining exaggerated hyperbole with a claim to ultimate patriotism and religious zeal — quite the ultimate power package.”By treating the case as a spectacle, rather than a serious issue, he may discredit it, at least in the eyes of his own supporters. Rather than hang his head in shame, as many facing the possibility of prison might, he frames it as just another Trumpian drama in a life filled with them, the latest reality show cliffhanger — will he get off or will his enemies get him?But the ratings-obsessed star’s need for the limelight invariably will draw it away from other issues of major import. The United States is in the middle of a nuclear-edged clash with Russia in Ukraine and Moscow has just arrested an American reporter, provoking another hostage crisis. Taiwan’s president is visiting the United States at a moment of bristling tension with Beijing. Just Friday, America’s top general warned of the increasing convergence of a hostile Chinese-Russian-Iranian axis.The indictment comes “at the exact moment when our military and economic power is being profoundly challenged by our adversaries,” said Heather A. Conley, president of the German Marshall Fund of the United States, a Washington-based organization focused on trans-Atlantic relations. “From a national security perspective, we need to keep our eye on the ball. But unfortunately, our gaze on Tuesday will be on our own domestic turmoil.”For President Biden, who has assiduously avoided commenting on Mr. Trump’s legal travails, the first criminal prosecution of a former commander in chief will surely make it that much harder to generate interest in his dutiful speeches promoting the latest bridge project or other achievements he hopes to tout as he prepares to kick off a re-election campaign.In today’s sizzle-saturated media environment, White House officials understand perfectly well that an incumbent president doing his job can hardly compete for attention with a former president possibly doing time. Instead, they hope the electorate appreciates a leader who ignores the Sturm und Drang to focus on matters like the economy, health care and national security.Gerald Ford reading a proclamation granting former president Richard Nixon “a full, free and absolute pardon” for all “offenses against the United States” during the period of his presidency.Associated PressIn some ways, Mr. Biden faces the challenge that President Gerald R. Ford did when he decided to pardon his predecessor, Richard M. Nixon, in the Watergate scandal. One of Mr. Ford’s advisers asked the Watergate prosecutor how long it would take to bring Mr. Nixon to trial if he were indicted and was told as long as a year. To Mr. Ford, it seemed too costly to have the country absorbed by a former president in the dock for so long.But those were different times and different presidents. Mr. Nixon had resigned in disgrace, his party had abandoned him and he grudgingly offered a measure of contrition when pardoned, even if not nearly enough for many. There was a sense of a chapter closing. Mr. Trump feels anything but contrite and, instead of sliding into exile, is mounting a comeback campaign with the support of many in his party..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.Mr. Biden vowed long ago not to pardon Mr. Trump and could not do so anyway in a state case like the one in New York or the election case being investigated in Georgia; moreover, it remains unthinkable at this point that he would entertain the notion in the two federal inquiries still underway.While Mr. Ford sought national healing and Mr. Nixon effectively accepted the point, Mr. Trump feeds division. Richard N. Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, said the danger now is a “partisan overhang” that makes it even more difficult for the parties to come together on important issues like raising the debt ceiling.“Things were already extremely partisan and polarized, particularly with the House, and I think this just exacerbates it and everything now will take on even more of a tinge,” he said. “It might increase the odds that House committees go after the president and his family or other members of his administration.”It is possible, of course, that America has seen so much Trump dramaturgy over the years that this has become the new normal and it may not upend the political system as much as might be expected. So far, at least, the indictment has not resulted in the sort of mass demonstrations Mr. Trump seemed to be calling for.If there is no other indictment, and this case devolves into the usual series of motions and hearings and other preliminary skirmishes, it may not be as captivating until a trial actually opens, which could be months away. And if that is the case, some of Washington’s old hands say, Mr. Biden and Congress could still focus on the business at hand.“As much as Trump and his team are going to try and make everything all about him, I believe that there is still enough of a governing coalition on the Hill that members will manage to get at least the bare necessities done,” said Jim Manley, a former senior adviser to Senate Democrats.“While the Trump sycophants in the House are going to make a lot of noise and throw up a lot of smoke,” he added, “I don’t foresee Congress blowing past the debt limit, for instance, because of Trump-caused chaos post indictment.”Mr. Trump’s appetite for attention has been fundamental to his identity for decades. As a celebrity developer, he happily played out his marital issues and affairs in the New York tabloids; his 1990 split with his first wife Ivana made the front page 11 days in a row. He loved making cameo appearances in movies and television shows from “Sex and the City” to “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.” He slapped his name on everything from hotels, golf courses and towers to steaks, bottled water and neckties.As president, he appeared on camera far more often than his predecessors, rarely missing an opportunity to make the story of the day about himself. During his first Senate impeachment trial, for abuse of power by pressuring Ukraine’s government to investigate Mr. Biden, Mr. Trump suggested he would show up on the Senate floor to make his case himself, to the horror of lawyers who managed to talk him out of it.When the Covid-19 pandemic hit, Mr. Trump eagerly conducted daily news briefings for nearly two months, dispensing misinformation and stoking divisions, to the horror of doctors and allies who only belatedly talked him into stopping. Nonetheless, he boasted about the size of the audience he was drawing as Americans were dying by the hundreds of thousands. When he himself got Covid and then recovered, he toyed with the idea of ripping off his shirt to reveal a Superman T-shirt to demonstrate his virility.Donald Trump answering questions in a coronavirus briefing at the White House in April 2020.Anna Moneymaker/The New York Times“The most unique thing about the former president is that he values the image surrounding an event more than its tangible quality,” said Michael D’Antonio, another Trump biographer. “The moment will pass, but the article, videotape, photo, or book will remain. That’s what he’ll care about more — unless of course he goes to prison.”But Barbara A. Res, who worked for Mr. Trump for 18 years as an executive at his development company and later broke with him, does not think Mr. Trump expects to be found guilty. “He’s incapable of believing that he’s wrong,” she said. And she doubted he would comply even with a gag order.“To be honest, nobody tells Donald what to do. Really,” Ms. Res said. A judge, she said, may hesitate to enforce a contempt of court order. “Even people that hate Trump or dislike Trump would probably think it was not a good idea to put him in jail for contempt of a gag order,” she said. And so, she concluded, “He will not shut up.” More

Prime Minister Sanna Marin’s party was outpolled by a rival that stressed economic concerns. Petteri Orpo of the National Coalition Party may now come to power, but coalition talks will be daunting.BRUSSELS — Prime Minister Sanna Marin and her Social Democratic Party lost a tight election in Finland on Sunday to a center-right party that focused on economic concerns.The National Coalition Party, led by Petteri Orpo, 53, captured the most votes in the parliamentary election, followed by the right-wing Finns Party and the Social Democrats. But no party is near a majority in the 200-seat body, and Mr. Orpo is going to have a complicated task pulling together a governing coalition.With almost 100 percent of the vote counted, late Sunday night, Mr. Orpo’s party had 48 seats with 20.8 percent of the vote, just ahead of the populist Finns, led by Riikka Purra, with 46 seats and 20.0 percent.Though Ms. Marin has been the closest Finland has to a political rock star, her center-left Social Democrats came in third, with 43 seats and 19.9 percent of the vote.The agrarian-based Center Party, which has been shrinking, may be a crucial part of a new center-right coalition, winning 11.3 percent of the vote and 23 seats.It was a narrow defeat for Ms. Marin, 37. Despite her popularity, the election turned on the economy, and Mr. Orpo succeeded in arguing that Finland’s debt is too high and that public spending should be cut.Mr. Orpo has a choice of trying to join with the Finns or with the Social Democrats, but he would still need the support of other, smaller parties to form a government. During the campaign, he was careful not to offend either of the major parties; Ms. Marin lambasted the Finns as racist.Mr. Orpo is expected to have the first chance to form a new government and, presumably, become prime minister. But given the tightness of the race, forming a new coalition government is expected to take many weeks of negotiations among the parties, some of whom have ruled out being in a coalition with the Finns Party.Prime Minister Sanna Marin greeting supporters in Helsinki following Finnish parliamentary elections on Sunday.Jonathan Nackstrand/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMs. Marin has been a fresh face for a fresh generation, and made a major impact outside Finland, though she has been more controversial within it. She has gotten good marks for her performance as prime minister, especially on issues like the war in Ukraine and NATO membership, and has been more popular in the polls than her party has.With Finland about to join NATO, however, the election turned mostly on economic issues: the size of the country’s debt, the future viability of its social welfare system and its policy toward migration. There, Ms. Marin and her Social Democrats garnered more criticism and proved vulnerable.“Democracy has spoken,” Ms. Marin said after the results were in.She said: “I believe that the Social Democrats’ message was heard, and that was a values-based message. It has been a great campaign, and this is a great day because we did well. My congratulations to the National Coalition Party and Finns Party.”Government spending was a key campaign issue.With the economy contracting and inflation high, Ms. Marin’s opponents accused her of borrowing too much and failing to rein in public spending. Ms. Marin, who became prime minister in 2019, refused to specify any cuts but instead emphasized economic growth, education, higher employment and higher taxes as better answers.The Finns Party pushed an anti-elitist agenda, concentrating on restricting migration from outside the European Union, criticizing Finland’s contributions to the European Union and urging a slower path toward carbon neutrality. But it has tried to soften its image under Riikka Purra, 45, who took the party leadership in 2021, and it has used social media cleverly, increasing its popularity among young voters.In general, as in recent elections in Italy and Sweden, the vote showed a shift to the right. Ms. Marin’s party and two others from her current five-party coalition, the Greens and the Left Alliance, had ruled out going into government with the Finns. The Center Party has ruled out joining any coalition resembling the current one.Ms. Marin’s private life, including videos of her drinking and dancing with friends, gave her celebrity abroad but caused some controversy in socially conservative Finland. She even felt compelled to take a drug test to forestall criticism. But she remained unusually popular for a prime minister at the end of a parliamentary term, said Jenni Karimaki, a political scientist at the University of Helsinki.Steven Erlanger More

The former governor of Arkansas, a prominent Trump critic within the Republican Party, has been testing the waters in Iowa.Asa Hutchinson, the former governor of Arkansas, joined the race for the Republican nomination for president on Sunday, banking that in a crowded field, enough G.O.P. voters will be searching for an outspoken critic of Donald J. Trump to lift his dark-horse candidacy.“What struck me as I was in Orange County, California, and as I was in Iowa for three days this week, was that the Trump factor really didn’t come up,” he said in an interview on Sunday, after he announced his candidacy on ABC’s “This Week.” The voters, he said, “are talking about things that matter to them, which is the economy, which is the fentanyl crisis that we have, and the relationship and leadership of America on the world stage.”“They’re asking tough questions,” he added, “but it’s not about the political dynamics of Trump.”Mr. Hutchinson has made several trips to Iowa, where he has tested out what he has called a message of “consistent conservatism” to Republican voters who have flocked to Mr. Trump in the past two elections. Recent polling has shown Mr. Trump’s lead among primary voters surging as his legal peril has grown. The former president is expected to be arraigned on Tuesday in Manhattan on charges that he falsified business records and violated New York campaign finance law to cover up hush-money payments to a pornographic film actress in the final days of the 2016 election.With several other cases pending, Mr. Hutchinson appears to be betting that external forces will trip up Mr. Trump’s third run for the White House. Other anti-Trump Republicans, such as the former Maryland governor Larry Hogan, have declined to run. And the Republicans who have jumped in or are preparing to — Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, and Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor — have carefully avoided direct criticism of the front-runner.Mr. Hogan said he decided against running because he thought the voices in the party who oppose a second Trump presidency needed to rally around a single alternative. Mr. Hutchinson disagreed, saying multiple voices needed to emerge to give Republican voters a choice.“This is the most unpredictable election cycle in my lifetime for sure,” he said Sunday. “It’s unpredictable as to what develops with Donald Trump. It’s unpredictable as to what candidates get in there and whether they can be competitive.”Mr. Hutchinson is not a moderate Republican. He signed a ban on abortion that makes no exceptions for pregnancies that result from rape or incest, though he expressed some reservations. He has pressed for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act. And he led a task force convened by the National Rifle Association after the massacre of schoolchildren at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012 to come up with a response to blunt the push for gun control..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.On Sunday morning, he embraced Arkansas’s abortion ban.“If that’s what they want to attack me on, then I’m proud to stand squarely on my pro-life position,” he said.But his government experience is broader than other candidates in the race. In addition to his two terms as governor, he served in the House, led the Drug Enforcement Administration and headed the Border and Transportation Security Directorate of the Department of Homeland Security when it was created after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.“Those experiences are central to the campaign because they address some of the greatest concerns of Americans, which is we need to secure the border,” he said.But his outspoken criticism of the former president has set him apart in a Trump-dominated party where dissent has not been tolerated. He has said Mr. Trump and those who supported his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election should not have positions of power. He stood against the Republican National Committee’s censure of now former-Representatives Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois for serving as the only two Republicans on the House committee investigating the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. And he called Mr. Trump’s election denial a “recipe for disaster” for the party.He was one of the very few Republicans to issue a statement after Mr. Trump’s indictment last week that did not dismiss the charges as political.“It is a dark day for America when a former President is indicted on criminal charges,” he wrote on Thursday. “While the grand jury found credible facts to support the charges, it is important that the presumption of innocence follows Mr. Trump. We need to wait on the facts and for our American system of justice to work like it does for thousands of Americans every day.” More

We talk with a Trump reporter to prepare you for the week when he will likely be arrested.Donald Trump is expected to fly to New York this week from his home in Florida to be arrested. For now, the specific charges are unknown because the indictment is under seal, but they involve his role in the payment of hush money during the 2016 presidential campaign to cover up an extramarital affair.To help you get ready for the week ahead, I talked with my colleague Maggie Haberman, who’s known for her behind-the-scenes reporting on Trump.David: You’ve reported that Trump and his aides were surprised by the news and didn’t expect an indictment for a few weeks — if at all. What’s the atmosphere like at Mar-a-Lago on the days after?Maggie: They’re still trying to assess what is happening on a few fronts. One is the political front, which I’d say they were most prepared on.Another is the legal front, which is messy because his team has had a lot of infighting, and there’s finger pointing about why they were so caught off guard. The lawyers also don’t yet know the charges because it’s a sealed indictment.Finally, there is the emotional front. While Trump is not said to be throwing things, he is extremely angry and his family is, not surprisingly, rattled.The other casesDavid: My instinct is that this indictment may make an indictment in one of the other cases — the investigations into Trump’s actions in Georgia after the 2020 election, his involvement in the Jan. 6 attack and his handling of classified documents — more likely. After all, one of the issues apparently giving pause to prosecutors was the idea that they would be the first ever to indict an ex-president. That potential barrier is gone. Nobody can know what will happen in those other cases, but does that basic dynamic seem correct?Maggie: You raise a point some lawyers have raised privately. All the prosecutors were concerned about being first with a historical precedent. And now there is a broken seal of sorts. That said, Republicans who dislike Trump are saying privately they wish this case wasn’t first because they view it as more trivial than the others.David: Is there one of those other investigations that most worries Trumpworld?Maggie: Georgia has bothered Trump personally for a while, possibly because there are tapes of him telling officials to find votes. Some of his aides are very worried about the documents investigation that the Justice Department has. It’s a clearer-cut issue, and a federal judge overseeing grand jury matters showed in a recent ruling that she’s taking the government’s claims seriously.David: Trump has faced major legal threats to his business career in the past and always managed to escape criminal charges. How does this compare to those earlier threats?Maggie: Trump has been trying to avoid being indicted since he was first criminally investigated in the 1970s. He actually hasn’t faced enormous criminal legal threats since then. He has instead operated in a world in which so much is based on machine politics and what Marie Brenner, the journalist, once described as New York’s “favor economy.”A project involving two of his kids was investigated by the Manhattan district attorney about a decade ago, but for a variety of reasons there were no indictments. Then, when he was president, he was protected because of a Justice Department opinion against indicting a sitting president. It’s worth remembering his company was convicted on 17 counts of tax fraud and other crimes last year. So this is something of a slow roll.Trump up, DeSantis downDavid: The last few weeks of Republican primary polls have looked pretty good for Trump: He’s up, and Ron DeSantis is down. Depending on which polls you believe, Trump either has a sizable lead or the two are close. Apart from the indictment, why do Trump and his team think he’s surged? And how do they see the politics of an indictment playing out?Maggie: I think nearly every national poll shows Trump with a sizable lead. Polls this early aren’t great predictors, but they are a snapshot of what has been pretty durable support Trump has among Republican primary voters.Trump’s team thinks it’s had a pretty good few months politically — it has, in fairness — and that DeSantis has struggled to gain traction. That is striking since DeSantis has been on a book tour. Trump’s team believes this indictment will help him raise money and could give him some boost — and maybe political antibodies when and if future indictments come from other investigations.It was lost on no one on Trump’s team that DeSantis — after initially trying to minimize a possible indictment as an issue that voters care about and speaking about it later than other Republicans — rushed out with a statement once an indictment happened attacking it as “un-American” and saying Florida wouldn’t help extradite Trump. It tells you a great deal about the grip Trump still has.More on TrumpTrump has already lashed out at the judge in the case, leaning into his time-tested strategy: attack and delay.The last few days delivered a rare legal reckoning for two forces that have reshaped politics: Trump and Fox News, which suffered a major setback in a defamation case.Trump’s campaign is betting that the press exposure will help his 2024 presidential bid, Politico reports.Foreign leaders still think Trump could bounce back.“Saturday Night Live” tackled the indictment.NEWSWar in UkraineChina is studying Russia’s war in Ukraine as it considers a potential invasion of Taiwan.Ukraine’s security service charged an Orthodox church leader with supporting Russia.Evan Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter detained by Russia, knew the risks of journalism there but felt a deep connection to the country.Other Big StoriesThe death toll from the tornadoes that tore through the South and Midwest this weekend rose to 23. UConn beat Miami to reach the men’s N.C.A.A. championship game. The team will face San Diego State, which defeated Florida Atlantic on a buzzer-beater.Iowa’s win over South Carolina in the women’s basketball tournament drew 5.5 million viewers on ESPN, the largest audience ever for a semifinal.Paul Vallas is highlighting his record leading troubled public schools as he runs to be Chicago’s mayor.FROM OPINIONA San Francisco apartment complex is an affordable-housing success story. But how it became one should worry liberals, Ezra Klein writes.Euthanizing an ailing pet is the right choice. It’s also a formula for shame and regret, Karen Fine argues.The Sunday question: Can protests save Israel’s democracy?Israelis’ disciplined grass-roots resistance succeeded in forcing the government to delay its judicial overhaul plan, says CNN’s Frida Ghitis. But the government remains determined, and the debate that underlies the crisis — about how Israel should treat the Palestinians — may divide the opposition, Aaron David Miller and Daniel Kurtzer argue in Foreign Policy.MORNING READSLow-lying areas in Venice still flood.Laetitia Vancon for The New York TimesSaving Venice: The city has amazing new sea walls, but floods aren’t its only problem.Locker-room celebrations: A win means water, everywhere.Pitch clocks: See how baseball’s new rules are changing the game.Vows: Two acrobats fell for each other.Sunday routine: A milliner visits Fanelli Cafe and Film Forum.Advice from Wirecutter: These are the best water bottles.Lives lived: Margot Stern Strom was a schoolteacher, then started an organization that challenged teenagers to understand the roots of injustice. She died at 81.BOOKSRachel Stern for The New York Times“Mating”: People thinking about long-term romance are sharing this ’90s novel.By the Book: The author Sarah Bakewell tends to avoid thrillers and mysteries.Our editors’ picks: “The Half Known Life,” which examines ideas of paradise around the world, and eight other books.Times best sellers: “The Anthropocene Reviewed,” by John Green, makes a first appearance on the paperback nonfiction list.THE SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINEJuan Arredondo for The New York Times Magazine.On the cover: The challenge of counting every birth and death.Ethicist: Her husband no longer wants sex. Is that grounds for divorce?Eat: South American sopa de maní is soulful and steadying.Read the full issue.THE WEEK AHEADWhat to Watch ForFor Western Christians, today is Palm Sunday, the start of Holy Week.Iowa and Louisiana State will play for the women’s N.C.A.A. basketball championship this afternoon, and the men’s final is tomorrow, pitting UConn against San Diego State.Trump is expected to surrender in Manhattan on Tuesday.Two major elections will be held on Tuesday: A runoff will decide the mayor’s race in Chicago, and Wisconsin will fill a vacancy on its state Supreme Court.Passover begins at sundown Wednesday.The U.S. government will release monthly jobs numbers on Friday.The U.S. stock markets will be closed on Good Friday.What to Cook This WeekDavid Malosh for The New York TimesEmily Weinstein recently found herself with leftover herbs. This week, her Five Weeknight Dishes newsletter is filled with recipes to use them: one-pan crispy chicken and chickpeas, which calls for herby yogurt on the side; baked chicken and feta meatballs; and coconut-caramel braised tofu, a quick vegan meal that would be superb with basil and cilantro.NOW TIME TO PLAYThe pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were anticlimactic and claimant. Here is today’s puzzle.Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Astounded (five letters).Take the news quiz to see how well you followed the week’s headlines.Here’s today’s Wordle.Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — DavidHere’s today’s front page. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. Reach our team at [email protected]. More

GREEN BAY, Wis. — Eric Genrich is running a full-throated campaign in support of abortion rights, reminding voters of his position at every turn and hammering his anti-abortion opponent in television ads. At a recent event, he featured an obstetrician who now commutes to a state where abortion is legal to treat patients and a local woman who traveled to Colorado to terminate a nonviable pregnancy.There’s just one inconvenient reality: Mr. Genrich is running for re-election as mayor of Green Bay, Wis., an office that has nothing to do with abortion policy.Even before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last summer, putting back into effect a Wisconsin law from 1849 that bans nearly all abortions, the city did not have a clinic that performed the procedure, nor a health department that regulated it.Mr. Genrich is one of several candidates for municipal offices on the ballot this spring in races in Wisconsin, Chicago, St. Louis, Lincoln, Neb., and elsewhere who are making their support for abortion rights — and often their opponent’s past opposition — a centerpiece of their campaigns, even though abortion policy in all of these places is decided at the state level.Mayor Eric Genrich of Green Bay, Wis., left, has made abortion rights central to his re-election campaign. At a recent news conference, one speaker was Dr. Anna Igler, second from right, a Wisconsin obstetrician-gynecologist who traveled to Colorado for an abortion because her fetus had a severe abnormality.Kayla Wolf for The New York TimesDemocrats used a muscular defense of abortion rights to great success in the midterm elections last fall, and, if that strategy works again, they are likely to copy it next year in races at all levels of government, including in President Biden’s campaign if he seeks re-election.The focus on abortion rights in down-ballot races, however, reflects Democrats’ increased nationalization of local politics. For decades, local Republican candidates ran on issues like abortion, immigration and national security, putting them in simple terms: “A noun, a verb and 9/11,” Mr. Biden once said in describing the phenomenon.Now Democrats are doing the same on abortion in left-leaning cities, hoping to win over independent voters and some moderate Republicans.Doing so allows Democrats to avoid discussing crime rates or other less appealing campaign topics. But beyond that, they recognize and emphasize that in today’s tribal politics, the precise responsibilities of an office matter less than sending a strong signal to voters about one’s broader political loyalties.“It’s definitely not a municipal issue per se,” Mr. Genrich said in an interview. “Voters don’t care about some of these parochial distinctions between municipal boundaries. This is a city issue, a state issue, a federal issue. Some of their most important questions are, what do you stand for fundamentally?”Mr. Genrich declined repeated opportunities to explain what, precisely, the mayor of Green Bay could do about abortion in his city.Still, Republicans running for mayor find themselves doing a political tap dance, trying to de-emphasize but not disavow their opposition to abortion rights, which is not an electoral winner in Democratic cities. In Green Bay, Mr. Biden won 53 percent of the vote in 2020; last year, Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, took 55 percent of the city’s vote.Mr. Genrich’s opponent in Tuesday’s officially nonpartisan election, Chad Weininger, is a former state legislator who cast a series of votes to restrict abortion rights before last year’s Supreme Court ruling. Now, as television ads and campaign mail blast his stance and label him “MAGA Chad” to emphasize his Republican politics, he is trying to change the subject.Chad Weininger, who is running for mayor against Mr. Genrich in Green Bay, is a former state legislator who has opposed abortion rights in the past. Kayla Wolf for The New York Times“I’m running for mayor, I’m not debating abortion,” Mr. Weininger said. “We could have discussions about nuclear arms, but guess what? Can’t do anything about it. We can have discussions about securing our borders, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”National Democratic organizations that do not typically involve themselves in local elections are using abortion policy to promote and raise money for candidates who back abortion rights.Emily’s List, a group that backs women who support abortion rights, has endorsed mayoral candidates in Jacksonville, Fla., Madison, Wis., and Lincoln, Neb.In Lincoln, where Mr. Biden won 54 percent of the vote in 2020, Mayor Leirion Gaylor Baird, a Democrat, said her constituents had demanded to know what she could do about proposed legislation in the Nebraska Legislature that would restrict abortion rights. Her answer: speak out against the bills.Mayor Leirion Gaylor Baird of Lincoln, Neb., has urged constituents to speak out in favor of abortion rights. Madeline Cass for The New York TimesVoters, Ms. Gaylor Baird said, are “much more interested in knowing where people stand. So I expect that people will want to know where I stand on this issue, even if it isn’t a local issue typically.”Her main opponent, Suzanne Geist, a Republican state senator who has sponsored bills to restrict or ban abortion in Nebraska, said her actions in the State Capitol should have little bearing on how she would run the state’s capital city. She said she would prefer to focus on issues like public safety and the health of the city’s business community.Talking about abortion, Ms. Geist said, is “a way of avoiding what the present issues are and trying to get the public wrapped around something that really has nothing to do with the mayor’s office or the mayor’s race.”Suzanne Geist, a Republican state senator running for mayor of Lincoln, Neb., said that talking about abortion was “a way of avoiding what the present issues are and trying to get the public wrapped around something that really has nothing to do with the mayor’s office or the mayor’s race.”Madeline Cass for The New York TimesPast opposition to some abortion rights has become a political liability even for candidates who support them now. In Chicago, Paul Vallas, the former Chicago Public Schools chief executive who is running for mayor, is being attacked by his more liberal opponent, Brandon Johnson, for a 2009 television interview in which Mr. Vallas said, “Fundamentally, I oppose abortion.”Mr. Vallas’s statement, which he made when he being asked about possibly running for state office as a Republican, came after he had declared himself “personally pro-choice” but said he would favor banning some late-term abortions.Mr. Johnson is now broadcasting ads with a clip of Mr. Vallas’s statement that he opposed abortion; Mr. Vallas has responded with advertising declaring that he supports abortion rights.In an interview on Sunday at a Greek restaurant, Mr. Vallas said Mr. Johnson had taken his past abortion comments out of context.“It’s had some impact,” he acknowledged.In other races, municipal candidates are trying to find ways to make their cities have some influence over abortion access.Daniela Velázquez, a public relations executive running for the St. Louis Board of Aldermen, has proposed providing money for women seeking abortions to travel across the Mississippi River to Illinois, where the procedure remains legal. While abortion became illegal in Missouri after the Supreme Court’s decision, Ms. Velázquez said many in St. Louis supported abortion rights.“I have been knocking on doors and people have looked at our lit and been like, ‘Oh, you know, pro-choice,’” she said. “Then they say, ‘Yeah, I’m going to vote for you.’”Democrats are open in their belief at the current moment, the best way to win votes is to focus on the abortion fight.“Abortion and reproductive rights is the No. 1 issue in 2023,” said Ben Wikler, the chairman of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, which has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to back Mr. Genrich in Green Bay and Mayor Cory Mason in Racine, who is making similar arguments there. “It’s the No. 1 issue that moves voters that normally vote Republican to vote for someone else and it’s the No. 1 issue to get Democrats off the couch and casting ballots.”Beyond the Green Bay mayoral election, abortion is a major issue in Wisconsin’s race for the State Supreme Court, which will finish on Tuesday and is likely to decide whether the procedure remains illegal in the state. Kayla Wolf for The New York TimesIn November, Racine asked voters on the midterm-election ballot if Wisconsin’s 1849 abortion ban should be repealed — and 71 percent said yes. Mr. Mason is now running television ads highlighting his stance in favor of abortion rights and attacking his opponent.Abortion, Mr. Mason said, comes up in his discussions with voters as much as snow plowing, public safety and housing.“These two big issues around freedom, the freedom to vote and the freedom to make your own health care decisions, they are every bit as front and center in this race as anything else that we deal with at the municipal level,” Mr. Mason said.Mr. Mason’s opponent, Henry Perez, a Republican city alderman opposed to abortion rights, said voters in Racine did not care much about the issue. He said that he did not remember how he had voted in the November abortion referendum, and that too much fuss was being made over abortion being banned in Racine when it was available across the state line in Illinois, roughly 25 miles south of the city.“A lot of people I’ve talked to say, ‘Henry, abortion, really?’” Mr. Perez said. “What do we care about it here? I mean, it’s not a thing that we do. And there’s always options like going out of town, you know, or going over to the next state to take care of an abortion if they need to.”Mitch Smith More

The merger of Digital World and Trump Media has been held up by investigations, but executives are rushing to complete the deal by a Sept. 8 deadline.Nearly 18 months ago, an obscure investment banker unveiled a blockbuster deal: His so-called blank-check company would bankroll a social media outfit that former President Donald J. Trump planned to start with hundreds of millions of dollars.Today, the social media platform Truth Social has millions of users, including the former president. But the company that was supposed to bankroll it has been swarmed by federal investigators. In late March, the deal’s architect, Patrick Orlando, was ousted as chief executive of Digital World Acquisition Corp.Officials at Digital World hoped that Mr. Orlando’s departure would pacify federal authorities and lead to the approval of the merger with Truth Social’s parent company, Trump Media & Technology Group, according to three people briefed on the matter.That deal has been waylaid by two intensifying federal investigations. One is focused on whether preliminary merger discussions between Digital World and Trump Media violated federal securities laws. The other investigation is looking at whether a group of early investors in Digital World — who were brought into the deal by Mr. Orlando — engaged in improper trading.If the merger is not completed in the next six months, Digital World — established as a special purpose acquisition corporation — will have to return the $300 million it raised from investors in 2021 through an initial public offering. But it is not clear that the investigations by the Securities and Exchange Commission and federal prosecutors in Manhattan will be completed in time to permit the S.E.C. to approve the merger as required.Patrick Orlando was recently ousted as chief executive of Digital World.Will WilkersonExecutives of Trump Media and some shareholders of Digital World have accused the S.E.C. of trying to run out the clock. In February, officials with Trump Media sent a letter to several Republican congressmen asking them to open an investigation into the S.E.C.’s refusal to approve the deal, accusing regulators of being biased against the former president.Hours after a Manhattan grand jury indicted Mr. Trump on Thursday, Eric Swider, a Digital World board member who replaced Mr. Orlando as the interim chief executive, wrote on Truth Social, “Never been more of a reason to fight on and never give up.”On Thursday night, Devin Nunes, the former U.S. representative who is now chief executive of Trump Media, lashed out against the holdup. “They even go after people we are trying to do business with so that we don’t have access to the public markets,” Mr. Nunes said on Fox News.Federal authorities began looking into the proposed merger soon after The New York Times reported that representatives of Trump Media had engaged in potential merger talks with not only Digital World, but also another SPAC led by Mr. Orlando.SPACs are not allowed to hold serious merger discussions before they go public, and if they do, it can violate federal securities laws. Federal authorities are trying to determine if Digital World’s talks with Trump Media were substantive enough that they should have been disclosed before the SPAC sold shares to the public in September 2021.Lawyers for Digital World told the S.E.C. that any talks with representatives of Trump Media before the public offering were not significant.“If it was clearly prearranged, that was an egregious violation,” said Michael Klausner, a professor of corporate law at Stanford Law School, who emerged as one of the leading critics of SPACs before the market for them collapsed last year. “The S.E.C. has the discretion to stop a merger where the disclosures violate security laws.”.css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff members may vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for candidates or political causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or giving money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.Learn more about our process.Representatives for the S.E.C. and the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York declined to comment.Mr. Swider declined to comment for Digital World. Mr. Orlando, who remains on the company’s board, did not return requests for comment, and neither did his lawyer.Trump Media officials did not return requests for comment.Since Mr. Orlando was the executive with the most frequent contact with representatives of Trump Media, Digital World was hoping that his ouster as chief executive would lead securities regulators to look more favorably on the merger proposal, said one of the people briefed on the matter.The insider trading investigation is focused on some investors associated with a small Miami-based venture capital firm, Rocket One Capital, that came to the deal because of Mr. Orlando. The group invested in Digital World about two months before the SPAC went public, said three people briefed on the matter.Soon after the group invested, some employees at Rocket One began to routinely refer to Digital World as the “Trump SPAC,” according to two of those people and documents reviewed by The New York Times.One focus of the investigation has been Michael Shvartsman, the Miami financier who founded Rocket One and was introduced to Mr. Orlando by a wealth manager, said two people briefed on the matter. Mr. Shvartsman then began inviting colleagues, friends and relatives to join the investor group, according to three people briefed on the matter and documents reviewed by The Times.Grant Smith, a Florida lawyer who represents Mr. Shvartsman and is a lawyer for Rocket One and another individual, declined to comment.The Rocket One group eventually invested at least $800,000 into Digital World, according to documents reviewed by The Times. In return, the group’s members got thousands of shares of discounted stock and warrants.A warrant is a security that entitles an investor to buy shares at a future date at a deeply discounted price.“They even go after people we are trying to do business with so that we don’t have access to the public markets,” Devin Nunes, chief executive of Truth Social, said after Mr. Trump’s indictment.Haiyun Jiang/The New York TimesFederal authorities are particularly interested in a surge in the trading of warrants that occurred before the deal’s announcement on the evening of Oct. 20, 2021. To prove insider trading, legal experts said, the authorities would need to establish that investors in the Rocket One group had invested or traded on confidential information and not mere speculation about a merger.In return for its investment, Mr. Orlando agreed to put Bruce Garelick, an executive at Rocket One, on Digital World’s board. Mr. Garelick, a former hedge fund manager in Boston, resigned from Digital World’s board in the summer when the company disclosed that federal authorities had sent subpoenas seeking information about Digital World’s dealings with Rocket One.Mr. Garelick and his lawyer did not return requests for comment.After investing in Digital World, some employees at Rocket One were tasked with coming up with a strategy to maximize profit from trading the company’s warrants. In one email, reviewed by The Times, a Rocket One employee mentioned having bought securities in Digital World “b/c target is trump media.”The email was written five days before the deal was announced.Meanwhile, the clock is ticking on the merger of Digital World and Trump Media. In November, shareholders of Digital World granted the SPAC another nine months to complete a deal. The time expires on Sept. 8.Without the deal, Trump Media would most likely have to look for new financing just as Mr. Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign could be getting into high gear and with the former president under indictment. The company has been paying its bills with advertising revenue and what’s left of the $37 million raised in an early round of funding. More

CHICAGO — Chicago is known as a city of neighborhoods, a sprawling metropolis divided into distinctive pockets defined by their own architecture, restaurants, languages, ballparks and beaches.But this is a heated election season, so Chicagoans are temporarily dissecting the city in a more political parlance: the mathematics of wards.There are 50 wards in all, each represented by a member in the City Council, and each with its own identity. The political winds can shift with every mayoral contest: In a runoff election in 2019, Mayor Lori Lightfoot won all 50, but in her unsuccessful February bid for re-election amid a crowded field of challengers, she took only 16. Paul Vallas and Brandon Johnson, the top two finishers in February, are spending the final days before their runoff on Tuesday crisscrossing the city campaigning for votes. More

Paul Vallas has long been a supporter of charter schools. He is running against Brandon Johnson, an ex-teacher with a different approach.CHICAGO — Paul Vallas took control of Chicago Public Schools when the district was among the country’s most troubled. He went to Philadelphia to head up a teetering education system that the state had taken over. And after Hurricane Katrina washed away much of the New Orleans school district, he helped rebuild it.Mr. Vallas built a reputation as the educational emergency responder of the 1990s and 2000s, someone sought out for the most challenging jobs. When he got to a new city, he moved quickly and forcefully, clashing at times with school boards and labor groups that objected to the pace and scope of his changes.“I’ll do 10 things and maybe accomplish five of them as opposed to someone who will do two things and maybe accomplish one,” Mr. Vallas said in an interview.One of two Democrats in Chicago’s mayoral runoff election on Tuesday, Mr. Vallas highlights his record of improving facilities, keeping schools open more hours and overhauling low-performing schools. He also forced out longtime educators, took a hard stance on student discipline and greatly expanded the number of charter schools, policies that earned him fans and enemies wherever he went.Mr. Vallas, 69, has put his education record at the center of his campaign for mayor of Chicago, arguing that the city needs that brand of crisis management to lower crime and improve schools. Yet he faces a changed political era in which teachers’ unions have asserted their power and many Democrats have grown skeptical of the idea of school choice, which Mr. Vallas supports and was once widely embraced by his party.Mr. Vallas is competing against Brandon Johnson, a county commissioner and former teacher who embodies the progressive critique of Mr. Vallas’s education philosophy. Mr. Johnson, a paid organizer for the last 12 years with the Chicago Teachers Union, has called for sweeping new investments in neighborhood schools and social programs. He wants to expand vocational programs, add resources for students who do not speak English and avoid closing schools with low enrollments. He has also been on the front lines of three work stoppages as his union clashed with two mayors and articulated a liberal vision for Chicago that extended well beyond schools.Mayoral candidate Brandon Johnson waited for a mayoral forum to begin at Kenwood Academy High School in February. Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York TimesIn Mr. Johnson’s telling, Mr. Vallas is an out-of-touch administrator whose policies would not help Chicago’s poorest residents. And when Mr. Vallas first ran Chicago’s schools, Mr. Johnson said, he made the city’s entrenched problems even worse.“The tale of two cities has been brought to us by Paul Vallas,” Mr. Johnson said. “He created a stratified system.”Mr. Vallas’s embrace of school choice, including magnet schools, military-style academies and charters, was a central part of the crisis playbook that he began developing when he ran Chicago’s schools in the late 1990s. Back then, though, many liberals as well as conservatives saw charter schools as a way to improve struggling school districts like Chicago. Charter schools, which are privately run and publicly funded, are popular in many low-income neighborhoods as alternatives to regular public schools. Teachers’ unions, though, have often bitterly fought the expansion of charter schools, most of which are not unionized. The unions contend the schools deprive the public school system of resources.Mr. Vallas came to Chicago’s schools from a finance role in Mayor Richard M. Daley’s City Hall instead of through the ranks of teachers and principals. He took over Chicago Public Schools in 1995 as Mr. Daley’s handpicked leader at a time of financial and educational crisis. The Illinois government, then controlled by Republicans, had just handed the mayor control of the system.Mr. Vallas quickly embraced other alternatives to traditional neighborhood schools, including magnet schools and military-style academies.His policies won praise from liberals who credited him with restoring order and raising test scores using a back-to-basics approach.The Clinton-era New Democrats were ascendant, and Mr. Vallas in many ways epitomized the moment, approaching the job like a corporate executive; his Chicago Public Schools title, after all, was chief executive.Under his leadership, the district placed faltering schools on academic probation, fired underperforming principals and ended social promotion, the practice in which failing students were advanced from grade to grade simply to keep them with their peers. The move helped him initially win over teachers. An official at the American Federation of Teachers hailed Mr. Vallas in 1997 for giving educators more leverage over students who were not doing their work.“People thought he was better than sugar,” said Josephine Perry, an instructor for a union that represents service employees in Chicago.Years later, though, much of what Mr. Vallas has spent his career championing — the tough disciplinary policies, the openness to charter schools — has lost some of its bipartisan sheen. Ms. Perry, who said she plans to vote for Mr. Johnson, summed up a concern of many Democrats: Mr. Vallas, she said, is “more aligned with Republican values.”Though Mr. Vallas is a Democrat, he has campaigned on a tough-on-crime platform and is far more conservative than Mr. Johnson. Mr. Vallas has also received endorsements from conservative organizations, including the local chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police, and financial support from some prominent Republican donors.The political divide on charter schools is complicated. A national poll last year by Education Next, an academic journal, found that a majority of Black people surveyed supported charter schools, while fewer than half of white people and Hispanic people did. Along party lines, Republicans supported charters at a far higher rate than Democrats.Mr. Vallas says it is not an issue of Republicans versus Democrats. It is about teachers’ unions, which he said have become “more radicalized” with power to shape Democratic Party politics.“The unions realized that they were losing ground, and I think it forced them to become much more political than they had been,” Mr. Vallas said.Leaders of the Chicago Teachers Union, which has donated heavily to the Johnson campaign, said they had been defending public education in a city where mayors have repeatedly failed to invest properly in schools. Stacy Davis Gates, the union president, said she believed Mr. Vallas was going to close some schools and privatize others if elected mayor.Mr. Vallas, center, talked with local school council members as Chicago Public Schools chief executive in 1996.Ovie Carter/Chicago TribuneHe “is going to marginalize Chicago Public Schools in a way that will make getting a public education almost impossible,” she said.Mr. Vallas says he wants to expand high-performing charters in Chicago but has not called for eliminating neighborhood schools.Though comparing academic achievement data over time is difficult, Mr. Vallas compiled a mixed record as a school executive in four cities that included notable successes as well as disappointments.In Philadelphia, Mr. Vallas’s first stop after Chicago, proficiency in math and reading improved in the years after he arrived, according to a study by the RAND Corporation. But that study also found that privately managed schools in Philadelphia, which included some for-profit charter operators, performed no better than district-run schools, on average.Ed Rendell, a Democrat who was governor of Pennsylvania for much of that time, said he believed that Mr. Vallas did a good job under trying conditions, even though not all of his ideas worked.“He was an innovator,” Mr. Rendell said. “Some his innovations were good and had a positive impact. Some were well-meaning and well-targeted but didn’t work.”Mr. Vallas’s tenure in Philadelphia ended after the district recorded a budget shortfall, which Mr. Rendell said “wasn’t a disaster” but also “wasn’t acceptable.”Mr. Vallas was especially aggressive in spending on school construction, which was also a theme of his tenure in other cities with decaying school buildings.“He always told me that if you send a kid to school in a school that has no paint on the walls and a heating system that doesn’t work and it hasn’t been cleaned,” Mr. Rendell said, “the kid’s going to figure out pretty fast that no one values their education.”But the scale of the change he sought, and the idea that the system needed an overhaul, made him plenty of enemies. Kendra Brooks, now a member of the Philadelphia City Council, said she got started in politics after watching with dismay as Mr. Vallas made extensive changes to neighborhood schools while expanding charter and magnet programs. She described his tenure there as a failure that continues to hurt the city.“When you restructure over 200,000 children into a new system, it’s not easy to just flip back to something else,” Ms. Brooks said.Building a new system was exactly what Mr. Vallas was hired to do at his next stop in New Orleans. He arrived in 2007, nearly two years after Hurricane Katrina had washed away much of the school system, and had to start rebuilding before it was even clear how many students would be returning to the city.To make it work, Mr. Vallas helped build a network of charter schools overseen by public officials but largely independent of the kind of bureaucracy typically associated with big-city school districts. A Tulane University study later found sustained improvement in achievement and graduation rates in the new, charter-centric school system that he developed.“Paul Vallas came in to stabilize schools. He didn’t come in to do charter schools,” said Paul Pastorek, the former state education superintendent of education for Louisiana and Mr. Vallas’s boss in New Orleans. “But I think he recognized the value of charters when he came here.”Mr. Vallas visited students at A.P. Tureaud Elementary School in New Orleans in 2007.Cheryl Gerber for The New York TimesStill, Mr. Pastorek stressed that Mr. Vallas was more than willing to close charter schools that were faltering, citing a 2011 decision to shutter the Harriet R. Tubman School in the city’s Algiers neighborhood.“Heavy political pressure was applied to keep it open,” Mr. Pastorek recalled. “Paul recommended the state board close it, and we did. Every school had to meet the same standard, including charters.”From New Orleans, Mr. Vallas went to take over the schools in Bridgeport, Conn., in 2012. Bill Finch, who was mayor of Bridgeport at the time, said he was impressed with the speed with which Mr. Vallas addressed budget problems, created academic programs and injected energy into a long-struggling school system.“We went from a disastrous situation to a normal situation,” Mr. Finch said. “And I think it was actually better than normal because Paul really innovated.”But as in other cities, Mr. Vallas upset people with the pace and type of change he was proposing. He was ultimately forced to leave after courts ruled that he did not have the proper credentials to lead a Connecticut school district.Now back in Chicago and running for mayor, Mr. Vallas continues to back charter schools and defend his education record against criticism that he breaks more than he fixes. He talks often about using schools “to fill gaps,” getting eyeglasses to children struggling to see and keeping buildings open into the evenings to keep students safe and engaged.“I’ve always been able to multitask,” Mr. Vallas said. He added: “I felt I had to level the playing field.”Julie Bosman More