Elections

At the annual conference this week, conservative celebrities like Mike Lindell and Kari Lake will attend, as will Donald Trump, but many possible 2024 rivals are skipping it.For decades, the Conservative Political Action Conference occupied a center ring in Republican politics.In 1974, Ronald Reagan used the inaugural event to unveil his brand of optimistic conservatism, describing a “city on the hill” to the conservative activists. In 2010, libertarian supporters of Ron Paul lifted their candidate to victory at the event’s presidential straw poll, an early harbinger of the Tea Party upheaval that would soon shake the party. And in 2011, a Manhattan businessman walked onto the stage to the tune of “For the Love of Money,” declared himself an opponent of abortion and began a yearslong takeover of the Republican Party.That businessman, Donald J. Trump, will be back at the four-day conservative gathering known as CPAC this week near Washington. He’ll be joined by a long list of right-wing media provocateurs, culture-war activists and a smattering of senators. Missing from the agenda: many of the Republicans seen as the future of the party.When Mr. Trump became leader of the Republican Party, he remade the conference in his political image. Now, as the party’s voters, donors and officials consider a future that may not include Mr. Trump as their leader, some Republicans say the decades-old CPAC gathering has increasingly become more like a sideshow than a featured act, one that seems made almost exclusively for conservative media.“It’s a content machine for the right-wing media ecosystem,” said David Kochel, a strategist on Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign in 2012, who noted that many of the catchiest lines from speeches will be replayed on Breitbart, Newsmax and the radio show hosted by Stephen K. Bannon. “But I don’t think it makes any difference in the 2024 run-up to the primary. You’ve got a couple people who aren’t going and a couple people who will go. It has faded in its importance.”Some of that fade, Mr. Kochel said, is directly linked to the allegations against Matt Schlapp, the chairman of the American Conservative Union, which runs the conference. He was accused of groping an aide to Herschel Walker’s Senate campaign last year. Mr. Schlapp has denied the accusations. The campaign aide filed a lawsuit against Mr. Schlapp in January.Those accusations were cited by some Republicans as one of the reasons they were steering clear of the conference, including Mike Pence, the former vice president who is considering a run for the White House. He passed on accepting an invitation, according to a person briefed on his decision. Instead, Mr. Pence is spending his week being hosted by other conservatives, including at a Club for Growth donor retreat to which Mr. Trump was not invited.Who’s Running for President in 2024?Card 1 of 6The race begins. More

Also, China’s attempt to erase “zero Covid” and Nigeria’s contested election.Secretary of State Antony Blinken, left, meeting with Kazakhstan’s foreign minister, Mukhtar Tleuberdi.Pool photo by Olivier DoulieryA U.S. push in Central AsiaThe U.S. secretary of state met with the president of Kazakhstan in Astana at the start of a new effort to isolate Russia as Belarus’s leader began a state visit to China — the latest examples of dueling diplomacy related to the war in Ukraine.Antony Blinken, the top U.S. diplomat, is urging five Central Asian countries that were part of the former Soviet Union — Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan — not to help Russia evade sanctions imposed by the West over its invasion of Ukraine. The countries have strong ties to Russia, but leaders there have made comments reflecting concerns about maintaining their sovereignty.One of Russia’s staunchest allies, President Aleksandr Lukashenko of Belarus, arrived in Beijing for talks with China’s leader, Xi Jinping. The U.S. has suggested that China was preparing to supply military aid to Russia, a claim rejected by the Chinese government.U.S. officials said they viewed Lukashenko’s visit as another sign of China’s growing engagement with Russia. Blinken’s trip to Central Asia follows recent visits to Kyiv by President Biden and U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen that were intended to shore up support for Ukraine.Context: China is trying to present itself as a neutral observer while maintaining close ties with Russia, a precarious balancing act. Beijing’s position has alienated European leaders who might have helped invigorate China’s economy following years of pandemic lockdowns.Other news from the war:The promised torrent of tanks from European nations to Ukraine now seems like more of a trickle.Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, warned that the situation in the eastern city of Bakhmut was “getting more and more difficult.”Removing a Covid testing booth at a park in Beijing. Jade Gao/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesChina moves to erase ‘zero Covid’China’s ruling Communist Party is trying to rewrite the public’s memory of “zero Covid,” the country’s strict lockdown policy. Analysts say the move is aimed at quashing any resentment over the enormous price China paid in economic loss and trauma to enforce its coronavirus restrictions.In a decree that was published after a recent meeting of top officials, a newly triumphant narrative has emerged in which the country’s Covid response was a “miracle in human history” and “completely correct.” China’s official messaging acknowledges none of the extremes of “zero Covid,” nor does it mention the chaos that ensued after the policy’s abrupt dismantling in early December, which left hospitals unprepared for an explosion in new infections.Instead, the party has declared that its efforts led China to a “decisive victory” over the virus. The term “zero Covid” itself, once ubiquitous, has vanished from the party’s rhetoric. The State of the WarRussia’s New Offensive: The Russian military is relying on tens of thousands of inexperienced conscripts to carry out its latest maneuver, which has barely budged over the last month.Deploying High-Powered Aides: President Biden has dispatched Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a concerted diplomatic push to show support for Ukraine.A War of Words: Russia and the West have been arguing for months about which side is more willing to negotiate ending the war in Ukraine peacefully.Analysis: The government’s messaging is in line with efforts to restore the public’s confidence, both in the party’s leadership and in the country’s future. But the aftermath of the pandemic may be especially challenging for the party to bury, as feelings of whiplash, grief and frustration simmer just beneath the surface for many Chinese residents.Counting votes in Lagos.James Oatway/ReutersNigeria’s opposition calls for a rerunThree days after Nigeria held its most wide-open presidential election in years, two opposition parties called for the vote to be canceled and rerun, saying it was compromised by vote rigging and violence.The call came as vote counting showed that the candidate of the governing party appeared to be taking the lead. With about one-third of the 36 states reporting results, Bola Tinubu, the candidate of the governing All Progressives Congress party, had won 44 percent of the vote.Many polls had predicted a win for Peter Obi, the so-called youth candidate of the little-known Labour Party. But early results showed Obi had just 18 percent of the vote, while Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party also trailed behind Tinubu with 33 percent.Response: A spokesman for Tinubu’s party campaign council rejected the accusations of vote rigging. Independent observers raised concerns about whether the election was fair, but stopped short of accusing the governing party of rigging it.Context: Many Nigerians had looked to the election to put the country back on track after eight years of rule by Muhammadu Buhari, a military dictator turned democrat. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, has struggled with economic and security crises under his leadership.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificDentsu helped coordinate the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in venues like Japan’s National Stadium.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesJapanese prosecutors accused the advertising giant Dentsu, a driving force behind the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, of illegally conspiring to evade the public bidding process.Hong Kong’s leader said the city would lift its Covid mask mandate, ending one of the last such policies in the world.Wendy’s, the American burger chain, is coming to Australia. Like other American imports, it might need to change its name.Around the WorldThe coffins of shipwreck victims in Crotone, Italy, on Tuesday.Valeria Ferraro/Associated PressA shipwreck off Italy’s coast that killed at least 63 people has made it clear that the E.U.’s consensus against migrants has hardened.After accusations of misconduct and mismanagement, the president of France’s soccer federation stepped down yesterday.U.S. NewsThe Supreme Court’s conservative majority seemed deeply skeptical of the legality of the administration’s plan to wipe out more than $400 billion in student debt.Jazz Pharmaceuticals exploited a safety requirement to prolong its monopoly on a narcolepsy drug that has generated more than $13 billion in revenue.Nearly two dozen dead whales have washed ashore on the East Coast since early December, in part because of collisions with cargo ships. 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Here’s a guide to sake basics.ARTS AND IDEAS Should acting awards be gender-neutral?The cast of Season 2 of “The White Lotus” at the SAG Awards.Jordan Strauss/Invision, via Associated PressAt the Screen Actors Guild Awards Sunday in Los Angeles, there was at least one red-carpet question without an easy answer: Should awards shows eliminate separate acting categories for men and women?The debate over gender-neutral acting prizes has gained steam as more nonbinary actors have given acclaimed performances and, in some cases, chosen to withdraw from awards consideration rather than compete in a gendered category. “Right now, you need to choose,” said August Winter, a nonbinary actor, referring to awards that separate categories for men and women. “And I don’t think people should be put in that position.”Others worry that gender-neutral categories could mean fewer nominations — or that women could be shut out of awards consideration entirely.“I’m not sure what the solution is,” said Sarah Polley, director of the Oscar-nominated film “Women Talking.” “But it certainly can’t stay the way it is, because it is excluding people from being recognized.”PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookBobbi Lin for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Sue Li. Prop Stylist: Sophia Pappas.This vegetarian tteokbokki features a base of butter-fried shallots, a layer of melted cheese and a crunchy blanket of raw cabbage.What to ReadThese three science fiction and fantasy novels offer a welcome break from reality.What to Listen ToThe experimental pop duo 100 gecs turns toward rock for its second album.Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: Paramour (5 letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. Have a great day. — Dan and MariahP.S. Here’s how The Times has covered the war in Ukraine, one year in.“The Daily” is about why so many buildings have collapsed in Turkey. We’d like your feedback! Please email thoughts and suggestions to [email protected]. More

Imagine standing patiently in line, waiting to vote, and suddenly men with guns arrive on motorcycles and start shooting. Imagine men dashing into your polling unit, violently seizing ballot boxes and taking them away. Imagine other ballot boxes being destroyed. Imagine being beaten to keep you from voting for a particular candidate. Imagine a crowd of people chanting “We must vote! We must vote!” when polling workers failed to arrive as expected. Imagine the police doing very little. All these things happened during the Nigerian presidential elections on Saturday. Through it all, there was a chilling lack of transparency from the Independent National Electoral Commission, or I.N.E.C., which oversees elections.Nigerian elections have a history of being rigged, of cooked-up numbers and stolen ballot boxes. This time, though, Nigerians were asked to place their faith in a new electronic voting system that would make tampering more difficult. Technology would be the savior: In each polling unit, votes would be counted in the presence of voters and then immediately uploaded to a secure central portal. Failing to upload the results in real time was the most egregious of the many irregularities of this election because it has destroyed the cautious trust with which many approached the process.The I.N.E.C. blames technical issues for the delay. How, Nigerians wonder, can a well-funded electoral body that had four years to prepare for an important presidential election make such a significant blunder? It is reasonable, then, that many voters have assumed purposeful intent, that election workers were instructed not to upload results so that they could later be secretly manipulated.I know Nigeria, the country of my birth, intimately. I know the political culture, where the exchange of large amounts of money makes so many people conscience-deficient, where the mainstream media’s instinct is political deference and where the will of the people is often ignored. Nigerians, especially young Nigerians, are determined that this time, their votes will matter. A majority of Nigerians are below the age of 35. They are a bright, innovative and talented generation, a hungry generation, starved of good leadership, who do not merely sit back and complain but who act and push back and want to forge their own futures.On Saturday, many went out to vote, enthusiastic but cautious, their phone cameras ready to record any irregularities. They waited for election workers who arrived many hours late to polling stations. They braved the harassment and beatings of men paid to create chaos. They went off and bought their own ink for finger-printing when election workers claimed to have run out of it. They provided their own light from their phones as they stood in line in the dark, and according to one recorded case, a voter brought a small generator to a polling place when the voting machine stopped working. They refused to leave even though they had to wait so long that it was almost dawn when they could finally vote. And when it began to rain, they came together and sang beautiful songs. I have never been so proud of my fellow Nigerians. Many were voting for the first time, inspired by one candidate, Peter Obi, who has brought to them that ineffable thing that we humans need to thrive: hope.Now, as results are being counted, there is growing disillusionment. A sludge of tension is in the air. A simmering rage. Some voters say that the official numbers trickling in do not match the numbers from their polling units, that the results tell a story different from what they witnessed on Saturday. They are convinced of the complicity of those who should be caretakers of the democratic process.Demonstrators accusing the election commission of irregularities and disenfranchising voters marched in downtown Abuja, Nigeria, on Tuesday.Ben Curtis/Associated PressElections must always be transparent, of course, but for an abysmally low-trust society like Nigeria, a radical transparency is needed for credibility. Elections must be completely transparent and must be widely seen to be completely transparent; sadly, neither seems to apply to Nigeria’s presidential election.African democracies are criticized, often condescendingly so, in ways that stoke resentment, not because the criticism isn’t valid, but because it isn’t fair. Africa is full of young nation-states, and democracy takes time to establish its roots, and even when it does, the fragility always remains.I’ve always found it curious that African countries were expected to form functioning democracies right after independence, even though the colonial governments they had only just freed themselves from were dictatorships in everything but name. Nigerians want a functioning democracy, and they are starting on the path to it but might be derailed unless the international community pays attention now.Nigeria is Africa’s tottering giant, the continent’s most populous country, the most politically and culturally dominant. To pay real attention to Nigeria is to signal that Africa matters, as the United States has always maintained. The Biden administration needs to stand behind the Nigerian people now and make a firm commitment to support election transparency. Besides — my tongue is lodged in my cheek — you don’t want a wave of Nigerian asylum seekers fleeing the unbearable discontent of living under an illegitimate government.Sometimes democracies are threatened by foreign invasions and sometimes democracies are most at risk from internal forces. All of them need support.Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a novelist and the author, most recently, of “Notes on Grief.”The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: [email protected] The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

Two parties say that the presidential vote in Africa’s biggest democracy was marred by fraud and violence, and they called for the head of the election commission to step down.Nigeria’s two major opposition parties on Tuesday called for the presidential election to be canceled and rerun, saying that it had been compromised by rigging and widespread violence.The election over the weekend in the West African nation — the most populous on the continent, with 220 million people — was the most wide open in years, with a surprise third-party candidate putting up an assertive challenge.On Tuesday, the chairmen of the two opposition parties — the People’s Democratic Party and the Labour Party — called for the head of the government’s electoral commission to resign, even as the commission continued to release results.With about one-third of the 36 states reporting results by Tuesday afternoon, the candidate of the governing All Progressives Congress party, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, appeared some distance ahead of his rivals in the count. Some 87 million people were registered to vote, but results from the first tabulations suggested low voter turnout.“This is not a credible election,” said Iyorchia Ayu, the chairman of the People’s Democratic Party, Nigeria’s main opposition party, at a joint news conference on Tuesday afternoon in Abuja, the capital. “It is not acceptable.”International observers who monitored the election reported delays, technical hitches and violence.The Independent National Electoral Commission had said in a statement on Monday that it took “full responsibility” for the logistical problems and delays.As of Tuesday afternoon, Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party trailed behind Mr. Tinubu with 32 percent of the votes, and Peter Obi, the so-called “youth candidate” of the opposition Labour Party, had 17 percent.On Monday, Mr. Obi pulled off an unexpected victory in Lagos State, home to the country’s largest city and traditionally a stronghold of Mr. Tinubu, who was its governor for eight years. More

How a white politician from the South who once supported segregationist policies eventually won the enduring support of Black voters.ATLANTA — Without Black voters, there would have been no President Jimmy Carter.In 1976, African Americans catapulted the underdog Democrat to the White House with 83 percent support. Four years later, they stuck by him, delivering nearly identical numbers even as many white voters abandoned him in favor of his victorious Republican challenger, Ronald Reagan.This enduring Black support for Mr. Carter illuminates two intertwined and epochal American stories, each of them powered by themes of pragmatism and redemption. One is the story of a white Georgia politician who began his quest for power in the Jim Crow South — a man who, as late as 1970, declared his respect for the arch-segregationist George Wallace in an effort to attract white votes, but whose personal convictions and political ambitions later pushed him to try to change the racist environment in which he had been raised.The other is the story of a historically oppressed people flexing their growing electoral muscle after the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965 removed obstacles to the ballot box. Certainly, for some Black voters, candidate Carter was simply the least bad option. But for others, the elections of 1976 and 1980 were an opportunity to take the measure of this changing white man, recognizing the opportunity he presented, and even his better angels.“His example in Georgia as a representative of the New South, as one of the new governors from the South, was exciting, and it was appealing,” said Representative Sanford Bishop, a Democrat whose Georgia congressional district includes Mr. Carter’s home. “It carried the day in terms of people wanting a fresh moral face for the presidency.”Mr. Carter’s support for Black Americans sheds light on the political evolution of the man, who at 98, is America’s longest living president. (Mr. Carter entered hospice care earlier this month.)Mr. Carter at an event in Georgia during the fall 1976 presidential campaign.Guy DeLort/WWD, via Penske Media, via Getty ImagesMr. Carter greeting supporters in New York City in 1976.Mikki Ansin/Getty ImagesThe foundation of his relationships with Black voters and leaders was built in his home base of Plains, in rural Sumter County, Ga. Its Black residents can recall his efforts to maintain and then later resist the racist policies and practices that targeted the majority Black community.Jonathan Alter, in his 2020 biography “His Very Best: Jimmy Carter, a Life,” noted that Mr. Carter, as a school board member, had made a number of moves to accommodate or uphold the local segregationist system of the 1950s, at one point trying to shift resources from Black schools to white schools in the name of sound fiscal management.But Bobby Fuse, 71, a longtime civil rights activist who grew up in Americus, Ga., a few miles from Plains, recalled that Mr. Carter had also shown moments of real character. Among other things, he noted Mr. Carter’s objection to his Baptist church’s refusal to allow Black people to worship there.“I wouldn’t have voted for anybody running against Jimmy Carter, more than likely,” said Mr. Fuse, who said he had first voted for Mr. Carter in his successful 1970 governor’s race. “Because I knew him to be an upright man different from the other Southerners.”There were seeds of this difference early in the life of Mr. Carter. But as a young politician, it did not always translate into action. And the repressive environment of the mid-20th century meant that he had no Black voters to woo when he started his first foray into electoral politics with a 1962 bid for a South Georgia State Senate seat. Due to racist restrictions, hardly any Black people were registered to vote in his district at the time.Mr. Carter waved to the crowd as he and his wife, Rosalynn, arrived at Plains Baptist Church to attend services in 1976.Associated PressPresident Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, with former President Bill Clinton and Mr. Carter at a ceremony commemorating the 50th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington.Doug Mills/The New York TimesHistorians say that Mr. Carter, early in his career, was both a creature and a critic of the strict segregationist system he had been born into. He largely kept his head down as civil rights advocates fought and sacrificed to change the status quo, with serious, and sometimes dangerous, protests and crackdowns flaring up in Sumter County.Later, once he had achieved positions of power, he was outspoken about renouncing racial discrimination, seeking means to redress it and trying to live up to those principles. During his presidency, he famously enrolled his daughter, Amy, in a public school in Washington, D.C. Decades after leaving the White House, he offered a full-throated rebuke of Barack Obama’s Republican critics, calling their attacks racism loosely disguised as partisanship during his presidency.“He saw his role as an elder statesman,” said Andra Gillespie, an associate professor of political science at Emory University. “The fact that you have an elderly white president, from the South, who is there saying, ‘Look, the emperor has no clothes; that argument has no weight; that dog won’t hunt,’ is something that he didn’t necessarily have to do.”Mr. Carter had grown up with Black playmates in the tiny community of Archery, Ga. As a boy, his moral and spiritual north star had been a Black woman, Rachel Clark, the wife of a worker on the Carter property. He slept many nights on the floor of her home when his parents were out of town. Mr. Alter, the biographer,  wrote that she had taught him about nature and had impressed him with her selflessness. Mr. Alter wrote that Mr. Carter had even been teased in his all-white elementary school for “sounding Black.”Traffic in Warm Springs, Ga., as visitors arrived to hear Mr. Carter speak in 1976.Gary Settle/The New York TimesRachel Clark, the wife of a worker on the Carter family’s farm, whom Mr. Carter credited with teaching him morals.National Park ServiceBy the mid-1950s, Mr. Carter returned from a stint as a naval officer and settled in Plains, where he built on the family’s successful peanut business. The Brown v. Board of Education decision, which dismantled the old separate-but-equal regime for American schools, had inflamed white Southerners. Despite his efforts to appease white parents while on the school board, he was also, Mr. Alter notes, “the only prominent white man in Plains” who declined to join the local chapter of the racist White Citizens’ Council.After winning his 1962 State Senate race, Mr. Carter, a man of searing ambition, set his sights on the governor’s mansion but was defeated in 1966. He ran again and won in 1970, with a campaign full of unsubtle dog whistles to aggrieved white voters that included promises to restore “law and order” to their communities and, according to Mr. Alter, the dissemination of a “fact sheet” that reminded white voters that Mr. Carter’s Democratic opponent, former Gov. Carl Sanders, had attended Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s funeral.In the Democratic primary, Black voters took notice: Mr. Sanders, in the runoff, garnered roughly 90 percent of their votes. But by the general election, Mr. Carter was campaigning heavily in Black churches.The dog-whistle strategy had generated its share of bitterness and criticism. But a course correction followed, in the form of Mr. Carter’s inaugural address.“The time for racial discrimination is over,” he said.Mr. Carter’s supporters at the Democratic convention.H. Christoph/Ullstein Bild, via Getty ImagesMembers of the Concord Baptist Church congregation listening to Mr. Carter speaking in Brooklyn in 1980.Don Hogan Charles/The New York Times“It was really dramatic for all of us, because he said it in that forum, as he was being sworn in,” Mr. Fuse recalled. “And hopefully we were going to see some activity from that.”They did. Mr. Carter expanded the presence of Black Georgians in state government, from senior officials to state troopers, and welcomed civil rights leaders to the governor’s office.Black skeptics were converted into allies in other ways. In an interview this week, Andrew Young, the civil rights leader who would serve as ambassador to the United Nations under Mr. Carter, recalled having “a real prejudice to overcome” when the two men first met as Mr. Carter was running for governor.When the matter of Fred Chappell, Sumter County’s notoriously racist sheriff, came up, Mr. Carter called him a “good friend.” Mr. Young was taken aback: Mr. Chappell had once arrested Dr. King after a protest. When Dr. King’s associates tried to bring him blankets to ward off the cold, Mr. Chappell refused them and turned on the fan instead.Later, however, Mr. Young said he had gotten to know Mr. Carter’s family, including his mother, Lillian. Mr. Young, too, came to trust him. “I decided that he was always all right on race,” Mr. Young said. “He never discriminated between his Black friends and white friends.”Mr. Carter, as president, meeting in 1977 with his commission for the appointment of Black Americans to the federal judiciary in the Fifth Circuit.Harvey Georges/Associated PressAndrew Young, right, campaigning for Mr. Carter in Boston in 1976.Mikki Ansin/Getty ImagesIt went the same way with other influential civil rights leaders in Georgia, including Dr. King’s widow, Coretta Scott King, and his father, Martin Luther King Sr. According to the author and journalist Kandy Stroud, the elder Mr. King sent a telegram to voters lauding Mr. Carter’s appointment of Black judges and his support for a fair housing law, among other things. “I know a man I can trust, Blacks can trust, and that man is Jimmy Carter,” he wrote.By the time Mr. Carter started his 1976 bid for the White House, it was these leaders who spread the message beyond Georgia voters that Mr. Carter was worthy of their trust. They helped bolster the “peanut brigade,” the nickname for the team of staff members and volunteers spread across the country to campaign for him, making it a mix of Black and white Carter supporters.“They had to tell these people in the rest of the country, ‘Yeah, he’s governor of Georgia, but he’s a different kind of governor of Georgia,’” Mr. Fuse said.In a recent interview, the Rev. Al Sharpton recalled that the King family had lobbied him to support Mr. Carter in 1976. That went a long way, he said, but so did Mr. Carter’s presentation. “A Southern guy that would stand up and talk about racism?” he said. “This was the kind of guy that my uncle trusted down South. And he connected with us for that.”As a presidential candidate, however, Mr. Carter again showed his propensity for trying to have it both ways in a racially divided country.George Skelton, a Los Angeles Times columnist, recently recalled covering the candidate as he campaigned in Wisconsin and watching as he seemed to give contradictory messages on school busing to separate groups of Black and white voters within the span of a single day.Mrs. Coretta King accepting the Presidential Medal on behalf of her late husband, Dr. Martin Luther King, in 1977.Associated PressMr. Carter, second from right, shaking hands with Black seniors at the Watts Labor Community Action Council in Los Angeles, in 1976.Reed Saxon/Associated PressAnd in a speech about protecting neighborhoods, Mr. Carter used the phrase “ethnic purity,” creating a mini-scandal. Soon after, Mr. Young told him that the use of the phrase had been a “disaster for the campaign.” Mr. Carter issued an apology.But Mr. Carter also found common cultural ground with Black voters nationwide, many of whom shared his Christian faith. They saw how comfortable he was in Black churches. “‘Born again’ is the secret of his success with Blacks,” Ethel Allen, a Black surgeon from Philadelphia, told Ms. Stroud at the time.As president, Mr. Carter sought “to mend the racial divide,” said Kai Bird, another Carter biographer. Mr. Bird noted that food aid was significantly expanded under Mr. Carter, benefiting many poor Black residents in rural areas. Mr. Bird also noted that the Carter administration had toughened rules aimed at preventing racially discriminatory schools from claiming tax-exempt status.If that explains why Black voters stuck with Mr. Carter in 1980, it may have also sown the seeds of his defeat. “I think all of these decisions were too much for white America,” Mr. Bird said. “Ronald Reagan came along and appealed much more to white voters.”Mr. Fuse agrees. All these years later, he still laments the fact that Mr. Carter was denied a second term. Instead of focusing on the problems that plagued Mr. Carter’s time in office — the inflation, the energy crisis, the American hostages stuck in Tehran — Mr. Fuse spoke, instead, about that hope that Mr. Carter had engendered in 1976, and not just for Black voters.“When this white man comes along who’s grinning with a broad smile after Watergate, he lifted our spirits,” Mr. Fuse said. “He lifted everybody’s spirits.” More

Mayor Lori Lightfoot faces a wide field of challengers on Tuesday, including one front-runner who has portrayed Chicago as a city in disarray.CHICAGO — Chicagoans were heading to the polls on Tuesday morning to vote in highly contested mayoral and City Council races that have largely focused on crime, policing and the performance of Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who is seeking a second term leading the nation’s third-largest city.Ms. Lightfoot, a former federal prosecutor who ran as a change agent vowing to root out corruption and reform the Chicago Police Department, won 74 percent of the vote in the final balloting when elected four years ago, a favorite of progressives who hailed her historic victory as the city’s first Black, female mayor.But she has faced widespread dissatisfaction from voters since, and many have thrown their support to other candidates: Eight challengers have lined up against her, and unless one candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote — a highly unlikely scenario — the top two finishers on Tuesday will advance to a runoff on April 4.Among the front-runners in the race is Paul Vallas, a Democrat with more conservative views on crime and education, who has portrayed Chicago as being in a state of disarray.Taylor Glascock for The New York TimesPolls suggest that Ms. Lightfoot, whose rivals have positioned themselves to both her political left and right, is in a tight contest for one of those spots. Voters have said in surveys that issues driving the race include crime, the economy, education and immigration.Perhaps most threatening to Ms. Lightfoot’s re-election chances is the spike in homicides and shootings in 2020 and 2021, and civil unrest and looting that scarred retailers, including those on the famed Magnificent Mile. In 2021, robberies, thefts and burglaries increased from the year before, leaving many Chicagoans unsettled about the direction of the city.Monica Jain, a property manager who lives in the Gold Coast neighborhood near downtown Chicago, left a polling place on Monday and said that she had heard Ms. Lightfoot talk about how some crime rates had now decreased. But, Ms. Jain said, “I’m worried about the South and West Sides,” where gun violence is most acute.Among the front-runners in the race is Paul Vallas, a Democrat with more conservative views on crime and education, who has portrayed Chicago as being in a state of disarray. Running with an endorsement from the local Fraternal Order of Police, he has called for expanding the police force, improving arrest rates for serious crimes and expanding charter schools.Brandon Johnson, a mayoral candidate and Democratic county board commissioner, answered a question from a Kenwood Academy High School student at a mayoral forum on Saturday.Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York TimesBut in making her final pitch to voters this weekend, Ms. Lightfoot pointed to investments in long-neglected neighborhoods and made the case that the city had emerged from the coronavirus pandemic in a strong position.“If you care about making sure that we continue to right historic wrongs and invest in areas of our city that have been without for far too long, that’s on the ballot,” Ms. Lightfoot told a crowd at a union hall on Saturday.Voters appeared unsure of whether they were willing to give her another chance. Chicago mayors have wide-ranging powers, even compared with mayors in New York City and Los Angeles: They oversee the sprawling public-transit system, Police and Fire Departments, schools, parks and other agencies. And when crime spikes or potholes go unfilled, Chicagoans tend to blame their mayor.Ms. Lightfoot, 60, has faced a cascade of crises since taking office. In 2019, she clashed with the powerful teachers’ union, leading to an 11-day strike, the longest in decades. Then, in 2020, the pandemic hit, sending unemployment soaring and leaving skyscrapers in the Loop mostly empty of workers and Chicago businesses struggling to survive.The economy has since rebounded, and downtown Chicago is attracting tourists and conventions again. But Ms. Lightfoot appears to have made far more enemies than friends as mayor, struggles to find support on the City Council and has gained a reputation as a pugilistic and mercurial leader.A voter filled out her electronic ballot on Monday in the final hour of early voting at the Welles Park polling site in Chicago.Charles Rex Arbogast/Associated PressMr. Vallas, 69, has taken a lead in the polls, but has also been dogged by ideological inconsistencies. He said in a television interview in 2009 that he considered himself more of a Republican than a Democrat, a strike against Mr. Vallas in the eyes of many voters in overwhelmingly liberal Chicago. Last week, The Chicago Tribune reported that Mr. Vallas’s Twitter account had liked a series of tweets that used insulting and racist language; Mr. Vallas suggested that hackers were to blame.Ms. Lightfoot is also fighting a challenge from Brandon Johnson, a Democratic county board commissioner who has been endorsed by the Chicago Teachers Union. Mr. Johnson staked out a position to the left of Ms. Lightfoot on policing, at one point suggesting that he agreed with the movement to reduce funding to police departments, though he later backtracked.Another contender, Representative Jesús G. García, is also competing for votes from progressives: He traces his Chicago political experience back to the campaign to elect the city’s first Black mayor, Harold Washington, in 1983. Mr. García, who was born in Mexico, would be Chicago’s first Hispanic mayor. In 2015, he ran for mayor against the incumbent, Rahm Emanuel, winning enough votes to force a runoff.Polls suggest that Willie Wilson, a businessman with a base of support from working-class Black voters, is also within striking distance of the runoff.Mitch Smith More

When the pandemic took hold, Chicago was awash in affectionate memes featuring Lori Lightfoot, the city’s stern, no-nonsense new mayor. Since then, the joke has worn off.CHICAGO — Mayor Lori Lightfoot was standing guard all over Chicago — virtually, anyway.In March 2020, in the early, frightening days of the coronavirus pandemic when city officials had closed down public spaces to stop the spread of the virus, a meme began circulating on social media with Ms. Lightfoot as the star: an image of her stern, unsmiling face Photoshopped around Chicago.There was Ms. Lightfoot in front of the giant, stainless steel Bean sculpture in Millennium Park, guarding the entrance to beaches along Lake Michigan and standing in a parking garage behind Ferris Bueller as he tooled around the city in a lipstick-red Ferrari.“Lori Lightfoot don’t play,” wrote one Twitter user, with an image of Ms. Lightfoot’s glowering face superimposed over picnickers in a Seurat painting that hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago.Because she’s not a hero. She’s a silent guardian. A watchful protector. A Lightfoot. pic.twitter.com/UzxT1wyozo— lu (@SquantsIsland) March 30, 2020
At first, the real-life mayor was baffled by it. But after her City Hall aides explained that the meme was an affectionate nod to her tough persona and no-nonsense countenance, she warmed to the scolding Lightfoots that began to spring up all over the city, cardboard cutouts in the windows of apartments and shuttered stores. Chicagoans needed a laugh, and the image of the mayor — diminutive, a little surly, dressed in fedoras and trousers so long as they puddled at the ankles — had provided.But after Covid-19, a crime surge and a tough four years in office, what began as something friendly now also reflects harsher perceptions of the mayor and her time in office. Ms. Lightfoot at Wrigley Field in Chicago, in April 2020. The Chicago Cubs used Wrigley Field as a food distribution hub to help support Covid-19 relief efforts.Nam Y. Huh/Associated PressThe pandemic dominated life in Chicago during Ms. Lightfoot’s term as mayor. Lyndon French for The New York TimesThis week, Ms. Lightfoot is in a fight for survival as she runs for a second term as mayor in a city that has yet to recover from its pandemic-era struggles. The blunt, tough-talking persona that earned Ms. Lightfoot early affection and respect turned into something else: the image of a mayor with an exhausting capacity for feuds and insults, whether aimed at her own staff, city employees or fellow elected officials.She is one of at least four candidates viewed as having a good chance to make it into a runoff election and could very well lead the current nine-person field. But even some supporters now worry that she may have alienated many people she needs as allies. Those include business owners, City Council members and voters, some of whom are fed up with her tone and substance on issues like crime, policing and public education — and are turning to other mayoral candidates.Take Bruce Heyman, a former ambassador to Canada, who remembers during the pandemic when his children printed a picture of the stern Ms. Lightfoot and hung it on the refrigerator in his Chicago home — a wry warning not to eat the food inside.“She was endearing, there was no doubt about it,” he said. “She was somebody we had a lot of hope for.”Mr. Heyman, a former partner at Goldman Sachs who worked closely with the former mayors Richard M. Daley and Rahm Emanuel, voted for Ms. Lightfoot in 2019. But he grew frustrated and disappointed with the mayor in the years since. During the pandemic and riots that tore through downtown after George Floyd’s murder, Mr. Heyman watched as Chicago’s problems began to multiply.“She didn’t tackle them as an effective leader — she began a very defensive, authoritarian style,” he said. “We’ve had strong mayors in our city before. But they got stuff done, and they were able to communicate and collaborate.”Andre Vasquez, a member of the City Council who represents a ward on the North Side, said that council members called her “the great unifier,” since so many members were lined up against her.“When there is disagreement, she takes it personally in a way that isn’t helpful,” Mr. Vasquez said. “It’s always felt very personal coming from her. And she can be dismissive and condescending.”Ms. Lightfoot has responded to critiques of her style by invoking previous mayors and saying she is no different.“I personally get asked this question of, ‘Well, Mayor, you know your relationships with City Council, shouldn’t you be nicer?’ Which I have to laugh at,” Ms. Lightfoot said last year. “When I think about who my predecessors were — I worked for Rich Daley and I was around Rahm a lot — it’s not like they won contests for Mr. Congeniality.”Chicago public school employees, teachers, students and supporters rallied outside City Hall, demanding increased funding from Ms. Lightfoot’s administration to lower class sizes and hire more support staff.Scott Heins for The New York TimesMs. Lightfoot spoke a news conference in 2019 as striking public school workers accused her of failing to deliver adequate funding and support.Scott Heins for The New York TimesAnd to many voters, her message and record resonated far more than her leadership style. Giavonni Downing, who works in marketing and lives on the South Side, said she liked Ms. Lightfoot’s message on investing in neighborhoods with fewer resources and thought the mayor deserved another term. “Covid hit, so, realistically, whatever you thought you were going to do when you got in office, all that had to go on the back burner,” said Ms. Downing, 40.In the final days of her campaign, the mayor has crisscrossed the city, trying to shore up support in neighborhoods that were once full of enthusiastic Lightfoot voters.On Friday afternoon, Ms. Lightfoot and her wife, Amy Eshleman, stopped in a record store in the Andersonville neighborhood on the Far North Side, an L.G.B.T.Q.-friendly community where rainbow flags peek out of storefront windows and hang above the porches of greystone buildings.Four years ago, Andersonville was a power center of Ms. Lightfoot’s support. Now many front yards are decorated with signs bearing her opponents’ names: Brandon Johnson, a county board commissioner; Paul Vallas, a former schools executive; and Representative Jesús G. García, a congressman from Illinois.Chris Hawkins, a manager at a nearby shop on Clark Street, was in the record store browsing when Ms. Lightfoot stopped in. Mr. Hawkins, who was born and raised in Chicago, said he would vote for Ms. Lightfoot again. She took care of the city during a trying time, he said, and she had been judged harshly because she is a woman.“We’re living in a society where women are marginalized and not perceived as leaders — they’re perceived as a stereotype,” he said. “I look at crime and stuff that’s happening in the city, and I just think, it’s easy to point the finger at one person. This is a mayor who’s taken on a lot.”Mitch Smith More

After two New York Times reporters published an explosive investigation into Representative George Santos’s past, more revelations have come to light. Times Insider explains who we are and what we do and delivers behind-the-scenes insights into how our journalism comes together.After Representative George Santos, Republican of New York, was elected to office in November, Grace Ashford and Michael Gold, two New York Times reporters, were given a seemingly straightforward assignment: write a deep-dive article about the new congressman. But when the reporters tried to verify details of Mr. Santos’s campaign biography, they ended up with more questions than answers. “We started to get a sense that perhaps he might not always be telling the truth, and that gave us a different way of looking at him,” Ms. Ashford said. So, they kept digging — and what they found, Ms. Ashford said, “ended up blowing our minds.”Weeks of research and interviews revealed that Mr. Santos had embellished his résumé in alarming ways. Baruch College, the school from which Mr. Santos said he graduated in 2010, was unable to find records of his graduation; companies he claimed to have worked for had no record of his employment. He was also facing criminal charges for check fraud in Brazil, The Times found.In the weeks following the publication of the investigation, more revelations have come to light about the freshman congressman, who, amid calls to resign and multiple investigations, has stepped down from multiple House committee assignments. The Times has continued to cover the controversy; for example, an investigation this month of Mr. Santos’s campaign finances uncovered $365,000 in unexplained campaign spending. In an interview, Ms. Ashford and Mr. Gold discussed the aftermath of their reporting and how they shape follow-up coverage. This interview has been edited.Were you surprised by the kind of attention the initial article received?MICHAEL GOLD: This was a two-day assignment that turned into multiple months. I don’t think I fully understood the impact that this might have had. We spent that first week reeling from the fact that so many people were gravitating toward this story. When you’re working in isolation for as long as we were working, you had no idea what would happen. We reached out to the Santos team leading up to publication, and their posture initially was the one that you usually get from spokespeople. It gradually became more aggressive, I would say, and defensive at the same time.More on George SantosHouse Committees: Representative George Santos said that he would temporarily recuse himself from sitting on congressional committees as he faces multiple investigations over his lies.An Expunged Charge: Mr. Santos was able to get a criminal theft charge dismissed and then expunged in 2017. The circumstances of the case — centering on bad checks and puppies — hew closely to other dubious episodes in his history.Marriage to Brazilian Woman: A letter to ethics watchdogs in the House of Representatives questioned if Mr. Santos’s seven-year marriage was a scheme to aid a woman’s immigration bid.Divisions on Display: A tense run-in between Senator Mitt Romney of Utah and Mr. Santos at the State of the Union encapsulates broader tensions inside the Republican Party.To have him that next week come out and say, as he put it, I did embellish my résumé,was an interesting moment. We stood by our reporting at that point, but we realized there was possibly more to the story.GRACE ASHFORD: And then the question becomes: Now what? Now that this is not just a report in The New York Times that has been denied — this is something that’s been admitted. That also broadened the horizon of what the impact of the story might be.When did you start thinking the initial investigation would need a wider focus?ASHFORD: The decision to publish when we did was a difficult one. What we were really saying in that first story was, he’s not who he claims to be — and we don’t totally know who he is. But what we do know paints a very different portrait. That was part of the reason I think that this story garnered so much attention: It invited America to help figure out what was really going on under the surface.GOLD: There were also things that we mentioned in that first story that became a bigger deal later on, like the pet charity. Then other reporting came out by Patch, originally, that suggested that there was much more about his involvement with pets. If you look back at that first story, there are a lot of things that maybe at the time felt like minor details that have become a major part of this.How do you think about formulating coverage going forward?GOLD: Since our first story ran, a lot of people who have known Santos have come out of the woodwork. That first week we were able to publish the story from friends, former co-workers and former neighbors who had spoken to us more about him and provided new avenues.ASHFORD: We had to learn that the things that Representative Santos says about himself cannot be taken at face value. And they run the gamut from the very serious, like his claims of Jewish heritage and ties to the Holocaust, 9/11 and the Pulse shooting, to losing both of his knees to volleyball. There are a lot of things that can be distracting from the bigger thing that is actually at stake here, which is, frankly: What kind of representative can you be when you’re not able to stand in front of your constituents and have a conversation, when your own personal story is clouding the discourse? It’s been very important for Michael and I to maintain focus on those things.Did this reporting make you a little more skeptical of public figures?GOLD: I am definitely more skeptical. If I’m ever in a situation where I have to write about a candidate again, I’m not going to take their bio at face value. One of the interesting reporting challenges here is when you talk to friends or former friends, family or people who knew him back in the day, they’ll say, “George Santos told me this,” and we have to stop and say, “OK, did you believe that was true?” It’s layers of skepticism.How do you divide up reporting?ASHFORD: Sort of naturally; we have totally different things that we’re drawn to. We’ve been lucky to have a really good working dynamic. It’s always more fun to work with someone than it is to work alone. Especially on a story like this, it’s incredibly valuable to have someone to share the questions and revelations with.GOLD: There are definitely things that we are pursuing separately, but there are a lot of things that we end up pursuing together. It’s flowed really naturally. We’re very happy to help each other on certain targets, and we’re lucky in that regard. More